Murphy's meeting with the Steam Lords went far more smoothly than he had expected.
When the elderly halfling lords heard that gnolls from the Creator's Guardians faction would come to help, they immediately expressed their gratitude and promptly issued the necessary permits.
Such quick decisions were hardly in keeping with the Steam Lords' usual cautious, almost pedantic way of doing things. It showed just how bad things had gotten in Chardo Port—bad enough that even these stubborn halflings could no longer afford to think things over.
All they wanted now was reinforcements!
The more the better. Who those reinforcements were didn't matter.
As the old saying went, if they could defend Chardo Port, the Steam Lords would give them as many troops as they wanted!
This sort of "reasonableness" born of desperation spared Murphy a lot of arguing. After bidding Captain Paula farewell and urging her to return to Transia as soon as possible to prepare the second wave of reinforcements, he rushed to the position where the Venerable Lord Paine was stationed.
Knight Palano personally led him to visit the Venerable Lord. The beauty-loving knight tried to wheedle the inside story out of him by asking all sorts of questions along the way, but he was clearly no good at this kind of conversation. Murphy fobbed him off with one excuse after another.
It wasn't that Murphy didn't want to tell Palano. He had absolute faith in the Rose Knight's ability to keep a secret. The problem was that this matter was far too big. Even a Golden-ranked fighter like Palano would be no more than a pebble tossed into the sea.
In the blood-soaked little house, Murphy met the Venerable Lord and the bloodstained holy spear beside him.
Murphy twitched his nose. A vampire's keen sense of smell