Renato's repeated tests of his new weapon were abruptly cut short.
According to the receptionist's halting account, Selina had suddenly jumped down from upstairs for some unknown reason and run off after a strange woman who had just entered the inn.
The receptionist before him had clearly been badly frightened. Her voice trembled as she spoke, stumbling over every sentence, but she managed to piece together a rough account of what had happened.
Still, hearsay was no substitute for seeing for himself. Once the Black-Armored Swordsman had the gist of it, he strode into the front hall of the High Tide and scanned his surroundings.
The hall was a mess. Several chairs lay overturned on the floor, and the mercenaries who had been sitting in the corner were nowhere to be seen.
The impact had loosened the inn's door hinges slightly. Its two heavy wooden doors now hung crookedly half-open. The edge of one bore obvious marks of a collision, with wood chips scattered across the floor.
Near the threshold, two feet short of the stone-paved street, a jumble of footprints overlapped on the ground.
Renato narrowed his eyes. Drawing on the powers of observation honed through years of combat, he quickly picked out clues from the chaos.
It appeared that someone in the front hall had panicked, slammed straight through the inn's doors, and stumbled outside. Seeing this, the remaining mercenaries had hurried to their feet and given chase...
The receptionist following the swordsman finally seemed to have calmed down. Still nervous and apologetic, she kept explaining what had happened:
"Just now, a woman I'd never seen before walked in. She was dressed reasonably well and didn't look poor, but she was... acting strange, staring blankly. She also said she wanted me to give something to someone."
"I asked