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Chapter 405  Bastard\'s Angle

I turned away from the stall and continued walking, not wanting to buy anything from her. Gloria fell into step beside me, and we were silent for a few moments before she finally spoke up.

"You didn\'t have to be so rude," she said, and I shrugged.

"I didn\'t like the way she was looking at me," I said, and Gloria chuckled.

"She was just trying to make a sale," she said, but I shook my head.

"No, it was more than that. She was looking at me like I was a piece of meat," I said, and Gloria\'s amusement faded as she looked at me in understanding.

"I see what you mean now. Yes, some of the people here can be quite... forward with strangers," she said uncomfortably, and I nodded in agreement.

"Have you ever had someone look at you and feel that stare of theirs bore into your soul, wanting to take even that?" I asked, and Gloria shuddered.

"Yes, actually. It\'s quite an unpleasant experience," she said, and I nodded in agreement.

We made our way out of the market square and back onto the main path that led through the town. We passed by several people, but no one stopped us or tried to speak to us. Everyone we passed just gave us a wide berth as if they were afraid of us. It was starting to get on my nerves.

Finally, we came to a stop in front of a large building that stood out among the others with its grandiose design. "This is the town hall," Gloria explained as she started to walk inside, and I followed her.

The inside of the building was just as grand as the outside, with a large marble staircase that led up to the second floor, where several offices were located. We made our way up the stairs, and Gloria led me down a long hallway before stopping in front of one of the doors near the end.

She knocked before opening it and stepping inside, and I followed her into what appeared to be some kind of meeting room with a long table in the center surrounded by chairs on all sides.

"So you were able to bring him! So good of you, Gloria!" One of three wizened old men said that was sitting at the table.

"I guess I should have asked why you were leading me here, but who are these men?" I asked, and Gloria nodded.

"Sorry, I needed to keep this quiet; there are ears everywhere. These three men are the people that ran Fishbar before King James took over," Gloria explained.

"Took over? What do you mean?" I asked, and one of the old men, who was sitting at the head of the table, spoke up.

"What she means to say is that we were forced out of our positions by that power-hungry man," he said, and I frowned.

"Why would he do that?" I asked, and the man shrugged.

"For many reasons. He\'s paranoid and doesn\'t trust anyone, so he got rid of anyone who could potentially challenge his authority," he explained, and I frowned.

"That sounds like a dictatorship more than anything," I said, and the man nodded in agreement before continuing.

"He\'s also greedy and wants everything for himself. He\'s been draining this town dry ever since he took over," he said, and my frown deepened.

"What do you mean by \'draining the town dry\'?" I asked curiously, but before the man could answer, Gloria spoke up.

"He\'s been taxing the people heavily to fund his own personal projects as well as taking a large portion of all businesses\' profits for himself," she explained heatedly, and I raised an eyebrow in surprise.

"How have the people been taking it?" I asked, but both Gloria and the old man just shook their heads sadly. It seemed like not good from their reactions, and the greed I had seen made more sense now.

"The people here are scared to death of him," The old man said after a long moment of silence. "They\'re too afraid to stand up against him or even talk badly about behind his back."

That didn\'t sound good at all if they were too scared to even talk bad about him behind his back. It made me wonder just how bad things really were around here if they were that scared.

"Does this have anything to do with the demons that are in that crystal cavern?" I asked, and everyone looked up at me in shock.

"How do you know about that?" Gloria asked in a hushed voice, and I shrugged.

"Not important," I said, and the old man shook his head.

"It\'s not safe to go down there. King James has been using them to power the town, but no one knows where he\'s getting them from," he explained, and I frowned. Of course, he wasn\'t going to tell people where he was getting them from if they were already scared of him.

"Do you have any idea where he could be getting them from?" I asked curiously, but all three of them just shook their heads in confusion.

"No, we\'ve been trying to figure that out for years now with no luck," Gloria said with a sigh, and I frowned as I crossed my arms over my chest in thought.

"What about this Spear? Do you know anything about it?" I asked after a long moment of silence between us all as we were each lost in our own thoughts. Everyone looked up at me again in surprise before anyone answered my question, though.

"What do you know about the Hurricane Spear?" The old man at the head of the table finally asked after a long moment had passed between us all once more as we each got lost back into our own thoughts, trying to figure out what we each knew that might help solve this mystery somehow.

"Only that it was stolen not too long ago," I answered honestly, hoping they would be able to fill in some blanks for me since Lillia and Mati hadn\'t really known much either when we had tried asking around town yesterday for information on it.

Everyone was quiet again for several moments before anyone spoke up though once more; each person, deep in their own thoughts, still seemingly; lost on how to answer my question or which questions they should ask next even.

The old man at the head of the table finally spoke up again, finally thought breaking through.

"We really don\'t know anything about it either. Honestly, I have never heard of the thing, didn\'t even know we had it," one of the men said, and the other two nodded.

I slapped my hand to my face. I was being played, but what was this bastard\'s angle keeping me here?