Dungeon Raider System-Chapter 783: The devil’s monastery Part 1

When questioned by Uriel about the other hunters present on the monastery, the receptionist lingered for a few seconds as though she had just realized something.

"The other hunters? I remember a group of hunters checking in, but haven't seen them since noon. I think they left without telling as hunters do."

"I'd like the same rooms they asked for, then." Uriel said.

"I don't think that will be possible, the cleaning staff has yet to prepare the rooms."

"Even better." freeweɓnovel-cøm

The receptionist handed them the key to a single room, which considering the prices didn't particularly surprise him. After all, while most hunting parties made thousands of credits by hunting beast rank cryptids alone, their expenses were also heavy.

They needed to consume more and better quality food, buy and maintain their gear, a place to store their weapons, but more importantly, while armors did provide some measure of defense against cryptids most hunters had to buy a new set of armor after each incursion as even weak cryptids could tear them apart with relative ease.

Uriel not only had none of those issues since he was able to carry his weapons inside his trait and he could also buy the gear he needed on the spot, but the underarmor made by Medusa was realized with thin orichalcum thread which made it indestructible. The need for it to be elastic also meant that it could only partially reduce the damage they took, but that was more than sufficient as they were also pretty sturdy. Particularly Luna who despite being an ascended, enjoyed the perks of being a werewolf.

"Geez, those guys were messy. Why didn't you at least let them clean this shit hole first?" Nika said upon entering the room and noticing the mess it was in. The beds weren't made, there were clothes on the floor and a few bags of gear with their contents spilled out on the corner.

"I don't think they made this mess, this place was trashed on purpose. Someone broke in and looked for something." Uriel replied.

"What could they possibly be looking for?"

"We won't know, it's likely they found it and took it with them." Luna replied.

"It's fairly obvious, the thing is, how did they know the room was empty." Uriel pondered out loud.

"It wasn't," Luna pointed at the bathroom where a masked hunter lied on the cold bathroom tiles covered in his own blood. "he's been dead for at least a few hours." She informed after checking the body up.

"Guess we are now on the missing person case and the Defenders are the victims." Uriel said, his face becoming a stone cold mask after confirming the identity of the man who just died. It was one of the men he met on the slums shortly after breaking up with Medusa, someone who had shown generosity to him in his time of need.

"No way, I say we just pack up and get out of here." Nika said.

"We can't, the doors are mysteriously locked at night and not even Uriel was able to tear them apart. This likely means there's a cryptid involved, what if it is a horror level cryptid and by exiting the place we're breaking their rule." Luna said.

"Why should we care about what a cryptid sets as a rule? That doesn't mean we must obey it, right?" Nika rebuked.

"Of course, we could break their rule, but we don't know what cryptid is affecting this place hence we also don't know what ability we could trigger. Besides, most horror level cryptids I have encountered possess an ability that may as well be considered sudden death. I couldn't see it with my own eyes, but the horror level skinwalker killed a hunter in an instant and not to mention the dullahan. If you broke the code of chivalry after praying, then it would be able to attach itself to you and control your actions." Uriel explained.

"Then how do we go about this?" Nika asked, fearing the answer would be to send her to investigate since she was able to use shadowblink to move unhindered by doors.

"You'll have to enter my shadow and I'll have dinner with Luna." Uriel said.

"Sure, go on a date while I'm stuck with your mummies." Nika scoffed.

"Buying me dinner is the least he can do after I gave him a ride at the expense of my flux." Luna commented.

"Really? What about all the times I've allowed you to hitch a ride on my Jaguar, shouldn't you be buying me dinner too?"

"Uhm... I have not considered that." Luna fell pensive and silent. As usual, her inner world remained a mystery to Uriel and he moved things on to discuss his plan. After which both Luna and Nika were impressed, especially when he so casually picked up the mask that belonged to the deceased hunter and put it on.

Uriel was the first one to walk out of the room, but only after dressing himself with some of the clothes left behind by the hunter party who now he knew were none other but the Defenders, and he went to the restaurant where Luna joined a few minutes later.

Behind the mask, Uriel scanned his surroundings the entire time in hopes of spotting anyone who acted surprised to see him as that would likely point towards the culprit of not only the murder and possible theft, but also might know where the rest of the Defenders were.

On the other hand, Luna seemed quite focused on her food, but that was only on the outside as she was also focused on Uriel's plate which he had no intentions of touching since that would mean taking off the mask he was now wearing.

"Don't you dare." Said Uriel when Luna sneakily attempted to grab something from his plate.

"But you're not going to eat it." She made her best impression of a pout.

"It's still mine." He grunted and kept on focusing on his task.

The place was crowded with people, but most of them weren't hunters which took Uriel aback. First, because traveling to other cities was supposed to be a dangerous endeavor only the bravest hunters would perform and second, because the fees were prohibitively high. Both facts pointed Uriel to the conclusion that the people in the monastery were all wealthy and that they probably traveled in caravans.

Knowing this, it didn't take him long to spot a possible caravan leader, a man with just one eye, gray hairs sprinkled on his beard and a single white streak on the side of his thick hair combed back. He looked like a well seasoned warrior, but had the cheerful bearing of a merchant.

"Suspect one, the caravan leader sets up some of his clients to steal their goods." Uriel said.

"Unlikely, because targeting hunters is never a good idea unless you know exactly what they're capable of and the Defenders were always careful with their traits and even wear masks so you can't identify them unless you get to know them in person. Second, because they did get some wealth by hunting cryptids for the agency, but that couldn't possibly have been enough to go through all the trouble of killing a hunter knowing his friends will want revenge." Luna explained then grabbed another piece of bread.

"You're pretty good at this." Uriel said.

"I know." She replied dryly with a face full of crumbs.

"Second suspect, the hotel staff. They might entrap tourists taking advantage of the supernatural ability of this place to become sealed at night..."

"Not likely either, if anybody escapes after their failed attempt they would likely inform of the situation in a city and they would send people to investigate." Luna answered.

"Isn't that sort of what happened?" Uriel asked.

"Not really, they're looking into a missing person case which means they don't know if it was cryptids or other hunters."

"Alright, then..." Uriel fumbled a few words while scanning the place then noticed a strange man with long hair, piercing blue eyes and a stubble who smoked his pipe while looking intently at him as the smoldering tobacco briefly illuminated his eyes.

"Not him either, he looks too suspicious to actually be a bad guy." Luna shook her head. It was one thing to say that appearances were deceiving, but to outright rule out someone just because they looked too suspicious seemed like a contradiction to Uriel. Then, he had to agree that had to be the case since a criminal would attempt to at least not look like one.

"That kind of makes sense, no one would trust him... It needs to be someone who seems harmless, someone who you can bump into and quickly forget... someone like."

"The guy with the hawaiian shirt." Luna said at the same time the man in question entered the restaurant, saw Uriel and became pale as a ghost.

"It's your turn, Nika. Take him to our room." Uriel grinned behind the mask.

"I will... uhm, be right there." Luna stuffed her mouth in a rush with any leftovers as Uriel walked out the restaurant bearing the calm fury of the ocean against the man who either was responsible for what happened or knew about it and kept it a secret.

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