EeDechi, Barrett, and Franco left Levi's Antique Shop and headed back to their inn.
EeDechi was troubled. According to Archmage Raffaelli, Longfellow Campbell was an elite mage, yet even he had been unable to recreate the technology behind skyships.
He was already the person closest to understanding ancient skyship technology. If even he couldn't do it, was there really anyone else in the City Alliance who could?
The three returned to the Silver Moon Inn. Behind the counter in the first-floor lobby sat a beautiful young woman.
She had long, pale pink hair pinned into a high bun, rosy lips, a radiant smile, and a slender figure.
Franco's eyes immediately locked onto her. As a veteran ladies' man, however, he knew better than to stand there gawking like a drooling pervert. Instead, he approached the counter like any other guest and smoothly struck up a conversation.
With his handsome face, silver tongue, and finely honed social skills, it wasn't long before their conversation grew lively and flirtatious.
Barrett's eyelid twitched. He dragged Franco aside and lowered his voice.
"Don't be so hard up that you'll hit on just anyone. Did you notice the ruby ring on her left ring finger?"
"I did. So? It just looks like an ordinary ring to me." Franco looked puzzled.
"In the City Alliance, wearing a ring on your left ring finger means you're married. She's married, Franco!"
"Heh heh. That only makes it more exciting, doesn't it?" Franco chuckled under his breath. "Besides, if she really wanted to turn me down, she would've told me she had a husband. But she didn't, which means she's interested too!"
Barrett sighed helplessly. "Don't do anything stupid. We don't know this place, so be careful. And if the captain finds out you're fooling around with a married woman, she'll beat you to death."
"Come on, old man. Keep it a secret for me," Franco pleaded quietly. "Relax. Nothing's going to go wrong!"
Night soon fell.
And late that night, something went wrong.
The Silver Moon Inn erupted into chaos. Every lamp in the place was lit, and Franco leaped out a window with nothing but a blanket wrapped around him.
A woman's shrieks and a man's furious curses came together in a symphony of chaos.
EeDechi woke in a daze, rubbing her eyes and yawning as Barrett dragged her out of the inn. Kilua jumped out a window with Cheeko in her arms, and the three of them and the cat met up with Franco, who was naked beneath the blanket still wrapped around him.
Only then did EeDechi learn what had happened.
The innkeeper had come home late that night, opened the bedroom door, and found his wife in bed with Franco.
The beautiful young woman Franco had flirted with was the innkeeper's wife.
Enraged, the innkeeper had chased Franco out with a knife. When he failed to catch him, he turned his anger on Franco's companions and threw them out as well.
After Barrett finished explaining the whole story, EeDechi's hand shot out and seized Franco by the ear, twisting it mercilessly.
"You came between a husband and wife! You dragged our party's good name through the mud! Unforgivable! Do you dare pull something like this again?!"
"I wouldn't dare! I wouldn't dare!" Franco grimaced in pain.
"Go apologize. Now!" EeDechi ordered sternly.
"I can't, Captain! The innkeeper will chop me to pieces!" Tears sprang to Franco's eyes as she twisted harder.
"Don't worry. I'll be there to collect your corpse," EeDechi promised solemnly.
"Captain, please have mercy! I swear I'll never do it again! Let me go! I'm guilty, all right? I'll make it up to them…"
Despite Franco's desperate pleading, EeDechi marched him back to the Silver Moon Inn.
When they arrived, however, they learned that the innkeeper's wife had been too ashamed to stay. She had hired a carriage in the middle of the night and fled to her parents' home on the other side of the city. The innkeeper had taken another carriage and gone after her.
Franco narrowly escaped disaster.
EeDechi spent the next half hour lecturing him, then issued him a verbal warning and a major demerit.
"One of these days, you're going to get yourself into real trouble!" EeDechi said, furious and frustrated that he never seemed to learn.
The next morning, Archmage Raffaelli sent a luxurious private carriage to take the adventuring party known as the Last Defender of the Way to a gathering of the local elite.
The City Alliance was crisscrossed by an extensive network of waterways. After the four of them and their cat left the carriage, they boarded an elegant boat painted yellow and sailed toward the far side of the city.
Their boatman, dressed in a silk shirt, eventually brought them to a private club. The place was lavishly decorated and stood right by the sea, with a clear view of the beautiful coastline.
Elegantly dressed maids bustled back and forth. Wealthy merchants, mages, and officials filled the hall, all dressed in expensive clothes and dripping with jewelry. By comparison, EeDechi and the other adventurers looked somewhat out of place.
There was little about the gathering itself worth mentioning.
Guileless by nature, EeDechi found the endless formalities and complicated rules of etiquette deeply uncomfortable.
Barrett could just barely manage. Franco, on the other hand, was completely in his element among the society ladies, exchanging flirtatious looks with several young noblewomen.
Kilua, the adorable blonde girl, stood there holding the equally adorable Cheeko and was soon surrounded by a crowd of creepy middle-aged men. Several potbellied tycoons even approached Barrett and offered to buy both Kilua and the cat in her arms.
In this money-obsessed commercial city-state, it seemed anything could be bought—including love, life, and youth.
Although EeDechi and the others were plainly dressed, Archmage Raffaelli had personally vouched for them, so few people dared to look down on them.
The gathering was essentially one long business exchange. Barrett only had to take out a few antiques they had picked up in the desert of the Eight Greed Kings to make the wealthy guests howl with delight.
One rich merchant in particular was exceptionally enthusiastic and quickly struck up a lively conversation with Barrett.
His name was Dempsey Everly, the heir to a wealthy family. Restless in his youth and disgusted by the scheming of the business world, he had gone to sea and become both an explorer and an adventurer.
He poured the entire family fortune into his maritime expeditions. When the money ran out, the family fell into decline, and his father, bitterly disappointed in him, became ill and died.
Then, during one distant voyage, Dempsey salvaged treasure from a sunken ship. His fortunes reversed overnight, restoring him to the ranks of the wealthy.
Now middle-aged, Dempsey had finally put his adventurous days behind him, settling down to manage his businesses in the City Alliance.
"If my old man hadn't been so stubborn—if he hadn't insisted I marry the woman he'd chosen for me—I probably wouldn't have spent all those years at sea refusing to come home."
Dempsey smiled as he sipped his wine. The bitterness and upheaval of those years had long since settled, leaving only that weighty remark over a glass of wine.
Because of his own past as an adventurer, he took an immediate liking to Barrett and the others. He invited them to visit his home and seemed especially eager for the handsome Franco to come along.
He said he wanted his son to see what a real wandering mage looked like.
Barrett, however, found something odd about his behavior. Dempsey Everly was warm, attentive, and almost overly courteous, yet he seemed to be deliberately ignoring EeDechi.
Barrett repeatedly emphasized EeDechi's status and strength. Any normal person would have been curious about someone so remarkable, but Dempsey acted as if he hadn't heard a word.
"Where are you folks staying?" Dempsey asked.
"Uh… the Silver Moon Inn."
"What? That third-rate dump? A group like yours deserves better!" Dempsey waved a hand in disgust. "I know several high-class inns with hot springs and cellars full of aged wine. They're far better than that shabby place!"
"Actually… we weren't very comfortable there either. We moved out this morning," Barrett replied.
Naturally, he wasn't about to admit they had been thrown out because Franco slept with the innkeeper's wife.
"Then stay at my house!" Dempsey's eyes lit up. "It's very spacious. I have seven or eight empty rooms, and the beds are large and comfortable!"
It was difficult to refuse such a warm invitation. Archmage Raffaelli had also vouched for Dempsey's character, saying he was a merchant everyone trusted and a man who kept his private life above reproach. He had a loving relationship with his wife and enjoyed a happy family.
Compared to the playboys who kept mistresses and slept with their maids, Dempsey had never even been involved in a scandal.
Barrett discussed the invitation with EeDechi. Franco had no objections either, so the three agreed.
Getting closer to the inner circles of wealth and power might help them uncover clues about skyship technology.