The Wanderer

CHAPTER 7-THE KIDNAPPING (PART 1)

Anyone who dares to speak something bad about those Taoist priests will get direct punishment from the king. A light sentence will put one in jail for several years, and severe punishment will cause a death sentence. Slowly, slowly, most people became more attached to the temple and those Taoist priests. Until one day, something happened in the capital city, and the citizens’ children started going missing. Some witnesses recently saw black-robed, masked men appear in the city at midnight, but no one saw what they were doing. Those black-robed masked men were quite clever as they only took 1 or 2 children away at a time, so they wouldn't alert the citizens or the officers. Their crime method was also smart. Once they had targeted the citizens' children, they would come at midnight in silence, then drug the people in the house by blowing the anesthetic powder through the windows, to make them sleep unconscious. The next morning, the citizens' children were missing. From time to time, the number of missing children increases, and the case becomes intense, so the magistrate sends the constable division to investigate and solve it. The rumors said that the children who have been kidnapped have been using it to create the longevity pill. Surely, the rumors had reached the king’s ear, and, as people expected, the king didn't believe that, and he even said that he had already confirmed the rumor with his advisor, and his advisor denied it. The king just believed in him. However, it was true. They extracted the blood from a virgin young boy and girl to mix it into the pill, as it was part of the essence of the pill. Now the constables' side was in a state of confusion, since they had no clue where to start investigating. Even though they have heard that the rumor about the missing children had somehow been connected to the Taoist priests, they can still investigate directly at the Taoist temple, as they have no proof, or, even worse, they will get punished by the king. For now, the constables can't touch the Taoist priests, so they can only investigate through the black-robed, masked men. This is their only clue. Then Haruto had an idea: set them up by ambushing them. The plan was quite simple: later, one of the constables would disguise himself as a citizen father, a single parent, and, for the child, they would hire a beggar kid to disguise himself as one. They also rent 2 adjacent houses side by side at the city's corner, by demolishing the boundary wall separating them, so they can access each other. One for pretending to be the family house, and the other for some constables to stay hidden there to gather information and also serve as the first ambush team, or the “intel-team”. The intel team is changing shifts (2 people per team, with day and night shifts rotating). Then the constable decided to ambush those black-robbed, masked men, with several teams surrounding them. The first few nights, nothing happened, which meant they failed. Later, they found out that the missing children were actually studying at the temple. Could it be those black-robed masked men who targeted those children? It's for them to find out. That's why suspicion grew against the Taoist priests, as they believed the black-robed, masked men must be somehow connected to them. However, how do you outfit those black-robed, masked men? They decided to let the fake father send his fake child to that Taoist temple for study. And the constables were quite right. Every child who studies there needs to record their name, their parents' names, their occupation, and even their house address. The Taoist priests said it was just for formality, and, in case something happened, they knew who the kids' parents were and where they lived. The constables' side is getting more confident about their education, as this must be the way those black-robed masked men kidnapped those children. At least they got a clue now. 3 nights in a row, still nothing happened. Even the constables’ team rotated their shifts day and night, but they grew tired and bored as there was no progress on the case. Not only that, the night before, the children went missing again. Eventually, the fake kid that they prepared at the rented house is still not yet touched by those masked men, but in fact, the masked men were kidnapped in another place. As for the mistake of neglecting, which they focused on one place, then the crime took place at another location. The magistrate officer punished them by cutting their salary in half for 2 months straight, unless they solved the crime right away. The constables knew they couldn't wait forever for the fish to take the bait. Just like this, they had to get the list of name records from the Taoist priests, so they could at least predict the next target family.