rajdakin

For the 16 readers that read the 500 words, you should be able to skip the first half, not much changed.

They returned to the guild master’s room, only to be refused the entrance as he was currently absent, being with the King to give him Craig.

“Well, let’s go back to your home for now. I’ll heal your brother at the same time.” (Finn)

““““Okay.”””” (the other four)

After releasing the cure in Brian, Finn made sure it spread enough then they went to sleep as the day was coming to an end.

The next day, they returned to see the guild master still didn’t come back, so they decided to move around and propagate the cure to their respective families.
It was decided to first go to Finn’s family, since the disease was his reason to become an adventurer¹cf. chapter 2, Finn went into that door to save his family.

On the way there, they took a request to clear out the path toward Yvon, the city where Finn’s family lives.

Once they arrived, they all sighed in unison at the sight of the queue formed in front of the gate, as always at end of days (the travel took them almost the whole day).

As with Thesis, this city contains two sections, the nobles sector and the commoners sector, surrounding the first one.
This city is actually a bit bigger than Thesis though, with a lot more nobles living there (around 1,000 out of the 60,000 people living there).

The region was quite a bit safer, with an average mana density lower than near Thesis but still high enough to bring enough benefits to peasants to make the land profitable.

There were less churches in Yvon than in Thesis though, and that was simply due to the fact that not a lot of them were needed to heal everyone. There was no need to add more churches since the Gods’ influence is ‘materialized’ by their systems, which made them ‘above everyone else’.

After going through the commoners’ door, the four of them were lead by Finn in direction of his house, after taking a quick detour to the local RCF counter to tell them the success of their mission (which is a lack of any monster on the road).

And once the arrived at Finn’s house, they got to enjoy watching the emotional family’s reunion.²I learned my lesson, I’m not going to try to make another emotional scene x)

“So, uhm, how’s mom doing?”

“She, well... She didn’t get better, but it didn’t got worse.”

“Oh, that’s fine. If it didn’t get worse, then...” Finn started saying, relieved.
“...Why are you looking away?”

“Uhm... It’s like... uhm... Did you tell me who those four were? Didn’t you said you were in a party of three?” Finn’s dad said, still not looking at his son in the eyes.

“Dad? What’s happening with mom?”

“I– urgh... She...she was kidnapped, and I have no idea where she is right now.”

“““““WHAT‽”””””
“When‽ How‽ Where‽” (Finn)

“Just yesterday, I left her alone in here, and when I came back she had disappeared. I noticed traces of someone breaking in, but...”

“So... What do we do now‽” (Daler)

“I don’t know! I already tried to ask the neighborhood, but they said they don’t remember anything... Well first what we should do is to go in but then...”

After Finn presented Laura to his dad, they started a heated debate on what to do next, but since no one had any idea about how to move forward, they ate their dinner then went to sleep.

And near midnight, they were disturbed by the noise something or someone made. When they opened their eyes, they saw a seemingly normal Noble elf, calmly waiting for them to wake up.

“Hey³you, you are finally awake.⁴You were trying to cross the border, right? Took you long enough to wake up.” (???)

“““““...”””””

“Oh, right, absolute obedience towards nobles... Oh well. Follow me to the living room please then. ...? Finn do you have a question?” She started to go back down, but noticed a slight questioning look on Finn’s face.

“... No, I can’t ask you...”

“Hmm? Well I guess I will answer you down there anyway. Though please hurry up a bit.”

And with that, she left them to wake up.
After a bit of time for dressing up, the group joined her downstairs, where she was waiting for them.

She invited them to sit down on the chairs in front of her, then started by saying,

“So, before you ask, I am from the dungeon. [It] told us to start investigating the disappearance of Finn’s mother, and as it turned out it was another noble that decided to kidnap her. He did it in broad daylight, but being a noble he just had to say one sentence to get away with it.”

“... So, have you found out who did it?”

“... No, not yet. But I am working on it. Though since everyone’s memory was wiped out, I do not have a lot to work with. Only those under my direct command remember anything since I ordered them not to obey anyone but me. ...kind of. Still, that reduces the amount of suspects by quite a lot. Do any of you have an idea?”

“... Have you tried analyzing the possible motives?” (Tris)

“What do you mean?”

“Why would a Noble kidnap someone, when he could simply ask for her?” (Tris)
“... It means it was made in secrecy.” (Finn)
“But then, why? I can only see on possible idea, that he was asked from Craig to do it. Maybe so that he could have access to the antidote.” (Tris)

“Oh yeah, good idea! Then I will try investigating that next. I knew coming to ask you was a good idea.”

“But that would mean he knew about the disease!” Laura suddenly shouted.

“Hey, beware of the others who are asleep right now. Though yes, that is correct. That lowers the count even further. Hmm, I think I can reduce the amount of suspects to 2 by tomorrow then. I hope.” The unknown noble muttered that last sentence. “Well then, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

rajdakin

1030 words!

And I’ll see you not tomorrow. x) (Also I feel tired right now, so I can’t write the next chapter... I also need to find what events will happen next, sooo...
Hopefully I’ll find enough ideas tomorrow and the day after to write another 1k words for Thursday! Also I’m writing this story late at night, and I have a bit more homework now though I did procrastinate those too.)