A bustling city! Cars left and right are being driven, even in the evening, which it is now. Jobs can be carried out at night as well, which makes people able to make money then too.
A government notice was issued to Harlequin city's local administration that since dark monster frequency is higher, people are not to leave the city. This notice was posted on the city board and gates for a few months now.
A convenient time for that man to be hiding in plain sight. Perhaps he wasn't aware of the fact that Patrol leave the city gates during these times to clear monsters. I gave a little white lie to him. I told him that I was patrolling for monsters, but what I didn't tell him is that I was patrolling because of the high frequency of monsters. What an odd question he asked earlier.
"Do cities run by local governments run as a Feudal System?"
"What do you mean?" I, Clyde, ask.
"Is the system run by a family of people, or is it run by elected representatives with centralization of authority in the upper echelons?"
It seems he isn't aware of how the political system functions. He was both technically wrong and correct with both questions, but I ignored it to hear if he would disclose why he feels that way. I don't believe Time Travel really exists. I've concluded that somebody must of had some kind of powerful Fabrication to maliciously meddle with his memories. I must bring this up in the meeting.
"Is the Fabrications completely random based on the person?"
"Do people get their Fabrication when they are born or is it random later on in life?"
"Are people born near the Monolith to appraise their abilities once they are born?"
"How do you know the Monolith is telling the truth?"
The questions went on and on. How does he know that fabrications are given later in life? Is he asking these questions in jest because he already knows, or is he trying to draw his own conclusion based on his weird perception on how the world should work?
How do we know if the Monolith is telling the truth...? The Monolith is able to tell the name of an ability and also assign a class to it, but it does not tell what the ability does. What does "appraise" or "bestow" mean? He seems to have been raised in mountains or something.
Mountains... Death Plateau. I came to that conclusion too. It's possible that the man is associated with dark monsters. When he asked to leave the car and train before hassling me, I was instantly relieved and feigned being in a bad mood so I wouldn't upset him while I don't know the answers.
An alleged monster associate who is capable of human speech. What kind of scary skills and jobs does he have?
_♦__________________________________________________♦_
At the usual meeting location, other Patrol agents and officers were present in the boardroom. The CEO of the board, Philip, opened the meeting with an announcement.
"This meeting is to discuss the strange anomaly happening in Death Plateau. I have a few bits of information to share with the lot of you to beware of, as well as a strange incident report involving Clyde. Please sit."
It took people a while to sit down. People of all ages after 20 were present in the meeting. From left to right, there are three large wooden ovular round tables in the room with a projector on the middle table pointing to a projector screen extended in front of the three tables.
There exist some classy higher ups in this meeting who were not here last time including multiple investigative department officials as well as... environmental protection agents? What's this about?
"Let me begin by stating that the crisis level of the city has climbed to B. Last month it was raised to C because of the dark power emanating from the Plateau range resulting in rumors and it being dubbed the "Death Plateau". The plateau's shrubbery and tree line have all been since exterminated by the dark swirling, but the swirling particles appear not to be approaching the city. As you all know, crisis levels are not assigned directly to the state of panic people are in, but an internal assignment based on unknown variables surrounding the city as well as recently occured natural disasters' destructive powers and consumption of human lives. Before we initially assigned a crisis level, there was a mysterious spiky-haired statue that was rumored to be a bad omen to the future to come. If the statue represented some deceased man due to the increase in dark monsters, I'd say the crisis level being B is too low. The investigative board official, Kalin is here with me today. Kalin?"
"Hello everyone, I am Kalin from the forensics and investigations department of the Topple bureau government. Currently the situation is like this."
Kalin went on to describe many things. Clyde was stunned.
Mysterious statue? Did they not think to bring it back to the city for investigation? That could be the man we talked to earlier! If he was a victim of a dark monster's memory manipulation, that would bring light to this city as well as simultaneously potentially reducing the crisis level because of results from the investigation. There's probably more going on than Mr. Philip describes. Enough speculation, time to listen.
"The city is currently experiencing its first string of strange phenomena since its inception over 20 thousand years ago. All of the phenomena have stopped abruptly a few months ago, but the dark demons don't seem to care about that."
I already know this, that's why I've been patrolling the outskirts of the city!
"However, when we sent investigators to inspect the condition of the statue today, not only did the grey statue vanish into thin air, the Barrier surrounding it also vanished at the same time. There is no other proof of residual Fabrication usage, which is wholly unprecedented. Normally the Monolith can identify such things, when we bring the prodding tools."
"Since the statue is gone, we have not disclosed this to the city as a public announcement, as it may spread panic to those who started the rumors."
"Can I ask a question?" a lower official asked.
"Ask away."
"If all of what you say is true, isn't it irresponsible to not know where it went?"
"Good question. Fortunately, that is also part of my information. We have observed a strange man last night outside of the city's wall, and saw him cast strange black lightning at a tree. The tree instantly changed into a bag with a tiny string closing it. That isn't the weirdest part though. Apparently, according to my agent, the man's appearance resembles exactly to that of the photo we took of the statue. I've sent a secret investigator to observe his behaviour for the time being. I chose this investigator because they are related to an incident that occurred earlier during regular patrols of the city walls."
"Incident? Could it be, the Patrol let the man go? How irresponsible!"
"The lives of my investigators take first priority. A team of Adventurer Investigators, the party of Tornado have extensively interviewed the man while driving him near the city walls. They were brave to ask questions about the man. Whether or not they knew the man was related to the picture we took of the statue is irrelevant. What's important is we have this preliminary information."
Many copies of the information were distributed to all of the attendees, who all subsequently gasped in surprise once reading the information. Said information is a combination of speculation as well as a report document of the interview.
