There was a small plaza in front of the castle. When Lucas and Carter got outside, about 2,000 people had gathered and were staring at the two of them. Lucas saw that all the people were wearing unhappy expressions on their faces.
Lucas saw disgust and indifference in the residents’ eyes. He silently glanced at Carter thinking 'Looks like the residents don’t like Carter. I am right again. But now what is done is done.'
Carter was still smiling. He ignored the eyes of the citizens and said, “Lord Baron, most of the citizens of Sedona City are here.”
“Carter, you can declare it.” Lucas said while nodding. He had started to think about the city. 'It seems that this city has a lot of problems. I guess that’s to be expected of a city worth 5 glasses.'
“Cough cough…” Carter cleared his throat and said, “Dear fellow residents, I, Baron Carter, hand over the status of a baron to Baron Lucas. Starting today, he is your city lord. So take care of him and he will take care of you. Now please let me take my leave. Baron Lucas will say a few words to you.” After he finished speaking, Carter took a step back and the smile on his face kept getting wider.
After being silent for three seconds the residents all started talking at once. Some of the things that the residents said made Lucas’s mouth twitch.
“Look, another poor guy has been fooled by Carter again. He had been scammed of his money by that old devil bastard.”
“Sigh! We are the ones who are suffering. Hopefully, this baron won’t increase taxes as well. Otherwise, our family will also need to move.”
“Damn it, the city lord keeps changing, and none of them knows how to manage a city. They are all just fools who only think that to run a city all you need to do is increase taxes.”
These words went into Lucas’s ears without any concealment and he looked at Carter with questioning eyes.
“Cough cough…” Carter coughed and said, “Baron Lucas, commoners are all like this. They will complain with their mouths but they won’t dare to actually be disrespectful. They all are good people so don't worry about them.”
Without waiting for Lucas to say anything, Carter smiled and said, "Baron Lucas, I left a gift in the castle’s dungeon. Remember to get it later. Okay then, this old man will take his leave first. Baron Lucas take care.” Carter then turned and left before Lucas could react. Carter quickly gathered his people and things. He put the things in a carriage. Then he got on a horse carriage and went out of Sedona City with about 30 people. 'It seems like he is in a hurry for something.'
Lucas silently looked at the group leaving and turned his head to the residents who were waiting for him to speak. It was his first time facing so many people, so there was no way he wasn’t nervous.
“Cough cough.” Lucas straightened up his body and looked at the crowd. “You may all leave.”
As soon as Lucas said that everyone began to leave and Lucas watched them silently. He just came here and didn’t know anything, so he couldn’t really change anything. First he needed to collect all the information about this city if he wanted to make changes in his city and citizens' life.
Lucas returned to the castle, strolled around and found that there wasn’t a single person inside the castle. No soldiers, no maid, no one. He was the only person walking inside this castle.
He looked all around the castle checking its condition. He couldn’t help but shake his head and mumble, “They really all left and won’t even give me the chance to understand anything about the city and its citizens. However, it’s good that they left since it saves me from the hassle of firing people.”
He now understood that this was a scheme planned by Carter that he didn’t know about but he was actually more at ease since Carter’s people had left. Even though this territory was poor and was bought with five glasses, it still gave him a good place to stay. Besides, this castle would be impossible to buy on Earth without tens of millions of dollars.
“I don’t know what Carter is scheming but I don’t plan to give away the things that I’ve obtained.” Lucas mumbled, smiling.
“Right, there’s the gift Carter was talking about before he left.” Lucas immediately searched for the castle’s dungeon. After searching for more than half an hour, he finally found the entrance of the dungeon in a remote corner.
There was an old lock on the door. Lucas found something to smash the lock and cursed, “Carter actually didn’t even give me the key.”
After hitting the lock for a while the door opened. The door had stairs behind it and they were going downward. Lucas felt the stagnant air. There was also a bad sour musty smell which made Lucas frown and made him question and doubt the gift that Carter was talking about.
Lucas took out a flashlight from his storage space and illuminated the surroundings. He slowly entered the dungeon. It looked like a prison to him. It was situated underground in a corner of the castle. He didn't know how it was made but he was impressed by its size.
There were many rooms to hold the prisoners here but all of them were empty. He found that the dungeon walls were made of granite and there were various torture devices hanging on the walls.
"These things again prove that Carter is not a good person but now I have entangled myself with him. I need to do something about it. But let's just hope that I will not see Carter in future again."
Lucas laughed out loud and walked into the depths of the dungeon which gave him a gloomy feeling. In the deepest part of the dungeon, he saw the gift that Carter had talked about before leaving with his men.
Under the light of the flashlight, he saw a small human figure curled up in the corner of the room. The person was at most 1.6 meters tall and was very weak and thin.
“Hey. Are you still alive?” Lucas knocked on the prison fence. He could only see the other person’s back.
The sudden sound made the person’s body shake a little. She turned her head, and the bright light from the flash light caused her eyes to close slightly, but she quickly opened her eyes again and looked over. It was a pair of purple color beautiful eyes, just like the summer lake but her expression clearly showing disgust toward him. There wasn’t a trace of fear on her small, dirty face.
What attracted Lucas' attention the most however, was the pair of ears on her head. It was a pair of cat ears.
“Beastkin? Catgirl?”
Lucas’s eyes were full of surprise. He hadn’t expected to see a living beastkin. He had been in this world for a month and had always heard that this world had them, but he had never seen one. He hadn’t expected to see a beastkin in a dungeon and a catgirl at that.
