She looked up to Tizmilly and me before throwing her face away.
"What are you talking about... Just... Quickly hand me over to the guards."
'Hm? That's not the reaction I expected...'
I narrowed my eyes at her, scanning her appearance.
Untidy hair, dishelved clothes, dirty boots...
I moved to Tizmilly's side and positioned my mouth near her ear. She flinched and was about to back away, but I grabbed her shoulder to stop her.
"What do you think about this girl, Tizmilly?" I whispered to her.
Tizmilly stopped trying to distance herself from me after I grabbed her shoulder. With a vague blush on her cheeks, she whispered back: "I am not really sure, since you just fooled her that easily..."
'What? Fooled her? Who? Me? I don't remember ever fooling anyone...'
"What kind of guy did you think I am, a scammer? I am a real gentleman—"
But before I could even finish my words, the sound of footsteps suddenly echoed through the alley. From the sounds alone, we knew that a lot of people were approaching this place.
It was at that moment that I noticed Carole's pale face.
She took a step back, her eyebrows twisted uneasily.
"They... Th-they were here..." She stuttered.
While Tizmilly and I looked at her confusedly.
"Run, quickly!" Said Carole before she ran into the deeper part of the alley.
'What happened?'
We still didn't understand the situation, but since the footsteps were getting closer by the second, we decided to follow Carole for now.
Our physical abilities were undeniably higher than those of normal people, so even if Carole ran away earlier than us, we could still catch up to her in no time.
"Wha—... How could you two run so fast!?" She squeaked the moment she realized we were already following her closely.
"More importantly, what actually happened, Miss Carole? Who were those people?" Tizmilly asked her.
We took turns several times through the dark alley paths, before we reached the place where old buildings are everywhere.
Carole brought us to one of those buildings. She opened the window without hesitation before gesturing for us to follow her.
Once we were inside, she inhaled a big amount of air and wiped the sweat on her face before opening her mouth.
"We should be fine for a while here... Right, you asked me what happened, didn't you?"
Tizmilly nodded in response to her question while I was looking around the interior of the building.
Apparently, this building was abandoned. We were currently inside a room that looked like a guestroom of some sort, so maybe it was a house before it was abandoned?
"In short, I was being chased by them."
With a sigh, Carole entered one of the doors visible inside the guestroom while explaining what happened to us.
Inside the room, she clutched her hands on her back before piles of shattered furniture, like a bed and a table. From the looks of it, the destruction of this furniture was artificial.
"All because of the debt left by my father."
She smiled toward us.
"You know, my father was really a stupid old man. He was easily fooled by them into taking a big debt, even though it was clear as day that they were trying to scam him into a bad kind of debt. As a result, my father ended up dead due to overwork while trying to repay them. My mother was the same. Then it was my brother's and my time to repay it. My brother work for them to get the money needed to repay it, while I become a scammer for the same purpose... Yesterday, one of them tried to... sexually assault me, so I fought back, and that made them furious. I am scared, so I ran away."
She clutched her own hands tightly.
"They may be torturing my brother now... Yet here I was, leaving him alone...!"
Tizmilly approached her and hugged her after that to comfort her. Our Miss Villainess truly is a kind-hearted girl.
"Miss Carole... It would be okay," Said Tizmilly with teary eyes.
"Wh-what okay with all of this? Everything was already..." Carole replied weakly, her face already wet with tears.
"Trust me, it would be okay!" Tizmilly stated stubbornly with a wide smile, "Right, Mister Roost?"
They turned toward me.
So I open my arms and smile in response.
"Yeah. Hug me, and everything would be okay!"
"..."
"..."
"..."
I cleared my throat awkwardly.
"Alright, it was a joke, okay? Sorry, sorry..."
...
I grabbed a table that still looked quite functional and placed it at the center of the room before putting the map of Dungeon City on it.
"First, could you please tell us about that gang... They were a criminal organization, weren't they? But what kind of criminal organization, and how big?" I asked Carole, and she nodded strongly in response.
"That's right. They were famous around here. People who lived here called them The Rats, and they were known for their debt service, but they were actually just a group of bandits who were active on the outer side of Dungeon City. They work in baiting poor people using high-interest debt, then trap them with their ridiculous interest rates. It was not rare for them to sell their debtors as slaves! They weren't actually that big, only about 60-90 members, if I am not wrong."
Tizmilly frowned after she heard that.
"I never knew that such a vile group of people existed inside this city! No, until now, I am not even aware of the existence of this place where people lived so poorly like this..."
I sighed after seeing how frustrated she looked.
"There are a lot of people like them everywhere, Tizmilly. It wasn't your fault. More importantly, we should find a way to get rid of them."
Tizmilly calmed herself and sighed.
"You're right..."
A criminal organization like theirs would never be able to exist without a connection to the authority. To fight them, we should get as much evidence of their crimes as we can.
Using our statuses as Academy Students would also help us in this situation. If used well, we could even bring the Academy into this, at least one or two Professors would probably show up later when we needed it.
"Then... Let's place the trap for these mice...!"