The three of them walked along the city’s main road that late afternoon, passing rows of buildings that had already been repaired and renovated.
More and more visitors were entering the city, and the atmosphere felt livelier than the day before.
Many of those people glanced their way, clearly recognizing Ethan walking side by side with Leon and Jill.
Their attention was mostly drawn to EthanArk, the handso man who had single-handedly taken control of Mavelard City from Silver Star.
His presence carried weight, a mixture of danger and authority, a reminder of everything that had happened during the invasion.
Not a single one of them seed bothered by Ethan’s PK status or by the red userna hovering above him.
In their eyes, that PK mark was simply the natural consequence of the city invasion he carried out yesterday.
As long as Ethan didn’t go around killing innocent people without a reason, they were willing to ignore the red mark completely.
Jill explained that the conflict took place in Ring 2, specifically in the western district of Ring 2.
Without wasting any ti, the three of them continued walking down the city streets, passing through the central plaza before finally arriving at the area of Ring 2.
Ethan ca to a stop when his eyes caught sight of a dense gathering of people blocking the road ahead.
Sowhere within that crowd, the three of them could faintly hear shouting coming from the center—angry voices, curses, insults being thrown back and forth.
He assud that the two people involved in the dispute were right there in the middle.
Ethan imdiately instructed Jill and Leon to break the fight apart and clear the area of the crowd gathered out of curiosity.
People began turning their heads, shocked when they saw who had arrived. EthanArk, the Vice Leader of LionArk Guild, was coming closer.
Several people stepped back on instinct, giving EthanArk room to enter the center of the dispute between the two guild mbers.
Jill and Leon did their job well, managing to pull the two n apart. Both of them looked beaten up, covered in bruises over sothing that seed ridiculously trivial.
"What happened?" Ethan asked.
"Sorry, Sir Ethan. I bought the land for this shop lot for 700,000 gold. But he took nearly half of my land," said the man from Sky Sword Guild.
"I didn’t steal it. I took that part because it’s my land," said the other man, a mber of Rose Mountain.
Ethan narrowed his eyes. The core of their conflict was clearly a land dispute, and the two plots overlapped in a way that didn’t match the city’s official layout.
He asked both n to hand over the docunts and land layouts. They both agreed, each bringing out a floating token that acted as a certificate of ownership.
Ethan touched both land tokens. The information panel displayed itself before him—showing their identities, purchase amounts, the official layout, and the na of the officer responsible for allocating the plots.
It was imdiately clear to Ethan that the layout of the two lands didn’t match the rules.
The land owned by the Rose Mountain mber was far larger than the standard size granted to every Ring 2 plot.
Ethan was certain that every property in Ring 2 was assigned the exact sa amount of land.
Yet for so strange reason, the mber of Rose Mountain had been given more.
He turned toward the man and took a good look at his face. The man, nad Bernice, visibly trembled when Ethan’s eyes fell on him.
"Why is your land bigger than the standard?" Ethan asked.
"I—I don’t know, the guild authority assigned it to ," Bernice said nervously.
Ethan clearly saw that the officer responsible for Ring 2 allocations was a LionArk mber nad Jason.
This problem would need to be settled between Bernice and Jason.
He returned the token belonging to the Sky Sword mber. Then Ethan instructed Jill and Leon to escort Bernice to the LionArk headquarters.
Since there was sothing clearly off between the two land layouts, Ethan suspected bribery.
It seed likely that Bernice had paid soone off to obtain more land than his neighbor—even if that ant encroaching on soone else’s property.
They arrived at the guild building. Jill and Leon imdiately escorted Bernice to the second floor, where Jason worked as the official in charge of Ring 2 land distribution.
Their arrival drew attention from many staff mbers. Behind Jill and Leon, Ethan followed with a serious, unwavering expression.
Staff whispered among themselves, trying to guess what was going on, and so even leaned closer to eavesdrop.
Jason’s office door swung open. Jason, who had been relaxing comfortably, looked startled when he saw Jill and Leon dragging Bernice inside.
"What are you doing?!" barked Jason, the Ring 2 officer and a LionArk officer.
"Tell —how could Bernice have a much larger land plot that even overlaps with his neighbor’s?" Ethan asked.
Ethan stepped into the room and closed the door, locking it. Jason imdiately panicked. He rushed toward Ethan and fell to his knees, bowing his head.
"I—I don’t know... it must have been my carelessness," Jason stamred.
"Careless? The layout was already input into the City Managent System. Your job should’ve been simple," Ethan said.
He crouched down in front of Jason, who was trembling in fear. "So why did the layout change?"
"I—I... I..."
Ethan narrowed his eyes. He couldn’t directly access soone’s log records to confirm bribery, but he had plenty of thods to force honesty out of people.
"I’ll only banish you and confiscate all the bribes you took if you confess. But if LionArk’s Legal Authority finds you guilty, you’ll face death," Ethan warned.
Jason didn’t answer. He froze, unable to give any response at all.
Ethan looked toward Jill. "Go bring Darcy, Head of LionArk Legal Authority."
"It seems you’re confident in claiming innocence, Jason," Ethan said coldly.
Jason still didn’t respond.
Before long, Jill returned with a man wearing black clothing and a black LionArk cloak—an unmistakable symbol of the Legal Authority.
Darcy entered the office with a calm yet intimidating presence.
Ethan and Darcy shook hands, greeting one another briefly. Ethan then explained everything, the reason he had called Darcy: a suspected bribery sche.
Darcy understood imdiately. He raised his staff and pressed a glowing blue orb against the foreheads of Bernice and Jason. The Truth Path Skill activated.
"Anything you ask, they’ll answer honestly," Darcy said.
"Can he lie?" Ethan asked.
"If he lies, the pain will be unbearable. You’ll know instantly."
Ethan nodded silently. He began questioning Jason and Bernice.
And the truth ca out—clear and undeniable. Jason had accepted a bribe of 350,000 gold from Bernice to manipulate the land size.
Jill docunted every detail of the confession. Ethan continued investigating, asking about other bribery cases.
It turned out Jason had taken at least twelve separate bribes from people who purchased land in Ring 2.
When Ethan asked him to na every person involved, Jill quickly wrote down all the nas.
Once Ethan felt he had enough, Darcy deactivated the Truth Path. Bernice and Jason regained their senses.
Jason grew even more panicked now that he fully realized Darcy’s presence in the room.
"I’ll leave this case entirely in your hands, Darcy," Ethan said, giving Darcy’s shoulder a firm pat.
"I understand, Sir Ethan."
"Jill! Leon! Go into the city and arrest each of those people!" Ethan commanded.
"Yes, Ethan!" they both answered with conviction.
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