Chapter 842: Your Desert Elu Is so Weird

The hunters started from the public tavern located in the center of the city and walked all the way outside the city.

When passing by his own chamber of commerce, Ancier got a carriage out, which made their movement a lot faster, but even so, it still took more than two hours to reach their destination.

The outskirts of East Doruma are not the kind of endless plains. It faces the sea (Jiokrok Inland Sea) to the south and hills to the north. The ruins of the fortress at the destination are located between the hilly areas.

Although the roads along this route are quite well built, smooth and wide, it still takes a lot of time to go around the hills.

"Stop!"

The horse was blocked in the middle of the road ahead. Several soldiers with spears stepped forward and stopped the carriage.

The coachman was a little dissatisfied. This carriage had the emblem of the Sterling family on it.

However, the soldiers of the kingdom did not let them go unconditionally because of this, and it seemed that they had received strict orders from above.

After all, not all the armaments stored in the arsenal are used to supply the battle streets. The logistics department of the kingdom's military also suffered heavy losses.

Kurt Az got out of the car and showed the order document from the guild headquarters, and then the soldiers moved away to let the horse go.

The destination was in sight, and Gordon and the others had no intention of continuing to ride. They jumped out of the car one after another. Anhil asked the driver to wait here. The group walked through the checkpoint and arrived at the ruins of the fortress. forward.

This is a castle built on a mountain. Looking at the map provided by Kurt Aiz, the arsenal is built inside and underground of the mountain. The castle outside the mountain has been completely turned into a masonry ruin. The original outline is not visible at all. Out.

"What kind of power does it take to destroy a fortress like this?" Hayata muttered to himself.

"What's even more frightening is that there were no survivors and there was no time to raise any alarm."

Gordon knelt down, took out his peeling knife, found a piece of broken masonry and chipped it a few times. "It's very strong. This is not some shoddy project."

"You understand what I'm saying. Why are you sure that it can't be man-made at first glance?" Kurt Aiz also squatted down and fiddled with the broken bricks. "Even if there is a group of thieves that can break through the defense of the garrison, it is impossible. Destroy the fortress like this.”

"Didn't you say before that there was a large amount of gunpowder stored in the arsenal? Is it possible that the castle was destroyed because the gunpowder arsenal exploded?"

Before Kurt Aziz could say anything, Pig Chop spoke first, "No, meow, the main reason why the castle was destroyed was definitely not the gunpowder explosion, meow.

The explosion of the gunpowder magazine shattered the castle into pieces. The broken bricks and stones were scattered hundreds of meters away. Meows were everywhere, but there was no meow. "

"Yes." Kurt Az nodded, "This is also the judgment of our guild knights who are responsible for the initial investigation."

Pandan, who has been covering her nose since arriving here, muttered, "It stinks so much, meow! This burning smell in the air, meow!"

Kurt Az spread his hands, "In addition to gunpowder, there is also some kerosene stored in the arsenal. It should be the smell left after burning kerosene.

Some soldiers who hid deep in the arsenal were suffocated to death by the poisonous smoke from the burning. "

"It's not the smell of kerosene." Xianglan held her nose and breathed loudly, but she said with certainty, "The smell of burning kerosene is very light, and it smells good. No, it's not like that anyway.

It's more like the smell of burning heavy oil. "

Gordon looked at Pandan curiously, "Do you still know something about oil?"

"Sneeze--"

Pandan sneezed, "I grew up in Balubare, and Balubare would sometimes move near the oil spring to extract kerosene from oil as a commodity.

Many little Ellu like to gather around the still pot and smell the smell of kerosene. "

"Is this meow? Your desert Ellu is so strange, meow." Pig Pork couldn't believe it.

Xianglan looked at it sideways, "Don't you Ellu from the mountains also like to smell monster poop and urine stains?"

"That's to confirm the danger, meow!"

Not having time to pay attention to the bickering between the two Ellu, Kurt Aiz frowned and thought for two seconds, then said "I'm going to find something" and then rushed into the ruins.

Gordon lifted the pork chop aside and asked Panlan, "What did you mean by heavy oil just now?"

Pandan gestured, "The sticky black waste left after extracting kerosene from petroleum can also be burned, but it will burn slowly and the smell will be too bad.

So it is basically useless. After refining the kerosene, it will be thrown away directly. "

Kurt Aiz ran back with a piece of brick. He put the broken brick in front of Pandan, "Is this it?"

There were traces of black grease on the bricks. Pandan sniffed a little and then folded her ears. She covered her nose and said, "It's meow. The smell is a little different, meow, but it's pretty much the same."

Gordon reached out and dipped some in it, then rolled it on his fingertips. It was very sticky, almost like glue.

"Have you confirmed that there is no heavy oil in the supplies stored in the arsenal?" Anhir asked.

"It's not on the list." Kurt Aiz shook his head and said, "Besides, it's not useful to store it."

"Then it seems that the attackers brought it here." Gordon wiped the grease from his fingers on the ground, "The Mantis has nothing to do with heavy oil, right?"

An Xil shook his head, "It's hard to say. The Pavilion Mantis is good at burrowing into the ground, and the ruins of the ancient village are in the desert. It's not impossible for it to happen to pass by an oil spring and get oiled all over it.

More importantly, doesn’t Mantis like to collect metal utensils? As far as I know, some large boilers also use heavy oil as fuel, so the possibility of Mantis accidentally bringing heavy oil is not impossible. "

At this point, Ansir paused and emphasized: "I said this just because I don't want to rule out the suspicion of Mantis because of the presence of heavy oil.

But this does not mean that we have to pin the real murder on Mantis. We still need more evidence and objective analysis."

"Yeah."

Kut Ez adjusted the brim of his hat, obviously agreeing with Ansir's statement, "We know too little about Mantis. You two can even be said to be the people who know this mysterious creature best in the world.

From the current evidence, Mantis is the most suspected.

But whether it is the attacker or not, what the guild needs is the truth, not a forcibly created enemy."

"Keep going inside." Gordon stood up, "I may not understand other aspects, but I think I am quite good at analyzing monster traces.

I asked before, and I also confirmed on the way here However, there are no footprints left by large monsters near the ruins of the fortress, so there are basically only two possibilities for the attackers' arrival and departure.

- Flying or burrowing.

The mantis should not be able to fly. We can look carefully to see if there are any underground tunnels or the like. Even if the attackers fill the tunnels when they leave, there will always be some traces of digging left.

From those traces, it should be possible to basically determine whether the attacker is a mantis. "

"Yeah, that makes sense."

Kut Aiz smiled and said: "The elder was right to call you back in a hurry. In terms of tracking monsters and analyzing footprints, our guild knights are not as good as you hunters fighting on the front line.

Let's search separately, which is more efficient. After the search, meet and communicate. "

Ps. It is mentioned in the setting that the fortress was destroyed several times and there were no surviving witnesses. This is actually quite difficult to explain.

Here is a possibility that the survivors hid deep in the fortress and were suffocated to death by the poisonous smoke of burning black oil.