The Greatest Sinner

Evan asked the location of the informant, and one of the bandits quickly replied, "Just go straight ahead, and you'll see a big building from the white wood. It's the only well-kept building in the place, huh. Next, act yourself, it gives me the creeps when I'm thinking of that psycho..."

Evan nodded and headed in the indicated direction.

<Hmm, why are they so afraid of a simple informant? What could be so scary about him?>

He didn't understand why when the bandits talked about the informant, there was fear in their eyes. Evan was wary, he sensed that this informant was not simple at all. But, he didn't change his mind about going to him, only someone like this would be able to answer his questions.

<This is one of the crime centers of this city, but the streets in the slums look much scarier and horrible.>

In Evan's opinion, this neighborhood didn't look like a den of Inlas main criminals, but a residential area of wealthy citizens. The buildings were old, but most of them were not yet falling apart. The streets were pretty clean when compared to those in the slums. There were no bandits taking money from anyone or little thieves. It was quiet here, but that was just a cover.

Evan could clearly sense a tense aura hanging over the place. Everyone kept a close eye on anyone who passed there. The main criminal bosses conducted their business there, the places where they would not be disturbed.

After a few minutes, Evan came to the place the bald man was talking about. It was an old, large building built of valuable white wood. Evan looked at the hanging sign in the shape of a pig's head and thought to himself:

<So this is a regular bar? Could it be that those two have deceived me? Maybe I've just come to the wrong place?>

He didn't understand how an informant could be in such a noisy and crowded place. Nevertheless, Evan decided to go inside anyway and see if the place had what he needed. Once inside Evan was a bit surprised, there was no one there.

<There are so many tables, but no one is sitting at them and this place is definitely not closed...>.

As Evan pondered what was happening here, he saw a tall blond man walk up to the bar. He was dusting a glass indifferently and didn't even look at Evan.

Evan took a slow step in his direction and said: "I need to see the informant."

He decided to cut right to the chase, that was the only way to behave in places like this. Everyone here understood everything.

The blond man put his glass aside and looked serenely at Evan.

He didn't say anything back to Evan, instead, the man pulled a plain parchment scroll from under the table.

Evan began to realize that something was going wrong, so he tried to cast a spell, but it was too late by then.

The man poured some mana into the parchment scroll, and the next second, the formation was activated. Evan was right in the middle of it, and now he felt like that monster in the "Half-Dead Forest."

Whoosh.

When the formation was activated, walls of darkness appeared around Evan. Evan tried to escape, but he didn't make it. He was trapped in this dark dungeon, and what's more, he couldn't even cast any of his spells. For some reason unknown to him, the mana didn't want to transform into the form he wanted. The flow of mana was disrupted.

Bam.

Evan started pounding on the walls of the dungeon, but it didn't work. He was strong enough to destroy the steel slab with his bare hands, but those walls didn't care.

Click.

Suddenly there was a snap of the fingers, and the walls began to narrow. Evan didn't know what to do in such a situation. He couldn't draw the demon's sigil and activate it, he didn't have time for that. 

Despite the growing danger, Evan took a deep breath and calmed down. He needed to find another way out of this situation.

<I can't break through these walls, but... there's one place that's unprotected. Evan thought to himself and took a powerful punch to the floor. Only there wasn't a dark wall there, breaking the floor wouldn't destroy the formation, but Evan had enough power to punch a hole in the floor.

Bam.

Evan struck with all his might. The punch was powerful enough to shake the entire room. But, to Evan's surprise, his punch was stopped by a magical barrier that covered the entire room from the inside. It was a trap from which it was impossible to escape, but Evan had got some results.

The barrier absorbed the force from his blow, but it didn't disappear right away. It spread throughout the room until it finally dissipated. The energy waves affected other parts of this formation and prevented it from working.

Then the dark walls disappeared, and the formation stopped working. It is worth noting that this situation was an exception to the rule. It was impossible to get out of a formation like this just by hitting it correctly.

This time Evan only succeeded because the formation, or rather its supports, were set up within the barrier he hit. Moreover, the formation itself was not particularly stable, while Evan's blow was very strong.

When the dark walls had been gone, Evan didn't lash out at the emotionless blond. He sensed that something was not right here. Thanks to his knowledge of formations, Evan knew why he could get out of this trap.

Evan had the impression that the whole thing was a setup. If he really wanted to kill him, there was no reason to put the supports of the formations in the radius of the protective barrier. Evan didn't understand why they would do something like that.

Click.

Suddenly a door was heard opening not far from the bar. A middle-aged man with thick black hair and light stubble walked in. His distinguishing feature was the blindfold, hiding his left eye.

The man looked at Evan and said with a smirk: "I think you want to kill me now, I see, but you shouldn't act hastily. You've come here to learn something, haven't you? You've passed my test, so if you want to know something, follow me."

As the informant finished talking, he headed for the door, Evan called out to him, "What if I kill you after I find out what I needed to know?"

The man smiled and said briefly: "You can try if you want."

After those words, the informant left. Evan decided to follow him. At this point, he was really going to kill this man as soon as he got the information.

After a while, Evan found himself in the informant's office. The man sat down in a leather chair and said: "I'll answer the question you want to ask me right away. Yes, everyone who comes here is subjected to such an ordeal, and some of them die."

Evan didn't answer anything, sat down across from the man, and quietly said: "I need to find out where I can find one dark organization, what's the price?"

"AHAHAHAHA, guy, I don't take money as a price, I need something else." 

At that moment, the informant dropped the blindfold from his left eye. It looked as if some sort of seal had been put on it.

"The price is your memories!"