Amon narrowed his eyes at the newcomer, feeling a bit of hostility. He couldn't help but observe them a bit more closely.
Looking at their straight postures and stern auras, Amon's eyebrows rose a little.
Soldiers.
A natural hostility between opposing forces, perhaps?
Perhaps they'd heard of his… management methods and had a dislike for him.
Who knew. Maybe there was even someone here who had actively hunted him in Terran, though thanks to the vast network left by the previous generations, he was never threatened by this nor had he ever cared.
But that didn't matter to him, those people never succeeded back in Terran, they wouldn't be able to touch him here.
Amon believed in self-interest triumphed over everything, first and foremost. In fact, not a few of his current cronies were once soldiers-turned-mercenaries.
"Are you sure?" He asked, maintaining his smile, "I took precious tea from Terran. I reserve its enjoyment with valuable guests."
Garan's stoic face was unmoved, his baritone voice reverberating in the surroundings. "We are just passing by. We're looking for our respective families."
"As a Lord, I could see the names of visitors and residents. I could help you if you need to find the names of your loved ones if you want."
This made Garan pause. However, no matter how desperate, he would never let him even mention his Althea's name.
However, declining strongly might give them away. He looked at his team, knowing that it would be unfair to stop them from looking for family. Most of them didn't have personal vendettas against this man.
"I am fine," He paused, "As for the others, it's up to them."
A lot of his men's shoulders slumped in relief. On cue, a couple of footsteps approached.
"Can I, captain?" There were two soldiers, Reuben and Minko, both of whom were not from Eden.
"Of course."
Reuben awkwardly held his bald head as he approached. "Rina Connery. She is my sister. She is nineteen."
"And Mine." Minko said, "Klara Solovic, my wife. She is thirty now."
Amon nodded at them and appeared to look at his panel.
After a few moments, he shook his head. "There are no such people in the territory, unfortunately."
The two men's shoulders slumped, disappointed.
However, with their example, a handful of others also tried their luck. Each one told of names of family members, hoping to find at least one of them. There were a few similar names, but the ages didn't match.
Garan looked at his soldiers' disappointed faces and sighed. "We will investigate on our own and we will no longer bother your lordship," Garan said, not wanting to have further interaction with the man.
"I see. Well, you can come to me if you need anything," he said, raising the guard of several cronies. This group had already caught their attention and alarm even before the lord showed such promise, but now he was being so hospitable!
Fortunately, the new guys were stupid and didn't appreciate the lord's gestures and excused themselves, leaving the lord with his cronies.
As they left, Amon's eyes followed their movements, dark eyes stewing with unknown thoughts.
He looked at Belize right beside him, presence extremely low as always. "Didn't you say the ice element is extremely rare?" He had asked because it was the element he wanted, not the earth he had gotten.
Belize's eyebrows rose, turning his head in the direction of the soldiers. "Indeed. I have only met a handful in my 50 years of living."
"Hm. Well, that man had ice… and metal."
Belize flinched. "What?" A dual elementalist? And of rare types, as well.
Looking at him like this, Amon knew he did not have the strength to go against this group.
For now, it was best not to intersect paths. He didn't even push them back. If he were to kick them out, who was to say they wouldn't partner with adjacent territories to attack him?
"Well, as long as they don't… damage the current status quo, we will not have problems." He said with a smile, but his tone was heavy.
"Or else… well. We'd have a very different talk."
…
Their group of 23 ended up renting two houses in the outer circle, with Gaudi and Eagle in charge of the arrangements.
Gaudi looked wistfully outside the wooden swing window, thousands of people interacting, and he felt envious.
Even when it was mostly a tragedy and depression, especially after the attack, at least they were together.
He remembered the time he used to see a lot of his brethren as well. It was very difficult, but it was miles ahead of being alone. Being the only one of your kind within a territory was depressing in more than a few ways.
He just sighed and arranged the furniture they bought from a shop owned by a citizen.
In fact, there were a number of shops owned by the citizens, which was proof that life was still decent here, at least on the surface.
Sammy helped him out with carrying the items while Eagle went off to gather supplies, recharging their group's supply and filling up his space.
The group had signed a contract to keep Eagle's space stone a secret, this included Gaudi and the rest of the aborigine members of the team.
To be honest, Gaudi (and the rest of them, for that matter) still couldn't believe this group's luck. They were such a small (and relatively weak) group, yet they managed to get a hold of such precious stone.
Well, as the wise elders from home had said: Great things happen to great men. It was apparently quite accurate.
While the logistics handled their supplies, the rest of the team was in charge of gathering information. Whether it was about the territory or about their family members, or the overall situation of their brethren, they researched and studied everything they could gather.
Later that day, everyone came back to the temporary 'home base' and seemed very productive. Whether it was replenishing their items or of information, they managed to gather a lot.
"A lot of people are thankful to us for saving them, so gathering information is much easier than expected," Sammy said, sitting beside Chris who nodded. "It was just that this is under the condition that the questions had nothing to do with the Lord or his party."
Gill looked at them. "What did you find out?"
"Most of the people here were from Eden. In terms of statistics, about 60% are Edenians. We noted most refugees seemed to have come from the East and Southeast direction.
"This is followed by a mix of people from the three adjacent countries."
This particularly interested the few members who were from one of these countries. "What?"
"How many?"
Most of the soldiers asked their teammates, eager to find out more.
Of course, there were some people who were dejected, knowing their families were probably far away because they were nowhere close to Eden on the Terran world map.
They could only wonder if they were okay, and if it was still possible to meet them.
However, it was not with little hope, because among these people who got concrete news were soldiers from countries far away.
Orz Lopez raised his hands. "My countrymen are here." Ben and Minko, his countrymen, nodded, apparently finding out the same.
Sean beside him flinched and looked at them in anticipation. "Mine aren't, but my country is next to Orz's."
Ryan was silent as he stared but he was already deep in thought. "Perhaps, mine is also nearby…"
The rest of the group looked at them in surprise. These five people were all from another continent altogether.
"How do you know?" Because of globalization, it was basically impossible to determine a person's country by their skin color, eye, or hair color. It was difficult even if one studied habits or cultures. It got to the point that people stopped judging anything around them.
But looking at Orz and the others looking so certain, the others couldn't help but stare.
Did the Transfer compress everyone together so much?