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nSam came out of Kelly's room and sat in the hall looking at the door.

nAt the Violet dew family main mansion. The elder who threatened Sam earlier was waiting outside for an audience with the family head and the pseudo rank 4 tailor artisan Maya violet dew. Both of them are discussing something. When they came to the main hall up on the servants informing them about the elder, they saw an elder with a pale face and shivering legs, he seemed to afraid of something so much. Behind him, a young lady who Sam met previously is standing with same scared expression on her face. She is none other than Jessie Violet dew.

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"Elder, what happened to you? Why are you in such a hurry to speak to us?

" The family head asked.

nElder looked at the family head and Maya once and took a deep breath before recounting everything that happened, word by word. He even said Sam's threat as it is without daring to downplay anything at all.

nFamily head and Maya has dark expressions as they heard the whole story. Maya is seemingly more pissed than the family head and when the latter saw that expression, he got increasingly tensed and threw a slap to the elder's face.

nThen Maya spoke.

"Family head, seems like what I said in the previous meeting doesn't reach the brains of the family members. My artisan status is something that I purely got by my hard work and the Violet dew family has nothing to do with it. I only came to the family back because, I don't want to unfilial and forget my roots. That is why I came to select a disciple from the family.

nBut seems like the family will never change, your subordinates are even daring enough to threaten a young pseudo rank 3 Artisan and kidnapped the niece of a rank 3 Artisan. I don't know that they are this daring. If I don't receive a proper explanation, my disciple will also cut all the ties with the family after she enters my tutelage.

" After she finished her piece, she left immediately.

nFamily head threw another slap across the elder's face and kicked the other party continuously.

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"Do you even know what you are doing? Do you think just because Maya has a last name as Violet Dew, you can use her name as you seem fit? She doesn't owe the family anything on the contrary the family owes her everything. We are lucky enough that she is not using her status against our family. What do you think you are doing by threatening a genius like that and even worse, the other party even knew who is threatening him? Making an enemy out of a genius like that.

" Then he turned towards Jessie and said coldly.

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"Jessie, as you are part of younger generation, I will not punish you. But let me give you an advice. As long as you keep following your father's methods and keep throwing your weight around, you will hit a hard steel eventually and this time is only one example.

" After that he turned back to the Elder and said.

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"Fulfil all his requests and don't try to play any tricks. You will personally go and handover all the things he asked and beg for his forgiveness. You are going to invite him to a meal after the banquet at the Count mansion is over. If you aren't able to make it, you are going to be revoked from your status and you are going to serve as a shop keeper. Now get lost.

" Family held his head as he walked away. He is going to find Maya. He has to coax her to make sure that she doesn't take any hasty decisions in a whim.

nSam waited for more than half an hour. He just kept on looking at the door. Nobody in the house dared to sit along with him. They just stood afar from him also watching the door.

nSuddenly, there was a knocking sound from the door. Sam opened the door and saw Kelly standing there along with a middle-aged man and Jessie standing behind him. There is a wooden box which has a faint blood scent to it.

nKelly immediately leapt into his embrace as soon she saw him. She sobbed continuously. Sam felt his west completely soaked and showed no signs of stopping anytime soon.

nSam put his hands around her lightly and let her cry in his embrace. He felt guilty up on seeing her face turning red from crying. The Elder and Jessie didn't dare to interrupt them.

nAfter she calmed down a little, she let go of Sam and stood by the side. Sam finally took a look at the Elder and sized him up. The Elder is at late stage Novice. When he looked at Jessie, his impression of her worsened a lot.

nThe Elder first opened the box and found three heads in it and he passed a spatial ring to Sam.

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"Sir, Sam. I am the one responsible for everything happened today and I realize my mistake. I hope you will be magnanimous and don't stoop to my level and accept my apology.

" The Elder said as he passed the ring.

nSam took the ring and placed it in his pocket. He didn't reply the whole time and just looked at the Elder coldly. The atmosphere became awkward and the Elder said again.

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"Sir, Sam. Will you please accept our apology and come to our family to accept our reception?

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nSam didn't reply to the question and said.

"I don't want to see you two near my mansion. If I see you two again, I will go straight to Piranha to place a bounty on your heads. Try me if you want. As for your reception, I am already surprised by how a family with esteemed rank 4 artisan behaves. I never thought that an artisan with such esteemed status will let an idiot like you to use the status like that. I don't want to see any other reception from your family. Get lost.

"

nHe closed the door right on their faces and walked towards the hall where everyone is waiting. The girls pulled Kelly to their side and started consoling her. After everyone calmed down a bit, they finally looked at Sam. They don't know, how to talk to him now. Never did they expect that they will see, Sam a kid who is same age as us, even younger by a few months can make a threat like that. They felt chills run down their spine and hearts trembling.

nThey were afraid of what happened.

nSam looked at them and took a deep breath before he spoke.

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"I don't know how you feel about me. But one thing I can tell you is, that this is the real me. All of you didn't know this part of me because, there was a never a situation like this before.

nKelly.

" He called Kelly and looked straight in to her eyes. Kelly looked at the handsome face and deep black eyes which are very familiar yet at this instance felt very strange. She only came out of the daze when Sam continued.

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"I am really sorry for what happened to you today. I don't know if you will forgive me and neither will I request you to forgive me. You have every right to be angry and hate me. But if there is any way I can make it up to what happened today, please tell me. As long as I am alive and the whatever you want is within my capabilities, I will do it. You can request it from me anytime you want. For now, please take this as a small token of sincerity.

"

nSam passed the spatial ring sent over by the Violet dew family to Kelly. She took it dazedly and looked as Sam went back to his room.

nSam sat in his study as he took a deep breath to calm his thoughts. He really doesn't want to face Kelly right now. Even though he is cold and ruthless, he really can't accept an unrelated innocent life in risk to get something out of him. If he gave in to them earlier, he was pretty sure that the demands will keep on increasing. That is why he has to be that ruthless.

nSam calmed himself down and took out all the scrolls shadow mice collected and placed them on the table. He took a scroll and opened it to read its content. When he was done reading it, he took a deep breath at the revelation. He understood clearly what these scrolls are. These are the scrolls containing orders. These orders are given to the boss of piranha, from their immediate superior and Sam was struck dumb because of who the superior is.

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"JACK!!!

" Sam shouted on top of his lungs. Jack came to his room hurriedly only to see Sam pointing him to read the scrolls. When he was reading the scrolls, his eyes widened again and again due to the details.

nMeanwhile, Kelly and Hawk are sitting in the hall. Hawk didn't know what to say as he looked at the fragile beautiful girl with such tired and haggard expression. After sometime, he took a deep breath before he asked.

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"Are you okay, Kelly?

" Kelly looked at him with a sweet smile on her sad face. After all, she is just a young girl and going through a kidnapping experience is not something to be happy about. But she is still trying to smile as much as she can. Looking at her effort to look strong, Hawk continued.

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"I am really sorry. I didn't know that the city guards are that lax. As the son of the count I really feel ashamed. I will consult my father and give you and Sam an explanation.

"

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"Thank you.

" Kelly replied weekly.

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"I have another thing to say.

" Hawk spoke and took out a bunch of invitations from his storage ring. Among the bunch there are four invitations which are different and seemed more elegant. He placed them on table and said.

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"My father is hosting a banquet at the Count mansion in a week. These are the invitations for you all. All the participants are invited along with the supervisors. The invitations for them were already sent to the inn they were staying in. There I learnt you address from your Principal. There will be a ball, so it is better to come with a partner. I don't know if Sam will meet me after all that happened. So, I will leave. Please, pass on the invitations to others and I really hope you will come. Bye.

"

nKelly took the invitations and started distributing them. She saw that the four special invites are for people who are in top 10. And there are four people in top 10 from their Starwood city.

nSam, Jack, Philip and herself all four of them are in top 10.

nIn Sam's study. Both Sam and Jack are almost done with scrolls. Their expression turned heavy. Not only the scrolls contained information of Piranha and its orders from superior. There are also list of members in the organisation and the sister organisations other than piranha they have dealings with. The sheer number of the members, establishments and everything involved made their heart beat faster. And the main thing that surprised Sam most was, his suspicion was real.

nBlack pond is the branch of Black water in Falcon Cliff city. And what surprised him even more is that the two organisations that are ruling the underworld of the Falcon cliff city, the piranha and Candiru are both the underlings of the Black pond.

nThe network and the members established by these organisations ran too deep in the city. Now, he understood why the Count left the organisations alone.

nThe information network that they are maintaining is enough to make one fear them.

nJack and Sam stayed silent for a long while.

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