You've been found! Make a dash for Mertz's office!

A plan would serve you well here, but unfortunately, there was no time for it. Your first attempt to duck the guards proved as fruitless as your first, as one of the helmeted guardsmen spotted you and immediately sounded his horn. In no time flat, you and the saintesses had guardsmen hot on your heels, just as many as you'd fled from at the gates of the town. This time around, however, you couldn't retreat into the shadows: you knew that this was properly your last chance to go for Mertz's office and find any clues before he got in there and scrubbed all evidence of the false saintess!

This led you to run one way: straight through the barracks' front door.

Guard after guard leapt at you unsuccessfully, occasionally catching hold of your tunic or one of the saintess's skirts before being unceremoniously thrown aside by one of your companions. Here and there, swords swung, tearing off swatches of your tunic and leaving bleeding trails in their wake. This was, to be blunt, the worst form that this mission could have taken. You all would be wanted men and women for sure, until the church could clear your names after the incident.

That is, if you even made it through this alive!

You reached the door to Mertz's room and severed the padlock with your blade, before lunging inside with your saintesses and then barricading it with your own body. Thankfully, the door was pretty well constructed, because the guards immediately set themselves to trying to tear it down, bashing it with their swords before switching to ramming it with their shoulders in coordinated attacks. The saintesses would just barely have time to gather papers before your whole group escaped down a cellar hatch. {if Belit = True}

Even the energetic Belit looked beat after all that. She breathed heavily, resting for just a moment in the underground tunnel. "Let's... never... do that... again..." she gasped between breaths, holding one hand to her modest chest. "I thought I was a goner..."

You reminded her: it wasn't too late for all of you to be murdered by those guardsmen. {endif}Your group needed to find your way back topside and re-enter a low profile, fast. Hopefully, what little bit you'd gathered from the man's desk would help point you to the false saintess you were looking for.