Chapter 79 October 3, 2022
Chapter 79 – Approaching Footsteps (1)
Terina Lionhowl, who was leading the way, stopped her footsteps and looked back.
“Captain? Is there something wrong?”
“…No. It’s nothing. I just felt like someone was watching us.”
“No way.”
Lloyd said so while fixing his glasses inside his hood, but Enya was different.
“Ah, really, Senior. Captain has a better sense than us, so you never know. That’s also why we’re here.”
“Hmm.”
It was just like what Enya said.
The three who were dispatched to investigate the mystery of Belfort Ricksen’s death were wandering through the alley in the middle of the night, and it was mainly due to Terina Lionhowl.
She went all the way there with the two lieutenants as if she had been hooked on something.
Lloyd was actually discontented with that.
For him, who valued rationality and scientific thinking, gut feelings were a mere fairy tale.
“Isn’t this just all about the fighting and killing between gangsters and vagrants in the back alleys anyway?”
“It’s a little different this time.”
“What’s the difference?”
“That’s what my gut tells me.”
“Is it gut feelings again?”
Even Lloyd couldn’t say anything to Terina because she was clearly his superior and, above all, her gut feelings matched with the facts surprisingly well.
Her gut feelings had produced a lot of outcome, so he couldn’t say that it didn’t make sense, after all.
—Because she had done the impossible over and over again.
She had been successful in her missions that the others thought were impossible.
So, even if he had complaints, Lloyd didn’t show it on the surface.
“So it’s here.”
They had arrived at the site.
There were several corpses lying in that place.
“This… the corpses are quite numerous.”
“Did some kind of battle happen here?”
“There must have been a fight between organizations.”
Terina strode toward the corpses.
She checked them by squatting in front of the corpses that were particularly noticeable among the other corpses.
“He’s an assassin.”
“Pardon? What?”
“This corpse, I mean. He’s not a mere assassin.”
Terina frowned upon the sour smell of the bottle that was hanging on the corpse’s waist.
“It’s a deadly poison. This is a special poison used by the Calsapa Assassins.”
The corpse itself seemed not much different from the others around it, but it was nothing more than a disguise for them not to be discovered by their opponent.
Lloyd and Enya also came close and identified the body at Terina’s words.
“In the end. His body definitely has proof of receiving training. His rough hands are full of calluses, and there are even small scars on his body. Since the scars seem pretty old, we can’t see him as a mere back alley gangster.”
“Whoa. If he’s a Calsapa Assassin, he’s that, right? The assassination group from the Southern Fatima Dynasty? They were quite famous.”
“They’re terrible people who don’t spare their lives while killing their targets. But why is there such an assassin in this kind of back alley…?”
Terina rose from her spot.
“Captain?”
“He’s indeed a Calsapa Assassin, but he isn’t the official one. Maybe he was wandering around and came all the way here to gain experience after receiving some training, or maybe he was been kicked out because of his lacking skills.”
“But isn’t he still a highly trained assassin?”
“Yes. It’s also true that he’s not the kind of guy who’d be in a place like this.”
—But such a Calsapa Assassin was dead.
For a mere battle that happened in the back alleys, it was an incredible result.
“The cause of death is probably the wound on his forehead. A thin and slender blade penetrated his forehead, and he fell down from up there afterward.”
Terina looked up.
The night sky full of clouds was blocked by the walls of the cramped alleyways.
“I don’t know who their opponent was, but this assassin was killed by a very skilled man—seeing that the opponent killed him in one blow without any minor injuries.”
A single blow…
The Calsapa Assassins were killed by a single blow.
Terina stopped her autopsy and moved to a more secluded part of the alley.
Lloyd and Enya followed her footsteps without a word.
When they arrived at another place, all they saw was another group of corpses.
“This is… were they killed by magic?” Enya asked while looking at the corpses that were all over the place.
It was impossible for nearly 10 people to die grouped together with the same type of cut in those alleys except by magic.
“Yes. Probably.”
“It’s surprising. I can’t believe a wizard was involved in a battle in a place like this. Then don’t tell me that the assassins were also…?”
“I don’t know.”
Then Lloyd spoke, as he discovered something.
“Captain. There are more corpses over there.”
In the darkness beyond the crowded corpses, there were two corpses who had died because of apparently different causes of death.
Terina realized that the two corpses were also Calsapa Assassins.
“They’re also the same as the first guy. One died from a stab in his heart. They were killed by the same person because their wounds were the same size as the first guy. Was it a surprise attack from behind?”
An assassin, who should’ve been the one performing a surprise attack, was surprisingly attacked instead.
‘How on earth?’
And in the case of the second corpse, his neck was cut by something sharp.
“The second corpse was killed by the same weapon as the first guy, but the last one is different. It’s not magic, it’s either a dagger or an assassination weapon. Lloyd. Check the area around your feet over there.”
“Pa-pardon?”
“There are some traces around there.”
‘What does she mean by traces…?’
Lloyd looked cautiously, albeit half-doubtfully, at the ground near his feet.
In the end, just as Terina said, there were slight traces of metal scratching the ground.
“This is…”
“It must be the trace of the weapon that killed the first two assassins that fell on the ground. If that’s the case, I can roughly assume a scene. The Calsapa Assassins and these corpses tried to kill someone hand in hand.”
However, the opponent was also not an ordinary person, so the Calsapa Assassins were killed instead.
The last remaining assassin had succeeded in taking away his opponent’s weapon, but he was ultimately defeated.
“It was a sharp blade that cut his neck. He’s more specialized in cutting versus stabbing. This assassin must have been killed by an assassination weapon. Seeing that the wound isn’t that wide, it was probably a dagger… Then it must be a black sword stick that he used at first.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“You may think that it’s a rapier, but take a closer look. The corpse here was killed by an assassination weapon. The person who killed the assassin is a person who specializes in piercing others’ weaknesses. If such a person used a sword to stab people, he would use a sword hidden in a cane.”
“I-I see.”
“And this trace… The assassin tried to fight in close combat in front of his opponent. If his opponent was using a rapier, he wouldn’t have done that. The assassin must have guessed that the opponent was someone whom he had to fight in close combat. no matter what, but the result wasn’t like that.”
“That’s a great deduction.”
Lloyd could not help but admire Terina’s deductive abilities in grasping the flow of the situation in an instant.
Enya didn’t need to say anything either because she was already staring at her superior with a fascinated stare.
“It’s nothing. I also just learned a little from my acquaintance.”
“No. Who did you learn your deduction skill from?”
“Rather than deduction skill, it is just a quick method to find clues around me. That person told me from the start that I had a good sense and that I could learn it easily.”
“Who on earth is that person? And when did you learn it…?”
“It was more than several years ago. That person wasn’t from an empire, it’s just a coincidence that we met when I visited another country.”
“What did that person do?”
“They were a private detective.”
“Pardon? Only a detective?”
Surely a detective would be a great person because they were specialized in finding clues and doing deductions.
And yet, was it possible for that person to teach Terina, whose senses far exceeded that of ordinary people?
“She’s a person who was good enough to teach me. She’s a detective, but she’s pretty eccentric. She’s that talented as well. Sometimes, I was surprised by her unbelievable deduction skills.”
“I can’t believe that you even said something like that…”
Who would have thought that Terina, who had always been calm and charismatic, would say that she was surprised from her own mouth?
“Anyway, judging from the corpses all over this place, this was not a normal fight. Given the hiring of Calsapa Assassins, the ambushers would have risked their lives as well.”
“Does it have anything to do with the death of Belfort Ricksen that we’re investigating?”
“I don’t know that yet because there aren’t enough clues. However, it’s certain that there’s quite a stir in the back alleys of Leathevelk.”
Terina scrutinized the surroundings attentively to see if there were any other clues.
‘Hmm. What I have discovered is that there are approximately only two people who caused all of this.’
One man and one woman…
There were clearly some high heel marks or traces that were carved on some of the corpses.
‘One person is the one who uses a blade in close combat, and the other one is a wizard who knows how to use magic.’
Terina approached the wall of the alley and swept over the wall with her fingertips.
Then she rubbed her fingers and smelled the scent.
‘There’s a subtle scent hidden between the odors here. Traces of the smell still remain in the alley. It’s the scent of diffusion incense.’
Diffusion incense was famous for increasing the conductivity of mana, but she knew exactly when it was used.
—It was when people were dealing with a wizard.
The scent was used to seal the opponent’s attack magic.
‘The assassins moved because they knew their opponent was a wizard, but they failed. Didn’t they know that the opponent was using a blade?’
No.
Because both the man and woman were wizards
However, one of the two was good at using swords while also using magic. The assassins hadn’t known that, so they were killed.
‘A wizard who’s good with blades, huh…’
Terina’s eyes shone sharply.
Because there was a similar guy in her memory.
—A man who surrounded his body with a black shadow and stole all kinds of expensive things.
The most famous thief whom she tried to capture a couple of times when she was not yet a knight captain, but that she had failed at capturing each time.
The mysterious thief, Arsene Lupin.
‘And the vault at Belfort Ricksen’s mansion disappeared as well. Don’t tell me it’s him?’
She thought that, since he had disappeared without anyone knowing at some point, he had left the job and went into hiding.
So it wasn’t the case?
‘Suddenly, a mysterious thief reappeared. Suddenly, a cryptid showed up, a werewolf. And a secret factory where something happened…’
Terina was certain…
That all those clues were connected as one.
“The confirmation is complete.”
“Already?”
“Yes. I’ve obtained all the information I can get here.”
“Then what do we do with these corpses?”
“Just leave them here. The corpses in this place will be taken care of by the street cleaners of the back alleys anyway.”
Terina was well aware of the rules in that place. No one would be surprised or ask questions about the corpses.
It was that kind of place.
It was a place where, even if dozens of people died there, they wouldn’t even be listed in the newspaper the next day.
It was a world where it was natural for people to disappear into the back of the void when they weren’t able to catch up in a huge flow called the current age.
“So what are you going to do now? Will the investigation end here?”
Terina shook her head at Lloyd’s question.
“The investigation will continue.”
“But we haven’t got a proper result yet, right? To continue our investigation like this…”
“Yes. So this is actually the last time.”
“Pardon?”
“So we should go where the last clue might exist.”
Terina turned her head and stared in the direction of the place on her mind.
“We are going to Sören Academy.”
***
It was an early morning when birds still chirped loudly.
Ludger usually went to the professor’s office on days when there was no class, but he decided to rest at his private accommodation that day.
—It was due to his accumulated fatigue because he had done too much work recently.
The Omnipotent Stone case, and as soon as it was over, he had even organized the affairs of the back alley of Leathevelk.
No matter how much stamina he had, he was bound to be somewhat tired.
‘But it’s really a fortunate thing.’
Ludger sighed while laying on the soft sofa.
Since it was the first test period, he was able to rest with the excuse of writing exam questions.
Thanks to that, he stayed in the accommodation and took a rest without having to go to the professor’s office.
Knock knock.
The knock on the door awakened him.
Who was it? He tried to pretend that there wasn’t any knock on the door, but knowing that they had come all the way there, they probably knew that he wasn’t in the professor’s office.
He had no choice.
Ludger immediately rose from the sofa and opened the front door.
“Ah! Professor Ludger!”
“Professor Selena.”
When he wondered who on earth had come there, it was Selena, who had entered the Academy with him, that visited him.
“What brings you here?”
“Ah. I heard Professor Ludger didn’t come to the professor’s office today.”
“Yes. Today is a day when I don’t have any classes, and I’ve been having a hard time because I have to create the exam questions.”
“Oh, I see.”
Selena stared at Ludger intensely as she was trailing off the end of her words.
It was because it was the first time she had seen Ludger dressed comfortably in his home, as she usually saw him dressed in only neat clothes.
Of course, he was properly dressed in suit pants and a dress shirt, but that alone created a new impression on her.
‘He also unties his hair.’
Maybe it was because he had completely untied his hair that was usually tied, but he looked different.
And maybe because he didn’t sleep well, he had dark circles under his eyes, but even that made him look like a corrupted beauty.
He looked like a painting, even though he didn’t dress up.
Selena was admiring him quietly but recalled why she went there.
“Oh, oh yes. Professor Ludger. I’m here because there’s a guest looking for you.”
“A guest, you said?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you send an employee but instead choose to come here by yourself, Professor Selena…?”
“Ehehe. I just decided to come here because I wanted to stop by anyway. Isn’t that a good thing for each of us?”
“I see. So what kind of guest came to see me?”
Selina replied with a bright and innocent smile.
“The Knights from the Security Department.”
“…”
Ludger’s complexion stiffened, but Selena didn’t notice it.
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