It was 8:10 PM.
In a luxury hotel in the imperial capital, Elayl, the sixtieth floor offered a splendid view of the world below. Lights were sparking like fireworks, in red, yellow, and orange. Eyeing each burst through the big windows, the woman let a smile played across her lips. The situation she found herself in suddenly struck her as richly amusing.
She’d come to Elayl prepared for a lengthy mission but never once felt at home. Mingling with those beneath her was nothing but suffering and made her miss home all the more.
Her mission was over, though.
She was unlikely to ever return.
The woman in a dark suit—Auroch—left the window, speaking to the knight in armor standing by the wall.
“It’s high time we checked out. Handle the luggage.”
The knight picked up a massive truck one-handed. They were tools of the trade they’d had no call to use but could not allow a bellboy to touch. Her assistant had handled all transportation.
Auroch ran a finger down the hilt of her magic sword. They left the room, boarded the elevator, and enjoyed the drop to the ground two hundred meters below.
Now, then.
Outside the elevators, they headed across the lobby. It was a vast space, with high ceilings decorated with chandeliers. She’d seen this each day, but something felt off this time.
The lobby was empty.
There wasn’t a single guest, and no one was at the reception desk. It was as if they’d vanished into thin air.
What does this mean?
Auroch’s hand unconsciously reached for her hilt—when a someone spoke to her.
“You’re finally here.”
A voice came from behind a column.
“I had the lobby evacuated. Told everyone else not to leave their rooms. You’ll be taking no hostages.”
The man stepped out.
He was short enough that one might mistake him for a student, with long, narrow eyes and a touch of a baby face around the lips. Auroch placed him right away.
“Come quietly. We don’t need to get rough.”
A girl in a nun’s habit stepped out from behind another column. The black choker on her neck was not very suitable for a cloister.
My, my, she thought.
“Auroch,” the Sixth Precinct’s detective said. “You’re under arrest for the murder of Chronos Drakenia.”
It all hinged on the next few minutes.
Rogue Macabesta kept his eyes on the Headtaker woman, his back to the reception desk. The knight assistant was on standby, a few meters to her right.
Auroch fired the first shot.
“You intend to arrest me? Without the authority to do so? Are you quite sure? I’m well aware you’ve been suspended.”
He’d figured she’d bluff her way out of it. If he let her go, he’d never catch her again.
“I know,” he said.
“Turn right around and leave,” Auroch said. “That’s the best thing for you. Drop this now, and I will not have to report it to my superiors.”
“Report it all you like. Don’t blame me if that means trouble knocking at the Ligtons’ door.”
“Ah,” Auroch said, her narrowed eyes widening slightly. “What a fascinating premise. How exactly would I bring trouble to my masters?”
“They’re the ones who ordered you to murder Chronos,” Catherine declared.
Her jade eyes bored through the Headtaker woman.
They’d prepared this speech ahead of time.
“Chronos was never behind this case at all. The whole thing is a fraud, perpetuated by you and the Headtaker Corps. You pretended to investigate it, directing suspicion to Chronos and disguising your own involvement. The mental interference on the victims and the melding with the Bloom spell were your doing.”
“Of all the accusations.” Auroch sighed, shaking her head. “How outlandish. Why would I need to go to that trouble? We are the protectors of the empire. We’re not like witches; we do not kill without meaning, to satisfy our base desires.”
“But what if it did have meaning?” Catherine asked.
“Sacrifices can be necessary to ensure a victory. If a hostage would help capture a witch, we would not hesitate. Even if that hostage was a child—as long as it is effective,” Auroch answered without pause.
But—
“That’s why you’re our culprit,” Catherine concluded.
“If the Ligton plan succeeds, they’ll control all the witches in the Sixth Precinct.”
“More accurately,” Rogue took over, “you’ll ram a Ligton puppet in the chief’s chair at the Sixth Precinct. Witches are the one thing the Drakenias have that the Ligtons do not. The Ligtons may have you Headtakers, but as long as the Drakenias have collars on witches, they can’t win. I’m in their way—so you need merely blow me up with a bomb or find a reason to get me suspended.”
Rogue took a step toward the Headtaker woman.
One step.
And another.
“You had to prop up Chronos as the perp because otherwise, the Sixth Precinct wouldn’t get involved. Witches don’t get called in for ordinary magic crimes.”
“What about the messages? Those made no sense to me,” Auroch claimed.
“Those were meant to convince us Chronos was involved. But not the last message: ‘I know.’ That was directed at the Drakenias. Giving the illusion that Chronos had found a way to completely meld with a spell—a trap laid for them. After all, the man himself was from the Drakenia family. That connection was the perfect excuse to investigate the inner workings of his family. You were not just attacking the Sixth Precinct; you were taking aim at the Drakenias, too.”
“Enough,” the Headtaker woman said. “You have a vivid imagination, but my flight leaves soon. Step aside.”
“Not happening. We’re here to cuff you both.”
Auroch shook her head.
“You should have brought a shred of evidence with you. All you have are vain accusations.”
Finally.
“Fair,” Rogue said. “So far that’s all we’ve offered. But we do have one fact.”
He looked at the knight in armor.
“Your magic sword’s power.”
“………What?”
For the first time, Auroch’s brows dropped.
“What about my assist—?”
Rogue cut her off, shoving his phone’s screen in her face.
It showed a bottle—full of grains.
“What do you think this is?”
Auroch’s eyes widened.
“A bottle. With…sand inside?”
“What’s inside this belonged to the museum. It’s what your assistant broke.”
He showed her a photo of the hawk statue.
“The curator got in touch. They were taking photos of the damage your assistant did and found something ‘like sand’ nearby. It was too fine a grain to be part of the rubble, so he kept it in a bottle for safe keeping. And passed it along to the Sixth Precinct.”
Rogue pocketed the phone.
“You’ve seen similar damage elsewhere, right? Say, on Chronos’s right arm.”
“……”
That shut up Auroch, and Rogue piled on.
“Your assistant’s magic sword drains the life from anything it touches. So dramatically that the slightest contact makes them crumble away into grains of sand.”
“……Why would we employ a means so easily traced?” Auroch asked. “That is a side effect of the Control spell Chronos once harbored. Even if my assistant possessed a similar ability, you are merely using it to frame us. Why would we leave the scene without hiding the evidence? Your argument doesn’t hold water.”
“The meld was dispelled.”
He saw her waver and kept pushing.
“You intended to blow me up. That would have hidden any evidence. But something went wrong a few hours before we reached the ossuary. Or perhaps something made it go wrong? Either way, you were unable to turn Chronos back into a bomb before we arrived. You were forced to abandon the idea of killing me off and went with the suspension, arguing that Chronos’s death was caused by the Control spell.”
Silence.
Auroch’s head was down. She said nothing.
The echoes of Rogue’s speech faded into the lobby’s depths.
“We’ve collected the remnants from the ossuary. Analyze those against the museum’s statue, and the results will speak for themselves.”
Then—
Tnk.
—a heel clicked on the marble floors. Auroch had changed her stance.
“……I should have left my assistant at the hotel.”
“You admit it?”
“……”
“We’re taking you to the station. You’re free to tell us your version of events,” Rogue said.
Auroch’s head came up.
“I’m afraid that won’t be happening.”
She flashed her pearly whites.
“Detective!” Catherine cried.
Even as she did, a trunk bounded off the floor in front of Auroch. The clasps came off; it was changing shape in midair. There was nothing inside—just a ton of dark-red writing. It hung in the air and began to glow.
“Obviously, I prepared an escape plan,” Auroch said, reaching for the transport gate inside the trunk. She vanished into thin air.
Shit.
The knight had been carrying that luggage, but his hands were empty now. He’d tossed it, knowing he wouldn’t have time to follow.
Rogue had to try. He reached for the transport gate but felt something unsettling. He got goose bumps all over, and his eyes went wide.