Elisa leaned against the washroom wall, listening to the entire conversation between Eleanor and Rupert as she pondered.
Scarface hadn’t told Eleanor that there were people higher up behind the murders. He hadn’t even mentioned that he was a Transcendent.
That was because Eleanor simply hadn’t asked. She hadn’t realized that Scarface wasn’t just an ordinary gang thug.
In the end, Eleanor’s intelligence still can’t compare to my male servant’s. She’s stuck at the curly-haired baboon stage, just like me.
Wait, how did she figure out that Little Beth’s family was being threatened? Elisa’s expression stiffened.
We’re both curly-haired baboons, so how are you smarter than me?
Or did Eleanor receive some outside help?
No, that’s not the most important thing right now. As long as Eleanor isn’t stupid, she’ll realize that the previous attacker was very likely connected to me. There’s a good chance the male servant’s identity will be exposed.
Elisa thought for a while longer before hearing another voice from outside the door.
“Hehe, I really am getting paranoid. There’ve already been two attacks. There’s no way there’ll be a shitty third one, right?”
Elisa put on the [Thousand Faces] and pushed open the washroom door.
Rupert stared dumbfounded at the third person who had suddenly appeared.
“…You pieces of shit really think I’m that easy to bully?!” Rupert finally snapped and fought back, lunging at the third attacker in a single stride.
Elisa raised a hand, her palm curling as though grasping something invisible.
Rupert felt all the blood in his body seize up as an invisible force clenched around his heart. All his strength vanished in an instant, and he fell flat on his face.
He desperately tried to control his muscles and circulate his spirituality, but his body still refused to obey him.
Shit, she’s at least Rank Four or Five, practically a demigod!
How many lifetimes’ worth of bad luck have I accumulated?! This is the third time already! Someone this powerful could be put in charge of a small city outside the royal capital, so why are they coming after a nobody like me?!
“Please take good care of my students.” Elisa spoke in a low voice.
She thought that although Eleanor would never admit it, she might as well claim the title first. It would also protect Eleanor by keeping the people behind the scenes from setting their sights on her.
“It would be my honor.” Rupert forced a smile, completely abandoning any thought of investigating the two attackers.
The moment he remembered fighting the first attacker, a wave of lingering fear washed over him. Thank goodness he’d been completely helpless. If he’d actually managed to injure the guy, wouldn’t this powerhouse in front of him have torn him apart with her bare hands?
Come to think of it, those two really did seem like they’d been taught by the same teacher. They both loved looting money and wouldn’t even leave behind the smallest copper coin!
“Is there anything else you’re hiding?” Elisa asked again.
Rupert added a few more details, but the main points were the same as what he’d told Simon.
Elisa nodded and walked out of the tavern.
Instead of going back, she headed to the murder scene she’d visited earlier that day.
It was a secluded alley with not a single pedestrian in sight beneath the night sky. The road was unpaved, and the blood had long since been cleaned away.
She activated the [Blood] spell and discovered traces of dried blood in the cracks of a wall beside the road.
The dried blood turned into a thin crimson thread and floated above Elisa’s palm.
Elisa sighed.
Whether it was when Mabel came to me or when the male servant asked about it, I had no intention of getting involved. But now, staying out of this is no longer an option.
The male servant has already uncovered enough information to continue the investigation, and Eleanor is even less likely to give up. She’ll definitely keep taking risks and drag me into it along with her.
If I want to get my peaceful life back, I’ll have to cut through this mess quickly and decisively.
She flicked her finger and cast [Blood Trace]. As long as the killer hadn’t thoroughly cleansed their body and hadn’t left the royal capital, there was no escaping her pursuit.
The thread of blood spun around her fingertip, then went still.
I really can’t find it?
Elisa sighed again and tapped into the power of the divine artifact within her. Her spirituality drained rapidly, and her face turned pale.
The blood thread finally reacted, darting swiftly forward.
She followed it out of the East District and arrived at a cemetery on the outskirts of the city.
The blood thread circled around a corner of the cemetery.
Activating [Spirit Vision], Elisa finally saw her target.
It was a curly-haired baboon.
“โฆ…”
For some reason, I feel like I’m being mocked.
The curly-haired baboon noticed her and let out a soundless roar before lunging at her. Its razor-sharp claws stabbed toward her chest.
Elisa dodged aside and observed the baboon carefully.
It’s a spirit… No, a semi-spirit. No wonder no one ever saw it. No wonder [Blood Trace] didn’t work at first. It was those sharp claws that pierced straight through the victims.
I never would’ve guessed the killer was a Transcendent animal.
Since it’s an animal, figuring out its motive is going to be difficult. Maybe it simply acted on a whim and stabbed whoever it happened to come across.
Is it someone’s Transcendent pet? Or some kind of experimental subject? Its strength is around Rank Two, perhaps approaching Rank Three.
Whatever it is, now that it’s run into Miss Elisa, it’s used up all the luck it had in this lifetime.
Blood seeped from Elisa’s fingertip and formed a crimson arrow that shot straight through the spirit baboon’s body.
The baboon collapsed against a nearby gravestone, twitched twice, then slowly dissipated.
Only a single bone remained where it had been.
It was a finger bone.
A finger bone?!
Elisa quickly picked up the finger bone and examined it closely. It was the middle finger bone from a right hand, with spirituality surging within it, identical to the [Finger Bone] the male servant had handed over.
Elisa stared in astonishment. So I’ve been involved in this whole affair from the very beginning.
What exactly do these finger bones represent? If I collect all ten, can I summon an undead or something?
Putting away the second [Finger Bone], Elisa headed back toward the manor, still full of questions.
In any case, the murder case was solved now. She could tell the male servant to stop investigating, and any further investigation Eleanor carried out would amount to nothing more than playing detective.
On the way, she opened [Simon’s Log] to see what the male servant had done after leaving.
[Simon returned to the entrance of the East District, gave back the clothes he’d borrowed, retrieved the 2 shillings he’d left behind, and paid 6 pence as a cleaning fee.]
So those 2 shillings weren’t the price of the clothes. They were a deposit!1
The male servant’s frugality was very much to Elisa’s liking.
***
[Miss Elisa killed the spirit baboon and obtained the second Finger Bone.]
If there were such a thing as [Elisa’s Log], it would probably look something like that.
Lying on his bed at the manor, Simon felt a little regretful. Elisa’s rank was far too much higher than his. Planting a tracking device on her was already the limit; generating a log for her was completely impossible.
Besides, he had to write his own logs by hand now. He couldn’t exactly make Elisa write hers by hand too, could he?
Now that Elisa had two [Finger Bones], it shouldn’t be difficult to ask her for one back.
As for Eleanor, she’s probably starting to suspect Elisa by now. But at the moment, all she suspects is that Elisa hired someone to warn the gang. She might even suspect that hired thug was me.
Elisa will definitely play along with the misunderstanding, or rather, she would turn the truth itself to her advantage and push me into the spotlight.
In the royal capital, anyone who wants to enter the true center of power can’t do without the support of Transcendents.
My background is clean enough, and with my connections to Mabel and Eleanor, it should be easy for me to gain acceptance into their circle.
Besides, those two [Finger Bones] are the perfect ticket in.
As Simon was pondering this, Elisa’s location returned to the manor.
[Mirror Traversal] really is convenient.
He sat up and began reporting the situation to his “teacher”.
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