While Cecil was having a headache over the new player, the Storm Inquisition, on the floor below, a guest room door stood wide open.
Xia'an crouched by the door. After checking the keyhole and the doorframe, she stood up and patted the dust off her gloves.
There were no signs of forced entry.
No signs of a struggle.
And no residual supernatural power.
This room was clean to a fault.
The curtains were only drawn halfway, allowing the gloomy daylight to spill onto the carpet.
A faint scent of soap still lingered in the air, and the water glass on the table had dried up, leaving a thin ring of dust at the bottom.
Not long ago, this place had belonged to that Landon girl named Ophelia.
However, the name in the hotel registry was not Ophelia Moore, but Irene Adler.
Neither of them could figure out where she could have gone. After all, she was just an ordinary person who had never consumed a supernatural potion or constructed any Rational Circuits.
“Where do you think she could have gone?”
Xia'an straightened her back and casually brushed off the floating dust on her fingertips.
She stood quietly in front of Ophelia's leather suitcase, staring blankly at the few change of dresses and the somewhat faded, starched shirts scattered inside.
“After returning from the sea, this girl didn't even come back to the hotel. She just slipped away directly.”
The girl with pale yellow hair put her hands on her hips, pursed her lips, and sighed.
“She's certainly extremely vigilant.”
“If ordinary reporters all had this level of counter-reconnaissance awareness, those gossip tabloids in Landon would probably have gone out of business long ago.”
“I don't know.”
Dabu answered with absolute sincerity, directly addressing Xia'an's first question with those three words.
The tall boy was crouching by the round wooden table, nimbly pulling spellcasting tools out of his heavy toolbox.
“But we will know very soon.”
Dabu mumbled in a muffled voice as he fished a small glass vial out of his inner pocket.
As he spoke, he produced a small vial of glow-amber, some ashes, a map of Hastings Port, and a single strand of Ophelia's hair.
The long strand of hair, wrapped in a paper packet, was something he had just found in the crease of a pillow.
Dabu smoothed out the map, weighing down its four corners with cups.
Then, he placed the hair in the center of the map, mixed the ashes with the ground glow-amber, and sprinkled them to form a closed ring around the hair.
With everything ready, Dabu pulled a box of matches from his pocket and struck one with a sharp scritch, lighting it.
A faint, steady orange flame flared up. The flickering light illuminated their young faces, casting giant shadows on the mottled walls.
Xia'an took half a step back and casually closed the window.
“Don't set the hotel on fire.”
“It's just a match.”
“That's what you said last time, too.”
Dabu pretended not to hear.
Closing his eyes, Dabu channeled the flowing spirituality within his body and rapidly chanted an official low-tier prayer:
“Watcher of the Origin Web, Weaver of all laws, Goddess of Mysteries and Knowledge...”
“I pray here for clarity of thought, the integrity of my Rational Circuit, and the manifestation of the arcane path.”
As the incantation left his lips, the powder on the ground began to move on its own, without any wind.
“Grant me humility before the unknown, keep me rational amidst power, and let me discern the correct laws among the chaotic echoes.”
“With a heart seeking knowledge as my proof, I seek Your gaze and favor.”
“I wish to know where Ophelia Moore of Landon is.”
The moment the last syllable fell, Dabu flicked his finger, and the flame of the slender match abruptly turned a ghastly blue.
The match quickly went out, and without a single pause in his movements, Dabu drove it straight into the pile of ashes.
“Buzz—”
Accompanied by a low hum that only transcendents could hear, a wave of blue arcane energy was channeled by spirituality, instantly activating above the map.
The blue arcane energy flowed along the ring, and the smoke drifted without any wind, slowly condensing into a thin line that stretched toward the eastern side of the map.
The thin line crossed several streets and finally stopped near the East Bank commercial district.
“Huh?”
Xia'an raised her pretty eyebrows. Looking in the direction where the smoke settled, she let out a soft exclamation of surprise.
“Liberty Department Store?”
Saying that, she shook her head, immediately dismissing the possibility.
“That's highly unlikely.”
“A female reporter who is currently being hunted down across the city by Wayland would have to be completely out of her mind to run to a crowded department store where eyes are everywhere.”
Unless she felt her wanted poster wasn't printed clearly enough.
“Ms. Cecil said that Mr. Rockland arranged for her to publish an extremely important report.”
Dabu picked up a pencil and drew a circle around the area pointed to by the ashes.
“Where do you think fits that condition?”
Xia'an's gaze moved downward along the map.
Department store.
Warehouses.
Cargo terminals.
Further south was a dense cluster of factories.
Both of them looked up at the same time.
“Pellis Printing House!”
Their voices overlapped almost perfectly.
“We're on the same page.”
Xia'an snapped the suitcase shut with a sharp click.
“We have to hurry.”
She rolled up the map and stuffed it back into Dabu's toolbox without the slightest hesitation.
“Question: What happens if we leave an ordinary person, whom Wayland considers a thorn in their side, wandering around outside?”
Without waiting for Dabu's reply, the girl with pale yellow hair answered her own question:
“Answer: She's probably not far from being captured, or being thrown into the sea to feed the fish by Wayland's armed lackeys.”
The two of them quickly left the room.
A few minutes later, an official carriage bearing the emblem of the Seventh Agency drove out of the Coast Hotel, passing through the still-uncleaned streets and heading straight for the East Bank of Hastings Port.
The disaster-stricken city had not yet restored order.
Tarpaulins covered the walls collapsed by the sea-folk, and charred wooden beams were piled up by the roadside.
The carriage was blocked several times by convoys transporting the wounded and building materials.
The range provided by the divination was not precise.
This kind of low-Scale divination could only determine a general direction.
The greater the distance, the blurrier the results. If there was a large amount of spiritual interference near the target, the deviation would expand even further.
Therefore, once they reached the East Bank, they would still have to rely on spirit-measuring instruments, residual scents, and on-site inquiries to continue their search.
Before long, the carriage came to a slow halt at the corner of a side alley that reeked of pungent printer's ink.
“Hey, why was the boss so annoyed when Ms. Cecil reassigned us?”
The two got out of the carriage. Dabu, carrying his various gear on his back, asked in confusion as they walked along the muddy gravel road.
The "boss" he referred to was Sir Vere, the leader of their investigation team.
Xia'an scanned the intersection first after getting off.
“When is he ever not annoyed?”
“This time is different.”
Dabu recalled carefully.
“Sir Vere's face back then looked as if his salary had been docked.”
“I don't know.”
Xia'an replied succinctly.
After walking a few steps, she added:
“But I can guess why.”
“What do you mean?”
Dabu frowned.
He was highly sharp when it came to combat, spells, and machinery.
But when it came to office politics and hidden dynamics, his reaction was always a beat too slow.
“Silly.”
Xia'an pulled her hat brim down, observing the display windows of the shops on both sides as she walked.
“The one who told the two of us to go find Mr. Rockland that night was the chief, right?”
“And who gave that order?”
Just as Dabu was about to speak, Xia'an added:
“I mean, the formal order.”
“The Director.”
“Exactly.”
Xia'an spread her hands, nimbly sidestepping a small puddle on the ground.
“Deputy Director Taylor originally suggested inviting Mr. Rockland to the branch.”
“But the Director refused.”
“The chief felt there was something fishy about that.”
She paused at an alley entrance, and only continued forward after confirming they weren't being followed.
“Think about it. The chief is both a noble and a captain.
“He's been in the Seventh Agency's system for so long, so he knows exactly how those big shots play their office politics by shifting leverage.”
“Reasonably speaking, Mr. Rockland is just an informant.”
A free transcendent who follows the pathway of the Moon Lord, who doesn't even have official establishment standing.
“Yet the Director directly ordered the boss to protect Mr. Rockland.”
The young investigator whispered to Dabu while keeping a vigilant eye on their surroundings:
“Although we don't know if the Director did this because he highly values him or for some other reason...”
“But the boss definitely believes that once something goes wrong with this person, the entire mess will become his personal responsibility.”
This kind of special care, which falls completely outside standard procedures and is based entirely on the personal will of the higher-ups, usually ends up with the frontline captain taking the fall if anything goes wrong.
“But the Director made him go anyway.”
“And the Director's attitude toward the boss has always been a bit... well...”
“That subtle attitude mixed with aristocratic factions and power plays, you know?”
Xia'an gave Dabu a knowing look, a gossipy smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.
Dabu stopped in his tracks, gripping his toolbox.
He thought about it.
“Know what?”
Rate on N.U.
