The light rain started in the afternoon and continued until the evening. It even became heavier and heavier. Shade hoped that the rain would stop before the night action, but until Dr. Schneider and Miss Louisa came to the door,
The rain is still pouring down.
The rainwater gathered into a curtain, hanging down from the eaves in front of Shade's house, like beads falling. The warm yellow gas lamp in the doorway was bright, blurred by the rain. In the strange halo, a doctor wearing rain boots stood in front of him.
On this humid night, we arrived at No. 6 Saint Teresa Square first, followed by Miss Louisa who came in a carriage.
"Good evening, Shade."
The doctor was surprised when she called Shade by his first name. But he said nothing. Middle-aged men would not care about the relationship between young people.
There were two targets tonight, Mr. Ponton from the special screw factory for steam engines in the east of the city, and Mr. Roosevelt, the accountant from the Star Grass Public Tobesk Nursing Home. After the three of them met, they compared the city map in Shade's study to plan their course of action.
.
Finally decided to go to the accountant Mr. Roosevelt first.
According to Mr. Schneider's investigation during the day today, the accountant lives in the nursing home during the weekdays and only goes home on Sundays. The Star Grass Nursing Home is closer to Saint Teresa Square.
With Dr. Schneider paying for it, the three of them got into a carriage and rushed to the nursing home. The rainy summer was extremely cool, and the city was silent amidst the sound of rain. The gas lights in the upper city and the candlelight in the lower city were all part of this era.
a part of.
Star Grass Nursing Home is a public nursing home, and of course, you need to pay some gold pounds to enter. The three of them got off the car at the intersection. Shade and Miss Louisa held umbrellas on both sides of the street to watch, and Dr. Schneider entered the nursing home alone.
There would be no pedestrians on such a rainy night, and the surroundings seemed to be surrounded by humid air and darkness. When Shade stood at the intersection and looked around, he also thought that if he peeped in the alley when he went to visit the girl Sophie last Saturday night,
The actions inside the door are like a horror story, so the current scene is probably very similar to a detective or spy novel.
It only took the blue-eyed doctor fifteen minutes to walk out of the nursing home wrapped in a coat. He seemed to have gone smoothly.
"I entered his dream and saw the things that the blood of mercury asked him to preserve. A black cloak, and a colorful biscuit box that must not be opened. The former cannot be exposed to sunlight, and I have an impression of the latter. Then
It’s a poet-level relic [the Cannibal Cookie Box], which can swallow living people and turn them into cookies. These are not what I’m looking for.”
He lowered his voice in the rain and waved to the two of them:
"I got other information in my dream. Roosevelt's accountant helped [Mercury Blood] sell stolen goods. I don't know anything about them. There are no more clues here. Let's go to the next target."
Dr. Schneider's ability to enter dreams is really very convenient for dealing with ordinary people.
Mr. Ponton, who owns a screw factory for steam engines in the east of the city, is not considered a powerful and wealthy man in a place like Tobesk. He has his own large house in the east district of Tobesk, which covers an area of about
Twice as much as the Shadd family.
This is a specialized residential area, and the people who can live here at least cross the bottom line of the so-called "middle class."
With Shade and Miss Louisa still standing guard outside, Dr. Schneider quickly climbed over the fence outside the yard and followed the gravel path to find the direction of the bedroom.
This time he came back faster. Shade had the [time perception] ability and accurately knew that it only took him two minutes and eighteen seconds.
Not only Shade was surprised, but also Miss Louisa was surprised by the doctor's quick action. The three of them held umbrellas and listened to the sound of rain. When they met at the door of Mr. Ponton's yard, Miss Louisa congratulated:
"Doctor, your thaumaturgy is getting better and better. It took ten minutes half an hour ago, but now you can get information from dreams in three minutes."
"What's getting worse? Something big happened..."
Thunder flashed across the air, and the sudden white light illuminated Miss Louisa's slightly wet hair, and illuminated the heavy expression of disbelief on Dr. Schneider's face.
Then, the rumble of thunder sounded from afar, and the sound seemed to shake the whole world.
Shade, who was also in the rain, looked at the dark street with his peripheral vision, and the hand holding the umbrella felt the tremor of the dense raindrops hitting the umbrella surface. The light of the gas street lamps on the street became even dimmer on the rainy night, and the light could only shrink in
In the small area under the street lights, you can't even see flying insects flying around the street lights.
Shade didn't like this kind of weather. Now he was very envious of the cat who could rest on the windowsill listening to the sound of rain in a warm and dry home.
The doctor ignored the fact that it was still raining and pointed to the mansion in the night rain behind him. Shade came back to his senses and looked over with Miss Louisa:
"Everyone inside is dead."
Generally speaking, correspondence magicians will not take the initiative to get involved in troublesome things that have nothing to do with themselves. But for the [Fake Philosopher's Stone], the five people in the group almost faced the evil god directly at Lakeview Manor, and now even if they are inside
Even if everyone is dead, the doctor will not give up on the investigation.
On the contrary, the death of an ordinary person related to the blood of mercury just shows that he is very likely to have important clues.
In order to prevent the Orthodox Church from causing trouble for "destroying the crime scene", before entering the house with only dead people, the doctor prepared shoe covers, gloves and hats for everyone, and Miss Louisa tied the long hair with a rope.
Tie up his hair. Of course they couldn't predict what would happen tonight, but according to the doctor, it was his habit to carry these things when going out.
It was hard for Shade to imagine what kind of "big things" Dr. Schneider had done.
The house is divided into three floors. Just now, the doctor climbed in through the window. But now that they were sure that there was no living person inside, they entered directly through the front door. Instead of using thaumaturgy or magic to open the lock, the female writer stabbed several people with hairpins.
Next, the lock is opened.
After entering the front door, moisture immediately poured into the house. The house was dark, and suddenly another thunder pierced the night sky. In the light of lightning, they saw a woman dressed as a servant lying in the hall, with a black body underneath her.
A huge stain of blood.
"He has been dead for at least two hours."
The psychiatrist knelt down to examine the body. Shade and Miss Louisa hid their umbrellas in the shadows beside the door and walked into the house. They closed the door to block the sound of the rain and prevent passers-by from finding clues.
The psychiatrist's autopsy skills were also quite good. He then used the dim light in his hand to examine the fatal injuries. The light spell was indeed a very common spell:
"A weapon similar to a short knife was stabbed directly into the heart, killing him with one blow. The technique was very sophisticated."
"Could it be that the dagger-like relics he kept were out of control?"
Because of the "fish scale" incident last week, Shade thought of this possibility, and Miss Louisa seemed to have the same view.
"This possibility cannot be ruled out..."
The doctor looked at the darkness around him and asked:
"Does your other self sense the whispering element?"
Shade and Miss Louisa both made a gesture of listening:
"No."
Both of them said.
But this doesn't mean anything. Even if the relic is out of control, the element will not be felt even 800 miles away. The last time they faced the fish-man, Shade and Miss Louisa got it after seeing that guy.
prompt.
Dr. Schneider stepped aside, and Shade and Miss Louisa stepped forward to inspect the body. But they could not find anything. Shade's fingertips shone with a faint silver light, and under the light, he looked at the corpse with dead eyes.
Thinking of something in his mind, he blinked. Although the moisture of the rain pouring in from outside the door diluted the smell of blood, he could still see very faint traces of blood in the air, extending toward the inside of the house.
There is no reason why the knife used as the murder weapon should not be stained with blood.
Then he tried the thaumaturgy [Echoes of the Past], but unfortunately all he heard were messy fragments of life. This kind of place where people live is not a good setting for this spell to be effective.
"Did you see blood?"
Seeing Shade's eyes staring forward, the blonde girl, who had worked with Shade once, asked softly.
Shade nodded, and while Miss Louisa was explaining to the doctor, he turned to look at the door, and lowered his voice to cover up the sound of rain outside:
"There is no blood stain in the direction of the door, and the blood stain extends to the inside of the house. This shows that the possible murderer continued inward after committing the murder here and never came back."
He analyzed in a low voice.
"As expected of a detective!"
Dr. Schneider also lowered his voice and patted Shade on the shoulder:
"Very good, then follow the direction of the bloodstains. We have destroyed the scene, so if we can't find the [Fake Philosopher's Stone], write down the clues we found and leave them here. The church will also know about us.
Not all correspondence magicians are troublemakers."
Doing so is actually causing trouble.
Shade was in front, the doctor walked beside Shade, and Miss Louisa was at the end. Under the silver moonlight on Shade's fingertips and the sound of rain getting louder outside, they continued to go deeper into the house.
The second body was found in the restaurant. A fifteen-year-old boy was lying on the dining table. After careful inspection, it was found that this time his neck was directly severed by a sharp weapon.
"There is no confusion around the blood stain, which means that after the knife was brought here, it killed him with one blow and then left immediately, so the trajectory of the knife was not mixed up nearby."
Shade said, turning around and looking at the restaurant. Except around the body, there were no obvious blood stains left today. The murderer did not stop here.
"The killing techniques are very sophisticated."
Miss Louisa remarked, looking around the dimly lit kitchen while the doctor examined the corpse.
"Look, there are actually two sets of silverware here. It's really rich. No, it's not ordinary silverware, this is..."
When she opened the cupboard, the blonde girl frowned.
"An antique from the Nolov dynasty? This factory owner still has this?"
