Mystery: Mr. Witch and Ms. Hunter

Chapter 386 Union
Leila put down her work and went to Adele's desk.

"This is the scene I got from divination."

Adele took down a picture obtained through ritual magic from her desk. It was a picture of the outer perimeter of the house where Sothoth was as seen in the magic mirror divination.

"The Intis spy I killed lived here. He might have left a key magical item in this house. Now you must gather your forces, find this house in Berens Harbor, and surround it with two layers of defense."

This is the search mode commonly used by Loen's official Beyonders. Ordinary police and low-sequence Beyonders will initially block the crime scene of important Beyonders, and then secretly assign mid- and high-sequence Beyonders to ambush possible accomplices of suspects.

“Can I apply for assistance from the church?”

Leila hesitated for a moment. After all, as a wild extraordinary person who had been captured and taken underground by official personnel, she felt a little uncomfortable suddenly cooperating with the official.

"Of course, we are very short of manpower right now." Adele nodded, "Even the church can hardly give you much help, so you must pay attention to your own safety. Do as much as you can with the number of people you have, understand?"

After all, she was working for the government. Now that she knew that one of the people in contact with Sothoth was Nebuchadnezzar, who was at least Sequence Five, Adele would naturally not allow Leila, a Sequence Eight, to participate in the subsequent ambush mission.

"I understand." Leila nodded, took the picture from Adele, and looked at it carefully for a while, as if she wanted to remember the appearance of the house completely in her mind.

"It doesn't matter if no one shows up. We can seal off the house with the help of a Beyonder from the Church. The people from the Church of Mother Earth know how to properly handle those things."

Adele continued to instruct, "If you are not accompanied by someone from the church, do not rush in by yourself. Just fence off the house and wait for me to come back and deal with it."

"I understand." Leila agreed without trying to show off. Then she asked Adele curiously, "You just said, 'Wait for you to come back'?"

"Yes, I plan to go back to Indo Port. Gagran asked me to find a craftsman to recast the 'whitewashed wall' and transform it into a simple and portable magical item. Once the transformation is completed, I can travel freely between the northern and southern continents."

Adele didn't intend to hide anything and told Leila everything about her next plans.

"So, Gaglan...really became an angel?"

Leila, who had heard some rumors, whispered to Adele, "I feel like you've become much more relaxed recently, as if someone is backing you up."

"Am I being so obvious?"

Adele didn't deny it. She touched her chin and asked back, which was taken as her consent.

However, after Leila mentioned this, Adele realized that she had indeed been much more relaxed during this period. When she was working on the privateering ship, she had always been thinking that the results of the looting were closely related to Emlyn's position. She always felt like there was a stone pressing on her heart. Now that she has Gegran as her backer, the stone has finally fallen to the ground.

"It's too obvious."

Leila curled her lips and said, "I've seen it since I first met you. You just have too many things in your heart."

"Because you have too many things in your mind, there are also many things that need to be balanced. If I stay around you for a long time, I will be inexplicably infected by your stress and become irritable."

"Really?" Adele smiled and didn't take it too seriously. "Thank you for your reminder. I'll pay attention to it next time... maybe."

……

Meanwhile, at Indo Harbour, the Longshoremen’s Assn.

During the implementation of the economic recovery plan for the Jianhai region, the area once regained its former prosperity, but soon it was reduced to its original state due to the re-closure of the port and suddenly became depressed and dilapidated.

Of the seven wooden hybrid ships purchased by Queen Island Shipping Company, only three, "Justice", "Spirituality" and "Sacrifice", are still operating as cargo ships. The other passenger ships are out of service and swaying gently with the waves at the dock.

Vinata wore a thick sweater, a black jacket with a lapel, and a simple soft hat, making her look more like a worker than the head of a multinational company or the biggest local gang leader - this outfit cost her a full six horns.

At this time, she did not wear any extra jewelry, only a "Rose Heart" necklace hidden inside her sweater, and her wheat-colored face was somewhat pale due to the cold wind from Feysac.

The people who followed her this time did not include those ferocious family members. After all, she was not going to cause trouble this time, so she only asked the gentle-looking Azik Eggers to go with her to the dock workers' union to listen to the basic demands of the workers.

Looking at the two-story building in front of her, Vinata crossed the street while talking to Azik Eggers beside her.

"Have you ever experienced something similar when you were in Loen? If so, I'd like to hear your advice."

Vinata asked a little awkwardly. Although she didn't know much about the background of this middle-aged gentleman from Loen, Azik's temperament always reminded her of her university lecturer, so she often subconsciously used honorifics during the conversation.

"Unfortunately, when I was in Loon, I was just an ordinary university lecturer, and the small town where I lived didn't have that many workers, so neither unions nor marches occurred very often."

Azik shook his head and replied in a gentle voice.

When I was the Archon of Death in the Balam Empire, I had experience dealing with similar issues...

Azik answered, thinking to himself.

Although there were no labor unions or strikes during the Balam Empire, there were rebels and slave uprisings. However, under the rule of Azik, who was a man of few human feelings at the time, some of these people were pulled to build the pyramids, while others were directly used as consumables to build the pyramids. This was obviously not an experience that Venata could learn from...

"Is that so? That's really..."

Vinata hesitated for a moment and didn't know what adjective to use here. It seemed a little wrong to use the word "regret" that there had never been a workers' march in the other party's hometown.

"……never mind."

However, Vinata did not hesitate for long, because she realized that these were just small matters. Even if there was a problem with her rhetoric, Mr. Azik was not her university teacher and would not correct these details, and she would not deduct points from his GPA.

She pushed open the door and found that the layout of the union was quite simple. The receptionist was an elderly-looking lady who was sitting by the stairs leading to the second floor, knitting a sweater. On both sides were corridors filled with offices. There were no wooden boards on the floor, let alone blankets, and there was not even cement masonry.

Vinata lowered the brim of her hat slightly, walked over to the lady who looked to be in her forties or fifties and said:

"I'm Vinata Sevens, the director of Queen Island Shipping Company, and this is my assistant, Azik Eggers. We made an appointment to meet today."

The lady was wearing a coat with many patches and dirty cotton showing at some corners, and she was only wearing a linen shirt underneath.

The yarn she used to knit her sweaters was of poor quality, and Vinata could even smell the pungent smell of the dye.

After hearing the title "Director of Queen Island Shipping Company", she became visibly flustered.

"Well, then you should go find Mr. Mosley, he's our publicity committee member. Turn left, it's the third room on the left."

"Thank you."

Venata did not demand a calmer reaction from the other party. After becoming a Sequence 6 Beyonder, she naturally had some extraordinary qualities. Sometimes, she could even suppress ordinary people with her aura alone. She bowed slightly and gestured for Azik to follow.

She walked slowly to the door of the room and knocked on the door of the corresponding room.

Knock knock knock, the knocks on the door echoed in the corridor, but no one answered in the room.

"Isn't he in the room?"

Vinata raised her voice and called to the lady in the hall with some confusion.

"Mr. Mosley has difficulty walking, so he probably doesn't go out casually."

The lady was also a little surprised. "I have the key here. I'll take you in first."

Vinata took two steps forward, took the brass key from the other person's hand, and walked to Mosley's door to open it.

However, just as the door was about to open, Vinata heard a subtle "bang". She often heard this kind of sound in Feysac's army. It was the sound of the tripwire of the booby trap being broken!

If it were an ordinary Beyonder, at such a close distance, even if they had the ability to protect themselves, they would not have had time to react. But Venata was now a Sequence 6 Conspirator, and her ability to control fire was no longer comparable to that of a Sequence 7 Arsonist, so even though she didn't have a Stand or similar abilities, she wouldn't be caught off guard.

At the moment when the flames and high-temperature gases of the explosion spread, Vinata had already pushed her left hand that was pressing on the door forward, exerting her enhanced ability to manipulate flames.

Although the flame manipulation of the "Arsonist" and the flame manipulation of the "Magician" have the same name, the former has a higher upper limit, and the flame temperature that can be controlled and the degree of control over the flame shape are far superior to the latter.

After being promoted to Sequence Six, the "Conspirator" can even control the high-temperature air generated by the explosion. He can manipulate, shape, and heat molten metal, high-temperature air, and other fluids with flame properties, achieving more incredible operations.

The flames and shock waves of the explosion only tore the door panel in front of Vinata, and then stopped briefly in front of Vinata. Vinata could even see the dazzling ball of fire rolling in front of her, as if there was an invisible wall in front of her fingers.

Then, Vinata clenched her left hand into a fist and compressed the fireball produced by the explosion a little further inward until it was the size of a washbasin, allowing her to see the situation in the room clearly.

In the room, a man with sparse hair was hanging from the ceiling, his eyes bulging out, his face was bruised and there was a large dark yellow stain on his pants. It was obvious that he was not going to survive.

Vinata sighed, slowly compressed her fingers inward, and clenched her fist completely. The hot fireball that she pushed back was directly extinguished with a "puff" sound.

Seeing that Vinata solved the explosion by herself, Azik quietly took his hand out of his trouser pocket and pretended to be confused when Vinata turned around.

"what's going on?!"

The lady in the hallway screamed, quickly put down her sweater and ran towards the two of them, but was blocked by Azik who took a step forward.

"There has been a murder here. Please notify the police and the church..."

Azik was about to ask the other party to notify the police and the church, but then he remembered that the church's Beyonders had already evacuated Indo Port, so he quickly stopped talking.

"Just go to the dock and find the police. If there's no one there, go to the shipping company and find Ms. Anne."

At this time, the residents who heard the noise opened the office doors one after another. Those who were closer saw the corpse in the room and immediately screamed, attracting more residents. A group of ragged poor people surrounded Vinata and the other person.

Vinata felt that she had dressed as close to the poor people in the dock area as possible, but now surrounded by these poor people, she realized that her understanding of these residents might have been too optimistic.

In her impression, the residents of Feysac were still the same as before the war. Although they were not rich, they could at least maintain basic food and clothing due to the vast land and sparse population and low level of industrialization.

However, the trauma left by the war on the residents of Feysac was obviously far beyond her expectations. After the defeat, she was directly abandoned by the army and left in Backlund. She ended up staying in the victorious country, and her understanding of the situation of the defeated country was ultimately limited.

Feysac's original economic situation was not as good as Loen and Intis. Under the coercion of the two countries, it participated in the world war in the northern continent, which triggered a serious economic crisis. Nearly one-third of the population became refugees and hooligans, and even picked up food from garbage cans to fill their stomachs.

Initially, in order to persuade the military-age people in the country to join the army, Feysac promised quite generous national welfare before the war, including disability insurance and retirement insurance.

However, after the war, with the tacit approval of the Einhorn family, the administrative authorities demonized the marching group composed of veterans, teachers, workers, etc., claiming that they received seven or eight times the compensation of other countries but were ungrateful. However, according to the laws of Feysac, they would not receive the compensation until seven years later, but those disabled veterans could hardly survive even one year, let alone seven years.

For a Beyonder like Venata who knew about the doomsday prophecy and knew that there were less than five years left until the predicted end of the world, the empty promises made by the Feysac government would only sound more ironic.

(End of this chapter)