Minor inconvenience

Here’s the chapter. I managed to post it earlier than I thought I would. I spent the whole night finishing up my company work, so I took the opportunity to write during the breaks as well.

I just finished now—it’s 6:01—and I’m going to sleep. I’ll take advantage of the fact that today is Saturday and tomorrow is Sunday to just rest and stay relaxed.

Especially since I managed to get my NP6 Draco with 900 SQ + 10 tickets. Happiness squared, I’d say.

Anyway, if you want to read 3/7/13 chapters ahead, or just support me, that’s possible on my (P)(A)(T). If not, I still thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading—thank you very much!

With that said, good night and happy reading!

[...]---[...]

[Mr. Fool]: How much of all this was just a bluff on your part? I want to know if I fell into some elaborate plan or if I just took the most obvious bait in the world.

[The Streamer]: In %?

[Mr. Fool]:

[The Streamer]: I’d say somewhere between 31.28% and 44.61%. I had a few things to go on when I considered that you might be a transmigrator.

[Mr. Fool]: What the hell are those absurdly specific numbers?!

[Mr. Fool]: But I’m glad—it’s lower than I expected. Guess I’m not that dumb after all.

[Mr. Fool]: What’s that part about my soul being different from Fors’s?

[The Streamer]: It is what it is. I don’t know much—the fog didn’t let me see much.

[The Streamer]: Put simply, it’s like your soul isn’t entirely suited to your body. The best example would be a freshly peeled boiled egg placed into a slightly smaller circular mold.

[Mr. Fool]: …

[Mr. Fool]: I don’t know whether to feel offended or applaud that example. It’s weirdly easy to understand.

[The Streamer]: Wouldn’t “I don’t know whether to laugh or cry” be better?

[Mr. Fool] Just because I’m Chinese, you think I’m some walking stereotype?!

[The Streamer]: ¯\(ツ)/¯

[Mr. Fool]: Back to the part about my soul still adapting to my body… is that noticeable? I mean, you noticed it, but could other people, like Beyonders, notice it too?

[The Streamer]: And how exactly do you expect me to answer that?!

[The Streamer]: I was in your world for less than ten minutes. And not even exactly your world, since it was that bizarre place with that strange fog.

[The Streamer]: What even is that place, anyway?

[Mr. Fool]: Good question… when I figure it out myself, I’ll let you know.

Jinn kept guiding me while my attention was split. Not that splitting my focus like this was difficult or tiring, but I let her lead since she seemed to be enjoying herself.

She stopped at various random stalls and bought little things here and there, no matter what they were.

For now, I’d dropped the concealment on the Slick Cane and my nightmare energy. Both so Jinn could interact freely with whoever she wanted and because I was testing how the new “abilities,” so to speak, I’d acquired worked.

I found out I could use Spirit Vision in a more internal way, seeing people’s emotions more precisely than if I interpreted them through what I saw reflected on their bodies.

There were nuances too—blended colors whose meanings I understood more instinctively, like an extra bonus from the abilities I’d gained.

It was, effectively, a skill I already had.

I could feel negative emotions with my nightmare energy. Along with Echo Humanitatis, I could sense practically any emotion, though it mostly affected humans.

The same went for the Chalice: I received the information present in the blood of everyone around me. But it was largely human, thanks to Echo Humanitatis, and vaguely divine due to Divine Anathema—not that I’d tested that part much.

Over time, as the Chalice evolved and absorbed more blood from different species, that would improve. But for now, Spirit Vision was a welcome addition, since I knew that as long as what I was looking at had a soul, I could see its emotions.

That is, of course, not counting magical, metaphysical, spiritual defenses and whatever else might exist. Still, it was good.

For example: when a person felt arousal/lust or saw something they found extremely attractive to the point of triggering it, the color that appeared was a vivid, almost bubbling red, with specks of yellow mixed in, representing the agitation of instinct.

It usually appeared in the lower abdomen, just above the pelvis and slightly below the navel.

I saw plenty of those—from both men and women—generally directed at Jinn, especially when she bent over to look at something at a stall.

I also found that a pale white color represented shock; yellowish pigmentation along the edges indicated the instinctive reflex of self-preservation and survival, usually appearing near the stomach and at the base of the spine.

That color would usually appear in people’s soul aura when they noticed me right after looking at Jinn and then saw me staring at them.

Jinn, meanwhile, seemed quite amused and a bit smug whenever that happened.

I was seriously tempted to buy a paddle I’d seen a few shops back… Did I have something like that in my Voidbag? Probably. I’d have to check later.

To be honest, I’d thrown so much stuff in there that I didn’t even know exactly what I had anymore.

I’d been putting off organizing my inventory—inventory of my inventory, which was always a stupid phrase—hoping that at some point an update would do it automatically and give me something like a hotbar.

I let out a sigh and flicked her forehead, making her giggle and keep walking, pulling me along by the hand.

The conversation with Mr. Fool was still going, actually…

[The Streamer]: By the way, what’s your name?

[Mr. Fool]: Which one?

[The Streamer]: We usually have just one.

[Mr. Fool]: We usually have just one body too…

[Mr. Fool]: My original body’s name is Zhou Mingrui. This body’s is Klein Moretti.

[The Streamer]: And Mr. Fool?

[Mr. Fool]: I only use that one in the Tarot Club. But it’s another name too, now that I think about it. I’ve picked up a few without noticing…

[The Streamer]: Is that your scammer name?

[Mr. Fool]: Let’s go with “persona.” Sounds nicer. Scammer doesn’t sit well.

[The Streamer]: … How many?

[Mr. Fool]: With Fors? …Two more people.

[The Streamer]: And (CHAT)?

[Mr. Fool]: I didn’t count those.

[The Streamer]: Fair.

[The Streamer]: So what should I call you? Mr. Fool in public, and here?

[Mr. Fool]: Doesn’t really matter. I’m both Zhou Mingrui and Klein Moretti at this point. Separating one from the other feels like it would just cause problems.

[The Streamer]: Zhou Moretti or Klein Mingrui?

[Mr. Fool]: That sounds like shit. Just call me Klein—it’s my current body anyway…

[The Streamer]: …Let me ask you something.

[The Streamer]: On a scale from 0 to 10, how much did you actually want to end up in that situation?

[Mr. Fool]: I did a ritual to boost my luck and woke up possessing a still-warm suicide victim in a world with no internet, insane powers, and monsters.

[Mr. Fool]: I’m also broke.

[Mr. Fool]: About a 3/10. Could be worse.

[The Streamer]: Yeah… that’s rough.

[Mr. Fool]: That’s actually a situation where I’d say “I don’t know whether to laugh or cry,” but I’ve kind of come to terms with it.

[Mr. Fool]: What about you?

[The Streamer]: How much did I want to end up in this situation?

[Mr. Fool]: Yeah.

[Mr. Fool]: I didn’t have time to watch the recommended VODs, but I saw you weren’t originally from that world—I think it’s called Terraria.

[Mr. Fool]: From 0 to 10, what would you give it? How did you even end up there?

[The Streamer]: Well, I went to sleep after a tiring morning at work and got kidnapped. I woke up with just the clothes on my back, my phone, and a pack of Halls in an alien world.

[The Streamer]: I also became public entertainment, like some zoo animal. I’ve kind of gotten used to that part.

[The Streamer]: I’ve almost died a few… dozen times? I don’t think it’s reached the hundreds yet.

[The Streamer]: I think my cortisol levels are sometimes high enough to kill half the planet if they were exposed, but aside from that? Honestly, it’s not that bad anymore.

[The Streamer]: About a 5/10.

[The Streamer] If it weren’t for the people I’ve met and the friends I’ve made—I really do appreciate them—I’d drop that to around 1/10.

[The Streamer]: Oh, and I have no hope of going back home. I’ll probably die miserably to some eldritch horror too, but it is what it is.

[Mr. Fool]: …

[Mr. Fool]: …Yeah, that’s rough.

[Mr. Fool]: But hey, look on the bright side—you still have your real body!

[Mr. Fool]: I’d say we should grab a drink sometime, but we’re in different worlds and I’m broke.

[The Streamer]: We can set something up if the opportunity ever comes.

[The Streamer]: For some reason, I’ve got quite a few of those drinking meetups lined up.

[Mr. Fool]: …Isn’t that kind of sad?

[The Streamer]: It is what it is ¯\(ツ)/¯

[The Streamer]: Actually, give me a second.

Shifting my focus away from the private (CHAT) and Klein’s messages, I pulled up the stream settings and tried to send a box of gold bars.

I had a few of those ready, since gold was useful as a form of currency in pretty much every world.

I didn’t worry about where Klein was, since the box would arrive as a message, and from what little I’d seen, he didn’t seem like someone dumb enough to pull it out of the Stream in the middle of the street.

If nothing else, I wanted to help the guy just because our situations were so similar.

The problem was—I couldn’t:

[Gift Sending: BLOCKED — Viewer “Mr. Fool” World | Integrity Preservation Measure]

I blinked, staring at the stream message.

What the fuck?… That’s new.

I’d sent items to Stark—in freaking MARVEL. To Rin, in the godforsaken world of FATE.

What kind of hellhole was this guy living in?!

[The Streamer]: Your world is a fucking mess.

[Mr. Fool]: And what’s that supposed to mean out of nowhere?!

[The Streamer]: It’s nothing.

[The Streamer]: Next time you summon me, I’ll leave some gold bars for you to help out—or money converted into pounds and solis.

[Mr. Fool]: How’d you know that?

[Mr. Fool]: Ah, the pig that converts currencies!

[Mr. Fool]: I wasn’t going to ask, but since you offered, I’ll take it.

[Mr. Fool]: Thanks!!!

[Mr. Fool]: (｡´∀｀)ﾉ

[The Streamer]: ( 。・_・。)人(。・_・。 )

Just as I was about to send another message, I froze when I felt something.

Jinn noticed immediately, since she suddenly couldn’t keep pulling me along and gave a small tug when she tried to keep walking and I didn’t move.

“Devas?” She turned, the smile on her face fading. “Did something happen?”

“There’s…” I replied, slightly expanding my senses to confirm. “A dead body a few blocks from here. In a small park, almost a kilometer north.”

Her brow furrowed.

“Someone you know? Something involving John or the church?”

“No, but…” I let out a sigh. “It’s better if I show you. Let’s go.”

I nodded, gripping the Slick Cane in my right hand as I moved ahead, parting through the crowd as people unconsciously stepped aside without slowing us down.

We got there quickly. The sign read: [Asser Levy Park]

The park was supposedly closed, but there were no gates or fences, so that was just in theory. I could see a few scattered groups and couples here and there, spaced far apart.

Mostly people who looked like they’d come from the fair, with a very gothic and emo style.

I walked toward a more isolated area, where the already sparse movement was almost nonexistent. I doubted anyone would stumble across the body until morning.

Maybe one of the couples would come here to hook up, but that was unlikely.

A few meters ahead, in a clearing between the trees, was the scene.

The body of a girl who didn’t look older than twenty. She was nineteen—I knew that. The dried blood that had run from the cuts on her throat, wrists, and the soles of her bare feet told me so.

Chloe Miller. That was her name.

She was laid out in the center of a crude circle made with what looked like a mix of red spray paint and chicken and pig blood. The Chalice had already tasted those animals’ blood, so I knew it was theirs.

There were black candles scattered around and a half-open book tossed behind a rock.

The girl wore a black velvet corset and a short black skirt, along with torn tights.

Several silver chains adorned her wrists, glinting under the purple light of the Shadowflame I conjured to make things easier to see for those watching the stream.

Her skin was pale, and she wore typical gothic makeup: black lipstick, heavy eyeliner, and a light foundation that made her look even paler—almost corpse-like.

Her arms were spread open, mimicking a crucifixion on the park’s dirty ground.

At the center of her chest, where the corset was open and exposed her breasts, a crooked ceremonial-looking dagger was embedded. Around it, four lit black candles flickered faintly. Something ritualistic, with the scent of incense and some blend of herbs.

The smell of the candles did a decent job masking the metallic scent of blood.

Beneath her, the pentagram drawn on the ground had its points wrong and was crooked. The runic symbols around it were nothing but meaningless scribbles, like they’d been copied from some random horror movie.

I’d admit it was visually convincing at first glance, but anyone paying attention—and with even a basic understanding of occultism, even as a hobby or from casual research—would realize it was all complete nonsense.

“Is that… a ritual?” Jinn murmured beside me, her expression turning somber at the sight of the dead girl. “It looks… wrong.”

I didn’t have time to answer. A message appeared in front of me, emerging from a small magic circle that formed in the air:

[CrimsonSatan]The ritual is fake. None of the symbols match—it’s clearly staged.

I nodded, flicking Sirzechs’ message aside.

“As our resident Satan said, it’s fake,” I said, tightening my grip on the Slick Cane as I looked around. I walked over to the book. “The black candles, the fake symbol half-done with spray paint, even the book. It’s all theater.”

I crouched and pointed at it, reading the cover out loud:

“Diary of Lilith’s Daughters…” I flipped through the pages—they were worn. I tapped the diary with the tip of the Slick Cane and used Analyze: Item on it. “It’s a ‘black magic book,’ in very heavy quotation marks. It’s a community thing—something she and her friends put together. Some of the spells are theirs, others are the most common stereotypes.”

(“There’s a checklist of stereotypes being ticked off here,”) Ozma’s voice came through the mental mic. (“Very theatrical. Is the ritual she’s in mentioned in the book?”)

“No. To give Chloe—that’s her name—some credit, she and her friends were fairly competent. Half the rituals in there brush against something that could theoretically work.” Not in practice, thankfully. At least not without forcing it. I stood up, steadying the Slick Cane. “They did their research. Whoever did this probably didn’t even open the Diary of Lilith’s Daughters…”

I let out a snort. Even in a sour mood, I still found that name so shitty it almost made me laugh.

“Could the killer be trying to blame her lifestyle, or someone else?” Jinn suggested, looking more closely at the body. “A friend, maybe?”

“The one who killed her, or the one the killer wants to frame?”

“Both. You said her friends made the diary with her. So they’re not amateurs, but that doesn’t rule out someone from another group of friends.” She looked at the cuts on the throat and wrists. “She’s been dead for a while. The cuts are post-mortem.”

“The real cause of death is strangulation—look around the cut.” I pointed the cane at her neck, where the actual cause was: a purplish, irregular patch of stasis around it. “The rest is theatrical. She’s been dead for almost four hours. Whoever did this had time.”

(“Premeditated, or partially premeditated. Strangulation is usually panic. Or the killer had enough pent-up anger to want to kill her with their own hands,”) Ozma commented. (“If I had to guess, the killer probably knew the victim for a while and knew her routine, even if they weren’t close.”)

He paused before finishing:

(“If the goal was to frame someone, the target of this setup is one of the people at the fair right now. The killer staged this here because they knew the person they want to blame would be nearby today. Chloe herself would probably have come to the fair as well.”)

I nodded slowly, saying nothing.

I stared into Chloe’s open eyes—vacant and glassy.

There was no blood or skin under her nails either. She hadn’t fought back, which is usually the case in strangulation.

I grabbed hold of the Chalice’s stream of information without filtering it anymore: ketamine. She had high doses of it in her blood. She didn’t react when she died because she was drugged.

The crime wasn’t sexual. She hadn’t been raped; the exposure of her chest was likely just to make the whole scene more macabre and humiliating.

I tapped the Slick Cane against the ground a few times, the sound of bone against packed earth echoing through the park’s silence.

“So what are we going to do?” Jinn stood up, adjusting her skirt. She turned toward me, but froze halfway. “Hunt wh— Your eye is orange.”

I looked at her for a moment.

I pulled back Echo Humanitatis and deactivated the Transparent World and Spirit Vision, letting the world around me return to normal.

“I already know who did it,” I said. “I know why he killed her—jealousy, and to frame other people. I know how, I know when, I know where. I know his name, his father’s name, his mother’s name, and his dog’s name. I know what he ate yesterday morning and exactly where he is right now.”

I was… irritated.

Not exactly the right word, but it worked for the moment.

I didn’t know Chloe. Frankly, I didn’t care about her.

A tiny part of me said I could’ve saved her—if I’d kept my senses expanded, if I’d been paying more attention.

But it was a small part, easy to ignore.

I knew it wasn’t my responsibility. And more than that, I had no interest in carrying the burden of saving everyone around me.

Still… it would’ve been better if she hadn’t died.

In the end, what really irritated me was something else.

I had been in a good mood.

And this ruined it.

“How curious… You managed to do something even Chloe and her friends couldn’t…” I murmured to no one in particular. “Your fake, staged ritual managed to summon the Devil—even if it’s a fake one, just like your ritual…”

“And I didn’t like this offering…”

I raised my right hand and pulled my phone from the Voidbag. I looked at Jinn as I dialed three digits.

“What are we going to do, Jinn…?”

I turned the phone toward her and hit call.

“911, what is the location of your emergency?”

[…]

POV: Teresa Lisbon.

I opened the SUV door, and the cold New York night air hit my face.

“Cold place…” I muttered under my breath.

Being on the East Coast wasn’t the norm.

But our bosses thought loaning the CBI team out for two weeks to assist the NYPD in a bizarre homicide task force would be a great interstate political move.

Frankly, at one in the morning, I just wanted to be in my hotel bed.

Cho got out of the back seat and shut the door with the same neutral, unshakable expression as always. Jane was already outside, adjusting his suit vest, that annoyingly curious smile on his face as he looked at the dark trees at the entrance to Asser Levy Park.

“A satanic ritual in a park at one in the morning,” Jane murmured, slipping his hands into his pockets. “New York has a peculiar charm, don’t you think, Lisbon?”

“There’s nothing charming about a ritualistic murder,” I replied.

Jane ignored me and turned to Cho.

“Reminds me a bit of the Elkins case. Remember them, Cho?”

Cho looked uncomfortable for a moment.

“I remember…”

“And the witch from the case, Tamzin—remember her too?”

“Sarah Jones, I remember. Witchcraft isn’t real.”

Jane looked even more amused. Cho’s unease with supernatural things always entertained him.

I hid my smile with a cough and brought the conversation back on track:

“Let’s go over what dispatch told us,” I said, turning on my flashlight and walking past the sign at the park entrance. “Homicide, staged ritual. The man who called 911 was very precise with the location—further inside—but didn’t give many details.”

“Are we the first to arrive?” Jane asked, grabbing his own flashlight.

“The local patrol unit was tied up with a fight at the fair nearby, so we’re first on scene. Forensics should be here in ten to fifteen minutes.”

“Dispatch said the caller sounded very calm,” Cho added, walking beside me along the dim path. “Usually witnesses who find bodies are screaming.”

“How calm?” Jane stepped ahead of us. “Calm like a sociopath? Calm like someone used to seeing bodies, or calm like shock?”

“Calm calm,” Cho answered briefly. “I wasn’t on the call—just relaying what dispatch said.”

We walked for just over a minute until we reached the Asser Levy Park Memorial, where dispatch said the caller would be waiting as a reference point.

Our flashlights swept the area, illuminating first the two figures standing there, waiting for us a few steps ahead of the stone pillar with bronze plaques.

The woman caught my attention immediately.

It was impossible not to look at her.

Her skin was entirely blue. Given the gothic and emo-themed fair happening a few blocks away, I assumed it was incredibly well-done body paint, along with the fake pointed ears peeking through her long black hair.

It was strange seeing a woman fully made up in blue, but looking back, it didn’t even crack the top five strangest things I’ve seen.

I was still deciding where Jane would rank…

She wore a light yellow summer dress and sandals—which was, at the very least, inappropriate for the temperature. She had a full bust and an almost absurd air of lightness, serenity, and calm that clashed completely with the dark park.

With extremely soft and beautiful features, she was, by far, the most feminine woman I had ever seen.

Comparing her to a fairy wouldn’t be unfair.

Beside her stood the man who, I assumed, made the call.

He was tall—around six feet three (1.90 m), easily Rigsby’s height. His skin was pale, and his left eye was covered by an eyepatch. He wore a well-tailored black suit and dress shoes, with a ring on the index finger of his left hand.

In his right hand, he leaned on a cane that looked like it was made of bone or polished white wood.

He had broad shoulders and, to my complete discomfort, wore a gentle smile, showing white, pearly teeth as he saw us approach.

His left arm was wrapped in bandages. At least the part I could see—his hand and wrist—was completely covered. I assumed the rest was the same. Some kind of burn, probably. Maybe the same accident that cost him his eye.

His black hair was short but messy, almost wild.

The only visible eye, the right one, was a honey-brown shade.

Aside from the missing left eye and the unusual bandages, his facial features were, surprisingly, simple. Ordinary.

“Agent Lisbon, CBI,” I introduced myself, raising my badge to chest level. I noticed Cho keeping a hand near his holster while watching the man. “Did you call 911?”

“I did,” the man replied. “I’m Devas, and this is my friend, Jinn. Pleasure to meet you, Agent Lisbon.”

I nodded, keeping the names in mind. They were somewhat unusual. Asian, maybe.

“Can I ask where the body is, and why you two are here this late? The park closes to the public after one in the morning.”

The man turned his head; I instinctively followed his gaze. In the distance, I could see a few other people scattered here and there.

“I thought it was still open, since there were still so many people around. My apologies for that. I’ll pay any fine if necessary.” Devas didn’t seem concerned, and his smile reminded me of Jane’s for a second.

I couldn’t fine him. I mean, I could—but if I did it to him, I’d have to do the same for everyone else scattered around the park.

And frankly, that wasn’t my jurisdiction. I wasn’t NYPD. This probably wasn’t even an NYPD matter… I think.

If he decided to file a complaint, it would just give me unnecessary trouble.

“As for why we’re here, Jinn and I were taking a night walk and ended up stumbling upon the body by accident.”

He pointed to the right with his free hand.

“The body is over there, in a more isolated area. I can guide you there, if you’d like.”

A night walk… Right.

I exchanged a quick glance with Cho beside me. He didn’t say anything, but he didn’t need to.

Jane, on the other hand, looked… far too interested.

“A night walk,” Jane repeated, almost savoring the words as he stepped forward, approaching Devas. “In a closed park, in the middle of the night, and you just happen to stumble upon a body. What curious bad luck.”

Devas’s smile didn’t falter.

“Sometimes chance has a peculiar sense of humor. You wouldn’t believe the things that have happened to me.” He extended his hand. “Unless you’re implying something else, sir…?”

Jane took it.

“Patrick Jane—but you already knew that. I could tell you recognized me.” He shook it twice before letting go. “And I wasn’t implying anything, just making a comment.”

“I did recognize you, but given the context, I thought it would be impolite to bring it up,” Devas replied. “I’ve heard a few things about you, Mr. Jane.”

Jane’s smile stiffened slightly for a moment; I wouldn’t have noticed if I weren’t used to him.

“Only good things, I assume?”

“That depends. But I know you’re an intelligent man.”

Before the conversation could go any further, I stepped between them.

“Alright, that’s enough. It’s late, and we have a murder to solve,” I cut in, looking at Devas. “Show us the way, please.”

The man nodded slowly and turned. Tapping his cane against the ground, he started walking.

“This way. Follow me.”

I glanced at Cho and subtly tilted my chin. He moved ahead; Jane followed right after.

“Don’t do anything stupid,” I muttered to him as he passed by me.

He had that idiotic smile he always wore when he was up to something.

Jane didn’t respond—pretended not to hear. I sighed and started walking. I only noticed the blue-skinned woman, Jinn, at my side when she spoke:

“Your partner, Patrick Jane… you like him, don’t you?”

I was a bit taken aback by the question. I turned my head to look at her for a second.

That wasn’t exactly the kind of thing you ask a federal agent—especially given the situation and where we were heading.

“That’s… not to be rude, but that’s none of your business,” I replied, trying to keep my tone professional. I ignored the way my face warmed slightly. “But thank you for the concern.”

Jinn didn’t seem offended, just smiled and nodded.

“I was just curious,” she said simply.

I looked ahead again, following Devas, Cho, and Jane a few meters in front of us.

“And you seem very calm for someone who just saw a body,” I added, more direct this time.

I realized it too late. I sounded a bit too much like Jane, which was bad, since he was an insensitive idiot.

Thankfully, once again, Jinn didn’t seem offended.

However, when the body was mentioned, her smile wavered. It didn’t disappear completely, but it turned… sadder, if I had to put it into words.

“It’s a shame something like that happened,” she replied after a moment, her voice still calm, but with a faint melancholy that hadn’t been there before. “And it’s not the first dead person I’ve seen.”

She paused briefly, glancing away for a second.

“But I’d rather not dwell on it. Thinking too much about these things just… makes you sad.”

I opened my mouth to ask: Who? Who else had she seen?

But I closed it again.

That wasn’t my business, and it would be rude.

It could be anything—a relative, a friend, someone close. Given the sadness on her face, I doubted it had anything to do with what we were dealing with now.

I just filed the information away mentally and didn’t comment.

“I understand…”

A minute or two later, we reached the spot where the body lay. The scene was, to put it mildly, theatrical if I was being generous—horrific if I was being realistic.

The girl lay at the center of a crude circle, her arms spread like a grotesque crucifixion.

Black candles flickered around her, and a crooked dagger was embedded in her bare chest. The blood had already dried, forming a dark crust around the wound and on her wrists.

I swept the ground with my flashlight, illuminating symbols scrawled with what looked like spray paint. It looked like something straight out of a low-budget horror movie.

“My God…” I murmured.

Jane was already moving before I could stop him.

He circled the body slowly, hands in his pockets, leaning slightly forward as he studied the crime scene.

“Jane, don’t touch anything,” I said, even though I knew he knew the rules.

“I won’t touch, Lisbon. Just looking, I promise.”

Devas and Jinn stayed a few steps back, near a tree.

He stood with his cane resting on the ground, a faint smile on his face. Jinn, beside him, looked more concerned and sad, but she still didn’t have the kind of shocked reaction I would expect.

Jane crouched beside the body, studying the girl’s face. After a few seconds, he straightened.

“Asphyxiation,” he said simply.

Cho raised an eyebrow. “Looks like she was stabbed. And the cuts on her wrists…”

“Post-mortem,” Jane cut in, pointing at the dagger in her chest. “Look around the wound. There’s barely any blood, and what little there is is already dry and uniform. If that dagger had been driven in while her heart was still beating, it would’ve been a bloodbath.”

He raised his hands to his own neck level and made a short sound with his mouth, like an exaggerated imitation of blood spurting.

I shook my head, pinching the bridge of my nose.

Jane moved again, pointing his flashlight at her neck.

“Here, look. These marks around the cut on her neck are darker. That’s stasis. The blood stopped circulating before it settled.” He paused, letting the information sink in:

“Someone strangled this girl. Then cut her wrists and throat to make it look like something else. The cut on the neck was probably meant to hide the strangulation marks.”

I absorbed the information before nodding to myself. It sounded right, and I’d learned to trust Jane’s instincts.

Forensics would confirm it either way.

Cho was already moving, keeping his distance from the body as he examined the ground around it.

He was the one who spotted it first, behind a nearby rock.

“There’s a book here,” he said, pulling a handkerchief from his pocket and picking it up carefully.

It was a thick notebook, bound in black leather.

Cho held it up to the flashlight, flipping through a few pages with the cloth still protecting his fingers.

“Diary of Lilith’s Daughters,” he read aloud. He turned a few more pages. “Incense recipes, prayers… drawings of pentagrams and symbols.”

Cho’s tone shifted slightly—more restrained. I knew that tone; it was the same one he used whenever he talked about anything related to the supernatural—more specifically, witches.

“Looks like something the victim or her friends could’ve made,” he continued. “There are personal notes, drafts… some of this matches the drawing on the ground, maybe?”

He closed the book carefully and placed it on a rock beside him.

“Looking at all this…” Cho paused, clearly uncomfortable. “The time, the location near the fair, her style, the diary… maybe this wasn’t a murder. Maybe it was a ritual gone wrong. Or something she volunteered for.”

He pointed his flashlight at the girl’s hands.

“No signs of a struggle. No marks under the nails, no defensive wounds. If she was drugged or something, the tests will show it. But if not…” he hesitated. “Maybe she let it happen. Thought she was going to be part of something bigger and… well…”

The last word lingered in the air.

I knew what he meant. Young people—usually idiots—fascinated by the occult, doing something stupid thinking it was real magic.

We’d seen cases like that before.

Jane looked at Cho for a moment, a faint smile on his lips. He didn’t respond—instead, he turned.

“And you, Devas?” Jane asked. “What do you think? Did she volunteer?”

The question caught everyone off guard. I looked at Jane, trying to understand what he was doing.

Devas didn’t seem bothered. He took a step forward, the sound of his cane tapping against the ground echoing in the silence.

“She was drugged and then murdered,” he said simply. “The killer is a childhood friend of hers—a man who was jealous of not being part of the ‘Daughters of Lilith,’ since he’s male and the group only accepted women.”

“He was a good friend, so Chloe trusted him. He put ketamine in her drink—a substance he stole from his father’s veterinary clinic—and drugged her. The plan was to take her somewhere else and frame a third party for her death, but he lost control because of his anger and jealousy and ended up suffocating her with his own hands.”

“To cover it up, he staged all of this. The blood, the candles, the pentagram. He even left her barefoot and with her chest exposed to make the scene more humiliating, out of revenge.” He gestured around, his tone unnervingly neutral. “He took advantage of the fact that he knew Chloe would come to the fair with her friends and continued with the plan to frame the group so they would take the blame.”

Jane raised an eyebrow, caught off guard by the level of detail. Too much detail… He even knew her name?!

“And how do you know all that?” I asked, stepping back and moving my hand to my waist, just like Cho.

I saw Jane retreat as well, ready to duck for cover.

I turned slightly, keeping part of my attention on Jinn, but she didn’t seem affected by the tension, nor did she try to attack me from behind. Just… sad, staring at the body.

Devas turned, unconcerned.

“In the time you were on your way, I found the culprit.” He looked at me with his single eye. “I have many eyes across the city. It wasn’t hard to find him. He’s not as clever as he thinks, and following his line of reasoning wasn’t difficult.”

He raised his cane. I tensed; Cho drew his gun and aimed it at him.

“Stop right there, now!”

Devas ignored Cho’s shout and pointed the cane toward an empty stretch of trees.

“Brandon is coming from that direction.”

The moment he finished speaking, footsteps came from that direction. Fast and erratic.

I drew my gun and aimed toward the sound. Cho, however, seemed to keep his focus on Devas.

Jane moved quickly and slipped behind a thick tree near where Cho and I stood.

He didn’t like being in the line of fire.

The footsteps grew louder—a desperate, clumsy run, someone crashing through branches and dry leaves.

The breathing came in short, irregular gasps, almost like sobbing, as if he wanted to scream but was too afraid to.

Then he appeared.

A young man, maybe in his early twenties. Black hair disheveled, plastered to his forehead with sweat. Thin-framed glasses hung crooked on his pale, sweaty face; one of the arms looked broken—they hadn’t fallen off only because he was holding them in place with his left hand.

His brown eyes were wide, almost bulging.

He wasn’t wearing a shirt. His thin chest rose and fell in a frantic rhythm, and there were two fresh cuts on it—one in the center of his chest, another on his right wrist. Blood ran in thin lines, sliding down his skin and dripping onto the ground.

He held a small keychain flashlight in his free hand, trembling, the weak beam shaking wildly as he ran.

His feet were bare, dirty, and injured—the soles raw, with small cuts from branches and stones.

When he saw us, his eyes widened even more.

“Please! Help!” His voice came out in a high-pitched cry, almost a sob. “There’s something behind me! Something that wants to kill me! Monsters!”

He ran toward us, the flashlight swinging between us and the darkness behind him.

“Stop right there! Hands up!” Cho shouted, turning his gun toward the runner.

“Stay where you are!” I shouted as well, aiming my pistol at his chest.

The man—Brandon, Devas had said—didn’t stop.

He tripped over his own feet, his glasses flew off, and he fell to his knees on the hard ground.

His knees scraped; he let out a pained groan but kept crawling forward, dragging himself, one hand outstretched as if reaching for protection.

“You don’t understand! It’s going to get me! It’s going to—” He crawled behind me and Cho, pressing his back against our legs, fingers digging into the dirt.

The flashlight slipped from his hand, its weak beam spinning across the ground before stopping, pointing back toward the dark path.

That’s when I saw the footprints.

An uneven trail of blood led from where he’d come from, marked with each barefoot step. The blood still glistened wet under the moonlight filtering through the trees.

Brandon was breathing in ragged gasps, his chest heaving in spasms. Every breath came out as a sharp, erratic wheeze. His hands trembled so much his fingers knocked against each other.

“What’s out there?” I asked, gun still raised toward the darkness. Cho stood beside me, body tense, face impassive—but I knew him well enough to notice the extra rigidity in his shoulders.

“It’s right there!” Brandon pointed violently toward an empty spot among the trees. “The demon! It’s there! Shoot!”

I looked where he pointed. Nothing. No movement, no sound besides the wind in the leaves. Cho shifted to the side, trying for a different angle.

“I don’t see anything,” I said, keeping my tone firm.

“It’s there! How can you not see it?!” Brandon jumped to his feet, staggered, and nearly fell again. Cho grabbed his arm to steady him, but the man pulled away, pointing at a different tree, then another. “There! There! All around! Made of shadows and hungry eyes!”

He clutched his head, pressing his hands over his ears.

His face was slick with tears, sweat, and snot.

“The whispers won’t stop,” he muttered, voice breaking. “They won’t stop, won’t stop, won’t stop…”

His eyes darted across the ground, across the clearing. Then they landed on Chloe’s body.

He froze.

His hands dropped from his ears. His lips parted.

“It’s because…” His voice came out thin, distant. “It’s because I’m the one at fault.”

“I killed her,” Brandon whispered. The words came out like he was talking to himself, in a trance. “I killed her. I killed her.”

He repeated it once, twice, three times. Each repetition louder, more desperate. His hands rose to his hair, tugging at the strands.

“I killed her, I killed her, I killed her, I killed her, I killed her, I killed her…”

He started backing away in clumsy steps, not looking where he was going. His injured feet dragged across the ground.

“Brandon, stop—” I started, but he was already too far back.

His back hit something solid.

He screamed—a sharp, cut-off sound—and fell backward, his legs giving out, his body collapsing. He landed sitting on the ground, arms raised to shield his face.

Devas was there. Brandon had crashed into his chest.

I don’t know when he moved. I don’t know when he left the spot where he’d been pointing his cane into the darkness. But now he was just a step behind Brandon, motionless like a statue, his single eye watching the man on the ground.

Brandon’s eyes went wide. His already pale face turned corpse-like, the color draining from it as if someone had opened a valve.

“How…” His voice came out thin. “How are you there?”

He pointed at Devas, finger trembling.

“You weren’t there before!” Brandon looked at us—at me, at Cho, at the tree where Jane was hiding—and then back at Devas. “There were three people! Three! You weren’t there!”

Part of me remembered Jinn, but I didn’t focus on that in the moment.

Devas didn’t move.

He just stood there, watching Brandon with that single honey-brown eye, his face completely neutral—utterly expressionless.

Then his lips curved.

A chill ran down my spine.

A soft smile, almost gentle. It felt so deeply wrong, for some reason, that I didn’t even begin to question it—I just raised my gun at him on instinct.

“Why wouldn’t I be, Brandon?” Devas said softly. “Wasn’t it you who summoned me?”

“I didn’t summon a fucking thing!” Brandon screamed.

He tried to scramble back, his bare, bloodied feet slipping in the dirt. He stumbled, dragging himself across the ground. He opened his mouth to scream again—but stopped.

His head snapped back and forth between Chloe’s body beside him, the pentagram beneath her, and Devas. He repeated the motion so many times that the cut on his neck split open further, but he didn’t seem to notice.

“No, no, no, no, no, no…”

“This isn’t real,” he whispered. Then, louder, as if trying to convince himself: “You’re not real. The Devil isn’t real. Demons aren’t real.”

He forced out a laugh. Short. Hysterical. His mouth opened to shout something—I saw his lips form a “go,” which I figured was the start of a “go to hell”—but no sound came.

His voice died in his throat.

Brandon’s eyes, wide with panic, suddenly lost focus. They went glassy. Still. As if something inside him had been unplugged.

For a second, I thought he’d fainted on his feet.

Then he turned and ran.

He pulled strength from somewhere I couldn’t even begin to guess—he looked like someone on the verge of passing out, and he’d already lost nearly half a liter of blood.

Brandon ran, his injured feet tearing against the ground, his arms pushing himself forward as he scrambled upright. He staggered, but managed it—and kept running.

Running away from Devas.

Running straight into the dark woods. Right toward the same direction he’d pointed at before, screaming about demons and hungry eyes.

“Brandon!” Cho shouted, but the man didn’t stop.

Without his glasses, without the flashlight, running blind in the dark, he didn’t see the thick branch in his path. The impact would’ve been comical in a cartoon, but for a moment I thought he’d broken his neck.

His body spun in the air before crashing down on his side, limp, arms splayed. He didn’t move.

For a moment, no one did.

“He—thank God, he’s alive.” I let out a breath.

It was faint and uneven, but his chest rose and fell. He’d just passed out.

After a few seconds, Cho approached slowly, gun still raised. He crouched beside Brandon, pressed two fingers to his neck, checking his pulse.

“He’s alive,” he confirmed.

I still had my gun aimed at the direction Brandon had run, my heart pounding so hard I could feel it in my ears.

That’s when Devas spoke.

“Aren’t you going to arrest him?”

His voice cut through the silence so naturally it made me step aside, turning to face him.

My gun came up on instinct.

Cho did the same. In less than a second, we both had our weapons trained on him.

Devas didn’t move. His cane rested on the ground, his single eye fixed on Brandon. The smile on his lips was gone.

“He confessed,” Devas continued, as if there weren’t two guns pointed at his chest. “Don’t worry about his defense claiming insanity. When he wakes up, he’ll confess again. And everything that happened here…” He paused.

“Will be nothing more than a nightmare.”

I almost fired. The only reason I didn’t was… I didn’t even know.

I wanted to pull the trigger, but I couldn’t.

Then I blinked—and he was gone.

The spot where he’d been standing seconds ago was empty. I looked at the ground—no tracks. I hadn’t heard him move. Nothing.

The woman—Jinn—was gone too.

“Where—” I started, turning in place, sweeping the clearing with my gun. The trees, the bushes, the rock where the book had been. Nothing.

“He was right there,” Cho said. His voice carried a tone I rarely heard: uncertainty. “Did you see him leave?”

“No. I blinked and…” I looked at him. “Did you?”

Cho shook his head. His gun lowered slowly, but his fingers were still white from how tightly he gripped it.

“I blinked too,” he admitted, reluctantly. “Just for a moment.”

“What the hell…”

Before I could finish, Jane stepped out from behind the tree. He looked pale, his eyes fixed on the empty spot where Devas had been.

“Did you see anything?” I asked.

Jane didn’t answer. He looked at the ground, then at where Brandon had fallen, then back to the empty spot. His mouth moved as if he were about to say something, but he closed his lips without making a sound.

“Jane,” Cho called, more firmly. “Did you see him?”

“No,” Jane finally said. His voice came out hoarse. “I… blinked. That’s all.”

The three of us exchanged glances.

No one said a word.

Then another sound of footsteps echoed—many of them, heavier. Along with voices, and flashlight beams cutting through the trees, sweeping across the ground and branches.

“NYPD! Forensics team!” a voice called. “We got the call!”

The tech team entered the clearing—four people in white coveralls carrying cases. The lead, a bald man with thick glasses, stopped when he saw the scene.

“Jesus…” he muttered, staring at Chloe’s body on the ground.

[…]

After giving my statement, being looked at like I was crazy, I went back to the SUV.

Cho and Jane were already there, both sitting on the curb in silence.

“So… are we going to talk about this?” I asked, sitting down beside them.

“I’m going to church tomorrow,” Cho said. “To see a priest. And every Sunday from now on.”

I wanted to laugh, I swear—but I just didn’t have it in me. The thought had crossed my mind too.

I turned to Jane, who was still silent. I wanted to ask what he thought—he’d always been the most skeptical. I wanted him to be, to give me a logical explanation for what had happened.

He was staring ahead, one hand in his pocket.

The expression on his face was something I hadn’t seen in years. Not since before he joined the CBI. Not since Red John.

“Jane?” I called. “What is it?”

He didn’t answer. His hand in his pocket didn’t move.

“Jane,” I repeated, more firmly, touching his arm. “What do you have there?”

He looked at me. For a moment, I thought he’d deflect—I saw the movement in his lips, I knew him, the old mask starting to rise.

Then he pulled his hand out of his pocket.

Between his fingers, there was a card.

Completely black. No logo, no text on the front—at least none that I could see. Jane turned the card slowly, as if expecting it to explode.

On the back, written in vivid red ink, was a phone number.

“What is that?…” I started to ask, but Jane shook his head.

“He gave it to me… Devas,” Jane said. “I don’t know how, but when I blinked, I heard his voice, telling me that if I wanted to talk to him, I should call this number…”

“That he would help me get what I want.”

[...]---[...]

This chapter isn’t quite what I wanted. I couldn’t finish the conversation with Klein and ended up extending the scenes with the CBI team a bit. It is what it is—I’ll pick up the pace later. I just didn’t want to write the next part in the state I’m in right now.

To clear up a few things: Devas “fooled” Klein because this version of Klein is still pretty inexperienced and, in a way, trusted Devas. That’s why it seemed so easy.

As for the chapter itself, I liked the first half and parts of the second. Devas got a bit irritated—by now, I think you guys already know him well enough to understand how he works. Maybe Chloe will come back in the future, I don’t know. I only created her to bring Jane into the story, but who knows—maybe in hell.

That’s about it. I’m going to write a Tarot Club interlude, something SCP-related. I also need to write the French girl’s OMAKE. Thankfully, those three are pretty easy to write. I’ll post them between canon chapters so it doesn’t feel like I’m only putting out “filler,” so to speak.

Alright, that’s all. Have a good night, everyone, and enjoy the read!