The Divine Hunter Chapter 26: The real murderer
On the second floor of the school, Roy and Vivien were flipping through the information quickly.
Kadel stood behind the two of them with his hands folded across his chest, giving him a cold gaze. She wanted to find out what tricks these two guys who wanted to see the registration form for no apparent reason could pull off.
"1256, 1257, 1258, 1259, 1260..." The two of them found a total of five blank registration forms from thirteen piles of information, one for each of the past five years.
"So, there are five missing people in total, and one person disappears every year." Roy whispered to Vivien. "The unique pattern shows that it is no coincidence."
"What exactly did you two discover? Should you explain it to me?"
"Teacher Kadell, you have been responsible for keeping admission information, so have you seen these blank registration forms?"
The middle-aged woman took one and checked it twice, her eyebrows almost knitted into a knot, "These papers are specially made, only one for each student, and they are not cheap. I am not that wasteful. But it cannot be completely ruled out. I stuffed it in accidentally."
"They were not originally blank..." Roy explained, "they recorded information about a certain student. Unfortunately, the words were erased, and the student described also disappeared. To be precise, , was taken away by the murderer."
"Why do you start talking like crazy like Vivien? How could anyone dare to kidnap my life without anyone noticing in Edsberg, a big city where thousands of people live? Student? Even the Sparrow Gang doesn't have the guts." Cardell retorted, "Unless you can produce other evidence, Roy, if you lie in front of me, just wait and drop out of school."
"You want evidence? That will have to wait a while." He was the only one who witnessed the change of the marks on the clothes, so he could not win people's trust.
But now he already has a rough idea in mind.
"Teacher Vivien...what is the specific date of the last diary entry in which 'him' appeared?"
“I have read the diary dozens of times in the past two years, and I can recite it by heart,” Vivien said. “On October 4, 1258, that night, Bob drunkenly slapped me in the face, and I was angry again. I was afraid, so I ran to school, and 'he' followed me."
"You and I also agreed at the time that 'he' should have disappeared between October 4th and November 1st of the new year."
Today is October 7, 1260, which means the time when the symbol on Roy's sleeve gradually faded, that is, when the student who drew the symbol disappeared, it was also within this range.
Both incidents are within this range, so they cannot be said to be coincidences.
Roy's thoughts were electric.
October is around, and it doesn’t make much sense just to look at this monotonous date. But in less than a month, it will be the New Year.
The world of The Witcher works like life, in a constant cycle. There are eight magic points in this cycle. Corresponds to the important festivals of this world, including New Year (Halloween), Winter Solstice, Spring Festival (Candlemas), Spring Equinox, May Day, Summer Solstice, Harvest Festival, and Autumn Equinox.
The closer you get to these eight days and nights, the stronger the aura of magic will be, and the easier it is for some magical phenomena and mysterious events to occur. The murderer chose to commit the crime at this time, so it is likely that it is a creature that is extremely sensitive to magic.
Roy wrote down the first sentence: Since 1256, the murderer has committed one crime every year, and the crime time is close to the New Year. It is most likely that he is a creature sensitive to magic: a monster or a human with a talent for magic.
The second sentence: The murderer will gradually erase most of the traces left by the missing person in the world, including the memories of the missing person by those around him, the words and paintings written by the missing person, and the direct description of the missing person. All text will be erased...
"Vivien, I remember you mentioned in your diary that you and your family have unknowingly ignored 'him'."
"I think so. I want to ensure fairness, so most of my energy is distributed equally to every student in the school. It is inevitable that he will be ignored and left out." Vivien's pretty face was full of sadness, "And Bob is a He is an old drunkard. He is busy looking for drinks all day long and has no time to talk to him. His mother is delirious and cannot communicate normally most of the time."
"So, 'he' is a person ignored by everyone..."
The five missing people... Even though the relevant memories of the people around them have been erased, and the traces and writings they left behind have been erased, none of their family members have noticed anything strange like Vivien. Investigation leads?
Roy wrote down the third sentence: The target chosen by the murderer may be children who are ignored by everyone...including orphans.
Perhaps it is due to some mysterious screening principle, or it may be that the murderer's cunning nature is revealed.
Compared to people who have attracted much attention, if the missing people are those who are always ignored by people around them, then the impact and change on the real world will undoubtedly be much smaller. It will also be more hidden and difficult to detect.
……
Roy showed these three conclusions to Vivien and Cardell. The former was a little surprised. She had noticed these points long ago and knew them clearly in her mind, but she did not summarize them so specifically and thoroughly.
Kadell's original casual expression finally changed, but he was still skeptical, "Roy, these three conclusions seem quite scary, but as I say, it is untenable without evidence. ”
"Maybe the fact is exactly the opposite of your inference. There are no five missing people at all."
"Evidence...if the murderer can be found, that is the best evidence." Roy breathed out, "Teacher Cardell, I beg you not to question me yet, just believe me for now."
"For five consecutive years, the murderer came out every year close to New Year's Day and took away a victim from Caddell House." Roy asked, "Do you have a feeling?"
"The murderer is hiding in the school," Vivian's pretty face turned pale, "He came out to commit murder just before the New Year?"
"This is impossible..." Kadel shook his head and said, "I know everyone in the entire school, including the kitchen helpers, and I dare to swear to Prophet Lebioda that there is absolutely no murderer among them."
"I didn't say the murderer must be a human being." Roy had already observed all the teachers, students and support staff in the school. They were all normal human beings and did not have the ability to delete their memories. "The greater possibility is that it is some kind of monster that lives in the school."
"Do you have an idea?"
"I'm not sure, please wait a moment." There is no monster in Roy's memory that fits the conclusion. But that doesn't mean there's nothing he can do.
He turned around and left the room, wandered in the corridor for two minutes, then took out the note that Lei Suo had left for him before leaving, and re-entered the room.
The notes contained knowledge about herbs, potions, and monsters, but he had been busy learning common writing for more than half a month, and he still had time to read the notes.
"What is this?" Vivien and Kadel couldn't help but cast curious glances.
"The experience notes left to me by a master demon hunter contain information about various monsters and may contain the target we are looking for."
Then the three of them read through most of the entire notebook about monsters. The more Roy read, the more frightened he became. He had no impression of most of the monsters recorded in the notebook. The world was deeper than he thought.
After browsing a dozen monsters of different forms, the three of them saw such a description on a certain page.
“The end of autumn is the best season for bear hunting. Serrit and I stayed overnight in a small mountain village.
That night, the wind outside the window was so strong that my bladder was swollen to the point of bursting. I went to the yard and peed, and the pendant around my neck suddenly began to vibrate. The amplitude was very slight, and the remaining magic power was not strong. But there was no doubt that there was a new prey calling me. Hunting monsters is more interesting than hunting grizzly bears. There are so many, especially in this completely unknown situation, this soaking in urine is the guide to my destiny.
I found an oak tree nearby that was over five hundred years old. The tree was engraved with some complex symbols of unknown meaning... The magic originated from this tree.
After trying more than thirty methods including Alder's Seal, Igni's Seal, evil ghost's excrement, etc., I discovered a chemical reaction between salt and oak trees.
The roots of the oak tree opened its mouth in pain, revealing a deep and dark tree hole.
I woke up Seret and went down to the tree hole to have a hard time.
The apprentice of the Snake Sect, yes, refers to you who are reading this paragraph. Do not skip the following content:
The monster under the tree hole, I named him the Stripper/Child Hunter/Tree Evil. It looks like a slender humanoid creature with a fuzzy face, rough and hard skin like bark, and sharp fangs. And sharp claws, once bitten by it, the hands, feet and nerves will be gradually paralyzed.
The accompanying picture is as follows——
Its speed and strength are similar to those of ordinary people, and it can regenerate quickly. Ordinary sharp weapons cannot cause fatal damage to it.
But he is afraid of fire, salt, and corpse-eating creature sword oil.
After Seret and I quickly solved it, we pulled out a total of fifteen remains from the tree hole. On the second day, we conducted half-month exchanges with the people in the mountain village~IndoMTL.com~A large number of investigations Later, the following information about this monster was obtained:
It spends most of its time sleeping in a tree hole, and only wakes up around the New Year every year due to abnormal fluctuations in magic power, and hunts nearby creatures.
Its targets are all young human children, and the lonelier they are, the better it suits its taste.
It will wrap the prey that has lost resistance with vomit until the prey suffocates and dies before eating. Its vomit also has some incredible miraculous effect, which can gradually strip away the connection between the prey and the real world, and the stripping is completed when the prey dies.
Most of the traces left by the prey in the real world will disappear, and everyone will forget about the poor man.
This is a forgotten ghost that sleeps under the ancient tree and devours the neglected people...
Rookie, when you read this record, you must have not passed the Green Grass Trial. If you want to deal with this guy, remember to bring all the equipment and wear thicker clothes based on the weak points. If you can kill it, take the most valuable tongue, dry it and preserve it.
October 6, 1204, Nilfgaard, Province of Vicovarro, written by Oakes at Mount Berry.
……
The three people looked at each other for a while.
"So, there is something living under the hornbeam tree in the yard?" Kadell looked in disbelief, and his voice was shockingly hoarse. "I've lived here for several years. How is it possible? How could I be unconscious?"
"You'll know after you try it!" Vivien clenched her hands into fists, her pretty face full of determination and hatred, "I remember, there is still a lot of salt in the kitchen?"
Roy took a deep breath and took another look at the disappearing mark on his left sleeve.
The person he forgot may still be alive. Do you want to go, rookie?