Ch.188188. Love is Death

“Whatever answer you give, you’ll be happy.”

The moment I heard those words, I found myself staring at her with my mouth shut, my mind going blank.

Looking at her, someone who cared more about me than herself, I felt something filling up inside me. That warm fullness I had felt while talking with Stella. I realized once again that although it was foreign to me, I craved it.

In a situation where neither of us could offer any real answer, we stood leaning on each other.

“My, how scandalous.”

“What a handsome couple.”

“Must be newlyweds. They’re just dripping with sweetness.”

I had momentarily forgotten we were in the middle of a city street. Hearing the whispers around us, Erika finally couldn’t take it anymore and abruptly turned away.

“Let’s go, we’re almost there.”

“Sure.”

Following behind Erika, we indeed quickly arrived at the dessert shop.

No, thinking about the location of the dessert shop and the route we had taken, I could easily tell that she had deliberately led us in circles.

“……”

When I stared down at Erika after realizing this, she must have felt my gaze because she intentionally avoided looking at me as she joined the line in front of the dessert shop.

“I’ll consider it a cute prank.”

Though time had been wasted, it wasn’t like I had any important business to attend to.

I was going to dismiss it as just a light joke, but Erika slightly turned her body and glanced at me.

“Was it cute?”

“That’s just a figure of speech.”

“……”

Looking at her back as she returned to her original position, I couldn’t help but feel the corners of my mouth turning up slightly, though I made sure she didn’t notice.

“The line here is quite long.”

Indeed, perhaps because lunch had just ended, there was quite a queue of people looking for desserts in front of the store.

I thought we would have to wait for a while, but then—

“Ex-excuse me, are you the Spiritmaster?”

A man wearing armor cautiously approached me. It was a face I had seen in passing a few times—the captain of Robern’s guard. I particularly remembered him because of his thick mustache.

“I am.”

“Ah! Sp-Spiritmaster! I am Paul, the captain of the Robern guard.”

I grabbed his shoulder and pulled him back up as he tried to kneel on one knee in excessive deference. I didn’t want to attract attention from those around us.

“State your business.”

Assuming he had a reason for seeking me out, I asked, and Paul’s expression darkened as he glanced nervously at Erika standing beside me.

“Well, yesterday there was a death at a villa on Glass Street.”

“……”

“The thing is… there are many strange aspects about the suspect. Actually, I was just thinking about requesting cooperation from the Academy to bring you in.”

“Strange aspects?”

The fact that he needed to call me meant he thought an evil spirit was involved.

“Yes, it’s a bit difficult to explain here, but if you wouldn’t mind accompanying me…”

Glass Street is on the outskirts of Robern, so it would take some time to walk there.

I glanced at Erika, who had already crossed her arms and was glaring at the guard captain with the same icy expression she showed to students.

“The mood was so nice.”

She muttered the words as if chewing them, whispering quietly so the guard captain wouldn’t hear, but I caught them since I was right beside her.

“It can’t be helped. It seems they need me. I’ll buy the dessert myself and bring it back.”

“Please do.”

I left Erika behind and followed the guard captain to Glass Street.

Glass Street.

The dark side of Robern despite its good security, and in some ways, a necessary evil.

Aggressive parents call it a trash can and insist that Glass Street should be eliminated, but the debate goes that doing so would only cause the trash to spill out elsewhere.

Students are particularly discouraged from entering this street, and professors patrol it regularly.

Looking at just the name “Glass,” one might think it has something to do with glasswork or art, but it simply refers to drinking glasses—a street of alcohol.

Though much smaller compared to other cities, it was still the place in Robern where bars, gambling dens, and brothels were most openly operating.

A death at a villa in such a place.

It might seem predictable, but if that were the case, the guard captain wouldn’t have called for me.

Guards holding spears were already controlling access at the entrance to the old, small villa.

Receiving salutes as we entered, I saw that the first floor had no hallway, just a door and stairs standing alone.

It seemed to have a structure with one room per floor.

“The crime scene is on the second floor.”

I climbed the stairs covered in cigarette ash and spit. The smell had been bad since entering the villa, and it didn’t appear to be well-maintained.

The front door on the second floor was wide open.

I passed the guards stationed there and went inside.

The interior was too dirty to be considered an ordinary home, with a terrible stench and bottles of alcohol scattered everywhere.

Opening the door on the right of two facing doors, I found a body covered with a white cloth.

“There are no external injuries. The cause of death is acute cardiac arrest due to alcohol poisoning.”

“The victim’s name?”

“Hansen. He worked as an employee at a nearby bar, but was fired a few months ago after getting involved with a barmaid. He’s been unemployed since then.”

“……”

“He was an alcoholic but didn’t use drugs. And… he had one roommate.”

The guard captain’s voice sank gloomily as he mentioned the roommate.

“This roommate is the problem. Ophelia. She’s the barmaid I mentioned, and the crime scene is her room.”

From what I’d heard so far, it sounded like a man named Hansen who lost his job, lived soaked in alcohol, and eventually his body gave out.

Especially since there were no external injuries on the corpse.

But what the guard captain leaned in and whispered quietly was quite interesting.

“Ophelia is actually a widow. A year ago, she lost her daughter and husband. I investigated that case too, but sadly it was ruled an accidental death.”

“……”

“But… in the past year, three men have died near this woman.”

“Hmm.”

“A young man from the neighborhood, a bar patron, and a retired soldier. All were men close to Ophelia. All died from accidents or sudden illness. But this is the first time her lover has died.”

“From the way you’re speaking, I gather you believe this Ophelia woman is the culprit in all these incidents.”

“…That’s correct. That’s why we’ve dispatched guards to search the mansion in this case.”

I had thought it strange that they were investing so many resources for a simple cardiac arrest death.

“I may be suspecting a pitiful woman, but I wanted to confirm it for certain this time.”

Hearing those words, I slowly approached Hansen’s body.

Without needing to lift the white cloth, I stared at it for a moment and nodded slightly.

“It seems the guard captain’s judgment is correct.”

“R-really?!”

Paul seemed surprised by my definitive answer, clenching his fist excitedly as if he hadn’t expected such confirmation.

“Where is Ophelia?”

“Sh-she’s temporarily being looked after by a resident from another floor!”

Without needing to say more, Paul hastily gestured for someone to bring Ophelia.

I am not a detective.

I don’t have the ability to identify a culprit or determine murder motives and weapons at a glance of a corpse and crime scene.

The guard probably does that much better than I would, having handled such cases professionally.

And they didn’t call me for that purpose either.

What only I, as a Spiritmaster, could see:

‘Hansen’s soul is gone.’

Even if he had found peace after death, he died just yesterday.

At the very least, a faint energy should remain, but the soul itself has completely disappeared.

If he had become an evil spirit, he would have left behind malicious energy that would be even easier to detect.

‘The soul itself has completely vanished.’

A simple death by cardiac arrest wouldn’t leave such traces.

Sensing that there was more to this man’s death, I waited quietly until I heard soft footsteps approaching.

“I’ve brought her.”

Greasy black hair, skin that could be described as pallid rather than white.

A skinny frame suggesting she hadn’t been eating properly, but with a relaxed smile on her lips.

Perhaps because of this, the woman was exuding what could only be described as a decadent beauty.

It was quite striking how Paul and the other guards kept glancing at Ophelia.

Thump.

Even in my chest, I recognized something stirring as I looked at her.

Along with a fluffy feeling, a desire to protect her welled up.

The moment I realized that the emotion I was feeling was the affection I had been searching for, an intense killing intent shot toward her without my control.

“Spiritmaster, this is Ophelia…!”

Perhaps because my reaction was too intense, even Paul couldn’t finish his sentence, and Ophelia, who had been walking stoically, froze with her smile stiffening.

“Let’s talk separately.”

I led Ophelia to the victim’s room on the left. She followed behind me, pushed by Paul’s back while watching cautiously.

Thud.

Click.

As I locked the door, deep confusion seeped into her eyes.

But I had neither the luxury nor the inclination to be considerate.

“How dare you.”

I glared at Ophelia, gritting my teeth. The reason I was caught in such a passionate emotional whirlwind was none other than—

This woman had provided a stubborn answer to the emotion of affection I had been searching for so diligently.

“Do you find it amusing to play with others’ emotions?”

“N-no, that’s not…”

“The moment I saw you, feelings of adoration toward you surged within me.”

Despite not knowing exactly what the emotion of love was, I was forced to feel as if this was love the moment I saw her.

Some might call it love at first sight.

But precisely because my emotional pool was shallow, I could recognize that this was false and artificial.

Especially after my conversation with Erika just now.

This coercive desire seemed to dismiss all my genuine emotions toward Erika and others as lies.

The rage that flared up like wildfire showed no signs of subsiding.

“I am in a very bad mood, so you should answer carefully and accurately.”

“Th-this can’t be happening.”

Ophelia’s confused eyes carefully examined me. Her intention was so clear that I reached out, grabbed her chin, and applied pressure.

“Ughhhh!”

With her chin gripped, Ophelia couldn’t pronounce properly. The act itself of her lowering her eyes to my lower body to check if I was male was intensely disgusting and repulsive.

“I told you not to try anything foolish.”

Even now, the desire to save this woman suffering in my hands was surging in my chest.

As if controlling the urge that screamed at me to release the pressure on her, I pushed Ophelia against the wall with enough force to crush her jaw.

Bang!

“Tell me what trick you’re using, and how you killed Hansen. Leave nothing out.”

When I released my hand, Ophelia, whose head had hit the wall, looked at me with tears in her eyes.

I was about to warn her again, seeing her expression of disbelief at my behavior.

But as I reached out my hand, Ophelia urgently knelt down and prostrated herself.

“I-it’s the tattoo! The tattoo on my chest has the effect of enchanting the opposite sex!”

Though I couldn’t see it now as she was prostrated, I had indeed noticed a heart-shaped tattoo earlier when I grabbed her chin.

“A-and! I really didn’t kill Hansen!”

“You expect me to believe that.”

I warned Ophelia with killing intent so intense that the mana throughout my body was writhing, but she cried out while still prostrated that it was true.

“It’s my daughter! My dead daughter! She’s killing all the men I loved!”

There were too many disturbing aspects in what she said.

First, saying that her dead daughter was killing people suggested she had become an evil spirit.

But what bothered me more was—

“Loved?”

The use of past tense.

If a dead daughter was killing her mother’s lovers, she should kill them at the point of love, not after the feelings had completely cooled.

I asked with that doubt in mind, but Ophelia was so flustered that she didn’t even hear my question and continued pouring out words.

“She keeps killing the people I loved! That’s why my husband! My lover! She killed them all!”

The woman suddenly raised her head and cried out to me with a tear-stained face, as if venting her resentment.

“Clair’s Curio Shop! This started happening after I visited there!”

“…Clair’s Curio Shop?”

The woman trembled in fear at the mere name, but I could only find it strange.

Because I also knew about Clair’s Curio Shop.

The secret shop that often appears in games.

A game ally that you can only visit if you’re lucky, where you can obtain rare items.

A place run by Clair, who is always cheerful, bright, and loves antiques.

‘Something is strange.’

It seemed that once again, the continent’s story was unfolding differently from the game I knew.