Ch.60006 Investigation Record – In Search of the Clues to Sorcery (1)

Fortunately, the detective still had some sense of loyalty left, or perhaps he was just pretending to have some honor at the place where he had witnessed a comrade’s final moments. Either way, he hadn’t contacted Giuseppina.

He was an unpredictable sort of person. Though I believed people couldn’t live by work and contracts alone, he boldly contradicted me. When working, he strangled necks; when not working, he shook hands.

Still, I won’t judge him yet. He had sneered that I should judge him only after hiring him, so I’ll reserve judgment until I’ve actually employed him.

In truth, I didn’t have time to worry about Giuseppina’s situation. The newspaper was incredibly busy covering a disaster where five hundred people had died in a single day.

Everyone approached their work with a bit more enthusiasm than usual. We all felt this wasn’t just an easy scoop handed to us by the mafia, but something we needed to handle ourselves.

As soon as news came at three in the morning that the situation had been resolved, several reporters immediately headed to Littlehold.

We received many photographs from Littlehold… but none of them could be published. There were too many dead dwarves. Using these photos purely for shock value seemed to cross a line.

My conscience also prevented me from using the photo of the immigrant riddled with submachine gun bullets. The extra edition wasn’t meant to be a newspaper sold for profit, but one meant to inform. We couldn’t attract attention with gruesome photos.

Instead, I wrote an article. Though the reporting was mostly handled through my father’s connections, writing articles had always been my responsibility, so this was something I could accomplish on my own.

Only after watching the newspaper boys run into the streets with my extra edition could I return home and sleep with peace of mind. Though it was for the article, I hadn’t slept until dawn and my eyes were heavy.

The next day, I inevitably slept in. I didn’t wake up until it was almost noon. Probably every journalist, detective, and police officer in the city had slept in today. It had been a busy day for everyone.

“Good morning, Paulina… Did we have any interviews scheduled today?”

Paulina was the exception. Though she had also stayed until dawn watching the printing press run, she looked as neat as if she’d been awake for hours already.

“The editor-in-chief called, but he said you worked hard on the article and should rest today, Rose. Oh, and he mentioned he could set up an appointment with the veterans if you wanted. Should I call him back?”

This was our first conversation since I’d helped him through his guilt with an honest talk, which was unfortunate. I gently shook my head.

“I’ll do this myself! This is something I want to cover personally.”

I felt I shouldn’t become too accustomed to relying on Paulina’s help. I remembered that when I was caught by the detective, I thought of calling Paulina rather than trying to do something myself.

I picked up the phone and dialed the now-familiar number of the editor-in-chief. After the automatic connector’s distinctive ticking noise, the call connected.

“Ah, um, you called this morning, right? Paulina answered?”

The editor-in-chief responded in a noticeably more comfortable voice. It felt rewarding to have confronted his guilt during our last intermission.

“That’s fine, that’s fine. I told you that you could rest until noon today anyway. Our company may be small, but we have more than just one or two reporters, and the president said to let the reporters who covered that incident rest. So, when would you like me to set up the appointment, Miss Rose? My son will help arrange the interview, so feel free to choose any time.”

I recalled hearing previously that the editor-in-chief’s son was also a Great War veteran. I’d heard he had been saved by the Argonne Invincibles.

That would make it natural to bring up the Argonne Invincibles, wouldn’t it? It takes a lot of preparation to ask someone about another person.

And even though my goal was to discover the ritual placed on the Argonne Invincibles, the veterans I would be interviewing had fought in the Great War. I couldn’t treat them as mere props.

“Would this afternoon or evening work? I’d like to meet them right away! They say when dealing with sources, you should buy them a meal first, right? I know some good restaurants.”

A soft laugh came through the static of the phone. After a brief moment, his calm voice continued.

“I was a fool to think you’d be depressed. Alright, let’s say 6 PM today. Where would you like to meet?”

After telling him about a restaurant that even elves with their sensitive senses could eat at, I hung up. I turned to Paulina, who had been watching from behind, and looked up at her.

“So, what do we know so far?”

Paulina might be a contract worker as that detective had said, but she was also someone who had been working toward the same goal with me for over three years.

“One, the Argonne Invincibles are under some curse or ritual. Two, that ritual is extremely powerful. Three, the Argonne Invincibles are trying to hide that fact… Anything else?”

“You missed the last one. We know so little that we don’t even know if trying to discover it crosses a line or not. First, what’s our lead? A lead…”

Even when we tried to compile what we knew, we knew too little. Sighing as I pondered, I recalled something.

There was a moment when we realized the Great War had crossed a line. It was when they conscripted ritual practitioners and deployed them as a separate military branch called warlock-soldiers.

The reason given was that we needed to counter the enemy’s use of rituals, but still, using rituals? Magic was rational, but rituals were primal. They involved deals with unknown entities.

Anyway, if the Argonne Invincibles were under a ritual, there was only one person who could have cast it.

“Right, there were warlock-soldiers! Our newspaper must have written articles about them before… Anyway, each unit had soldiers who specialized exclusively in rituals. Whatever ritual is currently placed on the Argonne Invincibles, the person who cast it must be that person, so if we can find and persuade them, we might learn something.”

Paulina nodded briefly but still asked with an uncertain expression.

“Will it be easy to find them? I think I’ve heard that warlock-soldiers went into hiding after being discharged, since being known as someone who can use rituals would surely bring disadvantages.”

That was true. But seeing how tightly the Argonne Invincibles still stuck together to keep their secret, it seemed likely that even a warlock-soldier wouldn’t be completely untraceable… But then we’d have to persuade an Argonne Invincible again. That seemed too difficult, so I decided to set that approach aside for now.

“It will definitely be difficult. But having a lead is much better than having none, right? For now, I’ve set up a meeting for 6 PM today, so we should focus on that first.”

Paulina nodded briefly. As I was about to go back to my room to prepare, Paulina stopped me.

“Oh, Rose. Just a moment. I’ve prepared something because the public safety seems to be deteriorating lately. You didn’t like guns much, did you?”

She tilted her head slightly and pulled out an elf-sized pistol from her coat. Actually, it was even smaller than an elf-sized gun—a derringer with two small barrels.

Would having this gun have made any difference when I faced the detective? I didn’t think so, but having even one means of resistance wasn’t a bad thing.

Normally I would have refused, but this time I decided to accept the pistol she had prepared. I had no intention of abandoning the flower garden that filled my mind, but after learning that my life could be threatened at any time, going around without any protection wouldn’t make me a better person.

Paulina smiled with satisfaction.

“Anyone can see it’s a self-defense pistol, so it won’t look threatening. Besides, last time, if you hadn’t used your wits, you might have lost your life to that detective… You can’t rely solely on quick thinking in such situations. You made a good choice, Rose.”

The fact that Paulina’s concerned eyes were sincere made me feel better than the gift of the gun itself. I wanted to show this face to the detective and ask if she was still just a contract worker.

After that, I made some calls to other sources. I expressed condolences about yesterday’s incident and set up new appointments. Fortunately, none of our sources seemed to have been injured or killed.

We did have one dwarf source, but fortunately… very fortunately, it seemed he hadn’t been in Littlehold that day.

Then I prepared to go out for dinner. It was near the restaurant where I had eaten clam chowder with Paulina’s lawyer colleague last time, though if my companion wasn’t an elf, they would have to endure the food smells.

I tried not to get cocky about having a gun in my pocket. It was just a small gun with two bullets, and I could imagine what might happen if I got overconfident with such a thing.

Paulina also wore a proper gray suit with mythril chain mail lining for the first time in a while. Her hair still covered her eyes completely. I couldn’t even remember when I had last seen her eyes.

We left the house and headed to central New York in Paulina’s car. After passing a restaurant frequented by Italians and turning a few more corners, we arrived at the restaurant I had reserved by phone.

I was familiar with places like this. Though it was a story from my hometown, I used to eat dinner in places like this three or four times a week. I opened the door and went in.

“I have a reservation under the name Rose Leafman.”

Actually, the name Rose Clichy would be better for making reservations. But even though I had become more realistic, I wasn’t ready to proudly use my family name yet.

“I’ll show you to your table. Your party is already here.”

I had arrived 15 minutes early, but they must have come even earlier because this was the meeting place? Feeling a bit nervous, I straightened my clothes and headed to the reserved table.

There sat… a very nervous person. With reddish-brown hair and ordinary black eyes, he looked around and then stared straight ahead, trying to hide his nervousness.

I leaned slightly toward Paulina and whispered quietly.

“I think I chose a decent place, but did I make a mistake?”

“No, it’s about the same level as where you took my colleague last time, so it should be fine… He’s probably just nervous because this is his first interview or coverage. Or maybe he’s overwhelmed because he heard he’d be meeting someone connected to the Argonne Invincibles, his saviors. I don’t think the restaurant choice is the problem, Rose.”

I lightly brushed my chest in relief, then approached the table, gave a slight bow in greeting, and sat down across from him. Up close, his expression seemed more overwhelmed than confused.

“Ah, I’m Rose Leafman, reporter from Golden Age Press. So…”

He seemed a bit too eager, reaching out his hand first, then awkwardly flinching when I started by introducing myself. I extended my hand to him, grasped his, and shook it gently.

He now looked at me with somewhat more comfortable eyes. Even though I sometimes messed up work matters, I wasn’t bad at dealing with people.

“Ah, thank you. I’m Gerard Thayer. During the Great War…”

After that, he told me a lot about his affiliations, but beyond recording it, there wasn’t much I could do with that information. I knew nothing about the military.

Rather than pretending to know, I decided to be straightforward. People dislike when reporters act like they’re just trying to extract the information they need.

From my perspective, we were a reporter and a source, but from the perspective of someone unfamiliar with this situation, it was a conversation between two people, so acting like a real person would create a better atmosphere for talking.

“I… I don’t know anything about the military. I only learned about the Argonne Invincibles during a completely different investigation.”

He, still looking somewhat tense, raised the corners of his mouth in a gentle smile and finally relaxed completely.

“We’re both extremely awkward. Well… Actually, my father mentioned that there was a reporter who had investigated the Argonne Invincibles.”

It seems the editor-in-chief wanted to prepare quickly. Last time he mentioned something about an association… but organizations with “association” in their names typically handled matters terribly slowly.

“They saved my life in the trenches, and I wanted to thank them, but I couldn’t meet them and had given up. Thanks to you, I think I’ll at least be able to express my gratitude.”

Now that the atmosphere had completely relaxed, we ordered food. He was a bit surprised when I only ordered soup, but he accepted my explanation that that amount was enough for an elf.

“And actually, the article I want to write… When people think of veterans, they immediately think of the Argonne Invincibles, right? So, I want to write an article that highlights other veterans without diminishing the achievements of the Argonne Invincibles… Could you possibly introduce me to other veterans?”

“Of course. We can’t diminish the Angels of the Trenches. I’m still in touch with most of my discharged comrades, so I can introduce you. Oh, this isn’t some occult article, is it? I’m still in contact with someone who served as a warlock-soldier. If you need, I can call him too.”

Knowing the ominous connotation of the word “ritual,” he whispered quietly.

He was the only ritual expert I could meet right away, so it would be better to meet him even if he wasn’t from the Argonne Invincibles.

And “Angels of the Trenches”… From what I’d heard about them rushing to help between flares, the term “angel” seemed fitting. Though that detective and the word “angel” didn’t match at all.

Hiding my true purpose, I nodded vigorously. Actually, it wasn’t really hiding. I would genuinely write the article I told him about. Finding clues about the ritual would just be a secondary objective.

“I’d be so grateful if you could! When writing these kinds of articles, finding sources is the hardest part. It’s rare for a proper source to introduce other sources.”

The goal was set. People around me were willing to help. As long as I didn’t get tired, I could go all the way.