"I resent the use of the 'disappear' term . " Manohar said with an indignant tone .
"I don't run away like a spoiled brat, I simply seek the isolation a complex matter like my endless research requires . "
"You are a spoiled brat . " Jirni replied as she opened the cuffs . Manohar had the habit of gesturing like a hysterical bird while he talked, almost dislocating her shoulder in result .
"Without constant supervision, you'd break more laws in a week than a serial killer in their whole life . You never fill your paperwork and neglect your students to pursue your own agenda . "
Manohar wanted to reply, but Jirni scared him . He decided that shutting up and hiding behind Lith was in his best interest .
"I know you said that you're a fan of my work, but this is more like stalking . " Lith said while giving Jirni a bow .
"Don't flatter yourself, kid . This time I'm here for him . " She laughed at the joke while pointing at Manohar .
"Once you geniuses find some answers, it will be my job to decide how to continue the investigation . From now on, you all work for me . Mage Felhorn, explain to us what's really happening in Othre . "
"Gladly . " Dorian stepped in the middle of the room and took a deep breath to calm himself . Death and madness plagued the room, making it hard for him to decide if to find more unsettling the corpses or the living .
Aside from the two young women, he had the impression to be the only human in the room .
"It all started a couple of months ago, when the first caravans arrived to exchange goods for food and vice versa . At first, the crime rate spiked . It's nothing alarming since Othre's population doubles until winter ends .
"Then, things escalated from the usual routine to crimes of magical nature . People with little or no magical talent turned into powerful mages and settled old scores the worst possible way . " He pointed at the corpses on the metal scaffolds .
"The phenomenon started from the outer rim and slowly spread to the whole city . The only thing we know is that receiving those powers is a double edged sword . It makes their wielder very dangerous, but in exchange, they die when struck by a spell .
"No matter the element employed, a tier one spell is enough to kill them . While we were still trying to sort things up, our analysts reported that the number of missing persons had spiked as well .
"It took us a while to notice because most of the victims were foreigners . Once it started to happen in the inner rims of the city too, the missing person reports led us to discover that the situation was even worse than we suspected .
"People come into Othre every day . We don't know if we are looking for dozens or hundreds of kidnappings . " Dorian was crestfallen noticing the lack of reactions in the room .
Tista's and Kamila's were genuinely worried, but the others seemed bored as if he had been talking about his vacations .
"We have been able to cover up both these issues and prevent panic from spreading, until these things started to appear . " He moved near the stretcher and pulled away the blanket hiding its content .
It was a corpse, but unlike the others on the scaffolds, it was completely dried up . The eye sockets were empty, the nose was replaced by two small holes in the skull, and the skin was so stretched that the mouth was deformed into a crazed smile .
"Unlike the other anomalies, this phenomenon appeared at the same time in all the rims . Also, in some cases we have witnesses, so at least we know what happened even though we have no idea of how or why .
"The gentleman in front of you is, or better, was Sir Rosen Stern, Baronet of the Kingdom . He died in front of over twenty guests and every one of them said the same thing .
"One moment they were having an amiable conversation and the following a blue pillar descended from the sky enveloping him . When the pillar disappeared, he had become like this . "
"Fascinating . " Jirni, Manohar, and Lith said as one while coming closer to the body .
"We haven't been able to identify a pattern in the timing or in the places of the alleged murders . Everything appears to be completely coincidental . Our only certainty is that whenever a blue light pillar appears, someone dies .
"All the victims belonged to the middle class or the nobility, which makes it impossible to cover it up . Especially since some of them died in front of numerous witnesses or in crowded places . "
Jirni knew of substances capable of inducing hallucinations and venoms that could reduce the victim into a similar state, so she searched the body for puncture wounds .
Lith used all of his and Solus's abilities to perform a full body scan of the corpse .
'The light pillar from the sky manifests when a magical beast is about to evolve . Usually it's of a golden color, while mine was silver . I've never seen a blue one . What the heck could it mean?' He thought .
'No idea . ' Solus replied . 'There's one odd thing, though . The body is completely dry of mana . Check it with Life Vision . '
Everything on Mogar was imbued with mana . Rocks, trees, even corpses . Yet only sentient beings developed a mana core and could use magic .
Ever since his first meeting with Kalla, Lith's Life Vision was capable of perceiving the mana permeating all things in the form of a faint wind of different colors they emanated according to their nature .
Green for the plants, grey for the stones, red for the animals, and black for the dead .
Lith pretended to chant a spell, touched his eyelids and activated Life Vision . His eyes now burning with light magic revealed that the corpses on the stretchers had no mana at all . There was no black wind .
It was the most unnatural thing Lith had ever seen, a void that he couldn't even begin to understand . Even Abominations were infused with mana .
Manohar cast a few spells while examining the body and after a while his eyes shone like those of child staring at his carefully wrapped Christmas presents .
"The reason I called you here is to solve the mystery behind these anomalies . Our first priority is to understand what killed Sir Rosen and is still killing his peers . " Dorian continued .
"What about the others?" Kamila knew she was just a liaison officer and had no active role in the investigation . Yet she couldn't help but be outraged by such a manifest discrimination .
"Are their deaths less important just because they were poor or commoners?"
"No . It's just that we have no leads . A problem that I hope our diagnosticians will be able to correct soon . " Dorian said while giving a small bow to both Lith and Manohar, even though after all the troubles he had gone through to recruit them, he felt they didn't deserve it .
"Cases like that of sir Rosen are so peculiar that, according to our experts, there are only three possible explanations and they are as bad as each other . "
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