The wind was chilling on this drab night, quite different from the usual colorful and noisy Slab Kortlea. Unruly streaks of blonde hair got removed from their clumps as the wind blew and disturbed the man's vision. A man deeply breathed in and exhaled out. What came out should be a condensation of smoke that came from the difference of temperature from his internal temperature and what the air he breathed in. The thing is, it wasn’t nearly cold enough to have this effect, winter was a long ways away. Even more quaintly about it was that the smoke moved in erratic ways, wanting to block his eyes from seeing what he wanted to see. A swift flex of his mystical muscles and he unveiled the illusion, finally having clear sight on the scene before him.
A once two story house reduced to its foundations. The inside, if you could even call it that, had numerous furniture and decorations that probably used to look good but now resemble the horror stories bards loved to tell. The ruins of the house reminded him of a certain luxurious estate that was burned. The resemblance took his memories towards a downward spiral, his hand stiffening in response and his eyes while open were focused at nothing.
He imagined Kortlea in the same state. People reduced to nothing, just like his brother.
“Peter.” The man known as Peter was jolted out of his thinking, his emerald eyes looked at the huge person in front of him. “Are you going in or what?” The deep voice belonged to a face with a mouth that didn’t move even as he spoke. He conjured his own sounds with his auditory magic.
“I am.” Peter said. The man with the deep voice amplified his own heartbeat in response with one harsh thumping sound of the heart. The sound had an irritated tone with it. Peter had no idea how a heartbeat could sound irritated but the man had his ways.
The two men walked closer to the entrance. The house was within a populated residential district of Slab Kortlea. And apparently the destruction of this house had no witnesses.
“Hear anything Gram?” Peter said. He looked around the residential district, it was full of small ocular enchantments that shone and stylized art that was in every home. When he walked past it earlier, it even smelled amazing, though inside of this bastion of humanity, something wormed itself in and destroyed a part of it without being seen by anyone else.
“Absolutely nothing. Except the terrified whisperings of the neighbors.” Gram replied with the same non-moving mouth.
“And the owner?” Peter remembered the woman who took care of this home, her husband died tragically in the events that occured and her kid was missing. Her husband was the only person in the street that was home, too exhausted from work, their kid wanted to stay with his dad as he wasn’t home all the time. Everyone else went to Living Life, a popular troupe in Kortlea that had a special event where they promised free seatings. The coincidences added up. Right now the woman was staying with one of the neighbors while they did their work.
“Same thing.”
“Keep an ear out for trouble. I doubt the incident is going to happen again, but you never know these days.” As Peter said that Gram’s heart pulsed in agreement.
Peter entered the ruins of the house. He was met with two people. Their eyes met his and they nodded to each other. “Did you find anything?” Peter asked them.
“Take a look at this, boss.” A woman said.
The woman, with her helm at her side, had short curly hair and a round face led Peter to their findings. They walked to the middle of the house with deep claw marks. The claw marks had four lines, the size of which couldn't have belonged to any natural creature in Arrelyn as far as Peter knew.
“It’s too coincidental to not be them.” The woman stated blandly.
“The devil is out and about again huh. Any traces of magic? Oddities?” Peter asked. He crouched down to the claw marks, curious about who could make them.
“No traces as usual, though I haven’t had the time to thoroughly analyze it yet. Still, this scene feels familiar…” She said.
“We’ve seen similar scenes before Irene.”
“Not like this one. They haven’t completely ruined a building in the middle of a residential area. This is different from their usual killings.” Irene explained.
The devil case as they’ve named it was a series of unsolvable killings that most likely came from the same group of people. It inexplicably had no motive for it was just random citizens that were targeted. They were a group because they targeted multiple people killing ten maybe even twenty in one day in wildly different areas before going into hiding once again and doing the same thing after a week has gone by. Now, this month was different, instead of just murders, destruction was involved, in the middle of a populated neighborhood that somehow no one witnessed.
“If it’s different, why would it be familiar to you?” Peter said with a quizzical expression.
“It’s because she’s insane, bossman.” A lighthearted voice entered the conversation. He was a man with a tall build, though his helm hid his face, you could tell he was smiling underneath it.
“If we’re talking about insanity, you’re closer to that than me, Luke.” Irene said in a cold tone.
“Truer words have never been spoken. By the way bossman, from my findings, there’s absolutely nothing here!” Luke said as he removed his helm, the expected smile revealed itself.
“Start using more of your advanced spells then. Do another sweep of the place. Gram and I will stand guard while you two do your investigation.”
While Peter was a skilled olfactician, it was better to leave the investigation to the optician and gustatician. The two did their work. Luke found the highest platform he could and jumped the gap easily. You could tell when a magician casted a spell, their eyes had this glossy look to it that were unfocused. Luke’s mind was preoccupied with casting the spell and not getting torn apart by directly tampering with his connection to his eyes. An ocular magician was best when it came to a general assessment in investigations.
Meanwhile, as Irene did her work, you could see her breathe in through her mouth. She was analyzing the chemical composition of the place. The taste sensation was nothing other than chemical sensors, same for the nose. While it was the same for olfacticians that they both had the same chemical perception, gustaticians had it better as they could break it down and piece it together bit by bit as they could harness the natural functions of saliva that is closely ingrained with tasting and conjure it to analyze the things they wanted. Olfactory is just duller when it comes to analysis. The house wasn’t any different as she targeted specific parts that she believed to have more tampering. In fact, the house was extremely normal except for it being destroyed. She had been in many scenes like this and they all have the same pattern of taste. This one was no different, like every case they’ve tackled that they had suspicion of the devils work.
She crouched down and tried to analyze the claw marks, but they only gave her a dull taste of soot, ash and stone. Searching further gave her nothing. No matter what she did, changing up her perception to be more sensitive to specific chemicals and duller to others. Going through the whole ringer, just to find anything. And she came up with nothing.
Now this was truly different. Usually we can find something. Now there’s zero? Irene thought to herself. A light feeling of an ache in her stomach made itself known. Her calm was fussed though she tried to shake it off.
Luke and Irene finished their sweep of the house and disclosed what they found or lack there of to Peter.
“This is unusual, there’s nothing to be found.” Luke said while cupping his chin. While he performed quite an extensive search that required multiple advanced ocular spells, he didn’t look fatigued at all.
“I’ve tried every variation of chemical sensitivity I could, nothing came up.” Irene said.
Peter looked at the house again. Was this the fate of Kortlea? No, this was going to be bigger. It could very well affect Threinas as a whole. Peter remembered the corpse of his brother. Buried in ash and soot. His eyes sliced through with his own blade. Why would he do that right in front of an enemy? Why did you abandon us Samuel? Peter thought to himself.
So, is this it? Are we just going to go home, empty-handed? Dalin who was our only lead killed himself and now this? Peter’s blood boiled in rage at the thought. His brother died for this, this couldn’t be it. His own power, he once thought was so mighty, is nothing compared to what was happening around him. His own brother was gone, he couldn’t bear it. But he had to keep going. Peter reminded himself of why he was doing this. He imagined a better tomorrow of those who had nothing. A better life for those found wanting. He calmed himself down. Usually there’s clues even with this devil situation, no matter how few. Now there’s nothing…
“Boss.” A voice interrupted him. He looked up and saw Irene with a face she hadn't really shown much. Worry. “I want to try something out, though it would require the use of my wand.” She said to him.
That was a bit concerning, the use of a wand was dangerous but powerful. One could gain inhuman control of their senses for the chance of even losing your perception altogether if you weren’t ready for it. “Are you going to be fine? You’ve just exerted yourself.” Peter said.
“I can rest for a bit. But I want to try something.”
Luke and Peter looked at each other. Even Gram from the other side of the house could hear them and was a bit worried, but he was busy guarding.
“We’ll go with your plan then, we can’t leave here with nothing. Not with what happened.”
Irene and Luke looked down at the ground. They knew what he was talking about. The death of Samuel wasn’t just hard for Peter, but for everyone. They’ve been a team for five years.
“Can you tell us what your plan is, at least?” Luke asked her.
“No. If it works, I’ll tell you, if it doesn’t then I’m just misreading things.” She said with a tone that implied finality. A pulse of the heart that eerily sounded like amusement was heard by everybody. They all smiled at that. Everyone trusted her. And they went with it.
Irene rested. It only took half as long for magicians to regain their mental energy as it did for someone who exerted themselves in a marathon to regain their stamina. While she rested, she regained a lot of her strength, but not all of it.
Gram, Luke and Peter were now in the living room of the house. Peter helped her by casting some odors that helped her focus and soothed her mind while also blocking her olfactory senses to keep her focused on her gustatory magic. Gram and Luke did the same for auditory and ocular senses. They didn’t have a haptician in their group, so she was stuck with a patch job of a semi-removed feeling of touch. Only an actual haptician can help her fully block the feeling of touch.
Her already sensitive palate was elevated even higher, she could taste the air without even trying to enhance it with her own magic. This was actually one of the many practices people did to unlock their own connection to the senses, to block everything except for one and hyper focus on that.
Irene unsheathed a wand. It was made from dekraydor wood and conducts the mana engraved in it better than any material enchanters have tried. This wand cost as much as enchanting a whole house by a first class enchanter. The wand was already quite a bit thin. I hope this doesn’t give up on me Irene thought to herself.
Irene readied herself and pushed her control to the limit. Her nose instantly bled and her eyes were crying blood. But she had such a clear perception of the world around her that it was quite surreal. Though instead of sight, she had a chemical composition read of the room, though that was just the physical aspect, she also could quite literally taste the mana in the air. Unimaginable pain for such irresistible clarity of the world. She always dreamed of being able to exist in this state forever, but that would quite literally kill her so she moved on and did her job as fast as she could.
Even with this much help from her team and the extremely specialized wand the area remained normal. The mana in the surroundings was quite normal, in places where enchantments are heavy it bends and warps the mana around though there was none of that here. Still, she noticed something concerning, the mana was normal but there was something interacting with it she had never seen before, even in her state she could barely notice it. Faint flickers of dark violet showed itself around the chimney. It was a spell, it interacted in a way with the mana surroundings she had never seen before. She immediately released her hold on her own spell. Her wand disintegrated just as she finished her search.
“Ch-chimney…” Irene coughed out alongside with some blood. Falling to her knees and losing control of her legs. But Peter catched her.
“Good job.” He said to her and he laid her gently along the floor. Administering some quick fixes with some medical aromas that should get her functioning back to normal. He signaled to Luke and asked him to look after her.
Peter examined the chimney, he enhanced his smell and fished for anything, he came up with nothing. He tried to put his hand through the chimney and there was nothing inside. Peter patted the walls and it brought him nothing.
Peter tried breaking the walls first to see if it was hollow inside. While he debated with himself if he should use his amulet to try to dispel the surrounding area of the chimney, that was a bit too drastic.
He destroyed brick after brick and when he got to the right side of the chimney even though when he hit it, it didn’t sound hollow. It broke and showed something inside. The wall broke down, and a human being revealed itself.
The boy was wide eyed, he was trying to yell out though the chains covering his mouth were doing a good job of silencing that. His arms and legs were chained to the wall. Peter immediately removed the shackles, they weren’t sophisticated, normal shackles that anyone with a modicum experience of lockpicking would be able to unlock, Peter was familiar enough to bypass it.
“Gram, I know you’re listening, call for the owner to get inside now.” Peter whispered, though he already knew he was doing it before he even said it.
The boy was crying, and when the shackles on his mouth were removed he was finally heard.
“They’re going to do it… They’re going to do it!” The boy screamed.
“You’re safe now kid! Look at me, your mom is here, okay?” Peter reassured the little boy.
The kid then held him, with eyes the same as warriors who have seen too much violence. “They’re going to do it again. I’ve heard them say it!” The child shouted.
“Who said it?”
“Th-they were…” The boy nervously tried to describe what he saw but it was obvious he was getting terrified of the thought.
Peter casted a spell on the kid. He used a relaxing aroma, to ease his fright and nervousness. He could see the kids' wide eyes normalize. Then he heard a voice.
“Jonathan! They found you!” A woman screamed then ran for the boy and hugged him dearly.
“M-.. Mom!” The kid said.
Peter called the others.
“We should let them have their reunion. Still, don’t let your guard down, this is the first time a witness survived an incident in this series of cases.”
The group had a small surge of pride go through them, this was the first time they’ve managed to get a witness. But a disturbing thought went across all of their heads at the same time. There were missing people in each incident that happened. Where were they? They all looked at the kid.
“How did you know what to look for Irene?” Luke asked her. The three men looked at her.
While she was happy, there was a distinct look to her face that was apparent that she thought this wasn’t good at all. “Let me ask you three first. Why do you call this perpetrator we have, ‘the devil’?”
“Well, it’s because they’re evil, right?” Luke said.
“All of what they’ve done has given them nothing but satisfaction for their deeds.” Gram answered.
“Killing, kidnappings all without financial or political gain. They have enough power to even make us headless chickens in this investigation.” Peter said. “This is the closest criminal we can call a devil.”
“This is all true. Except you’re not getting it.” Irene said.
“What don’t we get?” Peter asked.
But before Irene could answer. The child who was being comforted by their mother, suddenly screamed with an uncharacteristically low voice.
“They had pillars of fire burning patterns of enchantment! Shadowy figures with eyes that shone of blood. Spaded tails and skeletal wings! Claws that could enlarge themselves to destroy everything! THEY’RE DEVILS, OH DEAR MAKER THEY’RE COMING!” He screamed with increasing intensity. His mother tried to shake him out of it. The four investigators tried to run and help the kid. But for the most part, it seemed the kid got out of the possession himself and now he was shaking, paranoid of his own mind.
Peter looked at everyone but when he saw Irene’s face, it was even more terrified than the mother of a just-possessed child.
“And so a child, so pure and full of love was possessed and gave the first description of the devil…” Irene mumbled.
“Irene?” Peter said in a worried voice.
“I think I finally realize why I’m familiar with this scene… It’s from the Book of the Maker.”
The men looked at her and then at each other. Suddenly the erratic murders and their lack of reasoning began to make sense. Though they couldn’t be sure of what they’ve just realized was the truth, the implication made their blood run cold.
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