Sir Thomas Chember, an evil knight,

Sir Bethany Bellon, a young knight, and his two squire, Meny and Jack,

Harold Landa, a farmer,

Sir George Fulton, a retired knight

Another ordinary citizen, Felaio

The female knight, Dame Fiona Cotin,

Uta Meenee, a merchant, and Juveny, the maid in her house, and several other citizens on the list were the names they had been searching for three days.

“We are only halfway there.”

On the day that Lylphia and the others left for the trip, Yu had investigated the murder of Thomas Chember, the following days they continued to investigate other murders, and today they had spent the whole day investigating their murders again.

In the afternoon, they had one last house to inspect for the day. Then they finalized their plans for the day.

“Sir Veir Matan, this man was a knight. There was another person killed with him in his house, a common cook.”

They went to a farmhouse on the outskirts of town. It reminded Yu of the ranch houses in the American western movies that are on TV on Sundays. Of course, because they were worlds with different standards, the ranch here was a bit fantastical.

Behind the farm's tall hedges roamed huge, frighteningly long komodo dragons, as tall as a horse. Yurine called them komodores, if he remembered correctly.

There were sheep and cows, chickens and ducks, but it was these dragons that caught Yu's attention the most. There were two reasons for this, firstly because he was unfamiliar with this new species and secondly because of the terrifying appearance of the komodores.

Since this was a house on the outskirts of town, it would have taken too long to walk there. So they hired a carriage to bring them here.

When the carriage stopped in front of the farm gate, Yu got down first, then Yurine.

“Wait for us here,” he said to the driver. Then he opened the door to the farm and went inside.

The komodores looked up at the intruders entering the farm. They stuck out their tongues and locked their yellow eyes on Yu and Yurine. Their tough, black skin absorbed the sunlight that barely managed to penetrate through the clouds.

“These things are looking at us, are you sure they're not aggressors?”

“I'm not. After all, these creatures are mainly used in warfare, they should be trained to bite people.”

“Hey, hey! It's wrong to teach farm animals to bite people!”

Komodo dragons were scary enough, but komodores, which were several times bigger, were even scarier. They could take Yu's head off in one bite.

To begin with, Yu was not a person who was good with animals. He didn't call himself an animal lover, maybe he liked cats a bit, but he didn't like other animals. He didn't know how to get along with a giant komodo dragon when he couldn't get along with normal animals yet.

“You can't get along with these animals.”

“Th-this thing coming to us...”

The two dragons who had been watching Yu and Yurine waddled towards them, followed by the other dragons who saw their friends walking. They clicked their tongues and lowered their heads, squinting at their prey.

“Yurine, do something…”

“What should I do?”

“Aren't you a cat and a wizard? Maybe you can deal or kill.”

“I don't like animals!”

“It's nice to find out that we have things in common, but I would have preferred not to find out at a moment like this.”

While it would have made them feel a little more comfortable to learn that Yurine, like him, had a distaste for animals, this was not the moment he wanted to find out such a thing.

“Can they feel fear?”

The distance between them had become so short that the commodores could reach Yu and Yurine in a single leap. So they both had to stop, both lacking the courage to take a step forward.

“What stupid son of a bitch left them out in the open like this? Couldn't they have put them in a barn or something?”

The sour odor emanating from the animals' mouths began to reach their noses.

“Human.”

“Yes?”

“Do something?”

“If I could do something, would I ask you for help?” Yu looked at Yurine hopefully, but she didn't look any different from him. “You shit your pants and want me to change your diaper?”

“I don't want to hear that from you, look how you squeeze my shoulder. You said you quit at nine, but at nineteen you're still going on.”

Yurine responded to Yu's taunt with a harsh retaliation. Not expecting a sudden response, he couldn't hide his face, which fell in surprise.

“Melo! Filo! Shenjo! Rago! Felix! Leave them alone!”

As an adult and a supreme being pondered what to do, a little boy's thin voice was enough to draw the dragons away from Yu and Yurine.

Coming towards them from the farmhouse up ahead was a half-human child, no more than ten years old, wagging his fluffy tail.

“I never thought I'd see a half-human living here.”

Easthelm was a human-dominated island where other races were disliked. With Yu by her side, the attitude of the people towards Yurine was nothing more than dislike, but the few examples he had seen were enough to make him realize how bad the people here could be towards the stray half-humans.

“Were they bothering you? I'm sorry. We can't put them with the others because their training is incomplete, they cause disturbances.”

“You lined them up in one sentence and this is the incomplete version of their training...” Yu shuddered as the reality suddenly dawned on him. “Wait a minute! What do you mean their training is incomplete? You mean they could have attacked us?”

“Eh... They don't know strangers after all.” The boy scratched the back of his head. “But since it didn't happen, it's okay, right?”

“Is everything okay? Yurine's shit her pants here.”

“HE!?” Yurine grabbed Yu's arm and tugged. “You are the one who shit! You were scared too!"

“Afraid? Don't make me laugh, Yurine, do you think I'm afraid of a few animals? I was just testing you to see what you would do.”

“YURINE! DO SOMETHING!”

Yu froze.

Yurine had imitated Yu's voice unsuccessfully, but that wasn't why Yu froze in place.

Yurine stopped, realizing why Yu was frozen with surprise. Normally she would have hid her blushing face, but since she herself was surprised by what she had said, she waited, not knowing what to do.

“Yurine, yes. That's the name I gave you.”

A brief spark flickered in Yu's deep amethyst eyes. The tips of his lips moved up slightly as he gave a gentle smile that could easily melt a heart.

“You're both so full of shit. You've both shit your pants, you can wear diapers if you want.”

The half-human boy scoffed with folded arms. Yurine could take Yu's taunts, but she wasn't going to have the same tolerance for a person she didn't know.

“None of your business, stupid half-human!”

“Stupid half-human? Hahaha, that’s the part where should I laugh? As if you so different. At least I'm not a cat.”

“That's enough, shut up. I can't waste my time with kids like you, take us to your father or something.”

“I can't do that even if I wanted to, he’s been looking for milk somewhere since I was a baby.”

“That wasn’t funny.” Yu interrupted the two arguing child. Even though the boy whose name he didn't know had handled the situation, inside he must have been missing it. “Who is the current owner of this farm? There is something we want to talk to him about.”

“The owner of the farm is Verti Matan. What will you talk to him?”

“It's none of your business, take us to him.”

In the face of Yurine's rude behavior, the boy just shrugged.

“We are investigating murders that happened here two years ago. So we need to talk to Mr. Matan, can you take us to him?”

“That's what you get for being polite like this big brother, young lady. All right, I'll escort you home.”

Yurine turned her head with an ‘hmph’ sound, the boy turned on his heel and started moving forward.

The setting sun painted the world in shades of orange and red. Although many people liked the sunset, Yu did not like it. The sun painting the world orange gave him melancholic feelings and brought back the night he disliked.

When they arrived at the gate of the farmhouse, they were met by another half-human, a servant. She had red hair, round ears on top of her head and a fluffy tail.

“Megail, did you feed them?”

“Not yet, mommy. I met this little lady and the big brother up ahead. The big brother wants to talk to Mr. Matan.”

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

The maid turned gracefully to Yu and bowed her head, holding her skirt, “Welcome. I am Yumy, one of the maids of the Matan house. What did you want to talk to my master about?”

“The murders that happened here two years ago.”

Unlike Megail, Yumy was surprised by the reason for their arrival, but she did not let her surprise distract her.

“I see. Master will be here soon, you can wait in the hall.”

Yumy let them into the house and they went to the living room in her company.

“Would you like a drink or a snack? The tea brewed in this house is really good.”

“No, thank you.”

He did not like hot drinks in general, especially tea and coffee. He was not used to drinking hot things, so when he tried to drink it, he could not stand the heat.

Apart from the heat, there was a special reason why he didn't like coffee, Yu was disgusted by its taste and even the smell of it made him nauseous.

Yu was not one to drink the drinks offered to him to avoid shame, so even if Yumy brought them, he would not drink them.

Yumy's offer of a treat on the way back to Yurine reminded Yu of a memory from high school.

One of his friends insisted on buying him tea and he refused, saying again and again that he did not like tea.

Nevertheless, his friend bought him a cup of tea and forced it into Yu's hand. Yu couldn't force himself to drink something he didn't like, and when he gave the tea to someone else, he and his friend got into an argument.

“I said I don't like it, I said I don't want it. I don't have to drink something I don't like just because it's a treat.”

The maid asked Yurine the same question. When Yurine refused, she disappeared to attend to her own affairs. Shortly afterwards, a young man with blue hair came in with Megail.

“I assume you are the guests Megail mentioned, welcome.”

“Mr. Matan, right?”

“Yes.” The blue-haired man held out his hand to Yu. “Verti Matan.”

Yu shook the extended hand. “Yu Valarfin, my daughter Yurine Valarfin.”

“Hmm... You look so young to have a daughter at your age.”

Yurine hadn't said anything about her age, but from the way she looked he could guess that she was eight or nine years old. So Yu, who was not yet twenty, gave him the impression of being young.

“I take care of myself,” he said with a smile.

“I met the coachman waiting outside. If you like, he can join you for dinner.”

“Thank you for the offer, but we want to get our business done and leave immediately. We have other plans for the evening.”

Yurine didn't know what plans they had for the evening, but she continued to listen to the conversation without interrupting.

“Well, would you like a drink? It's good for talking.”

“What is this love of treats? Anyway, at least they are polite.”

But in trying to be polite, people could offend the other person.

“Thank you, we don't want anything.”

“So, Megail, can you get me some tea?”

“Right away, sir.”

After Megail's departure, Verti interjected, clapping her hands.

“I heard you came to talk about what happened to my uncle.”

“We also wonder what happened to the cook.”

They had not come here for a single murder. Veir Matan was the more prominent of the two, but the cook at the farm was killed with him the same night.

“Who was your uncle? What was he like?”

“My uncle was a knight. When he was fifty-five he was retired and given this farm. Unfortunately he didn't get to spend much time here, it happened in the third year of his retirement.”

One of the motivations for joining the army in Rolderhelm was the good retirement opportunities. Those who had spent a long time in the army and achieved rank could retire with a plot of land and a good amount of money.

In their retirement, these knights or soldiers would leave the city and settle in their villages to spend the rest of their time working the land or raising livestock.

Especially since knighthood was a difficult and long-working job, many knights did not have the opportunity to marry or have children. It was therefore not uncommon for the knight's relatives to inherit the remaining lands, as in Verti's case.

“I don't know if I can say anything negative about him. He spent his life as an honest man, he didn't deserve to die like that.”

Sir Veir Matan, like many of the killer's victims, was tortured to death.

“What about the cook?”

“I don't know him, he was probably no different from any other person trying to survive in this world.”

“Can Mrs. Yumy say something about him?”

As they talked, Megail brought his master's tea. “Thank you, Megail,” Verti said after taking a sip of tea. “Will you call me your mother?”

At Verti's request, Megail ran to the kitchen and called her mother. Yumy came to her master without delay.

“Here you are, sir.”

“Mr. Valarfin has a few questions for you, would you answer them?”

“Of course.” Yumy curtsied to Yu, holding the hem of her skirt. “What do you want to know?”

“I want you to tell me about the cook who was killed. What kind of person was him?”

“She was my friend, a good girl. I don't think I know anything about her that would interest you. She was just an ordinary person trying to live.”

“Did Veir and the cook exhibit any strange behavior near the time of their deaths?”

He had asked the question to both Verti and Yumy. They both answered no.

Yu decided that was enough, after getting a few bits of information that he thought would be useless.

“I guess there's nothing more we can learn. Thank you for your help.”

***

“They were kind people, weren't they?”

“They weren't like other idiots.”

The people in the places they had visited before Matan Farm had been very unpleasant. Almost all of these attitudes were against Yurine because she was half human and had white hair.

“It was shorter than our research yesterday and this morning. Did you find out what you wanted to know?”

“‘That's it! Now I've got him!’ I don't have any information to say things like that... To be honest, in all the murders after the murder of Thomas Chember, almost all the victims were ordinary people. I mean, according to the accounts, they were all people who were just like that.”

When they went to the house today, they found no new information.

“But I believe we have enough clues about the killer's algorithm...”

“What do you mean?”

“The killer's choices...”

He had a bad feeling.

“Yurine?”

Next to him sat a girl he did not recognize. This girl with white hair and cat ears could not be real.

Nothing could be real right now. Yu's perceptions of time and reality were disappearing like a faint reflection on the glass, getting farther and farther away. Where was he? What was he doing? He felt like he was moving somewhere unknown.

“What's going on?”

He did not hear Yurine, his body began to tremble.

There was nothing inside his head. There was no time, no names. He didn't know where he was, he only heard a disturbing ringing in his ears.

His eyes didn't even move as the cat-eared girl picked him up and put him on her knees.

“I am sorry.”

“That voice?”

---

Yu had just started his sentence when he suddenly went silent and stared at Yurine. After a few seconds of hesitation, his hands trembled and his face contorted, making Yurine's heart ache.

As his teeth clenched together, saliva escaped through the gaps and ran down Yu's chin.

“What's going on?”

She didn't need to ask, she knew exactly what had happened. It was another one of those crises she had faced several times before.

“Is there a problem? Sir?!”

The driver in the driver's seat turned his head at Yurine's alarmed voice and saw Yu's pitiful face in the middle of the attack.

He was about to pull the carriage to the side of the road to intervene when Yurine stopped him from doing so.

“Go on.”

When she rolled Yu onto his side and placed his head on her knees, his drool stained Yurine's dress, but she didn't mind.

“What's going on?”

The driver looked back over his shoulder. Needless to say, this was the first time he had encountered such a situation.

“Go on.”

Yurine brought her small hands over Yu's head and the mana came out of those hands in the form of light and went inside Yu's head.

When the driver realized that Yurine was a mage, he turned his head to the road and gave the horses a few strokes with his whip to speed them up.

Yurine continued the healing spell until Yu stopped shaking and fell asleep.

***

“My head, it's cracking...”

He woke up with a burning acid sensation in his throat. It felt like there was a void in his stomach and a burning liquid inside that void. He was hungry.

At first he tried to control his burning stomach so he wouldn't vomit, but to no avail. The burning liquid from his stomach rose up his throat and Yu stuck his head out of the bed before it came out of his mouth.

Although he couldn't taste it, he could feel his mouth burning and there was a heavy odor. Brown vomit came out of Yu's mouth and pooled next to the bed.

The surroundings were blurry because of his teary eyes as he vomited. He tried to wipe away the tears with his hands to clear his vision but failed. He could not bring his arm up to his face.

He closed his eyes, trying to remember what had happened. Tears were spilling out of his eyelids.

“Yurine...”

“I'm here.”

Yurine responded to being called by the name Yu had given her. Yu was happy.

He remembered being in the car. Now that he thought about it, he realized that he also remembered the moment of the crisis, when Yurine had taken him on her knees.

But this memory felt like it was from years ago.

“It gets worse every time.”

Yurine must have been aware of this. Except for the first seizure in the Sigma Tower, each of Yu's seizures was more severe than the last.

“I don't know what's going to happen.”

In his own world, he was able to prevent seizures thanks to the medication he was taking. He had epilepsy medication with him when he came to this world, but it soon ran out.

“Even if I had those pills with me right now, I wonder if they would do any good.”

Yurine was the only one who could help him with the seizure and she had already helped him through it quickly.

But what happened this time was worrying him. Normally the healing spell brought Yu back to himself quickly, but this time he fainted and woke up in his bed.

“Why me and not someone else?”

He couldn't remember how many times he had rebelled against his situation. He could only dream of getting rid of this disease that had plagued him since he was seven years old.

“It's as if the world repays me for every smile it gives me.”

He was fed up. The smallest moment of happiness was followed by trouble.

“What are you doing?”

“You should be grateful to me. It is not something I will always do, I am doing it just for today. You can see it as a debt. Pay me back later by serving me well.”

Yurine was cleaning up where Yu threw up.

“You didn't have to do it for me.”

“These are not the right words to say thank you.”

She had thrown one of Yu's clothes on the floor and was cleaning up the mess by moving it with her foot.

“Thank you.”

Yurine was embarrassed. Yu's thanks were sincere.

“Where are you going?”

When Yu regained his energy and was able to move his arms and legs, he stood up.

“I'm going to wash my mouth, and I want some fresh air.”

His mouth was still burning and he could feel it stinking. He had to get rid of it.

First he opened the window to let in fresh air, then he poured water into a bucket on a table, where he rinsed his mouth.

This bucket was there to drain the water left over from shaving, washing the face and brushing the teeth. When the bucket was full, they emptied it into a pit in the backyard of the guild.

After washing his mouth several times, he went to the window and inhaled the cold air. As the air filled his lungs, his mind cleared.

“Who brought me here?”

“I told the driver to carry you.”

“I hope you meant that in a polite way.”

Yu spoke in a sarcastic tone. He knew that Yurine was not, at least not yet, the kind of child to ask for things politely.

“I'm sorry. I didn't mean for this to happen today.”

Today was an important day and he did not want anything unpleasant to happen.

“I...” He didn't know how to get to the point. It was a simple thing, but it was difficult for some reason, perhaps because he couldn't predict Yurine's reaction. “I won't claim I am good at choosing gifts.”

“What do you mean?”

After pushing aside his expensive dress with her foot, Yurine gave full attention to Yu. She wondered where the conversation was going.

“Usually when I have to give a gift, I want it to be something useful, because most gifts are thrown away never to be used. Of course, useful gifts are also expensive and I am poor, so I would prefer to give my sisters a service rather than a product as a gift. By service I mean cooking, entertainment center, massage and so on. Because compared to something that will never be used, these turn into good memories and relaxing.”

This was Yu's general idea of gifts.

“But there are no entertainment centers in this world and I didn't know what you would like, so I chose something classic.”

He left the window and opened the wardrobe inside the room. After rummaging around a bit, he pulled out a small brown plush bear hidden under some clothes.

“It might be a cliché gift to give to a child and I don't know what use it is.” How to play with a toy? Yu didn't know that. “You've never had a toy as long as you've been with me, so maybe you might like this.”

He handed the gift to Yurine. Yurine was both surprised and hesitant. She stretched out her arms and took the toy in her tiny white hands.

“I'd like to say that I splurged, and unless Lylphia bought something cheap and put it in the rest of the money, it's the best teddy bear you can find here.”

“So this is the other job you talked about before Lylphia left.”

“Yes, that was it.”

Yu was always with Yurine, so he couldn't go alone to pick out a gift. If he wanted to go to buy a gift, Yurine would have to come with him and the surprise would be spoiled.

“Yurine.”

Yurine's red eyes locked on Yu's amethyst eyes. Those red eyes were about to be wet with tears.

Yu put the best, warmest smile he could on his face.

“Happy birthday.”

Yurine's cheeks were flushed. She tried hard not to let her eyes well up, but she couldn't stop a few tears from falling.

“How did you know?”

“How did I know? You must have forgotten that you and I issued ID cards at the same time. Besides, I carry your identity card, of course I will know your birthday.”

Yurine's birthday was on September twenty-third, three and a half weeks after Yu's birthday. Unlike Yu, Yurine was a Libra.

“Thank you.”

A shy, timid but sweet thank you. She was giving Yu the purest of all the happiness he had ever felt.