“What’s going on?” “How’d he get killed?” “Who killed the princess?” and other such questions were whispered through the crowd, as they all stood in the ballroom, the only room in the mansion capable of holding all the guests.
The murmuring began to die down when a figure took the stage.
“HELLO EVERYONE!” they called out, leading to everyone’s eyes turning onto them, “I am Graham Kane. I was going to be the individual responsible for informing you of your guess on the theft of the Mythic Rank Necklace held in this mansion. Now, I’ll be recruiting a couple of you to assist in the investigation. Any volunteers?”
A few hands shot up. The couple from earlier, two spies Veronica has in her spy group, and Veronica herself. With the variety of detectives gathered Graham pulled them into a spare room and explained the plan.
“You all go out and find your stuff. You’re free to go together, but I’m hoping for small groups to find and corroborate details. If any of you get an idea, feel free to come by and suggest it. I’ll be here, compiling evidence and trying to figure out what happened.” With his speech finished, he pulled out documents and began noting stuff down something on a notepad. Seeing this, the rest exit, leaving Veronica and Graham.
“Are you hired by EH?”
Startled, Graham turns towards Veronica, before nodding. “Why do you ask?”
“Do you know the thi- second guest?”
“Huh? You can’t be asking about the party list, so what are you asking about?”
“Guests requested by EH. There’s the princess, and someone else. I’m very certain the killer is the second guest.”
“Well, I can’t help you. EH told me nothing of the sort.”
Sighing, Veronica headed out. With neither of her spies knowing her, she had no one else to catch up with, leading to her searching the office again.
The documents were the same, with the only two interesting items being a guest list and a blueprint. Scanning through it, it had encrypted details beside all guests. Some were easily broken, such as Viscount Garry Turquoise hiding the fact he’s bald, and others being much harder to break. Considering the strength was in general ranks, it’s likely restricted based on actual value.
Slipping it and the blueprint into her pocket, Veronica left only to find someone dressed in a black cloak hiding their face.
“Hello again. This event is going fantastic. The subtle looming dread and fear, the difficult mystery, oh it’s so wonderful! A shame I’m not a part.”
With their short monologue finished, they threw a letter before disappearing.
“... Dread is a subset of fear.”
Opening the letter, it was more or less a notice saying there was evidence leading to the killer's motive. Sighing again over the seemingly useless note, Veronica began to think. Evidence… motive… an idea appearing, Veronica ran over to Graham.
“I have an idea!”
“Oh?”
“I got a guest list, with encrypted details besides each of the guests. Maybe one of them will answer who did it!”
“Let me see,” Graham took the paper and inspected it closely. “I can decrypt most of it, but it’ll take time. You should probably get going for more evidence.”
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Nodding, Veronica checked the blueprint. No secret passages were shown on the map, but there was a secret basement. Heading over, Veronica found the staircase was blocked by a gate, with a paper right taped on it. The note said: “For you seeker, beyond the gate of wisdom. To pass, you must show your wisdom in the question you are seeking the answer to. As your reward, there are 5 documents.”
Veronica wondered, why 5 documents? And how do you show wisdom? The question must be the murderer, so what wisdom has she done?
“The killer is the third guest.”
With a rumble, the gate opened. Before her was a long staircase, lit only by the light behind her. Heading down, the gate closed behind, leaving her in the dark, revealing a faint outline of the stairs. Minding her step, she traversed the staircase.
∅∅∅
Reaching the bottom after many minutes, torches suddenly ignited, revealing a desk with 5 documents. Picking up the leftmost one, it was titled, “Why Tarcam Committed the murder”. Veronica hurried to check the others, finding they were all titled with a member of the group. She went back to the first and read them all in order.
“Tarcam killed them in the ballroom and fled through the window. It was out of anger, the desire to have taken Osiris for herself.”
“Terry killed them in the bathroom and [illegible] room. It was out of sadness, for killing his former girlfriend.”
“Emily killed them in the ballroom. It was out of [illegible].”
“Alexander killed them in the ballroom [illegible] door. It was out of greed, to steal the throne.”
“Lucas killed them in the ballroom and fled [illegible] passage. It was out of greed, to steal the throne.”
A bell rang, dragging Veronica out of her trance. Grabbing the papers and hurrying back out, she found herself instead in the hallway to Graham’s room, alongside the four others. Deciding not to question the teleportation, after entering and taking a seat, she began to try and piece together the case with the documents, and possibly solve the illegible sections.
Looking over the Tarcam document, she removed it due to being Tarcam herself. Moving on to Terry’s, she removed him due to the victims not dying in the bathroom, but in the ballroom. Emily, for not leaving. With the couple removed, the only suspects left were her own spies. Now, was it Alexander or Emily?
Graham chatted peacefully with the other detectives while Veronica stared at the words. Door. Passage. Passage!
Taking a break, Veronica separated each of them, and asked them a variety of questions, all to disguise the main one: did they know of the secret passageways?
With one positive result, matching what Veronica deduced from the documents, being a solid case against them.
Gathering them all, Veronica began. “EH, the orchestrators, left a path of hints. There’s this one,” Veronica showed the papers, “a list of possible suspects and how they did it. Removing Tarcam for being me, and because there was no sign of the window opening, Terry for killing them in the bathroom, Emily for not leaving, and Alexander for leaving the front door! This leaves only one person to be the killer, the one who killed in the ballroom and left through the secret passage. And combined with being the only one who knows of the secret passages, something only the killer would know, and who the third guest would know, as EH would’ve told them. Lucas, it was you! You made a deal with EH, so when Osiris hosted the party, you were invited alongside the princess! You killed her to take the throne, which wouldn’t be hard with her being the only royal child and you being a well-liked and capable spy. You killed Osiris as well to both hide your motive by making it look more indiscriminate and prevent him from revealing you! But, you didn’t expect for me to see you! Your fleeing was supposed to hide your involvement, but it became the final nail in your coffin!”
Larry began to laugh. “Ah, but the question remains. How exactly are you going to convince anyone,” Larry pulled his assassin's dagger, with its death-dealing enchantments, “if you’re dead?”
Larry lunged. His air flew behind him, his dagger close to his chest. His face was twisted with a smile, terrifying Veronica.
But it wasn’t meant to be. Larry suddenly fell over, head separated from body.
“Congratulations Veronica. You solved the case. Here,” Graham handed her a note. “And, your original clothes,” handing her a box. Having handed her prizes, Graham began to clap with the couple, leaving Veronica and Alexander weirded out. It got weirder, with servants coming in to clap, then leaving and being replaced by others. At the end, Osiris and the fake also came in.
“Congratulations. Your ride is outside,” Osiris told her, leading to her leaving.
∅∅∅
On the boat, Veronica looked at the mansion, wondering what was even going on there. Shaking the thoughts away, she opened the note.
“Nulla isn’t dead. HE and EH are closely tied together. Larry was used, his pride stoked. Athena knows more. The price of more will be a great one. Will you pay for future for it?”