a New Incident

Grant brought the group to the new crime scene. This time, the kidnapping happened in the city slum, the poorest area of Lancester. From the first step inside the slum, the putrid smell attacked the group's senses. Piles of human excrements and urine were mixed with the road, becoming one with the actual road itself. The absence of insects like flies in the winter that would usually eat these filths made the smell even more unbearable. The houses are made out of flimsily put-together pieces of wooden boards and metal parts and appeared to have had many repairs due to the destruction from harsh weathers.

The group is currently in the street where the kidnappings occurred.

"Yuck. The Slums. I'm not paid enough for this..." A knight complained.

"Right. Who cares about the slums anyway? People here disappear all the time." Another knight chimed in.

Rudy went up to those two knights and smacked their head.

(SMACK)

"Shut it! Remember that knights are in the service of the people, no matter what social class they belong in. That includes the people of the slums. Besides, these disappearances matched the modus operandi of the previous incidents so we must be dealing with the same kidnappers." Rudy barked at his men.

"Nicely put Captain. At least you're better than just some womanizer..." Braum said in a low voice.

"-Huh? What did you just say?" Rudy looked confused for a second.

"Nothing. Right. What are we dealing with here this time?" Braum asked.

Grant's hand went to his overcoat's pockets and pulled out a small notebook.

"11 children missing...All of them are orphans. There are no families here in the slums... The poor areas will still have families but the slums are worst than that. Parents here will abandon their children the second they become a burden to their own livelihood. The children here are mostly abandoned...This is just one of the crime scenes where a child supposedly disappeared." Grant said while looking at his notes.

"What makes this different than the usual cases of human traffickers and slavers taking these unwanted children?" Rudy asked.

'Slavers...' Braum thought, disgusted again.

"Those criminals won't risk taking these many children at once like this. For protection, the children will usually join local rat gangs that guarantee their safety to some extent by having these children become thieves and gang members. The slavers usually only take children that were sold to them by the gangs when they are not useful OR when the children are not part of a gang yet." Grant answered.

"And what makes us so sure if these children are in a gang or not? And what if the slavers are taking chances this time by kidnapping more children than usual. " Braum also asked a question since he is quite ignorant about these matters.

"That's simple. The slavers actually have good relations with the local gangs and won't want to anger them. And as for how I know some of the children kidnapped were in a gang? Well... ask that guy behind us." Grant said.

After hearing Grant's words, everyone turned around to see who's behind them. They saw a young thug peeking at them behind one of the shabby houses. After noticing that his cover has been blown, the young thug fled.

"Hey! Stop right there! Knights! Chase after him!" Rudy ordered his men in a hurry.

Some of Rudy's men then started to chase after the thug.

"H-how did you see that thug behind us?" Rudy asked dumbfounded.

"I smelled him," Grant answered.

"H-h-how? This whole slum smells like shit! How could you make out his smell?" Rudy asked again.

"Well one, we live in a world with this thing called magic so I used some and two, he smelled of Black Flower, my favorite alcoholic drink. I would recognize that smell from miles away. And no slum people would afford that drink anyway, his gang probably stole it. *YAWN* " Grant answered while seeming even more tired.

"*sigh* even when you found something it's related to your alcoholism" Rudy replied.

'I did notice the thug's presence but I did not think he was a threat so I did not say anything. To even notice his presence like that...Grant impresses me once more. His intelligence almost seems uncanny in this medieval society. He would make a great scientist in Yakana.' Braum thought.

"Back on topic guys. When did the kidnapping supposedly occurred?" This time, Urada snapped the group out of their daze.

"*cough* right. It happened last night during the snowstorm. That's all we know so far." Rudy answered.

"Well, let's search the area shall we?" Urada said while smiling and the group started their investigation.

**

The group split up and combed the area. But the filth of the slum made it even harder to find evidence since every known form of small human parts and fluids are mixed with the road.

'Shit. The ARIM is detecting everything. By everything I mean everything. Urine, sperm, poo, belonging to the people of the slum. It's hard to tell which one is evidence. I also turned on the function to detect mana signature but came up with nothing.' Braum thought.

"Hey, Stef, did you find anything?" Braum asked.

"I'm sorry Zed. Investigations are not my specialty... I'm just acting as your bodyguard here." Urada answered.

"Right...that's fine *sigh*"

'I need help' Braum thought in his head.

'What if...Grant? can I trust him? he seems like a good guy...albeit a bit eccentric...Alright, I'll trust him. If he tries anything...we'll erase him." Braum came up with a solution.

Braum approached Grant who is squatting down and looking closely at the road.

"*pokes* Hey, Grant," Braum said.

"WHAT! *sigh* you surprised me, motherfucker. What's up kid?" Grant replied.

"Don't call me kid."

"Well you fucking look like one, no matter how strong you are. What do you want? I'm busy investigating here." Grant asked Braum with a frown.

"Come with me to that alley over there. I found something." Braum said and motioned Grant to follow him.

"What? *sigh* Alright. Show me what you found." Grant followed Braum to an alley behind one of the houses.

"What is it?" Grant asked with an impatient tone.

Braum's hand went into his bag and pulled out another ARIM device. He handed it to Grant. "Here."

"What's this?... It's made out of some sort of metal...perfectly smooth...and this blue light? What is this?" Grant looked into the small circular ARIM device carefully.

"Wear it above your ear," Braum told Grant.

"What?" Grant dumbfounded.

"Wear it. Trust me."

"*sigh* you're wasting my time. Alright." Grant replied and put the ARIM device up to his ear.

The ARIM device on Grant's ear started to blink a yellow light before turning to its normal blue color again.

"W-what? What is this blue square in front of me!? What language is this!?" Grant shouted in surprise.

ESTALIAN LANGUAGE DETECTED

CALIBRATING USER INTERFACE...

ESTALIAN INSTALLED.

PAIRING WITH DEVICE: BRAUM GUNDALA

"Oh! I can read it now! Who is this B..r..aum?" Grant was having difficulties pronouncing the name shown.

'Oh shit!' Braum said in his head.

"Ssssshhh! I'll explain everything to you later! Just listen to me first!" Braum barked.

"Y-yes?" Grant was taken aback by Braum's higher tone of voice.

"This device allows you to see things that are invisible to the naked eye and show you their information and descriptions. Look at this rock," Braum picked up a rock below him and showed it to Grant.

"W-what?" Grant was still confused but started to look at the rock in front of him.

ITEM DETECTED: SMALL ROCK

CONTENTS:

88% Limestone

5% Human's Feces

5% Human's Urine

2% Other Contents (SHOW)

"W-wow! It's showing what's in the rock!? This is amazing!!! How does it do this??? My job would've been way easier if I had this!... Who are you, Zed?" Grant was excited about the device but at the same time, very suspicious of Braum's real identity for giving him such technological marvel.

"*sigh* Again, I'll explain after everything is done. Can you use this to investigate now?" Braum asked.

"...Alright, I'll leave it at that for now but remember that I want to know where you actually come from after this... Wait, why didn't you also give this device to Rudy?" Grant asked back.

"Heh...I don't really like him that much so I don't want to give this to him but you're my type of people. The troublesome kind." Braum replied while smiling.

"Fuck you too...But heh. I'm also not fond of Rudy's character. There's just something about him that struck me as off. Call it a searcher's intuition but he's probably hiding something. I suspect it's related to his Hastelfield family." Grant scratched the stubbles in his face.

"Hmm...Well, we can think about him next time. Let's just go back to the crime scene for now." Braum replied.

**

Braum and Grant walked back to the crime scene, where they saw that everyone was still busy combing through the crime scene. They were too busy to pay attention to the two of them.

"Alright, what have you found previously, Zed?" Grant asked.

"Nothing. The device detected everything. Every little thing. I couldn't make out which one is the evidence." Braum threw his hands on the air and said.

"By everything you mean things like human fluids and DNA?" Grant asked.

"Wait, DNA? How do you know about that? The continent does not have knowledge of the microscopic world!" Braum asked in surprise.

"The continent? Heh, you're revealing too much you know. But we'll talk about it next time. About the DNA stuff...I learned it from an old friend of mine. A mercenary." Grant replied.

"Mercenary? That's probably related to...Wait, nevermind about that. Let's focus on the case first. How do you think we should go about this?" Braum asked.

Grant started to scratch his facial hair and think of a solution.

"Hmmm...Can this device filter things? Say...items and materials from a particular timeframe." Grant asked.

"OH FUCK! There is that option! Let me try. ARIM. Detect evidence only from last night, around 12 hours ago." Braum said.

FILTER CONFIRMED

DETECTING...

Grant also saw the same interface that the ARIM is showing to Braum since their devices are currently paired.

"Alright, let's search again," Braum said and both of them started to began their investigation.

After a while, Grant found something.

"Hey! Here!" Grant said to Braum.

"What is it?"

"Skidmarks of a body..." Grant said and started to follow the trail.

"Here. A piece of wood from this house fell to the ground."

"And here, fresh blood belonging to a child...Ah! Another piece of the mysterious black cloth-"

Grant kept finding more and more pieces of evidence with the device.

'How the hell...he's a natural' Braum noted Grant's ability in his head.

SUFFICIENT TRAILS OF EVIDENCE DETECTED

RECONSTRUCTING...

RECONSTRUCTION COMPLETE.

WATCH RECONSTRUCTION?

YES/NO

'What...' Braum was surprised on the new feature of the ARIM.

"Hey, what's this? Should I press 'yes'? " Grant asked.

"Uh...sure." Braum was not too knowledgeable about this device and just simply replied.

Grant pressed 'yes' and then artificial figures of two individuals started to be constructed in front of them.

"Holy shit! This device is going to show us what happened! This is...amazing!" Grant was uncharacteristically cheerful because of this new technology he was wearing.

The reconstruction showed a child figure hugging his or her legs while sitting down in the alley. He or she seemed to be trying to stay warm in the snowstorm. Suddenly, another figure, this time of an adult, slowly approached the child, grabbed the child, and puts his or her hands to the child's mouth to prevent the child from shouting for help. However, this child was actually quite strong for his or her age and started to struggle in the hands of the kidnapper. The child then bit the hands of the kidnapper, which caused a piece of the black cloth to fall. Afterward, they stumbled around struggling until they hit the house and caused some parts of the wooden parts of the house to break.

"Ah! So this is what happened!" Grant said.

Both the kidnapper and the child continued struggling until they arrived in the middle of the street. The kidnapper seemed to have enough. The kidnapper released the child and punched the child's stomach hard after the child turned around. The punch was so hard it caused the child to spit out blood.

FRESH BLOOD

AGE: 13 HOURS

BLOOD BELONGS TO A CHILD (12-15 YEARS OLD)

"The kidnapper knocked the child's out cold. This particular kidnapper seemed a bit more amateurish than usual, leaving a lot of evidence. That's odd." Braum said.

"You're right. The previous crime scene left very few evidence. But the same black cloth confirmed that they belong in the same criminal organization. I think this is just a case of an inexperienced member of the organization taking the job" Grant chimed in.

The reconstruction continued and after knocking out the child, the kidnapper carried the child in his or her's shoulder. The kidnapper then started to run up the walls of a three-story building.

"To the roof? The ARIM seems to have detected that due to the marks on the walls. It's fortunate that we're dealing with a clumsy kidnapper and the building seems to be made from weak materials." Braum said.

"It's odd seeing such a tall building in a slum. This seems to be a brothel. Right...How are we going to get to the roof?" Grant asked.

Braum then suddenly swooped Grant off his feet and into a princess carry.

"Hold on tight." Braum smiled and said.

"What the actual fuck? Put me down!" Grant complained.

Braum then puts some battle force into his feet and jumped high into the roof of the building.

"Wow! We made it!" Grant said and Braum put him down.

Below, Rudy and the others noticed Braum's jump into the roof.

"Hey! What are you doing! Get down! You are not authorized to search that building or the roofs!" Rudy shouted.

"We found something! Let us investigate!" Grant shouted back.

"Really!? Tch. Fine! Just don't stay there too long!" Rudy barked.

Urada also noticed that Braum and Grant were on the roof of the building and jumped there as well.

"What have you found? Wait....that device! Zed! What are you thinking? Why are you giving it to him!?" Urada noticed that Grant was wearing an ARIM.

"Ssshhh! You're too loud! It's fine, I trust him." Braum replied.

"We can't trust anyone in the continent! What if he steals it and reveals it to the kingdom?" Urada was looking worried.

"We'll deal with it when that happens. I truly trust him. He's the type of person that wouldn't do that." Braum answered.

"Ugh...Fine. But I'll have a very close eye on him." Urada replied frowning.

Grant was in the middle of his investigation and was squatting down.

"It seems that the kidnapper went north. He jumped to that other building over there." Grant pointed at another relatively tall building ahead.

'Hmmm...let me try again.' Braum turned on the mana signature detection feature of the ARIM.

'Aha!' Braum found small traces of the dark mana. The kidnapper seemed to have used the mana to jumped such a long distance.

"W-what are those dark things in the air? They're fascinating!" Grant was surprised by the appearance of the dark mana in his vision.

'It seems that he can also see it because he is paired with my device.' Braum concluded in his mind.

"You guys wait here. I'll follow the trail" Braum said and took off jumping to the other building and following the trail.

"Zed! *sigh* I'll guard the asset!" Urada shouted at Braum's back.

"Are you talking about me? Am I the asset?" Grant asked bewildered.

"Shut up. I don't trust you with that device. If you try anything I'll crush your balls." Urada said menacingly.

"*sigh* alright little lady calm down now I won't do anything. I'm actually just pretty curious about you and Zed's identities." Grant replied while putting his hands on the air.

"Don't call me little lady! And don't even think about investigating us. Now just shut up and let's wait for Zed." Urada replied coldly.

"...Fine." Grant replied.

**

Braum followed the trail continuously from roof to roof until he found a gloomy public cemetery. There, he found two unexpected figures.

"Kaz? Rob? What are you guys doing here?" Braum asked confused. Kelvin and Niko were there.