C44: Mysteries In The Night

We set off from our camp, and along the way, Bets explained the situation in the village. "I went to buy some food for breakfast. Since the sun was out, a drowner demon couldn't do much. So I left Gem to handle the-"

"You don't need to try and create excuses for leaving your post. What happened already happened, and we can't change anything about it." I reassured him.

Bets felt terrible for what he did; that was obvious. But wasting time mulling over it would only distract him. He probably realized we weren't dealing with a mindless drowner demon by now. So he just made a reckless decision to leave his post, and we could have been attacked then and died. A ruthless enemy wouldn't have let such an opportunity go.

It wasn't like we were defenseless; I had stayed up all night and knew we were being watched.

"Sorry," he winced and stared at the ground before looking me in the eyes. "Yesterday night, some corpses in the cemetery were dug out and disappeared."

"Zombies?!" Exclaimed Gem.

"Ghosts?!" Screamed Agon.

Were they kids? We're exorcists, and an exorcist being afraid of ghosts and the undead sounded like the punchline to a joke. "Who were the victims?"

Bets frowned, and a bead of sweat rolled down. There was a look of fear on his face. "That's the thing. The graves belonged to all the kids and the man killed by the drowner demon."

Fuck, that sounded like some complicated shit.

When we arrived in the village, I immediately talked to a woman walking on the outskirts.

She had a bag of groceries in her hand and seemed better dressed than most villagers.

"Excuse me, mam. Can I talk to you for a minute?" I put on the best good boy smile I could muster.

She turned toward me and looked confused for a couple of seconds. "You're that new exorcist, I believe. I don't think I ever got your name."

"It's Emmory," there were abilities out there that could activate simply by telling your name to their user.

Just to be safe, I will assume everyone was a suspect or a demon in disguise.

With so few people around, it was the perfect place for interrogation. I started asking questions and acting like I knew shit. "I heard about the thing."

"W -What thing?" She averted her eyes for a couple of seconds.

Oh? She is hiding something? Does this village have some kind of secret?

The look on her face said a lot. She was a horrible liar. But it seemed like she was the type who wouldn't talk.

"We heard that you have a secret dish! It's a local delicacy!" Gem came up with a good excuse on the spot. He had a foolish smile on his face.

Good, everyone trusted fools to be stupid.

"O -Oh, sure. But you should ask one of the pub owners," after saying that, she hurriedly walked away.

As soon as she was from earshot, the foolish look on Gem's face disappeared. "She is hiding something."

Yeah, no shit.

Bets and I nodded in confirmation. Whatever that something was, we needed to find out soon.

"What about the secret dish?" Agon asked.

We all turned toward him. Bets, the bald saint, patiently explained. "There's no secret dish. Just follow us. There will likely be a battle soon."

He didn't explain anything important to Agon. Involving him in plans would probably end up being a power of friendship power up after the plan fails horribly.

"But how do we get the information out of people?" Gem turned toward me and smirked. "Is torture on the table?"

"No," I answered without hesitation. There's no way I'm torturing some villagers on baseless suspicion. Actually, I'm not really into torturing anyone. "Don't even bother using intimidation either. They're not the best ways to get information out of someone."

I just said the last sentence to save face. As the team leader, I had to be ruthless and think whatever was best for the team.

"Then what's your plan?" Gem inquired. "How do we get the information? It might be something that would help us."

Well, I didn't have a plan. But I was trying to think of one. "Don't worry. I have something in mind. Follow me."

As we walked toward the village, I thought of a thousand things.

What was the secret of the villagers? How did the drowner come to exist? Who robbed the graves? Were all of these things connected?

That didn't matter. Trying to analyze something when I didn't have the full picture would just create a dangerous bias. The only thing I knew for sure was that there was a drowner demon, and the corpses of the drowner demon's victims were taken.

One thing was for certain; drowner demons were rotten fleshed undead. Even their brains were rotten, so they couldn't have devised a plan like only digging up the corpses of their victims.

Two possible situations were occurring here.

Someone had been using the drowner as a cover-up for their murders. They desecrated the graves of the dead to try and destroy any evidence.

The second possibility was that someone was controlling the drowner. These actions that it was taking, which required basic intelligence, were the will of the mastermind.

Well, those were just theories.

In Manga, the authors always wrote smart characters who seemed to figure out everything with 100% certainty. But assuming that my theories were right, without a single doubt, would be careless.

While walking down the village streets, some kids played with a rugged ball.

Three kids had died due to the demon, and if one more died under my watch, that would be my fault. It meant that my abilities were lacking.

I wasn't the hero type by a long shot. If my life were on the line, I would probably be the first to run away. But like everyone else, I also had certain personal dispositions.

The Ord inside my body bubbled up. Carpy thrashed on my backpack as if sensing my change in emotions.

No, I must calm down. Anger will not lead me to a power-up. Self-destruction was the only road ahead for a cloudy-minded individual.

While thinking of cloudy-minded individuals, an idea hit me like a lightning bolt.

I smiled at my team. "You wanted to know an effective way to learn a secret? Just ask those who know but at the same time are clueless about it."

"You doing riddles now?" He tilted his head in confusion.

I approached one of the children. They looked at me with uncertainty, as anyone would look at a stranger.

"Hi there!" I greeted the kids. "Do you know a place where I can buy candy? If you tell me, I will get you some too."

"You can get them from old man Xiro! He makes super delicious candy!" One of the boys with snot running down his face told me immediately. The other kids seemed a bit disappointed.

Did they think I was offering candy to only one of them? Wait, if I give everyone candy, it will seem like the boy who spoke up did so for nothing. But if I don't preoccupy all the kids with candy, they might talk about this with an adult who might realize what we were doing.

"Good," I praised the young boy and crouched down. "You earned yourself and your friends a lot of sweets."

Wording it this way would make everyone know that the kid who spoke earned everyone candy.

Then I took a silver coin from my pockets, and the kids' eyes shined when they saw it.

"Be careful not to tell anyone else what your parents told you not to speak about, okay?" I cautioned them.

The kids nodded, but they were concentrating on the silver coin I put on the hand of the boy who spoke.

"Before you go, I hope you all remember what not to speak about, okay?" I had a strict look on my face.

"Yes," the kid who spoke bobbed his head, and others nodded along.

"Just in case someone forgot, recite what your parents told you not to say," I told them, and the kids started speaking one after another.

"""Never speak about Junji, who had taken a demon as a lover,""" the kids didn't seem to know what most of those words meant.

I let go of the kid's hand with the money on it and put a finger in front of my lips. "Remember, tell no one. This will be our secret."

After that, the kids ran off with huge smiles on their faces. Some were crowding around the kid who had spoken up first. Seems like he will become quite popular amongst his peers.

"Seems like our friend, the village head, has been keeping quite some secrets from us," I told everyone.

The implication in my words was as clear as it could be; from now on, the village head was the main suspect.

"What?! Why?! He seemed like a nice dude!" Agon exclaimed.

Okay, it seemed like my words weren't clear to some. "We're going to pay a visit to the village head. Ask why he kept this secret from us."