Vol. 1 - Ch. 292 - The Case of Saintess's Disappearance (5)

“…Can we get back to the topic now?”

Just as the Freak and I were locked into a probing contest, Coco pulled the conversation back on track.

He easily brushed away the brewing tension between us, and spread out a map of the eastern district of the royal capital on the table and began explaining our investigation plan.

There were three key points.

—First, we needed to find out whether anyone had seen anyone suspicious making contact with Jeu during her charity work at Emin Church last week. 

However, according to my master, Jeu’s butler had stayed by her side throughout the treatments and never once left her unattended. If that was the case, any blatantly suspicious conversation should have been noticed immediately.

That said, it wouldn’t be impossible to communicate by hiding written messages beforehand, like inscribing letters near the area to be treated as reference.

From what Benze had said earlier, many of the locals around here had received treatment from Jeu, so the likelihood of them being accomplices was low. In that situation, the culprit was probably someone unfamiliar who approached her using treatment as an excuse.

Whether a patient was a local or not would be difficult for the attendant to tell, after all.

—The second point was to find witnesses who had seen Jeu herself after she left.

Coco pressed a finger to his temple and stared intently at a commercially sold map of the eastern district, then divided it into sections with three lines.

He began shading areas on the map.

“Please gather sighting information centered around the shaded areas, starting from after 4:00 PM last weekend. Try out in crowded places especially.”

I glanced at the map, and saw that the shading grew lighter the farther it got from the academy’s back gate—where Jeu had gotten off her carriage—measured by walking distance.

“…I see. You calculated the area she could realistically reach within the time limit, based on her walking speed and the time between getting off the carriage and entering the academy's premise.”

Coco nodded once.

“Jeu always walked with exactly the same gait, so much so that it felt unnatural. That might have been… a hidden message from her.”

He had always been this sharp on this aspect. Even during our adventures, typically when we had been out to map out the walking distance during mountain hikes, he had predicted traversal times with uncanny accuracy when planning routes like mountain hikes.

According to him, whenever he glanced at the map, he would inevitably find himself walking through the terrain. 

I could understand what he was saying, but I had no idea how he had managed to do it.

The reason the map was shaded in three gradations, fading with distance from the back gate, was likely because he factored in the time Jeu might have spent to negotiate with someone.

In other words, the lighter the color, the lower the probability that it was the site where she made contact with the culprit. And areas left unshaded meant there was virtually zero chance she reached them on foot.

Even so, it still covered a fairly large area, but it was far more efficient than searching blindly.

And by visualizing the information and layering it onto the map, even Benze and the others, who could hardly be called sharp, could grasp it easily.

—The final investigation point was gathering information from the underworld.

No matter the world, the shady bunch like information brokers, black-market dealers trading illegal materials, smugglers, or even people who made a living out of human trafficking or assassination always existed in certain numbers.

I’d rather not get involved with people like that if I could help it, but every trade has its specialists.

Of course, I wasn't naive enough to hope anyone would outright say, “Yes, I’m the culprit,” but if the kidnapper took Jeu and, as the letter suggested, planned to move her to another country, they certainly wouldn’t do so through official channels. They would cross the border by illegal means.

If that was the case, then what methods and routes could they possibly use?

That was the kind of information only those who live in the shadow of the royal capital would know, so I asked Benze and the others to dig into it.

◆

“—It seems that the warehouse belongs to a company with strong ties to the Rosemieur Empire.”

As I had promised my master, once our information had been reasonably sorted out, I reported back to the Knight Order as promised.

“…I have to say, it's really... impressive to gather this much intelligence in just one day, Allen. Or perhaps I should praise the Mad Hound that’s been taking the capital’s underworld by storm?”

When I paused my report, Dante-san said that with a wry smile.

We still hadn’t identified the suspicious individual who likely made contact with Jeu, but eyewitness accounts of Jeu herself came in almost immediately.

It was what I had expected somewhat. Jeu stood out from ordinary people just by the way she carried herself, and if someone like her walked through the slums alone, without attendants, she was bound to draw attention.

According to the sightings, Jeu was last seen entering a certain building in a warehouse district in the slums, all alone.

The building belonged to a trading company that mainly handled commerce with the Rosemieur Empire, but due to worsening relations between the two nations, it was currently all but shut down.

“…That’s troublesome.”

A frown spread on the master's face at the mention of the Rosemieur Empire.

In current time, the only city to maintain any official diplomatic ties to the Empire was Mins City, and knights didn't even have to specifically make a request as that city already maintained strict checkpoints.

This meant the culprit would most probably be looking for illegal border crossing, and that was the problem. It was realistically not possible to pin down all the routes. 

“…We’ve narrowed it down to two likely leads. First, someone witnessed a carriage loaded with apple crates leaving that warehouse late at night, despite the fact it shouldn’t have been operational. Given the timing, there’s a strong chance Jeu was kept inside. We’re currently tracking its whereabouts.”

That information came from an adventurer working day labor, to unload cargo, at a nearby warehouse. Several people saw it together while taking a break outside, so the account was almost certainly reliable.

“The second lead is about a village halfway up Mount Elonce in the Serenade region. It’s said to deal in illegal goods, including people. There’s supposedly a massive tunnel maintained by an earth-magic user that allows passage to and from the Empire. If they used ‘brokers’ to smuggle her into Rosemieur, there’s a high probability they went through that route.”

As I laid out the result of the investigation, my master couldn't help but stare wide-eyed, and then glanced at Dante-san. Dante-san brows furrowed, and shook his head in exasperation. 

"...How the hell did you manage to get all that shady information even knights had been trying to pin down, eh? You really are a crooked brat."

"......It came from a certain explorer who had taken that route to instead come to the empire just a while ago. ...Freak. That's what people seem to call him. He apparently wanted to join my clan, so I brought him in."

"For crying out loud......"

Master was taken back when I revealed the source.

Ah, this reaction. He must have heard about my solo trip to the Empire, and how I met that Freak. 

"..................Allen-kun, you should know who Freak is, right? Are you sure we can believe in him?"

T/N - Hey everyone. This— https://discord.gg/n23W87YC2P — is the link to our discord server. In case of any error or problem regarding chapters/patreon, feel free to mention it. (Just in case, I would be adding at the footnote of every chapter)

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