Corvin dug out the silver casket that contained Aron's body. One could tell just by looking at it that it belonged to a rich noble. Looking at the silver casket that exuded an aura of wealth, Caleric could not help but curse Aron for not leaving him some of his inheritance.
"I am going to open it now," Corvin said as he slid open the cover.
Caleric had prepared himself for this. He was not going to lose control of his emotions like the previous time. As the casket opened, the figure of Aron wrapped in white silk came into view. His eyes were shut, he was in deep slumber, one that would last forever.
"Do you want to do the honors or should I?" Corvin asked.
Caleric, who didn't think he would be able to handle opening up the white cloth—since even seeing Aron like that was difficult for him because of his inherited memories—decided to leave it to Corvin.
"I might not be able to," he said.
Corvin didn't ask any further questions as he began to unwrap the white silk cloth. He was trying his best to be slow in order not to damage anything. Looking at Corvin being considerate enough to deliberately slow down, Caleric found it a little ironic.
Corvin was a bounty hunter. From what Caleric was able to figure out by observing him, he could tell that the man had killed many in the past. Someone who carried that degree of bloodlust being slow, precise, cautious, and calm was something Caleric found truly contradictory.
"Hurry up, id**t, we don't have the whole night," Thisia growled at Corvin.
Well, I guess someone else is more impatient. Caleric quietly chuckled.
Corvin had removed the white silk cloth without damaging it and set it aside. Now it was Aron's body, wearing a loose pair of white clothing, laying inside the casket.
Caleric felt his emotions slightly stirring up, but he managed to subdue them in time.
"So how do we find out who did it?" Caleric asked.
Just then, Thisia crouched beside the casket. She glanced at Caleric, then at Corvin. Without saying anything, she lifted Aron's loose shirt, revealing his naked stomach bit by bit.
As she lifted the shirt up to the chest level, they saw it—a strange blood mark, a wound that had been closed by someone. It was a star-shaped cut, three lines intersecting at the middle, cut directly at the left side of his chest, right where the heart was.
Caleric found it horrifying—such a cut right at the heart. He had started assuming whether a weird cult was involved with the murder. As his imagination was about to wander off, Corvin said,
"I knew it."
"You were correct," Thisia replied.
"It's their doing, huh?"
"Who did it?" Caleric was getting impatient.
"A terrorist organization. They call themselves the Three-Winged Ravens," Corvin replied, still looking at the star-shaped cut.
"Before Aron, there had been two more murders in a similar fashion. From my sources, I got to know it was the work of the Three-Winged Ravens, so I figured this case is also related to them.
"Their killing method is very weird. They kill their victims using any means, in this case, it was poison, but then leave a symbol, the star mark, by making cuts in the victim's body. They are basically announcing it's them, as if openly challenging the authorities," Thisia explained.
"Two more murders before Aron? Can you tell me about the previous two murders?" Caleric asked.
"Sermon Jonas, military personnel, former commander of Virelia's central force, and Jean Jaque, a politician. He had gained considerable popularity in recent months and was likely to be appointed as a member of the Central Circle."
A military commander, a politician... and an information broker. Three murders. Only someone stupid wouldn't be able to recognize the pattern here. Someone has hired this terrorist group to carry out these killings. This is directly related to the upcoming war.
Can nations be involved? Does that mean it could be any of the three other nations? This goes way deeper, just like I had expected.
"It's related to the upcoming war," Caleric said without elaborating.
"You are smart. I had a similar guess," Thisia said.
"What is this Three-Winged Raven group like?" Caleric asked.
Corvin was quick to answer his question.
"They are a bunch of cowards. They don't fight head-on. I have hunted some of their members before, but their ways of doing things are very different. They are very cautious.
"If I remember correctly, they are always black-robed and wear those pointy masks. What's that called again?"
"You mean the Plague masks?" Thisia asked.
"Yeah, that. They wear plague masks as a symbol. For a group that does such hideous things, they sure are way too comfortable with having a symbol and public image. It's almost as if they are too confident. Makes me really mad. I want to hunt them," Corvin said, his tone clearly reflecting anger.
They are confident as well as cautious? What a weird combination. Perhaps it is because they are cautious that their confidence arises.
To me, it looks like they are a bunch of narcissists who want attention. That's true—every organization has such narcissistic tendencies. They want to be known, but if they overdo it, they get caught.
Yearning for fame is human nature, but achieving it through illegal means is on a whole another level. How intriguing.
As Caleric was thinking about this, something else caught his attention.
Plague mask? Plague Doctor mask? Wait... where did I see it last time? The gray-eyed private doctor at the Gnalet mansion. Doesn't mean he is the perpetrator... it could be a coincidence.
As he thought, his eyes fell on the cut mark that was right at the heart.
"How cruel are these Three-Winged Ravens to leave a cut right at the heart, right at the core of life," Caleric said solemnly.
"At the heart? That's news to me. They don't usually do that."
"What?"
"The star mark is the symbol; the location does not hold much significance," Corvin replied.
As the words fell in his ears, something clicked in his mind.
"Let's check the other bodies," Caleric said.
"Why?" Thisia was slightly confused.
"I want to confirm something," Caleric did not bother to explain his reasoning.
Thisia was the one who had recruited Caleric to Blue Preservation. She had done this because of the revelations by the Eye that told her Caleric was a smart man. She didn't question him and glanced at Corvin.
"Do I really have to?" Corvin didn't want to dig up three more graves. Not only was it tedious, it was also a very exhausting process, especially when he was the only one doing the digging.
Thisia didn't say anything. Noticing her nonchalant attitude towards Caleric's demand, Corvin understood that he was being ordered to do the laborious task. He could not help but start digging yet again.
After digging out Silv's casket and the casket that held the twins, he was completely exhausted. Panting heavily, he sat down under the lone tree as Thisia and Caleric started opening them up.
"I want you to check where the cuts are on the other bodies," Caleric told Thisia.
Thisia didn't argue. Perhaps she wanted to witness the intellect of Caleric, who seemed to have noticed something she had missed.
She did as Caleric told. She first examined Silv's body; Caleric did not glance, after all, it would be rude to.
As Thisia uncovered her chest, she saw the star-shaped cut, placed right below the left breast, close to the sternum. It was exactly where the heart is.
"It's on the heart."
As Caleric heard her, he jumped right at the casket. Maybe he had forgotten that it was rude, but he had to make sure of something.
"Corvin, you have a lot of experience with killing, right?" he asked.
"You could say that," he replied, lying exhausted.
"Then can you look at the mark and tell how precise this is?"
What Caleric had just asked caught both Thisia and Corvin's attention. Corvin crawled over to the casket and looked at the mark on Silv's body.
"It is pretty precise."
"Now compare it with Aron's."
Corvin looked at the other open casket and examined the star-shaped cut. He then looked at Silv's body, then back at Aron's. After observing back and forth for a good while, he finally concluded,
"It's almost identical. Someone with a lot of killing experience has done this."
Caleric looked at Thisia without saying anything.
"You want me to check the kids?" she asked.
Caleric nodded.
"F**k you," she cursed silently as she proceeded with the indecent deed.
She examined the bodies and found that the cuts on them were also identical.
"It's as I had thought. These are very precise, at the same spots..." Caleric mumbled.
"Would you be so kind as to explain what's going on in your head?"
"The cuts are really precise. Someone with a lot of killing experience? Or maybe someone who is good with anatomy and a knife... like a doctor?"
"What are you implying?" Thisia asked.
"The private doctor at the Gnalet mansion. I have seen him with a plague doctor mask.
"He said: 'It makes me look serious.' Could it be that this wasn't a sarcastic joke, but instead a genuine slip-up? Did he just reveal that when he is serious, he usually wears the mask?"
"I thought it was only a coincidence, but the precision in the cuts, and then the fact that he just so happened to be a doctor, someone skilled with human anatomy...
"Then the fact that he was able to leave undetected. Someone who is trusted enough. Everything points towards him."
"That makes sense—the poison. Someone like a doctor would easily be able to slip in poison without getting detected, especially if he were trusted," Thisia pointed out.
By then, Caleric had already considered everything. All the clues were pointing to the gray-haired, gray-eyed man—the private doctor of the Gnalet family. The only thing bugging him was his previous conclusions.
Did Aron know that the doctor would end up killing him? Could it be that he only knew he was going to be murdered and didn't know who would be the one doing it?
As always, new discoveries gave rise to more questions.
I am tired for today...
Caleric glanced at the sky. The green moon hung high, thrice as big as any moon he had ever known from his previous life, casting an eerie glow over the world below.
Beneath that green luminance of Ver, the symbol of life itself, Caleric stood beside his dead family, the brilliance above starkly contrasting the silence and stillness around him. He was too sleepy to think any further.