Last night, two incidents occurred in the capital of Midgar.
The first was the murder of a member of the Alliance, an organization made up of representatives sent by nobles of all ranks throughout the Kingdom of Midgar to petition the royal family for an investigation into the mysterious disappearances of subjects across various territories, which were suspected to involve the kingdom's most notorious criminal organization, the [Thirteen Nightblades]. The victim's body had then been hung above the entrance to the Alliance headquarters as a threat.
Of course, this was hardly a major incident. Although the Alliance had been jointly formed by nobles both great and small, it was little more than a token gesture by the various Houses to show that they were investigating the matter and voicing their dissatisfaction. Not a single truly capable person had been sent. No one wanted to jeopardize their own political career over it... except Christina, the unfortunate fool who had wandered into the whole mess on her own.
If Earl Shoddi Goodz, one of the [Thirteen Nightblades] and a man known as one of Midgar's shadow rulers, had not been found dead in his own home last night, the murder of Christina's fellow Alliance member might very well have been the story spreading throughout the capital the next morning.
But there were no ifs.
Compared to the death of one of the thirteen leaders of the Nightsword, there was little reason to care about an organization that looked impressive on the surface but was, in reality, nothing more than a rabble.
"Anyway, that's more or less the situation. For now, we're assuming that the people who killed the member of your Alliance, Miss Christina, are the same ones who killed His Excellency Earl Shoddi..."
Cid, Christina, and the others were gathered in a café. Sitting across from them was Gray, a tall, imposing man and a member of the kingdom's knightly order currently responsible for security.
At the moment, he was brushing Christina off in an extremely casual tone. After taking a single look at the unidentified minor nobleman who had been hanging from the front gate, he had concluded that the culprit was the same person who had killed Earl Shoddi Goodz. He was already preparing to withdraw the other members of the Guard, leaving only a few inexperienced rookies behind to secure the scene as a formality.
"Wait a minute. How can you reach a conclusion so carelessly and arbitrarily? No matter how you look at it, there's no way the same people committed both crimes. And even if they did, you should still investigate properly..."
Exactly, Christina-san. I'm completely with you on this one.
Cid couldn't help nodding.
It wasn't as though he were some lunatic who enjoyed randomly killing people for fun. Even if those idiots were the sort who might betray him at any moment, there was no way he would kill his own allies.
Being blamed for several extra deaths when he hadn't done anything at all left Cid deeply dissatisfied. He could tolerate people inventing baseless accusations about him, but he absolutely could not tolerate someone dumping their own crimes onto him. At the very least, not when the crime in question was killing his own side.
"Right, Cid? Kanade, you think so too, don't you? The Guard's conclusion clearly wasn't based on any serious investigation of the scene. We absolutely cannot accept this attitude!"
Seeing Cid nod, Christina apparently misunderstood what he meant. Her spirits immediately surged, and she began confronting the Knight Commander, a man who wielded considerable authority in the kingdom.
That wasn't the point.
The point was... I didn't say anything! Why are you dragging me into this?!
Cid instinctively opened his mouth to object, but with the atmosphere as it was, he simply couldn't bring himself to contradict Christina. Depressed, he turned his head and exchanged a look with Kanade, who had also been caught in the blast for no reason.
A moment later, Kanade realized what had happened and glared furiously at him.
Are you insane? If you want to get dragged into this, don't drag me along with you.
She didn't say a word, but Cid understood exactly what she meant.
Cid glared right back without the slightest hesitation.
He was actually involved in the case. Wasn't it perfectly normal for him to react when they were talking about something connected to him?
If anyone was crazy here, it was clearly Christina for noticing something that small.
"Miss Christina, if possible, please stop making trouble for us. Our investigators only reached that conclusion after confirming a connection between the two cases. Compared to this place, there are undoubtedly far more leads at Earl Shoddi Goodz's residence. Please have some faith in our professionalism."
Gray sighed. Looking helplessly at Miss Christina, who genuinely seemed to be making things difficult for him, he spoke with visible irritation.
"Are you kidding me? With an attitude like that..."
"Or are you saying, Miss Christina, that these two people from lower-ranking noble families are more professional than our experienced officers?"
His rough voice cut Christina off without mercy.
A nearly confrontational pressure bore down on the group, while the threat in his eyes was directed unmistakably at Cid and Kanade.
"E-Eek..."
Poor, frail Kanade had never faced anything so intimidating before. The expression she had worn while challenging Cid just moments earlier vanished instantly, and almost on instinct, she hurried behind him to hide.
"..."
Cid's mouth twitched as he looked at Kanade clutching his arm as though she were showing some great loyalty.
Unless he had imagined it, Kanade had very consciously decided to use his body as a shield.
Gray, rendered speechless by Kanade's ridiculous reaction, withdrew his intimidating stare and looked back toward Christina, who seemed oddly reassured by Kanade's behavior.
"Well, anyway, that's the situation. Judging from their reactions, they clearly have complete faith in the conclusions reached by the members of the Royal Capital Guard. Since that's the case..."
"Hey, don't just decide what other people think for them. Just like Christina-san, I don't believe the same people committed both crimes."
"I-I agree with Cid-kun. I support Lady Christina."
Gray abruptly stopped talking.
He glanced at Cid, who had interrupted him, then at Kanade, who was still hiding timidly behind Cid while raising one hand.
"Fine. If that's how all of you feel, I'll leave a few more people behind. If you find any clues, you can report them to me. That should be enough."
Gray waved impatiently, drained the coffee on the table in one gulp, and picked up the sword beside him.
Just as he was about to leave, however, his steps paused.
"You have some good friends, Miss Christina. So, for their sake, please stop causing us trouble from now on. Some matters simply take priority over others..."
"So the person who died on our side doesn't matter? We're supposed to abandon this case just because someone from Nightsword died?"
"I never said that. But the Guard has limited manpower. If the only person found dead today had been one of your people, I would have assigned every available investigator to this case. So if you want us to solve it as quickly as possible, Miss Christina, please stop making our work more difficult."
"What do you mean by that!?"
Christina shot to her feet and slammed the table. Fury flickered in her emerald-green eyes as she glared at the large man before her, anger creeping into her voice.
"I mean exactly what I said."
Leaving those words behind, Gray walked away.
The moment he was gone, Christina slumped back into her seat and rested her forehead against one hand in frustration.
"What's wrong, Christina-san?"
"Nothing, Cid. It's just a little hard to endure seeing a rotten, worm-eaten pest hopping around right in front of me when I can't simply swat it dead."
Christina spoke in a low voice with her head lowered. Her tone sounded almost like she was joking, making it impossible to tell whether she was serious.
She was probably joking... right?
"Still, thank you for what happened just now, Cid, Kanade. I knew I hadn't misjudged the two of you."
As if confirming Cid's assumption, Christina recovered after only a short while. Her beautiful face brightened with a gentle smile as she looked at them.
"Well, you really don't need to thank me. I meant what I said."
What kind of excuse was "the same person committed both murders," anyway?
There were limits to how half-hearted an investigation could be. Did they seriously think the person actually responsible wouldn't know whether those extra deaths were his work?
Cid casually responded to Christina while furiously complaining in his head. Then something suddenly occurred to him, and his gaze shifted toward Kanade, who was standing beside him as though nothing important had happened.
What?
Noticing Cid looking at her, Kanade gave him a questioning look.
Didn't you say you didn't want to get involved? Then why did you deliberately speak up just now?
Cid glanced at the pleased Christina, then back at Kanade. He was confident she would understand what he meant.
He really couldn't understand why Kanade had joined in earlier.
It made sense for him to say something because he was directly involved. But Kanade?
After spending the last two days around her, Cid refused to believe Kanade possessed that much integrity. She was absolutely the type of top-tier extra who would sell out her teammates the instant things started going badly.
Lady Christina is definitely going to remember me now. Since it's already come to this, a nobody like me might as well cling tightly to Lady Christina's coattails.
Kanade conveyed the thought with a miserable expression.
Cid understood immediately and nodded in realization.
"Cid, Kanade, are the two of you even listening to me?"
While Cid and Kanade were secretly communicating through their eyes, Christina cut in. She stared expressionlessly at the pair, making her displeasure at being ignored perfectly clear.
"Sorry. I got distracted for a second, Christina."
Cid gave her an awkward smile and admitted it outright without trying to make excuses.
His immediate confession left Christina speechless for a moment, but she ultimately said nothing more. She simply propped her cheeks up with both hands and looked at the two of them.
"You two really are interesting. Never mind that. What are you planning to do over the next few days?"
"What do you mean?"
Cid blinked and instinctively asked the question. He had, after all, just admitted that he hadn't been paying attention.
"I mean your safety."
The corner of Christina's mouth twitched, but she still resisted the urge to simply stop caring about Cid and Kanade altogether.
"The Guard claimed that last night's murder was random, but you both saw what their investigation is really like. That explanation was nothing more than an excuse to brush the case aside."
At that, Christina gritted her teeth.
It was obvious that the way the Capital Guard and the Knights had treated her earlier was still bothering her.
"Um..."
Kanade looked between the two of them. When neither spoke, she hesitated for a moment before raising her hand.
"There's actually something I still don't understand. Why couldn't both murders have been committed by the same person? We haven't really done anything to those powerful people, so they shouldn't have any reason to kill us, right?"
"If that's the case, maybe it really was some incredibly brazen murderer killing people at random, and we were just unlucky enough to get caught up in it."
Kanade spoke nervously, with a trace of hope in her voice.
Her words, however, made both Cid and Christina stare at her in disbelief.
Christina slapped a hand over her face, then turned toward Cid and silently left the explanation to him, apparently hoping he would crush Kanade's wishful thinking for her.
"Cid-kun, could you explain it to Kanade for me?"
"Sure."
Cid cleared his throat, organized his thoughts, then pointed toward the front gate. The body had only just been taken down, and large patches of blood still stained the area.
"Kanade, look. Last night's killer murdered one of our Alliance members and then hung his body on the gate. That's completely different from the way the killer acted at Earl Shoddi's residence. Unless the culprit deliberately changes their methods every time they kill someone, it's reasonable to conclude that there were two different perpetrators."
"Also, if the killer only wanted him dead, why go through the trouble of hanging his body on the gate of our headquarters? The victim's home isn't extremely far from here, but it isn't exactly nearby either. How did the killer even know he was connected to this place?"
"One thing is certain. The killer had detailed information on the victim and had some objective important enough to risk being discovered while transporting the body here and hanging it from the gate."
"So what was that objective? Think about it. Who would be affected most by seeing the corpse of one of our Alliance members hanging from the entrance? Us."
"Wasn't this Alliance created specifically to investigate the so-called Thirteen Nightblades? Hanging one of our people from the gate is both a show of force and a warning. In theory, if everything went according to plan, it would work entirely in their favor."
"They were just extremely unlucky and happened to run into a lawless, capricious terrorist with absolutely no moral restraint, so Earl Shoddi ended up dying in his own home before he could even hear what had happened here."
Cid did have one small doubt about that conclusion, though he kept it to himself.
For an organization that was essentially a ragtag collection of nobodies, was it really necessary to have a show-of-force negotiation fail that afternoon, then immediately hire an assassin that very night to kill someone and make an example of them?
That kind of escalation felt rather excessive for normal human behavior.
Then again, when Cid put himself in their position, he reconsidered.
Someone like him could hear a rumor and show up at your house that very night. If someone else responded to a failed negotiation by immediately sending assassins after your entire family, perhaps that wasn't so impossible after all.
With that thought, Cid stopped talking.
As expected, Kanade was staring at him with her mouth hanging open, obvious newfound respect in her eyes.
"Mm-hmm."
Cid gave a few satisfied hums and turned his head.
To his surprise, Christina was also staring at him with wide eyes, looking completely shocked.
Wait, why are you surprised too?
You were the one who asked me to explain it.
Don't tell me you seriously hadn't thought of any of that yourself.
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