Entering late July, Tingen City's temperature gradually dropped. Although it couldn't yet be called pleasantly cool autumn weather, even during sunny noon, the sunlight only felt glaring rather than requiring people to hide in the shade to avoid the heat.
Since Angel and Klein "officially joined" the Nighthawks and were introduced to other members by Dunn Smith at the dinner, a week had passed.
During this time, Angel had performed official shifts, read newspapers in the recreation room, lost money in "Fight the Landlord," guarded the "Chanis Gate" late at night, jointly patrolled cemeteries within their jurisdiction with other Nighthawks, and handled quite a few cases transferred from the police that were suspected of having Beyonder force involvement.
She also hadn't forgotten her purpose for joining the Nighthawks. In her spare time, she had read through most of the internal documents and books, and even attempted to translate Emperor Roselle Gustav's notes with Old Neil, but unfortunately still knew nothing about "how to return to Earth."
Maybe staying longer and trying to borrow some documents from other parishes would yield results?
She comforted herself this way.
"Five 10-penny lunches, thank you!"
The waiter from Old Will Restaurant arrived punctually at Blackthorn Security Company to take the noon meal orders. Angel surveyed the members in the reception hall, then counted Korney guarding the Chanis Gate and Old Neil watching the armory, ordering work meals for them all together.
Dunn Smith, Lolotta Ladin, and Frye had already gone out for their daily routine patrol of the jurisdiction and would solve their lunch outside as usual. Leonard Mitchell had received notification to go to the police station to collect documents. Seeka Teon was on vacation today. In the reception hall besides Angel, only Rozanne and Klein remained.
Watching the waiter who had noted the order leave, Rozanne shook the coffee pot, listening to the sound of liquid sloshing inside, and refilled her already empty coffee cup with fragrant coffee.
"Should we change to a different restaurant for meal orders? I feel like I'm tired of Old Will's lunch. They have the same dishes every day, and they're far from delicious."
She spoke in low voices to Angel, who was getting up to close the main door, and Klein, who was spreading out the new issue of "Tingen Daily," her eyes glancing toward the door, seemingly afraid the waiter might return and hear her negative comments.
"But their lunch is the most affordable and can be delivered to the company on time. On Zotland Street, you probably can't find a second restaurant like this."
Angel returned to the sofa and answered with a smile.
She didn't mind changing flavors, but other nearby restaurants offering delivery service were either more expensive or too busy to deliver on time. Overall, Old Will was still the most suitable choice for the Nighthawks.
Klein's head, hidden behind the newspaper, nodded in agreement with Angel's assessment.
Since last week's dinner, his attitude toward Angel had been somewhat strange. It couldn't be said to have gotten worse, but there was something distant yet seemingly worried about something. Not only the gossip-loving Rozanne and Seeka Teon, but even the slow-witted Angel herself had noticed.
But she was also confused, unclear about what had happened.
Could it be that he discovered my secret promotion to "Instigator" while I was on a business trip?
Thinking it over, the only thing that might cause the other party's attitude to change was her advancement from Sequence 9 to Sequence 8 before and after her trip to Enmat Port.
But she had neither used the "Instigator's" abilities nor let anything slip. How could anyone tell she was Sequence 8?
Just as she was secretly guessing, the reception hall's main door was pushed open from outside.
Rozanne's low complaint about Old Will Restaurant was immediately swallowed back. Several people simultaneously looked toward the door. The "Midnight Poet" Leonard Mitchell, with black hair and green eyes, his windbreaker fluttering, strode in with large steps.
He carried a thick stack of documents under his arm, walked directly to the coffee table in the center of the reception hall, and placed the documents on the table with a "bang," then sat in the only remaining empty seat.
"Miss Rozanne, please heat me a cup of coffee, thank you."
After unabashedly sending away the only clerical staff present, he distributed the documents he brought to Angel and Klein.
"Just transferred from Tingen City Police. You look at them first, then share your thoughts."
Angel curiously took the document handed to her, first skimmed through it roughly, then returned to the first page to read carefully.
These were nearly 30 death reports, concentrated within ten days in mid to late July.
With Tingen City's population and average lifespan, the annual death toll was about three thousand, averaging about eight deaths per day from various diseases, accidents, and even criminal acts.
But as Angel read page by page, she discovered the situation was not simple.
Most of the deceased in the reports were young or middle-aged people, and their various deaths were horrifying.
July 22, 5 PM, dock worker Wells beat up a foreman who had long withheld wages, then jumped from a high building in the West District to end his life.
July 22, 2 PM, McGum on Sapphire Street in the West District tried to set fire to his long-resented neighbor's house but accidentally ignited the flammable materials he carried, becoming the only casualty in the arson case.
July 21, 11 AM, Laurence, whose factory had gone bankrupt on Linden Avenue in the West District, pulled out a pistol, cursed the former mayor of Tingen, then shot himself in the street.
...
July 12, 6 AM, Wal on Iron Cross Lower Street was found dead in his bed, preliminarily determined to have died of heart disease during the night.
In just ten days, over 30 people had died intensively, and almost all were sudden incidents or serious illnesses leading to death, rather than the common elderly dying from underlying diseases or simple accidents.
After browsing through the documents, Angel looked up at Klein sitting across from her. He also looked shocked as he glanced over, then immediately averted his gaze.
Hmm, what's wrong with him...
A flash of displeasure crossed Angel's mind, but with the case at hand, she didn't act on it, instead looking toward Leonard, who sat with his arms crossed on the sofa.
"Do you find the number of deaths and manner of death strange?"
He changed position to sit more comfortably before continuing.
"This is only part of the death list, the part that occurred in our jurisdiction. The 'Punishers' and 'Machinery Hivemind' have no less on their hands than we do."
"In the past two weeks, death incidents in Tingen City have been more than four times the normal annual rate, with a significantly younger age distribution and very different causes of death from the past. Tingen City Police Headquarters discovered the problem when compiling statistics and transferred these materials to us and the Beyonders of other churches."
"They think there's Beyonder force involvement?"
Klein put down the documents in his hands and asked with a frown.
"Not necessarily, but very likely. I met the captain on my way back. He asked me to return to Zotland Street first, find you two, and investigate this part," he pointed to the death reports in Angel's hands, "the ones in Klein's hands stay here, and the captain will arrange for others to investigate."
"We..." Angel looked at "Seer" Klein and suddenly understood, "The captain thinks we need help from ritual magic or divination?"
"Exactly, so the other team will bring Old Neil. Now only he and Klein in the team can help in this regard."
Leonard nodded, confirming Angel's guess.
At this time, Miss Rozanne returned to the reception hall with heated coffee. The several people tactfully closed their mouths and began organizing the documents on the table.
The large number of death cases in such a short time was too shocking, and they didn't want the kind Rozanne to know.
Until Leonard retrieved these documents from the police headquarters, new names were still being continuously added to the death list, meaning that if all the death incidents really had a common perpetrator behind them, then he or she was still active in Tingen City, continuously creating new tragedies.
Given this, Angel and Klein had no heart to wait for lunch. They hurriedly bid farewell to Miss Rozanne and hired a carriage on the street to head directly to the crime scenes.
In the carriage, Leonard carefully closed the window connecting the carriage to the driver's position, then turned back to ask in low voices: "From these death records, did you see any patterns?"
"The distribution of death times is quite regular, occurring every day, almost in every time period."
Klein answered first, pointing to the list in Angel's hands to strengthen his tone: "We need to first exclude normal deaths among them, classify all abnormal deaths by time and location, and find patterns from them."
"Yes, that's exactly what the captain requested, so we need to split into two teams, otherwise we simply can't keep up with the pace of death..." Leonard's tone was somewhat melancholy as he looked toward the constantly retreating street scenes outside the window and the pedestrians hurrying past on the street, "Right now, another innocent person might be dying from this incident."
"What is his purpose? These deaths all appear to be indirectly caused. If it were a serial killer, it shouldn't be this style of crime. They prefer to act directly, enjoying the victims' fear and the pleasure of killing."
Angel also frowned as she analyzed. She had already looked through the list several times in the car but found nothing except that most of the deceased were from Tingen City's lower classes.
"That's the answer we need to find. Maybe it's to make sacrifices to some evil existence, maybe it's to hide the real target among innocent deaths, or it might even be a promotion ritual for some potion..."
Promotion ritual? Can't potions just be drunk directly?
Angel looked at Leonard with some curiosity, but he didn't continue this topic.
The carriage fell into an eerie silence for a moment.
Klein loosened and tightened the silver chain bound to his left wrist, seeming to want to perform divination right here.
Leonard kept looking out the window, but his eyes weren't focused.
Angel had to continue looking through the records in her hands, trying to find some undiscovered patterns.
"Knock knock—"
The carriage was knocked from outside, and the driver's somewhat muffled voice came through the wooden board.
"Linden Avenue in the West District has arrived."