“An update?”
I was confused. An update? Now of all times? Did it have some sort of correlation with the scenario that I just cleared…?
I had a lot of questions, but no answers.
The only thing I could do was stare at the sudden notification with a frown.
However, I snapped out of it rather quickly as I pressed [Yes] shortly after.
Surely an update was a good thing, right?
[App is updating]
[Please wait a moment…]
The notification stopped from that point, leaving me at a loss.
Scratching the back of my head, I eventually settled my gaze on the painting on the wall.
“It’s still here…”
I moved closer to it and traced my finger over it.
Nothing.
Touching the painting, there was no reaction at all. I felt a little relieved knowing this.
The little girl in the picture was in the same position as she once had been, and everything else was in place.
“…..!”
But it was only for a brief moment as something streaked into the painting, startling me completely.
’Shit!’
Taking a step back, the painting came to life once again as the girl in the picture lowered the umbrella, exposing her black eyes.
She was exactly the exact same as the first time I saw her.
No, actually…
Taking a closer look, she was holding onto a teddy bear.
Confused, I turned my attention towards my wrist and realized that the white mark was no longer present.
’When did she…’
“I’m hungry.”
A certain voice whispered in the air, and I looked up.
Mirelle’s face now covered the entire painting as she looked at me.
“Food. You said you would give me… food.”
“Oh, right.”
I suddenly recalled my promise to her.
“Just give me a minute. I’ll go get the food.”
“Huuuury.”
“Yes, yes.”
I dropped whatever I was doing and got out of the office. On the way out, I made sure to lock the door behind me.
Not only was the painting recognizable, but I didn’t want anyone to know it was haunted, too.
“Let’s see, let’s see…”
Moving towards the kitchen area, I rummaged through the cabinets in search of any snacks. However, all I could find were half-empty cereal boxes, a bag of stale pretzels, and a suspicious-looking jar of something that might have once been peanut butter.
I sighed, closing the last cupboard a little too hard.
Looking through the other cabinets, all I saw was instant coffee powder. A lot of it.
Too much of it.
“What sort of drug addicts are these…?”
Moving towards another cabinet and seeing it filled with instant coffee powder, I started to feel bad.
Was this some sort of drug?
“Well, now that I think about it, I kind of need some coffee myself.”
I held off on making it for now as I rummaged through every corner of the kitchen. It was only after a minute of good searching that I finally saw something that caught my eye.
“Ha!”
Secretly tucked behind several instant coffee jars was a bag of chips.
“It’s also unopened… Nice.”
I felt a lot more relieved with the chips in my hand.
I was just about to turn away when—
“What are you doing?”
“….!”
A certain voice reached me from behind, and I almost jumped out in fright. Thankfully, I managed to keep my cool as I turned around while hiding the bag of chips behind my back.
“Kyle…”
Thankfully, it was just Kyle as I sighed in relief.
But my eyes soon narrowed.
“Hm?”
Taking a look at him, he looked quite haggard.
His hair was disheveled, and his eyes were baggy. He looked almost as bad as I did, which I thought was almost impossible to do.
“What the hell happened to you?”
“Ahh… I don’t want to talk about it.”
Kyle dismissed with his hand, moving towards one of the cabinets and taking out a jar of instant coffee before dumping about a quarter of it into a cup and adding just small amounts of water.
The fuck?
Surely that…
“Oh, not bad.”
Kyle smacked his lips while he looked at me.
“What?” He brought his coffee closer to himself. “Don’t tell me you want some.”
“I’m… okay.”
I thought back to the time I stole his coffee.
Don’t tell me…
“There’s quite a messy situation going on right now.”
“Hm?”
I looked at Kyle. I thought he didn’t want to talk about it.
“There’s been an incident not far from here, and… ehm, I was sent to investigate the stuff. It’s a rather complicated situation. It seems to be some sort of High-Order entity. We’re still unsure of its rank, but it’s extremely powerful.”
“How powerful are we saying?”
“…That’s what I’m struggling to figure out.”
Kyle smiled wryly before taking a sip of his coffee. Smacking his lips, he yet again mumbled, ’This is good stuff.’
Lunatic.
Absolute lunatic.
“So far, all of its victims have been regular people, but the fact that we’ve yet to find anything related to it is extremely worrying. It’s almost as if… It doesn’t exist in the first place. Regardless of what we do, we can’t detect it.”
Seeing the rare look of solemnness on Kyle’s face, I felt my chest grow heavier.
For him to look like this, this case must be really dangerous…
“Here, take a look.”
Kyle suddenly extended his hand to show me his phone.
That was when I caught a glimpse of his screen, and my entire body froze.
“This…”
A sickly, mummified figure appeared on the screen, the skin shriveled and brown like dried leather. Sunken eyes peered from hollow sockets as it lay slumped on a sofa, hands curled inward, slowly blinking at the recording device while its open mouth just barely moved.
I raised my head to look at Kyle, who stared at the video with a grim expression.
“This right here is the state in which he leaves all of his victims. As you can see, they’re not dead, but at the same time, they’ve lost the ability to do anything.”
“…..”
I pursed my lips while looking away from the phone. The video was too much for me.
“Are you sure you should be showing me this?”
“…It’s not exactly confidential information. In fact, it’s probably best if you know about it since the matter is probably going to get escalated to the bureau.”
“It is?”
“Yeah… The Guild requested a few scouts from the Bureau to conduct some tests. Based on the results, the Bureau will assign it an international ranking. If it qualifies as Thrall-class or higher, Guilds from other jurisdictions will start coming here. It’ll probably make the news too.”
“Thrall-class?”
What was that?
“Huh? Ohhh…”
As if recalling my ignorance on most of the matters, Kyle started to explain.
“You might not know this since it’s something usually taught later in your second year, but the Bureau classifies anomalous entities into five categories: Sigil, Elcid, Melas, Thrall, and Kermite. Thrall-Class is the second most dangerous.”
“I see…”
I was starting to understand.
“Anything ranked below that falls under the sole authority of the local Guilds; no outside interference is allowed. But once an anomaly reaches the higher classes, it’s a different story. Those are considered global threats, and when that happens, anyone, regardless of jurisdiction, is permitted to step in and deal with the situation.”
Kyle played with the phone in his hands.
“Which is what might be happening in this case. Things will get rather lively if that happens.”
Chuckling, Kyle chugged the last remaining of his coffee before taking a deep breath.
“In any case, this anomaly…”
Kyle licked his lips.
“…They call it the twisted man.”