The Speedrun Manual of Miss Witch - Chapter 22

Ciel returned to her bedroom, changed back into her school uniform, and hung her slightly damp robe on the door.

Under her persuasion, Lichie had already gone to wash up and head to bed. After all, having taken the rare day off, she deserved a proper rest.

Meanwhile, Ciel sat in the dimly lit room, leaning against the window as she quietly observed the events unfolding below.

The police officers who had been investigating earlier had now all stepped outside the cordoned-off area, pushing the perimeter another 50 meters back and dispersing the remaining onlookers.

It was peak dinner time for the workers returning home, and the blocked-off street drew plenty of complaints.

But once people heard that it involved the gang wars and a homicide, no one dared complain further. Those whose routes home were blocked either decided to share meals at nearby coworkers’ homes or simply headed to the Savior Goddess Church for relief meals.

Why had the investigating officers… suddenly left the scene?

Were they waiting for the investigation department the officer had mentioned earlier?

The notebooks, the potion, and the mystical material—Ciel hadn’t touched any of them. She had intentionally left them in place to make the “mutual killing” scenario appear more convincing.

If she had taken anything, and transcendent powers were brought into the investigation, the conclusion would quickly shift to a transcendent-on-transcendent crime for treasure.

Ciel’s goal was to keep things simple and avoid implicating “another transcendent.”

After about 20 minutes, there was finally some movement at the distant police line.

A figure holding a black umbrella stepped past the officers and walked steadily toward the bodies.

From Ciel’s angle, she could only see the black umbrella, not the person beneath it.

She watched as the umbrella moved back and forth between the two corpses before stopping in front of the black-robed man’s body.

When the black umbrella moved toward the alley’s entrance, Ciel noticed that the potion and mystical material were gone—they had been taken by the person under the umbrella.

A transcendent.

Ciel instinctively reached this conclusion.

Ordinary people might see the potion vial, but they likely wouldn’t notice the tendril-like mystical material. Whoever saw and took it must have possessed some special abilities.

Ciel drew the curtains shut, ceasing her observation.

Once transcendent powers were involved, she couldn’t be sure whether her gaze might attract attention.

After all, the High Priestess Uris had been able to “smell” whether she was lying and discern her emotions.

She wanted to minimize any risk of exposure.

Unfortunately, things rarely go as planned.

Like Murphy’s Law, what she feared the most happened. Barely ten minutes after she closed the curtains, there was a knock at the door downstairs.

Ciel opened her bedroom door; Lichie, seemingly exhausted, was already asleep in her room, undisturbed by the knocking.

Ciel waited for a moment, but as the knocking grew louder, she got up to avoid waking Lichie, descending the stairs to answer the door.

When she opened it, she saw a beautiful young woman standing outside, folding up a black umbrella. She was only slightly taller than Ciel.

The woman’s straight black hair cascaded down her back to her waist. Perched on her slightly upturned nose was a pair of gold-rimmed half-frame glasses, with two delicate silver chains hanging from the frames, curving gracefully to her ears.

She wore a formal black uniform dress. Her dark purple eyes studied Ciel intently. Despite the rigid structure of her attire, her hands were adorned with long, black silk gloves, exuding an air of refinement. Over the gloves, she wore a pair of leather ones.

At that moment, she was removing the leather glove from her right hand, extending it toward Ciel.

“Good evening, Berren City Police Department. You can call me Agent Avena.”

“Good evening, Ciel. Unemployed.” Ciel extended her hand, meeting Avena’s.

When their hands met, Ciel found her touch to be remarkably soft, almost boneless. The sensation of the delicate black silk gloves made it feel even smoother.

“You certainly have a sense of humor.” Avena’s face remained expressionless as she offered a polite remark. “Did you just graduate from Berren Private Academy today?”

Ciel’s current attire—a comfortable school uniform dress—paired with her earlier response about being unemployed, made it easy to infer that she had just graduated.

“Yes, I graduated today.” Ciel answered honestly. “Is there something I can help you with, Officer?”

“There were a few homicides not far from your home tonight. Are you aware of them, Miss Ciel?” Avena asked.

“Yes,” Ciel nodded. “An officer mentioned it to me earlier. It’s Blackwater Gang business. Not uncommon.”

“Indeed,” Avena replied flatly, nodding as well. “But their manner of death… is quite uncommon.”

“Hmm?” Ciel put on a puzzled expression, as though she didn’t understand what Avena meant.

“Two men outside the alley shot each other. Their guns—everything from the serial numbers, rifling, to the wear-and-tear on the cylinders—were identical. I simulated the bullet trajectories—the shots to each other were fired from the ear-level of the black-robed man. Strange, isn’t it?”

“Strange,” Ciel agreed, her calm demeanor showing no hint of a crack thanks to 【Calm Mind Lv.1】.

“Inside the alley, one man stabbed another who appeared to be strangling him in terror. The attacker was also strangled to death. But the strangling left only post-mortem bruises—the real cause of death was trauma to the throat.”

“Someone reached through his flesh and directly crushed his windpipe. Any thoughts on that, Miss Ciel?”

Avena tightened her grip on Ciel’s hand, holding it firmly.

“Uh… a rather unconventional method,” Ciel replied, staring at the officer without any sign of panic.

She knew Avena had no evidence. Everything she mentioned was merely conjecture based on the bodies—none of it could tie back to Ciel.

“One last thing.” Avena looked directly into Ciel’s eyes, her tone deliberate. “May I ask how you heard the knocking at the door?”

“I knocked on every door in the area. Yours was the only one that opened.”

“Do you have any thoughts on that?”

The knocking… Only a transcendent could hear it?

Ciel’s eyes narrowed dangerously.

Without warning, she tightened her grip on Avena’s delicate hand, pulling her into the house.

Her shadow emerged swiftly from Ciel’s feet. The moment the door slammed shut, it lunged at Avena, clinging to her back like a leech. Avena’s body went limp, collapsing onto the living room floor with a dull thud.

Ciel straddled her waist in an instant, pinning Avena’s right hand above her head with one hand while pressing her left hand against her throat.

If Avena made any threatening moves, Ciel was ready to kill her on the spot.

For now, she would keep her alive to see if she could extract any useful information from her.

This way, when Ciel returned to reality, she could truly perfect her method of killing.