I washed my face with the water pouring from the bathroom sink.

While doing so, it felt like the sound of the grinder was echoing in my head, making me nauseous, but having already thrown up more than three times, there was nothing left to come out.

After rinsing my mouth and turning off the tap with trembling hands, I stepped out of the bathroom.

At that moment, as if he had been waiting nearby, Yoon Si-woo cautiously approached with a worried expression on his face.

“…Scarlet, are you okay?”

“…Yeah, I’m fine now.”

I answered Yoon Si-woo’s question in a small voice.

But as soon as I replied, his expression darkened.

…This was why talking to this guy was such a hassle.

“…No, actually, I’m not okay. How could I be, damn it…”

I spat out a response laced with curses and took a deep breath to calm myself down.

Inhale deeply, exhale.

But it didn’t seem to have much effect, so I sank down, curled up, and buried my head between my knees.

Without realizing it, I began to voice my thoughts.

“…I was convinced that person was the culprit. I didn’t know what they might do if we left them alone, so I thought we had to catch them quickly…”

There was a brief pause before the answer when I was asked if there were any unclear parts in my memory.

And when the answer came, the tone had suddenly changed as if the person had become someone else altogether.

At that moment, I somehow understood.

If Mr. James truly had another persona as I suspected, then the one answering right now was the culprit.

That was why I had shouted in anger.

If something had gone wrong with my classmates and precious friends, they might have died because of that person.

I thought about how quickly another victim might emerge if we didn’t catch him.

I was simply acting on such a thought.

“I didn’t want this result…”

The scene I saw in the kitchen wouldn’t leave my mind.

When I entered the kitchen, there were dishes laid out inside.

I recalled Mr. James smiling, saying he wanted to cook for those struggling without lunch today.

Mr. James was that kind of person.

We succeeded in identifying the culprit.

But the revealed culprit had made an extreme choice, and because of that, Mr. James also ended up dead.

It felt like it was all my fault.

The sound of the grinder kept echoing in my head.

The grinding noise.

The sound.

Then, I sensed something strange.

I lifted my head from my knees and asked.

“Yoon Si-woo, was the sound you heard before you broke down the door the sound of the grinder?”

“Huh?! Oh, yeah. It was definitely that sound.”

Yoon Si-woo, who had been squatting in front of me with his arms outstretched, hurriedly corrected his posture and replied to my question.

I had no idea what he was trying to do, but that wasn’t important right now.

I asked him once more.

“When you heard that sound, did you hear any other noise?”

“…I don’t think I heard anything else.”

I stiffened my expression at Yoon Si-woo’s answer.

No matter how I thought about it, that was strange.

The kitchen and the dining area.

The door was closed, but we could have conversations through the wall, so if there had been a loud noise, Yoon Si-woo, with better senses than an average person thanks to the Immutable Holy Sword, wouldn’t have been able to miss it.

Yet he answered that he hadn’t heard the sound that should have been obvious.

I mentally retraced the events step by step.

Dining hall, kitchen, dual personality, questions, grinder. Noise.

And then, in the next moment, my hands began to tremble with a shock as if my head had been struck with a hammer.

“…It wasn’t.”

As the realization struck me, words spilled out of my mouth.

The very premise was wrong.

“…It wasn’t a dual personality.”

I jumped up urgently, facing an unimaginable worst-case scenario.

“Scarlet?!”

Yoon Si-woo looked at me in shock as I shouted in haste.

“The real culprit was someone else!”

A dual personality means that the body still belongs to the original person.

No matter how crazy someone was, they wouldn’t choose to die in such a horrific way just because their identity was exposed.

With so many kitchen tools available, if they were going to commit suicide, they would have used a knife instead.

Moreover, no one could be ground up in a grinder without a scream.

The only answer that could explain all of this was one.

From the very beginning, that body did not belong to the original person.

I shouted with a twisted face.

“They were controlled!”

*

Moments ago in the kitchen where the dreadful incident had occurred, several teachers were discussing seriously.

“…I can’t believe Mr. James was the culprit.”

“To be accurate, it wasn’t Mr. James but his other personality. The student who first identified the culprit said it was a dual personality. I never thought that being caught by a lie detector would be for that reason…”

“Mr. James is really dead, isn’t he? How could this happen…”

The faces of the teachers distorted at the shocking realization that an acquaintance they had known for so long was involved in the incident, mixed with the sorrow of no longer being able to see him.

However, addressing their grief was secondary to the urgency of completely resolving the case, so Eve, as the representative of the teachers, began to speak.

“…It’s unfortunate what happened, but now that we’ve found the culprit, we should look into how a terrorist attack using magic could have occurred within the barrier. You remember when intermediate magical beasts appeared at the school last time, right? If there’s an issue with the mechanism that blocks magic’s entry, then the terrorist incident that happened today is not just the beginning.”

If that were the case, it posed a grave concern that could bring great turmoil to the city within the barrier where people believed they were safe.

Another teacher asked Eve.

“You said you requested support from the Security Maintenance Bureau, right?”

“Now that we’ve identified the culprit, there’s no reason to restrict access anymore. None of the teachers specialize in that field. They’re supposed to arrive soon.”

As soon as Eve finished speaking, a short-haired woman in the Security Maintenance Bureau uniform entered the kitchen with a stern expression and spoke.

“I am Investigator Rhea Abella from the Security Maintenance Bureau. Teachers, please cooperate with the investigation.”

Eve looked at her for a moment, sighed, and spoke quietly.

“…Rhea, you were close with Mr. James, weren’t you? You don’t have to pretend to be okay in front of us. It’s okay to cry.”

At her words, Rhea, an academy graduate with red eyes, wiped her eyes with her sleeve and managed a weak smile.

“…I’m on duty right now, so later. If I start crying now, I don’t think I’ll be able to stop.”

“…I see. It seems the once mischievous Rhea has now grown up.”

“…I have always been mature, you know?”

The teachers present at the moment couldn’t help but smile at Rhea’s words.

Everyone remembered her from her student days.

Eve also smiled slightly and asked Rhea.

“A mature person shouldn’t be so careless with herself. What’s with that scratch on your neck? You’re not still fighting with cats over snacks, are you?”

Rhea blushed at Eve’s mention of her school days and shouted.

“It’s not because of a fight with a cat! I… I’m going to start the investigation now, so everyone, please leave!”

“Okay, okay. I’m counting on you to check every nook and cranny.”

“Really, it’s not!”

As Rhea shouted at the teachers leaving the kitchen, her expression turned gloomy once they all departed.

She had received vague explanations through contact, but it was hard to believe.

That Mr. James was both a dual personality and a terrorist.

In her memory, Mr. James was always a good person who made snacks with a smile whenever she asked him.

Thus, while feeling sad about his death, Rhea resolved to uncover the truth behind this incident and began to examine the items in the kitchen.

*

Psychometry, the ability to read the memories of places or objects.

Knowing that reading old memories required time, Eve waited for Rhea to emerge.

After a while, Rhea exited the kitchen with a rigid expression, and Eve asked her.

“Did you check everything?”

Rhea slowly looked around and spoke to Eve.

“…I don’t think this is something to discuss in a crowded place. Can we talk somewhere private?”

There were several students in the dining area.

If it was something that shouldn’t get out, Eve nodded in agreement with Rhea’s suggestion.

As soon as they entered the night watchroom attached to the teacher’s office, Eve asked Rhea.

“So what exactly happened?”

Rhea didn’t respond immediately, gazing around the watchroom, then sat down on a long sofa and waved for Eve to sit closer.

“I’ll tell you, but please sit next to me, Teacher.”

Eve sat next to Rhea, smiling.

“You used to insist on calling me ‘Teacher’ instead of ‘Professor,’ and now you say it properly.”

“Did I?”

“You did. Have you forgotten already? Well, regardless, can you tell me what happened?”

Then Rhea leaned closer to Eve and whispered.

“Oops, I made a mistake again.”

THUMP.

A kitchen knife plunged into Eve’s neck.

Soon, the light faded from Eve’s eyes, and her body crumpled to the floor.

Rhea looked at the scene while scratching her neck, then unfolded a blanket from the watchroom.

Rhea covered Eve with a blanket soaked in oil that she had brought from the kitchen and slowly crawled inside.

And from the oil-soaked blanket, she pulled out a lighter.

WHOOSH, flames leaped up.

The former master and student burned to death in that one place.

Eve watched the illusion in silence.

After pulling Rhea, who had fainted in the illusion, away with a knife to her throat, Eve wiped her neck.

A slight trace of blood appeared on her hand after wiping her neck.

“…That was close.”

She had completely trusted Rhea because she was her student.

The only reason she could respond just in time was due to Scarlet’s warning from the day before to never let her guard down anywhere.

“…I should thank Scarlet.”

Muttering this, Eve looked at Rhea with cold eyes.

Rhea Abella, who had been a troublemaker but sweet and brought smiles to everyone.

She was not the kind of child who would act this way.

This indicated either brainwashing or control.

Both types of magic were strictly prohibited for ethical reasons, and powerful control that wouldn’t let one awaken until burning to death was beyond human capability.

This meant there was only one being capable of such actions.

“A witch.”