“Oh, come on,” Helm scoffed, pulling the notebook from her grasp.
“Go home early. If you’re truly bored, you could volunteer at the church and fulfill your actual duties.”
“You don’t believe me?” Ghervil frowned.
“It’s not a matter of belief or disbelief…” Helm began, a sigh escaping him. “Let me put it this way: I’ve been a detective for nearly a decade, and I’ve seen many people like you. They all share a common trait: excessive arrogance and blind overconfidence. Many have lost their lives because of it, including some of my own colleagues, who always believed they were under the special protection of the Goddess…”
She found herself listening to the same tired, didactic rhetoric, feeling her ears grow numb from the familiar lecture.
Interpreting the girl’s speechless expression as a sign of his words having little effect, Helm intensified his lecture, adopting an even more profound tone. In response, the girl’s face fell, and with a sigh, she emerged from behind the tree.
“Were my words really that ineffective? They used to work quite well…”
Still, he thought, there was no immediate danger, so allowing her to stay a little longer wouldn’t hurt.
The shade beneath the tree offered a cool reprieve, and being far from the bonfire, the unpleasant odor was faint.
Leaning against the tree, Helm enjoyed the coolness while observing the girl’s every move.
He surmised she had failed to get a satisfactory response from him and was now off to bother the other officers. A hint of schadenfreude touched him.
Ghervil felt nothing towards the condescending, overly-mature man. Given her age and experience, countless others would likely try to lecture her in the future; if she were to be bothered by and refute every single one, life would become unbearable.
Once an idea formed, she was compelled to put it into practice. Her immediate task was to unmask the killer, preventing further harm to others.
The officers chatted idly near the bonfire, while the sergeant sat smoking. Ghervil positioned herself with her back mostly to the group, ensuring that from ten meters away, no one’s full attention was on her.
Clearing her throat, she planted her feet firmly, took a deep breath, and shouted at a volume that commanded the attention of everyone present,
“Mr. Angeli!”
As expected, everyone turned to stare at her with puzzled expressions, save for one individual.
“There’s a theory,” she continued, “that if you’re certain a culprit is among a crowd and you suddenly shout their name, there’s a high probability they will turn around.”
Under the astonished gazes of everyone, she walked towards the lone officer who remained hunched by the fire, the only one who hadn’t turned.
“But there are exceptions,” she asserted. “If the culprit is prepared, they will deliberately not turn, fearing their gaze might meet that of the person who called their name. Am I right, Mr. Luke? Or… should I call you Angeli the Coachman?”
A chilling, peculiar sensation spread among the dozen or so people present, the girl’s words so preposterous as to be unbelievable.
Only the sergeant and the detective, witnessing this unfolding scene, sensed something was amiss, slowly advancing with their hands gripping their pistols.
Helm instantly regretted not having trusted Ghervil’s words.
If her claims were true, then the most imperiled individuals were undoubtedly the surrounding officers and… the girl herself, who, despite knowing the killer’s identity, had approached him so closely.
Was she trying to be flashy? No…
From their brief interaction and the little he had gathered about her, she was not a reckless person.
In his estimation, the girl was a nun so kind she bordered on foolishness. She had been willing to pay extra silver coins to ensure his younger brother could rest at home, and even after realizing she had been swindled, she hadn’t reneged on gifting him precious flower petals. ‘Right, kindness…’ he thought. ‘That’s why she’s standing so far forward. If the culprit lashes out after being exposed, they’ll undoubtedly target her, being the closest one…’
Involuntarily, he tightened his grip on his pistol.
“You must be mistaken!” Franz was the first to step forward, shielding Ghervil. “I’ve known him for years; it couldn’t possibly be him…”
“Get back! That man’s dangerous!” Godfrey’s furious roar was also a warning to Ghervil.
Though no one dared disregard their superior’s words, most of those present only symbolically retreated a meter or two. They couldn’t comprehend how, if he truly were the killer, so many of them couldn’t handle just one man.
“I knew… I should have known all along…”
‘Luke’ finally murmured to himself, slowly rising with his back still turned. The flames in the bonfire suddenly surged, crackling and spitting.
Some sharp-eyed officers noticed movement within the bonfire, which had supposedly burned all the rats to death.
“I knew you’d remember me!” He slowly turned around, his face contorted in an expression that was both a cry and a laugh,
“Everyone thought I was sick, said I’d changed, told me to get treatment. Bate did, those two old fools did too… If it weren’t for that cursed doctor! I would have already…”
“So you killed them all?” Before he could descend into full madness, the girl interrupted, her voice calm, almost devoid of emotional fluctuation.
“Fools don’t deserve God’s grace, and those who deem themselves noble and self-important deserve to die. A pity… that bullet missed you, the last remnant of the abbey!” His hand darted to the holster at his waist, his expression turning instantly sinister. With a sudden ‘Swish!’, he drew his gun with a speed that startled most, aiming it directly at Ghervil,
“Bang!”
Ghervil squeezed her eyes shut, not daring to move. After a brief, tense silence, at least three more gunshots echoed, followed by the sound of something collapsing into the bonfire. A force then seized her by the back of her collar—Helm had lifted her as if she were a small chick. Though she bristled at the indignity, she let out a long breath of relief, her legs feeling weak and unsteady when he finally set her down.
“What took you so long? I stalled for ages! Detective, you almost betrayed my trust!”
“You’ve done a great service, Sister,” Helm said, still holding his gun aloft as he shielded her,
“If we’d let this fiend slip away under our noses into a crowded area, we’d either face the gallows or be forced to resign. I’ll treat you to a good meal when this is over, but first, we can’t let these beasts escape!”
“These? What do you mean, they’re not dead yet?”
Ghervil cautiously leaned out to survey the situation.
Everyone’s faces were grim, especially the officers, who hadn’t yet recovered from the shock of their colleague’s sudden, violent transformation and death.
“Hmph…”
Heavy, ragged breathing filled the air. Several timid officers began to retreat as they watched the corpse’s skin, after less than three minutes of burning, shrivel and then strangely bulge in localized areas.
At that moment, the flames weakened further, and a thick, putrid stench, carried by black smoke, billowed towards them.
Dozens of fist-sized forms writhed beneath the skin, pushing it outwards. Hands, feet, torso—more and more of them emerged, until the corpse swelled to twice its original size.
“Fire! Don’t give these creatures a moment to breathe!”
“Bang! Bang! Bang-bang-bang…”
As Helm issued his command, the sergeant led the officers, and a volley of gunfire immediately drowned out the crackle of burning wood and the faint, intermittent squeaking of rats.
Despite the rats having burned for so long, and their reluctance to believe, they now understood what those writhing bulges were. Their so-called colleague had likely been devoured by the rats, leaving behind only bones and a hollow shell.
Countless bullets tore through the skin, and the bulges gradually ceased their movement. Pools of black blood oozed out, extinguishing the already weak flames, and the air grew heavy with a fresh, metallic scent of gore.
Most of the skin had completely ruptured, spilling out several black-furred rats that, though immobilized, were not entirely dead. Indeed, these creatures could only be truly eradicated by burning them to ash, which meant they would have to rekindle the bonfire.
“It’s finally over… Ugh…” Witnessing the grotesque scene and assailed by the foul odor, some officers could no longer hold back, slumping to the ground, hands clapped over their mouths as they fought the urge to vomit.
The stout sergeant, too, holstered his gun and wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead.
“Squeak! Squeak!”
Suddenly, a piercing, distinctly different rodent shriek galvanized everyone present.
“’Eternal life’…”
Ghervil recalled ‘Luke’s’ words, her gaze falling upon the bullet-riddled corpse, as a grim premonition settled over her.
The corpse’s head had split open along the bullet wounds, revealing no brain matter or even blood, only a single red-eyed, white-furred rat, three to four times larger than the others, curled up inside.
“Squeak!” Another shrill cry.
The immobilized rats began to writhe frantically, swarming rapidly towards the white rat.
Once more, the officers’ bullets followed, but this time, even severing some of the rats in half couldn’t halt the horrifying spectacle.
In moments, countless rats bit into each other’s bodies, their tails intertwining to solidify the mass, growing larger and larger. Limbs, a head, a torso, teeth, and a longer, thicker rat tail coalesced, piling together to form a ‘giant rat’ approximately two meters in length.
“What is that white rat?” Ghervil asked, disbelief coloring her voice.
“A Ratmire White Rat (TL Note: A highly vengeful and disease-ridden creature, known for its aggressive nature and ability to transmit severe plagues.),” Helm’s voice grew increasingly urgent with each word. “Perhaps I’ll have to change the premise for that good meal. Run! Its target is you! Get as far away as possible! We’ll try to hold it off—just find a way to survive!”