Observations from the Lounge

Knock, knock— A soft tapping came from outside the lounge door.

"Come in." Angel, who had been staring blankly into space in the second-floor lounge of Blackthorn Security Company, rose from the sofa by the window. Her right hand instinctively went to her skirt, only for her to remember that all her weapons had been handed over to the young Nighthawk named Leonard Mitchell.

The doorknob turned, and a white-haired person in a black trench coat entered carrying a wooden lunch box.

At first glance, Angel thought she was an old woman. Only after the newcomer fully entered the lounge did she realize that beneath the long white hair was the face of a woman in her thirties. Her features were unremarkable, but she carried a tranquil, peaceful air, and her dark eyes gave the impression that she could see through everything.

"Seeka Tron, Nighthawk." The white-haired woman introduced herself briefly. "The captain asked me to bring you lunch."

The captain was that stern-faced Dunn Smith... so this was the female Nighthawk he said he would arrange to "watch" me? Angel hurried over and accepted the lunch box from Seeka Tron.

The box was small. Inside were a piece of oat bread, a small bowl of stew, and several thin slices of bacon. The portion was not large, but it had meat and vegetables and was reasonably balanced.

This "Blackthorn Security Company" did not seem to have its own kitchen. Angel guessed the lunch had been delivered from a nearby restaurant.

Since she had skipped breakfast, it had been nearly a day since Angel had last eaten. Aside from the two cups of hot water she had drunk after arriving in the lounge, her stomach had long been empty. Not caring that someone else was present, she set the lunch box on the table and began wolfing down the food.

Seeka Tron sat quietly on the sofa beside her, casually picking up an Ahova Evening News from several days ago and hiding her gaze behind it.

However, Angel always felt that her attention remained fixed on her.

A woman's body could not eat nearly as much as Angel's formerly well-trained body had. Though she felt hungry enough for her stomach to stick to her back, after finishing most of the oat bread with the stew, she already felt eighty percent full.

After slowing down and gradually finishing the last of the food, she picked up the napkin beneath the bread, wiped her mouth and hands, and let out a satisfied sigh.

Seeka Tron lowered the newspaper and glanced at the empty lunch box. Her brows rose in surprise, making Angel feel heat creep into her cheeks.

I'd been hungry for almost an entire day. It was perfectly reasonable to finish one serving, wasn't it? Besides, this lunch wasn't exactly lavish. Back then, I could have finished three portions in one go...

"Where should I put the lunch box?" Angel asked, trying to escape the awkwardness.

"Just leave it there. Someone from the restaurant will come collect it this afternoon." The white-haired Nighthawk answered with a smile. "I just thought that you could still have an appetite in this situation. That's... well, very impressive."

As long as I'm not embarrassed, the other person will be embarrassed... Angel's eyes wandered as she tried to change the subject.

"How many people are there in your 'security company'? I mean, the Nighthawks?" The moment the words left her mouth, Angel regretted them. Her change of topic had been far too abrupt.

But Seeka Tron did not mind. She simply set down the newspaper, adjusted her long legs beneath her trench coat into a comfortable position, leaned against the soft cushion of the sofa, and only answered after a brief moment of thought.

"There are six combat personnel including me. I think you've already met some of them. With the clerical staff, there are a little over ten people altogether."

That answer was rather vague. Was she afraid of leaking confidential information?

Angel silently recalled the Nighthawks she had met: Dunn Smith, who was called the captain; Daly Simone, who dressed like a Spirit Channeling; the young Leonard Mitchell; and Seeka Tron before her. That already made four. When she had first arrived at Blackthorn Security Company, she remembered Dunn telling Leonard to find two others who were on leave. It seemed these were the Nighthawks' entire combat force in Tingen.

Though there were not many of them, if they were all Beyonders, they would definitely be a force not to be underestimated. Even if they were all Sequence 9, each possessed different peculiar abilities. Once several Beyonders fought as a team, their endless variety of powers would cause immense trouble for their enemies.

"Only six combat personnel? Wouldn't that be too much work?"

Angel pressed on, genuinely curious. In the latter half of last night alone, three Nighthawks had come to her home just to investigate Cole Granger's case. Half their combat personnel had been deployed. Excluding those resting at home and those on duty, it had practically been a full mobilization.

Seeka Tron gave a quiet laugh, and her narrowed eyes made her look much younger.

"In fact, we're quite free. There aren't many supernatural incidents to handle in Tingen City. Including yours, there have only been four in June. Besides, we Nighthawks aren't the only ones working. We only handle the North Borough, West Borough, Golden Wutong District, and such places. The other areas are handled by the Mandated Punishers and the Beyonders of Machinery Hivemind."

"If you hadn't reported this to Saint Selena Cathedral, it wouldn't have been our concern in the first place."

The Mandated Punishers of the Church of the Lord of Storms and the Machinery Hivemind of the Church of the God of Steam and Machinery were both church Beyonder forces, just as the Nighthawks were the force of the Church of the Evernight Goddess. It seemed the three major Orthodox Churches of the Loen Kingdom had clearly divided spheres of influence. At least that prevented conflicts—or even outright fights—when dealing with related cases.

Seeing that Seeka Tron answered every question, Angel went on to ask about the other Beyonder teams in Tingen City. It seemed Sica's concerns about "leaking secrets" applied only to her own Nighthawk team. When discussing the other two Beyonder teams in Tingen, she knew everything and held nothing back, greatly broadening Angel's horizons.

"...Since those people were believers of the Lord of Storms, the Mandated Punishers arrived at the scene too. They hadn't had a case in a whole month. When they saw that the captain and I had already solved it, their eyes nearly popped out of their heads. They almost started a fight with us..."

Sharing others' embarrassing moments was indeed one of the best ways to deepen friendships, and Angel and Seeka Tron were soon chatting like old friends. When Leonard Mitchell, having changed out of his black uniform and wearing a casual black vest over his shirt, pushed open the door to the lounge and walked in, Seeka was holding her stomach ungracefully and nearly rolling around on the sofa.

"Cough... cough." The moment she noticed someone entering, Seeka Tron instantly resumed an upright sitting posture, as though her collapsed image from moments ago had been an illusion. "Leonard, what is it?"

She looked at the lunch box on the table and suddenly understood. "Did you come to collect the lunch box?"

Leonard Mitchell nearly failed to maintain his deliberately dashing expression. After freezing for a moment, he replied, "Of course not. The waiter has already collected the dishes outside. He probably forgot yours. I came because the captain asked me to notify you to attend a meeting in his office, regarding tonight's operation."

Hearing that it concerned tonight's operation, Seeka Tron became serious as well. She rose from the sofa and straightened her trench coat.

"Then I'll head over to the captain's first. Can you cover for me?" Seeka motioned with her eyes toward Angel, who sat on the inner sofa.

Leonard nodded. "No problem. I'm not taking part in combat tonight anyway."

He naturally sat on the sofa Sica had just rolled around on and picked up the earlier copy of the Ahova Evening News.

Seeing Seeka Tron preparing to leave, Angel also stood up to bid farewell. "Ms. Tron, thank you for your companionship during this time."

Remembering that the Nighthawks were all believers of the Evernight Goddess, she added, "May the Goddess bless you."

"May the Goddess bless you." Seeka Tron traced a Crimson Moon over her chest before leaving the lounge.

The room fell silent again. Leonard Mitchell seemed to have come solely to read the newspaper. With one leg crossed over the other, he held the Ahova Evening News in both hands and stared intently at the pages, as though the news hid some secret to wealth.

Angel found him overly serious and fond of getting to the bottom of things, so she did not speak to him. Instead, she pulled a newspaper from the bookshelf nearby, returned to the sofa by the window, and began passing the time.

It was an Intis Post from a week ago. It seemed the newspapers in the lounge were not updated very frequently, and the Nighthawks who used them to pass the time did not care much about that.

Her gaze settled on the front-page headline:

"Shocking! Several Tingen University students mysteriously vanish—could a female literature professor be the cause?"

What was this?

Angel frowned and set the newspaper aside. She had no interest in such sensationalist headlines. If such a title could make the front page, this newspaper probably was not very authoritative.

But after a few seconds, she picked up the Intis Post again, wanting to see whether the article mentioned Cole Granger. After all, that man had used the Instigator's abilities to deceive many students into skipping class and heading to the Ammantha Mountain Range north of Awwa County. There had reportedly been no news of them for a month. Calling them missing was not quite accurate. Angel felt they had probably already died, perhaps with even their bodies dragged away by wolves.

Only after reading the article line by line did she conclude that it was worthless news, full of the sort of tabloid speculation from her previous life. It was written solely to attract attention, using anonymous claims from all sorts of fabricated "informants," while cleverly employing words like "possibly" and "perhaps" to avoid legal trouble.

Turning to the later pages, she found one attention-grabbing headline after another. The topics covered every industry in every country across the North Continent, with the sole common feature being wild speculation and sensationalism.

Just as she was about to throw the newspaper far away, Leonard Mitchell, who had been buried in his paper searching for a "secret to wealth," suddenly spoke.

"It seems you and Seeka get along quite well. What was your first impression of her, and of us Nighthawks?"

His tone was casual, and his eyes did not leave the newspaper, as though he were merely asking in passing. But from their conversation in the carriage, Angel believed he definitely had some purpose.

"Ms. Seeka Tron seemed a little distant when we first met, but after talking with her for a while, I found her to be a very warmhearted person."

Angel chose her words carefully.

"As for the Nighthawks, honestly, my first impression wasn't very good. After all, you broke into my home in the middle of the night and directly invaded my dream. If I hadn't been a Beyonder too, I'm afraid your captain, Dunn Smith, wouldn't even have given me a chance to talk. He would have simply prepared to obtain all the information in my dream, wouldn't he?"

She first voiced how she felt as an "ordinary citizen," then changed tack.

"But since you were fighting Beyonder crime, I can't say much about it. Setting aside my personal feelings, I think highly of your professionalism and efficiency."

"Normally, when we visit someone's home, we go with the neighborhood police. This time, it was in the latter half of the night, and the situation was urgent. Ms. Daly is leaving Tingen tomorrow, so the captain was in a hurry to close the case as soon as possible."

Leonard Mitchell had not expected Angel's assessment to be so blunt, and he explained with an awkward expression.

"Compared to 'moderates' like us, those brutes among the Mandated Punishers tend to kick doors straight in and arrest people before questioning them; the Machinery Hivemind is even more accustomed to holding firearms to combat crime right out on the street, and I believe you wouldn't like their methods."

As though recalling some past experience, Leonard's mouth twitched. He seemed to want to laugh, but held it back.

He simply put down the Ahova Evening News, which he had not turned a single page of, switched the direction of his crossed legs, and fixed his emerald eyes on Angel.

"Based on your current impression, if you had the chance to join the Nighthawks, would you be willing?"

Join the Nighthawks? Me?

Angel looked at Leonard, trying to find even a trace of joking in his face, but Leonard's expression was calm and his gaze did not waver.

He seemed serious...

Angel frowned. As a former Templar Knight, her first impression of the Nighthawks, the Beyonder force of the Evernight Goddess, had not actually been bad. Much of her earlier criticism had been intended to establish the image of "an ordinary person full of complaints about violent authorities." From the perspective of fighting crime, their swift and informal approach became an advantage.

But what did that have to do with me? My current identity was merely that of a witness who submitted a report. Perhaps tomorrow, once I wake up, I'll be in prison keeping Mrs. Sharon company because of her testimony. And now you're asking if I'm interested in joining the Nighthawks... You don't look like some kind of suicide squad either?

She guessed at Leonard's intentions and did not answer immediately.

"Heh, I was only asking. Don't take it to heart."

Seeing Angel's shifting expression and her continued silence, Leonard did not press further.

"It's just that departments handling victims of supernatural incidents like you usually need to arrange for their placement, to prevent further harm or the leaking of secrets. Since you're already a Beyonder, you'll have more options. Once Mrs. Sharon is arrested and brought to justice, the captain will probably speak with you in detail."

A victim? Once Mrs. Sharon is caught, if I simply deny that anyone named Angel Granger exists and reveal the effects of the Sequence 7 Potion, Witch, it would be hard to say which of us would reach the gallows first. If I said, "I'm a victim too. Cole Granger died during the Promotion Ritual long ago, and I'm a wandering soul from another world possessing this body," would anyone believe me?

Though she had long prepared for the worst in order to deal with Mrs. Sharon once and for all, the thought of such a troublesome possibility made the bit of good mood Angel had gained from chatting with Seeka Tron evaporate instantly like dew beneath the Blazing Sun. She picked up the Intis Post, filled with gossip and tabloid stories, and immersed herself in fabricated news to pass the time.