Out of the Blue

Taking advantage of Olga Marie's brief moment of distraction, Lily had already moved close to the girl.

"Whatever... whatever you want!"

Although the girl wanted to refuse, after meeting Lily's jewel-like eyes, the words that were on the tip of her tongue inexplicably disappeared.

After hearing Olga Marie's insincere reply, Lily smiled and said to the girl:

"Then please take care of me, Mary-chan~"

After meeting Olga Marie in the dining car, Saber, feeling bored and somewhat incompatible with Olga Marie, left the dining car and started wandering around the train with Fujino Asagami.

Lily followed behind her until they arrived at this place, the very spot where the girl's former attendant, Trisha, had died.

Olga Marie began her investigation once she arrived in this carriage.

However, the carriage had already been cleaned up by the train staff. Not only was Trisha's body gone, but there wasn't even a trace of blood left. The neatly arranged room had almost no place to hide anything. Even with a modern scientific investigation, it was unlikely that any useful clues would be found.

However, the girl carefully examined the space that had once swallowed the life of her servant again and again.

What prompted her to do this was not a particularly significant reason.

It was just a very, very simple intuition, and a faint, almost imperceptible sense of unease...

Something's not right...

The girl's unconscious mutterings made Lily, who was following behind Olga Marie, involuntarily turn her attention to the girl in front of her.

"What's wrong, Mary-chan?"

"Miss Lily, do you sense anything strange?"

Pulling herself out of her thoughts, Olga Marie instinctively turned to Lily and asked.

It's hard to imagine that someone with Olga Marie's personality would ever ask others for help.

However, if we disregard her status as the "daughter of Lord," Olga Marie is merely an eleven or twelve-year-old girl.

Having lost Trisha, the maid who had been with her since childhood, she had experienced a nightmarish one last time. In fact, due to mental exhaustion, the girl's face looked much more haggard than before.

If Lily hadn't secretly cast a calming Magecraft on her, poor little Mary would probably have come out with dark circles under her eyes today.

"Miss Lily, don't you sense anything strange?"

However, after asking the question, Olga Marie realized the mistake in her words.

Even if one senses something amiss in the room, it could just be their imagination. But now they're using this "evidence of possible illusion" to seek confirmation from others...

For someone born into Lord family, this was utterly disgraceful...

However, to the girl's surprise, she got the answer she wanted from Lily.

Something's fishy.

"Huh?"

Olga Marie instinctively looked up and stared at Lily in surprise.

"Mary, you're not wrong. There is indeed a message left for you by the deceased in this room. But you'll have to find the answer yourself, because this is a private message she left for you."

"Trisha ..."

Olga Marie's pupils constricted sharply upon hearing a certain word in Lily's words, but she quickly returned to her original state... This was not the Olga Marie who was deeply affected by the death of her attendant, but rather Olga Marie, the heir to the [Department of Astromancy].

"Hmph, who do you think I am? I'll find out these mere clues and show them to you!"

After making this confident statement with her arms crossed, the girl suddenly turned around and looked back into the carriage, hoping to find something.

However, Lily could still vaguely hear the girl mutter something under her breath before turning her head away; the gist of it was something like—

[For Trisha...]

Having regained her composure, Olga Marie turned her gaze to the empty space before her.

There was nothing there. Only the cold air was circulating. But if, according to Miss Lily, there was a [personal message] Trisha left for her in the carriage, then...

The magical energy within her body flowed through the Magic Crest belonging to [Animusphere].

The girl, having activated the Magic Crest within her body, took a deep breath, raised her arm, and carefully moved her fingers slowly in the air before her, where she could see nothing. It was as if she were touching something...

Really--

"Is there a spell here?"

Olga Marie quietly narrowed her eyes as she pressed her finger against the invisible True Magic circle in the void.

Just as Lily said, this was a [personal message] that Trisha left for herself. Because this spell would only be activated when facing her own Magic Crest.

Otherwise, this technique should have been discovered when the Lord El-Melloi II and his group inspected the site.

But how could Lily possibly know about this...?

However, this question only lingered in the girl's mind for a moment before being forcibly pushed out by her eagerness to solve the mystery.

The girl began desperately trying to recall the teachings she had received from Trisha.

Trisha's Magecraft attribute is the extremely rare [imaginary] attribute. It is considered to exist in an imaginary space of nothingness, something like a dimensional pocket, into which things fall without being affected by time and space.

The ability to interfere with this dimensional pocket is determined by the initial spell used.

Trisha once said that although they would generally be set as people with the same imaginary number attribute, the conditions could be changed to other more different ones depending on the circumstances.

--Just like a lock.

So, since it's a lock, it's usually designed so that others can't open it. But if the restrictions are intentionally relaxed, it should also be able to be used to exchange items with others. If Trisha set up the imaginary space for some purpose, what could it be...?

With that in mind, Olga Marie began to move her fingers carefully.

After turning about halfway around, she stopped.

"It's stuck. Next, I'll probably have to enter a password... Trisha will likely choose a phrase I can guess..."

The phrase she had said to herself the most times came to mind, and the next second, Olga Marie's eyes welled up with tears.

After a long pause, the girl whispered a short incantation (code) from her lips.

"... Silly Mary, stand tall and hold your head high."

Magic gathered at the curved fingertips, and the fingertip turned halfway like a key. Instantly, something in the void reversed, spitting out the object hidden inside.

With a thud, accompanied by a heavy sound, [something] fell to the ground.

"Are you... are you kidding me?!"

The moment [that thing] came into Olga Marie's sight, the girl's uncontrollable screams echoed through the carriage.

Even though she was born into the Lord family of the Clock Tower, and had just witnessed her attendant being murdered on this train, the girl never dreamed that such a scene would unfold before her eyes.

It fell from the void to the ground, and eventually rolled into the girl's sight...

--It was none other than the head of the previous victim, Trisha!

"Ara ara..."

At the same time, a sudden sound in the carriage made Olga Marie instinctively turn her head and cast a wary glance in the direction from which the sound came.

Then she noticed that at the end of the carriage, a woman in a kimono was standing there, as if she had been there from the beginning.

"What are you trying to do?!"

Ignoring her grief and anger, Olga Marie used her body to block the line of sight between the woman and the head.

"I didn't intend to do anything..."

After noticing the other person's actions, the female Magecraft from the Department of Law, Hishiri Adashino, shook her head with some regret and then turned her gaze to the girl.

Seeing the girl's unpredictable expression, a slight smile quietly appeared on Hishiri Adashino's lips.

"As expected of the person who will inherit the name of the Department of Astromancy), thanks to you, I have witnessed quite an interesting scene."

Chapter 359. Unexpected Events

"What happened?"

Shirou and Lord El-Melloi II rushed to the carriage based on Lily's words, only to find that they weren't the only ones there when they opened the door.

Yvette L. Rayman – A girl with Mystic Eyes from the Department of Mineralogy.

Karabo Frampton – a priest of the Holy Church.

Jean Mario Spinella – Magecraft works at a television station.

Hishiri Adashino – Magecraft from the Department of Law.

Olga Marie Animusphere – the heir to the [Department of Astromancy) ], and Lily standing beside the girl.

It can be said that, apart from Saber, who is currently wandering around the train with Fujino Asagami, and Gray, who is resting in her room due to exhaustion, as well as the deceased Trisha, they are the members who originally boarded the [Rail Zeppelin].

But if you calculate it this way, it seems like we're still missing one person?

"Caules, where have you been?"

Seeing his disciple hurrying in from the other end of the carriage, the Lord El-Melloi II, who was seeing him for the first time since waking up, subconsciously frowned.

"I only strolled around the train for a short while."

Hearing the reprimand from his teacher, the young man scratched his cheek somewhat embarrassedly, as if he had some unspeakable secret.

Although I'd like to ask further, now is not the time to discuss such matters.

"What exactly do you want? You're from the Department of Law."

After everyone had arrived, Father Karabo from the [Church of the Holy Church] impatiently questioned the organizer of the gathering, Hishiri Adashino.

It's not fair to blame him for being rude; the relationship between the [Holy Church] and the [Mage's Association] was merely a superficial cooperation, with countless unsavory dealings taking place behind the scenes.

Moreover, the Department of Law, from which Hishiri Adashino hails, can be considered the brain of the Mage's Association. Given this complex relationship, Karabo's behavior is naturally understandable.

Upon hearing Karabo bring up serious matters, Lingli clasped her hands together as if she had just realized something.

"I haven't explained it to you all yet. By chance, I happened to obtain some [clues], so I was thinking, how about I temporarily play the role of the detective? And from the Rail Zeppelin of [RailZeppelin], it would be better to resolve [this matter] before the auction."

The "this matter" that Hishiri Adashino was referring to was naturally the "death of Trisha".

However, her suggestion did not receive the response it deserved.

"... Yeah."

After hearing what Hishiri Adashino said, Father Kabbalah's expression turned cold, and he stood up from his chair and said.

"Then I'll take my leave."

"I'm going back too."

Yvette, who was right behind her, also stood up.

"Oh, are you leaving too?"

"Is there even a question? Whether your reasoning is right or wrong, whether we are the murderers or not, none of that matters. For Magecraft, fighting is commonplace anyway, so we might as well hide in our rooms and wait for the auction to begin."

"... I agree with her. Besides, I'm a member of the Holy Church. I have no reason to take orders from your Department of Law."

It was undoubtedly the Magecraft's statement, and it was undoubtedly the statement of the Holy Church.

The truth of the [incident] and the lives lost are of no concern to them. In their worldview, as Magecraft, they are always at risk of killing or being killed.

Therefore, in their view, avoiding unnecessary risks is a matter of course. And everyone in this carriage is Magecraft, so no one would deny their statement.

However--

"Then let me see, a [mystery drama] from the Department of Law."

A familiar voice suddenly sounded in the room, causing Yvette to instinctively clutch her forehead. "Teacher, you..."

Yes, everyone in the room is Magecraft. But there are always exceptions among Magecraft, and Yvette's teacher is the exception among exceptions...

You're too naive.

Seeing that everyone's attention was focused on him, Lord El-Melloi II gently adjusted his glasses and said, "Since Miss Hakuno was able to make such a request, it means she has made the necessary preparations. I think Miss Hakuno's confidence lies in [this train]."

Perhaps to verify the Lord El-Melloi II's deduction, the auctioneer Leandro, suddenly appeared in the carriage the instant his voice fell.