Silence.
Still silence.
An awkward silence filled the room, making the spacious hospital ward feel cramped.
Looking back into Emma's pale golden eyes, which gleamed even indoors, Horn asked in confusion, "My eyes have always been like this. Is something wrong, Miss Moore?"
Brushing aside the inexplicable sense of déjà vu, Emma shook her head and denied it. "Of course not, Mr. Horn. If I couldn't tell the difference between natural red eyes and redness caused by infection, I wouldn't deserve to walk the path known as Enlightenment."
She clapped her hands lightly, dispelling some of the awkwardness, then continued, "Back to the Blood Thirst Period. By this stage, the patient's mind has already been warped, and the information their senses relay may not be real. They'll crave food involuntarily, even the flesh and blood of the living. In a moment of confusion, they may mistake a living person for a delicacy, and a conversation for a hunt."
"In documented cases, some people have even devoured their own sleeping children alive while out of their minds. Then, once their hunger and thirst were sated and they came to their senses, they were horrified. They went to the police station to report the crime, blood still at the corners of their mouths..."
Describing the horrifying truth without a change in expression, Emma said calmly, "And because of the abundance of [Grail] spirituality at this stage, the infected will unconsciously use it to strengthen their bodies as they hunt. Even an underage child might bring down an adult man, causing us plenty of trouble in our investigations."
"Some of those who realized something was wrong with them went to a clinic for an examination or to a church to pray. Then they were sent here, to Sacred Heart Hospital, for treatment by the director, who is also the local head of the Prevention and Suppression Bureau, Frank Mills."
"Others were too frightened to leave their homes. They hid away in some dark corner, only to go mad during one of their recurring bouts of hunger and thirst, or die in agony by their own hand."
"Some even came to believe it was a Gift. They might even try to do something under the name of the Blood Cup Cult. You've seen what became of them: pitiful, and unaware of it; twisted into bloodthirsty beasts. While alive, they're convenient puppets. After death, they're convenient sacrifices."
Listening to Emma, Horn swallowed, a chill running down his back.
Once again, he realized what these extraordinary beings truly were.
No longer human.
Having explained how serious it was, Emma reassured him, "Fortunately, most patients lose their minds completely and collapse before reaching the final stage, turning into beasts. Only a very small number of 'suitable candidates' can grow stronger by devouring others, gain the ability to infect them, and become Blood Thirsters."
"So, after we destroyed the Hound Bar, an important infection hub, the situation was basically under control. Just focus on getting your strength back, and wait to be discharged."
Smiling confidently, Emma thumped her chest and vowed, "'Let creatures of the night remain in the night, so that creatures of the day may walk by day.' That's one of the Prevention and Suppression Bureau's principles."
"The extraordinary belong to the extraordinary, and ordinary people to ordinary people. Night-walking monsters have no place beneath the daylight, and we in the Prevention and Suppression Bureau aren't the only ones upholding this law."
"Don't worry. With Miss Veronica here, it won't be long before the Blood Cup Cult's officiant is caught. Maybe by the time you're discharged, he'll have been reduced to ashes."
Watching Emma put on a fierce expression and mime scattering ashes, Horn was infected by her optimism and laughed.
That was right. He wasn't some savior. If the sky fell, someone taller would hold it up. What was there to fear?
"Oh, right. There's also Jim Belloc's reward money. I added up the odds and ends to make it a round figure."
As if she'd just remembered something, Emma took a dark wallet from her jacket pocket, shook out a gold coin bearing the profile of George V, King of Avalon, and handed it to Horn.
"Here. This is for you."
Horn eagerly took the weighty Florin coin. Suddenly, he felt the whole trip had been worthwhile.
Belloc, you died well!
With this one coin, Horn could buy at least three of the popular high-grade formulas on the market, then stock up on a huge pile of ingredients and use Flame of Destiny to turn his income meter upside down—making in one year what would otherwise take ten. With that capital, he could achieve financial freedom right away.
And then what?
Seeing Horn stare at the coin, suddenly lost in thought, Emma explained, "The Blood Cup Cult has had a bounty posted by the Prevention and Suppression Bureau for a long time. There are rewards for eliminating its accomplices, too. This is your reward. Keep it."
Though she didn't know why Miss Veronica had credited the Thug Belloc's death to the boy in front of her, Emma decided to curb her curiosity and not dig any deeper.
Otherwise, she might start imagining a story suited for publication in the Kael-Isum Review.
"All right. Since there's nothing else, get some rest."
Emma patted Horn on the shoulder, then shut the door behind her as she left, leaving the quiet to the boy sitting on the hospital bed, lost in thought.
And so, a long silence settled in.
At the workbench in his consciousness, Restlessness turned grayer still. On the card, the finger tapped more and more frequently, a dark sheen flickering faintly across it.
After leaving the ward, Emma didn't go far. She crossed a street and entered Birmingham Police Station.
Her Prevention and Suppression Bureau credentials got her through without a hitch. She made her way to the interrogation room, and the easygoing air she'd shown in front of Horn was gone, replaced by a grave sense of duty.
"'The Blood Cup Cult will be reduced to ashes'—that was easy to say, but the real world wasn't a fairy tale where everything ended once 'the prince and princess lived happily ever after.'"
"Even if the mastermind was destroyed, the poison he'd left behind remained. The infected wouldn't be magically cured and returned to their everyday lives."
"One more successful prevention might spare a family from tragedy."
Her pupils shone like sparks as she felt her Candle Bearer grow ever brighter. The Second Seal no longer seemed far away. Emma Moore suddenly understood why a senior who walked the same path of Enlightenment, her uncle, the Enlightenment Detective Douglas Moore, had sent her to Birmingham.
Illumination was the nature of the Candle's principle. Pointing the way for others was its duty.
And a candle always had to burn something to give light.
Looking at the corpulent police chief bound to a chair before her, Emma sat opposite him. Ignoring the curses and pleas assailing her, she neatly laid an entire set of sharp surgical instruments from Sacred Heart Hospital across the table.
"Chief Miller, could you tell me more about the victims?"
"I—uh—ahh—"
Emma stared into Turner Miller's murky, scarlet eyes. A merciless thirst for knowledge shone in her own.
"Don't worry. I know your rules. If I want to know, I have to go find it in your brain myself."
"Right?"
Before you continue