True Blood of Saint Januarius (Seeking Monthly Votes)

Transforming from a wild extraordinary into a dignified agent of the Prevention and Suppression Bureau, Hohen stepped through the doorway with his head held high, buoyed by the joy of having finally made it ashore.

Then, the world spun.

It was like crawling through a quagmire in a night devoid of stars or moon, where direction had lost its original meaning, and the concepts of time and space were lost within the darkness.

Amidst the endless disorientation, a cool touch arrived; Hohen's right hand was grasped by a more slender one, and his body paused gently under the guidance.

Thus, the arrow found its direction, thought found its purpose, and the traveler found his home.

Hohen had arrived at his destination.

Birmingham.

The black-haired girl was stealing a moment of leisure; after finishing her work, she had slipped into an idle room, happily pulling out the day's Kael-Isum Review to catch up on the latest gossip.

"Tsk, which reporter is this bold? Daring to spread rumors about a big shot from the Endeavor Society, and with photos too! Let me see!"

"Tsk tsk, the Ambrose Cup is being held again. The new generation is really powerful; more fun to be had."

"Tsk tsk tsk, the truth behind the Birmingham bombing, a shocking secret, it turns out to be such and such..."

Hmm, where?

Caught off guard by reading gossip about her own organization, she slapped her thigh with a smack, her eyes widening as she stood up with a start.

"How can these unscrupulous reporters write anything they want! This isn't even a normal conspiracy theory anymore; we must come down hard on them!"

"What did they write?"

In her righteous indignation, Emma didn't even notice the newspaper being pulled from her hands, and she answered casually:

"It's truly outrageous! It says Mills got his position by engaging in unspeakable 'gutter' transactions with Director Norbert, who is still at the Snow-Shelter Temple dealing with the Worm incident..."

"In the long years of conquest, his markings lost their original pink tenderness, so under the Temptation of the Blood Cup Cult, he chose to grow teeth in the gutter to suck blood to maintain a fake tightness, until he fell into the forbidden path of using the gutter as a cup, from which blood filled with pleasure and pain overflowed..."

Nodding thoughtfully, Veronica agreed, "This approach is even wilder than those Historian-Constructors from the Saint Hydra Society. As expected of the Review, they really dare to print anything. Haha, I wouldn't even be surprised if I saw the Secret History of the Hours posted on there one day."

"Exactly! And there's even more explosive stuff... Eek! When did you get back?"

Only now realizing she had been openly slacking off in front of her superior, Emma stood at attention, glancing left and right with unease. The moment she made eye contact with Hohen, her eyes widened.

As if she had seen a ghost.

She barely managed to swallow the exclamation of "How are you still alive?" as she waited for a light pat on her shoulder.

"Since you're free, Hohenheim has just joined the bureau, and I've already handled his paperwork. Take him to sign his formal contract, and while you're at it, explain the common knowledge of the secret world to him. You know the training procedure, right?"

"Yes, yes, received, no problem."

Nodding repeatedly, Emma let out a sigh of relief.

"But you handled the pollution at the scene so quickly—did you encounter any residual divinity? The fall of a quasi-Immortal is no laughing matter. If things go wrong, the secondary disasters caused by handling the pollution could be even more troublesome than killing Saliba a second time."

Asked about this, Emma also showed a look of surprise: "The on-site survey results are out. The pollution of Heart and Blood has basically been cleared to zero, or rather, there wasn't much left to begin with; it's almost negligible."

"The alchemy master we hired said she had never seen such a clean post-incident scene; it was as if it had been licked clean by a dog, with absolutely nothing left."

Hmm?

That shouldn't be right.

What was going on?

Hearing a result even more absurd than her best-case scenario, Veronica frowned, feeling that something was off.

Saliba had performed such a massive ritual; it would be ridiculous if nothing had been converted. He himself had been submerged in the waves of the Styx, and a portion of his divinity had vanished with him. But even ignoring that part, the remainder still didn't match the level of pollution.

Was the Restless Blood watered down, was Saliba incompetent, or was it...

She turned her head to look at Hohen, who was still adjusting to the recent teleportation process. After a moment of hesitation, Veronica shook her head.

Impossible, absolutely impossible.jpg

Stanislav had already checked it; if he said there was no problem, then there was no problem. Even if there were remnants, they should be extremely minimal, and there hadn't even been any aftereffects. A large amount of pollution involving divinity could not have escaped the notice of a scholar with such high attainments in both Preservation Arts and Woodland Studies; that possibility had already been ruled out.

To be safe, she would go and check the scene again herself.

Meanwhile.

While even the detection instruments were being questioned, Hohen, who was the only one not being suspected, remained calm on the surface, though his consciousness looked guiltily at the ink-green desktop within his soul, pulling up the system prompt from that moment.

[Defeated a powerful enemy!]

[You have altered a fate that was originally destined to occur. History has veered in a vastly different direction due to your influence—upward, rather than downward.]

[Settlement Reward: True Blood of Saint Januarius]

[You have obtained a special curiosity.]

After Saliba's death, a card with a pink-blue background that pulsed incessantly had appeared on the desktop for no reason, and its description was the longest and most difficult to understand that Hohen had ever seen.

[True Blood of Saint Januarius: Also known as the Pulsing Blood, the Restless Blood, the Saint's Blood. The Vigilant Storm protected a person named "Januarius" from danger in every past.]

["Thus it never, never, never stops dancing."]

[Aspect—Consumption: Fuel, ointment, pigment, and patience: all diminish over time.]

[Aspect--Remnant: The remains of someone or something; regardless of what it was, it is no longer its former self.]

[Aspect--Liquid: "What goes to low places, flees from high places, and is bound by no forged chains?"]

[Aspect--Heart 10: To protect the skin of the world as we know it, the tireless heart continues to beat.]

[Aspect--Vault 8: A light breeze, a gale, an echo, a song; things of balance, things of harmony.]

[Aspect--Key 6: "Locks seek keys, walls seek doors," language and understanding, opening and dismantling. The common law of thieves and oracles.]

[Aspect--Pentimento: "Pentimento," if the world is a canvas, then this is the artist's regret. What was originally intended was not this, yet traces still remain. Far more traces remain than the author ever anticipated.]

[You may cast this card into the [Flame of Destiny] at the appropriate moment, replacing the Final Ink used to compile history, to write another denied history and tread a path never taken at the divergence point of fate.]

Oh my, oh my, what is going on here? I went out for a stroll and the item just came back on its own. Saliba, do you have any idea about this?

Setting aside the fact that the prisoner is already dead and has no opinions, the stats on the [True Blood of Saint Januarius] are terrifyingly high; it doesn't look like something my First Seal could suppress at all. Even if Veronica is suspicious, she won't end up suspecting me.

Can a matter of Alchemy really be called stealing?

I found it fair and square!