Life didn't get easier, even in another world

123 Meet again

“So we have to divide ourselves into two groups. We have to take care of both of the cases at the same time so this is necessary.”

The deputy team leader stood in front of unit members and announced that.

“One team will take care of the mascry case and the other and help in searching for the culprit behind the monster breakout. Both of them are urgent and important cases so you all have to work hard for a while.”

The unit members nodded their heads as if they were expecting this to happen and weren’t surprised at all.

The deputy team leader took out a piece of paper from her pocket and started to read the members’ names.

“Team one that is in charge of the monster breakout consists of Team leader, Darren, Elsie, Rai, and Serria. You guys should receive orders directly from the team leader.”

“Yes.”

“Carlson, Reyan, Kairen, and me, will be the second team. I’m the one who is in charge of this team.”

She paused for a moment and looked at the others’ faces to see if anyone wanted to disagree with her decision, but there was none.

.....

She smiled and continued to talk.

“Glenn will also help team one with the research. It is more important so we don’t have any other choice.”

“What about team two?”

The deputy team leader turned her head and looked at someone who was deep in thought.

“Glenn said Kairen could take care of that.”

As if snapped out of his thoughts just now, Kairen blinked his eyes and looked around.

“Huh?”

The deputy team leader chuckled.

“I was also surprised after hearing that from Glenn, but that’s it. He must be sure of your skills if he says you can do it. He said you were quite good with computers.”

Kairen looked at the deputy team leader with a blank face.

‘The fact that I’m good with computers doesn’t mean I’m also good at gathering information! They are completely different!’

Before Kairen could even oppose, deputy team leader Bray resumed talking.

“Team 1 will work together with unit 2 and team 2 will work with unit 3. It is so that we get the results as soon as we can. Well then, I’m done talking. Back to your jobs.”

She clapped her hands and turned away to leave when a voice stopped her.

“Umm... What about me?”

Deputy team leader Bray stopped and looked at Asa. Asa tilted her head and looked around nervously.

“What about you?”

Asa grabbed the pen in her hand roughly.

“What should I do?”

The deputy team leader raised her eyebrows, one edge of her mouth also rose as if she was teasing Asa.

“Isn’t that obvious? Study!”

“W-what?”

She turned away from Asa and walked to her office. She stopped once more in front of her office’s door and pointed at three people that were looking at her.

“You three, come here after your done with whatever you are doing now. We have a meeting in half an hour with those guys.”

She said that to the three other members of team 2 before opening the door and entering her room.

“WAIT! I could at least help with gathering information!”

She stood up and shouted behind the deputy team leader’s back.

“Do you mean I am even worse than that always-blank dude over there?”

She pointed at Kairen with her finger and shouted those words.

‘Always-blank dude...’

Kairen lowered his head after hearing that.

‘Well, she is not wrong.’

Kairen ignored Asa and continued to write his report.

No one paid any attention to Asa.

“Please! Why do I even need to study when I already have a job? Argh! This is so unfair!”

She slammed her book on the table and kept nagging even though no one was answering back to her.

. . . . . . . .

The atmosphere in the room was heavy. It was heavy and cold.

The two groups treated each other politely and nicely, but their gazes and expressions betrayed the nice words that were being exchanged between them.

It was obvious that they were unwilling to work with each other, but they had to do this in order to achieve what both of the groups were after.

“So what you say is that the traces of the thieves appeared at one spot and disappeared at some point?”

The deputy team leader read through the papers in front of her and asked that while glancing at the man in front of her.

The man, one of the agents sent from Bordkly, nodded his head with a disrespectful look on his face.

“Our best mages searched the mines. The results were confirmed by all of them. It is as if the thieves appeared all of a sudden, then disappeared. Almost like teleporting.”

There were a bunch of papers in front of all of them. The man picked up one of them and showed it to everyone.

“We’ve recreated the scene that the mages reported after checking the mines with magic completely according to their own words. This is how all of the three mines looked like after using Trace.”

The people looked at the papers. There were two lines with two different colors. They both started from a place right outside of the entrance and ended right at the end of the mine.

“Does that mean it was done by two people?”

“It seems that way.”

“Did they teleport there?”

“We’ve checked the mines thoroughly. There were no traces of magic being used.”

“Then, was it a gadget?”

“That is one of the possibilities, but we are not sure if a gadget can teleport people without using a single drop of mana.”

The people looked down at the documents and continued to debate about them.

Group 2 of unit 5, as well as unit 3, were having a meeting with agents sent from Bordkly regarding the mascry mines that were looted in their countries.

Among them was Kairen, who sat on a chair and stared at the pictures.

‘I feel like I’ve seen something like this before.’

Kairen looked at the pictures and tilted his head.

‘A trace that appeared and disappeared all of a sudden as if the person had teleported.’

Kairen had seen something like this.

He couldn’t help but think about the case that he had worked on not long ago when he was still a cadet.

He clearly remembered that when they were searching for the murderer who killed a bunch of rich people, they couldn’t find anything about the killer because the traces were mysteriously cut off at one point.

Kairen had even faced the killer.

‘Someone who could use the power of space...’

Could it be that something similar was happening again?

‘Should I tell the deputy team leader?’

Even if he was wrong, there was no harm in telling her about it.

Kairen looked at the others. The meeting was about to end and Bordkly’s agents were leaving the room.

“Deputy team leader!”

Kairen called out the deputy team leader and rushed towards her.

“What is it?”

The deputy team leader was quite surprised to see Kairen stopping her, but she still waited for him to tell what was in his mind.

.....

Kairen raised the picture showing the results of Trace magic and started to talk.

“About these, I’ve seen something similar before?”

The woman raised her eyebrows. Seeing her reaction, Kairen hurried to explain.

“When I temporarily worked as a mage in the police department, there was a case of murder. It should still be unsolved as we couldn’t find the murderer. The murderer also used a method like this.”

Others also gathered around Kairen to see what he was saying. It was a little bit embarrassing to talk about his previous failures in front of all of them, yet Kairen explained the situation to them more or less.

Of course, he censored some parts, such as the time he was scared like shit when he faced the murderer.

And it seemed like the deputy team leader found his words useful, as he was told to gather all the data regarding that incident.

Just like that, Kairen was back in Glenn’s room, in front of the computer that he was now starting to have feelings for.

‘I wish I could install some games in it.’

One of the things that he missed a lot was his precious laptop.

“Sigh.”

He sighed and started to type on the computer.

Ding

‘Hmm? A message?’

A small green light on his phone was going on and off, showing that he had received a message.

‘Is it Kain? Is it another shopping list that I have to buy?’

Kain tended to use Kairen as an errand boy, sending the shopping lists that were sent to him by his wife, and asking Kairen to buy them instead of him.

‘Man, just stick to your bed and sleep if you are injured. What shopping?’

Kairen picked up his phone while nagging and opened the message.

-I know you are busy today, but I wish we could visit each other this evening again. There are some things that I have to tell you.

“....”

Kairen blinked and looked at the message.

‘Who is this?’

The number was an unknown number that he had never seen before.

‘Meet each other again? Where?’

While Kairen was pondering if it was a message that was sent to him by mistake, he received another one.

-5 PM at the gym. The usual place. Don’t be late I am busy and won’t wait for you.

“....”

‘5 PM at the gym? The usual place?’

Kairen looked at the number again.

‘Captain Neal?’