Jingle bell, jingle bell——

Pushing open the newly painted and shiny door, the bell hanging behind the door made a crisp sound.

Klein, wearing a neat police uniform, stepped into this newly opened clinic and cast his gaze into the spacious and bright reception room.

His luck was neither good nor bad. There seemed to be no other patients in the clinic at this time. There was only a young man who looked like an assistant sitting behind the reception desk, yawning in boredom.

When he saw the police coming to the door, the young man with disheveled black hair calmly put down the half-read newspaper, stood up and came over:

"Good afternoon, police officer, how can I help you? If you are here to see surgery, you may need to wait for a while. Dr. Mikhail is going to have lunch now. If it is internal medicine, I

We can diagnose you, and our clinic has launched a preferential program for public officials. You can enjoy a certain percentage of the consultation fee discount with a police certificate——"

...Huh? Can the police get a discount when they come to see a doctor here? The business strategy of this clinic is so humane?

Klein was interrupted by this and almost went off topic. Fortunately, he reacted in time, cleared his throat, and showed his ID to the handsome young man in a white coat:

"I'm not here to see a doctor. I hope you can cooperate with my questions and answer a few simple questions."

"...Ah, sure, of course there is no problem." The young man reacted instantly and exited the business state. The mature and steady expression on his face was replaced by nervousness and panic in the blink of an eye, "But, but, this sir, I have never

What bad things have you done? What do you mean by asking...? If I can answer it..."

Seeing that the other party just raised his hands to prove his innocence, Klein shook his head secretly in his heart, and still asked in an unambiguous manner about the details related to the disappearance cases. However, Leonard was not present at this time, so he omitted it.

He determined the correct time of the incident, added Alice's information to the names of several missing girls, and asked the teenager to focus on recalling his experiences in the past half month.

"No, sir, I'm pretty sure I've never seen the girls you described." The young man who called himself Shermin swore.

Although he had vaguely guessed the answer, Klein still asked again with some disbelief. When he saw that the young man's face was so anxious that he looked like he was about to cry, he gave up and raised a reluctant smile to show his comfort.

"By the way, when will Dr. Mikhail, the doctor at your clinic, be back? I also need to confirm the situation from him."

Klein looked sideways at the clock placed in the reception room, mentally estimating the time it would take to get from here to the meeting point.

"It should be soon, the doctor should be back around 12:30..." Shermin breathed a sigh of relief, and moved a chair with some restraint, indicating that the young inspector could sit down and wait, "You want

Want some water?"

Just when Klein was about to drink the water in the cup, the refreshing bell sound finally came from the door of the clinic.

Jingle bell, jingle bell——

He stood up suddenly, straightened the police hat on his head, lowered the brim of the hat slightly, and walked towards the doctor in a white coat wearing gold-rimmed glasses.

…

"Okay, thank you for your cooperation."

Klein didn't know how he put on a smile and said these words, but when he reacted, his facial muscles automatically made the most reasonable response, showing off his identity as a policeman in front of these people who had forgotten about Alice.

A normal attitude.

"This is your duty as a citizen." Dr. Mikhail said gently. He even did not forget to take out the business card box from his breast pocket and handed the business card with his name and clinic address to the doctor in front of him.

The young police officer said, "Officer, maybe you have heard about the preferential plans launched by our clinic from my assistant Shermin. If you have any needs in the future, Mikhail Clinic will serve you wholeheartedly."

After taking the business card and looking at it, Klein nodded slightly and put it away optionally.

"……I see."

Without staying longer in this clinic, he opened the newly painted clinic door and walked into the warm and bright afternoon sunshine. For a moment, he just wanted to empty his mind and no longer have to deal with all kinds of complicated thoughts.

The clue is broken.

How to investigate a cold case where only the identity of the victim is known?

No witnesses could be found, the location of the crime could not be determined, and there was no way to know many of the doubtful points.

The color of Klein's eyes turned darker, and his gaze was no longer fixed on the floor tiles on the street. He flipped up a copper coin with his right hand and silently and quickly recited the customary divination sentence in his heart:

"Dr. Mikhail Adams did not lie."

The copper penny spun and tumbled down, but he caught it with ease.

In the middle of the palm, the two mustaches on the portrait of King George III were tilted up as if to mock him, laughing at his whims and his stubborn resistance.

The slim hope that had sustained him for several days just dissipated.

It was so understated, so calm, and there was no turning point that he expected, and there was no sign of any miracle.

Silently putting away the coins, Klein stopped and wiped his face.

Now he even feels a little confused.

If she disappears and is never found again...

Of course, his life will not change much because of the departure of a witch, not at all.

Both Benson and Melissa had forgotten her, so there was no longer any sadness about parting; his work had little overlap with hers, only the various arrangements after becoming an official night watcher, and the investigation of the dark red chimney house.

He has many plans and takes up most of his energy...

How would he live without her?

In reality, there is no such thing as a love fairy tale in which one cannot move on without the other person, let alone that they have not reached that point yet.

He has tried his best to find traces of her, and he also knows that this is the limit of what he can do, the limit of his identity as "Klein".

But even if he stepped into the mysterious palace in the gray fog space and sat on the high-backed chair belonging to "The Fool", he would still be unable to do anything.

At least until he mastered the "sacrifice" ritual, the earrings with telepathic functions were just superficial decorations on the gray mist and could not play a role in contacting Alice.

And this will be his last resort to find her.

As early as the night he became the "Joker", Klein performed a divination in the gray fog and compared the risk of using the "Breath of Mind" earrings in the gray fog space and in the real world.

It was in line with his intuition that it would be relatively safer to use the "Breath of Mind" earrings in the gray fog space, but the citrine pendulum still showed that there was a slight possibility of danger.

……but if.

Alice had promised that as long as she was still in this world, she would hear and respond to his voice... But what if she couldn't respond to his call?

Before being forced out of fear by the truth he had imagined, Klein decided to clarify the process of the "sacrifice" ceremony as soon as possible, sacrifice the "Breath of Mind" earrings to himself in the gray fog, and then risk the slightest

Try it at your own risk.

"It's a pity that I only got the 300 pounds not long ago. The 'sacrifice' ceremony may require spiritual materials, which is a big expense..."

After forcing himself to focus on the calculation of his property, Klein felt that the confusion and anxiety in his heart were significantly reduced.

He shook his head, as if doing so would get rid of the worries lingering on him.

Under the bright sunshine at 1:30 in the afternoon, Klein walked towards his colleague Leonard, who seemed to have been waiting at the intersection for a long time, and raised a smile.

…………

Late at night, inside a high-end house in Jinwutong District, Tingen City.

After finishing her day's work arrangements, Danitaly called off the maid, took off her clothes, and walked into the bathroom wearing only a few pieces of close-fitting fabric.

The bathtub, which is spacious enough to accommodate two or three people, has been filled with steaming water, filling the entire bathroom with steam.

The beautiful lady with medium-long dark blond hair threw the last few pieces of underwear into the changing basket by the door. She slightly curved her mouth as if she was in a good mood. At the same time, she did not forget to move her hair to her chest, revealing a large area of ​​snow-white skin on her back——

In this bathroom without a mirror, hideous and terrifying lines gradually appeared on the snow-white back that no one could see. These crimson lines that were close to black were twisted like living creatures, forming a divine image.

Pattern of human face.

Accompanied by a sticky sound, like an eyeball being crushed with the sole of someone's shoe, the piece of flesh and blood with a human face was torn into two gaps by an unknown thing, and two turbid and dark eyes were drilled out of each.

The eyes; and the spine downwards close to the tail vertebra also pulls up and down to create cracks involving blood and bone, opening a hole that looks like a mouth.

Danitaly, who looked slightly pale but still had a smile on her face, spoke first, as if talking to the face behind her:

"Quitna, I encountered something interesting during the day today. Do you want to know what it is?"

There was no reaction on the human face, only a pair of turbid and strange eyes moved silently and rapidly a few times.

"The witch Alice you mentioned to me before actually had the police come to ask questions about her today... If it is true as you said, I have forgotten all the memories related to that witch, but the police remembered it.

Her name, isn’t it interesting?”

This time, the crack that was too twisted to look like a lip moved, and a hoarse voice of indistinct age and gender came out:

"...It's not what if, you did forget that witch."

Danitaly raised her long legs, stepped into the hot water that barely covered her hip line, and sat on the seat built into the bathtub.

"I know, I don't mean to question your statement. After all, I have to admit that I do have a lot of doubts about the memory of my promotion to Sequence 7 'Fire Mage'..."

"Because your potion formula, as well as the main and auxiliary ingredients are all obtained from the deal with the witch." The pupils and whites of the eyes, which are almost completely black, are constantly squirming, as if some evil spirit that chooses people to eat is lodged in them, "In order to

To test her, you even drew spiritual power from me and fought a battle with her on the night you just completed your promotion... and lost."

"What does that have to do with it? What's yours is mine. Why don't you borrow some for use?" Danitaly answered without caring. She picked up the bath ball soaked in the bath liquid and began to scrub her upper body. "It's just

According to your description, it was a witch who was originally a woman. It is a pity that she disappeared so suddenly..."

Xie Yi Ren Lian naturally knew what the pity she was talking about meant.

After being silent for a few seconds, it decided to warn Danitaly a few more words.

"You should give up. It's not a good idea to choose her as a target... Her strength is definitely more than the 'joy' of Sequence 6, and may have reached the 'pain' of Sequence 5. She just didn't use it on you out of some concerns.
To be continued...