Chapter 155 - 155. The Case Escalates

Jack stopped reading his notes after hearing her, "oh? Why is that?"

"I told you before that higher class' spells had more than one rune, right? There are some magic users who had trained their minds so well that they could form multiple runes at the same time. This means they will be able to cast their spells faster compare to magic users who form each rune one at a time. If you can process multiple thoughts at the same time, you should be able to do this multi-runes forming at the same time as well."

"That would indeed be great. Now I can't wait to quickly get those high-level spells," Jack said enthusiastically.

"First you will need to brush up on forming one rune first. Look at how slow you are, it will be useless even if you can form multiple runes at the same time with such slow speed," Peniel immediately doused his spirit.

Jack spent the rest of the night practicing his Barrier spell while thinking about the quest's clues and chatting with Peniel. The night passed soon and another day began.

The next morning, he was woken up by the butler who came and served him breakfast. He slept rather late last night as he kept on practicing and thinking about the quest. He had made no breakthrough in the quest, but he had quite a significant improvement in the speed by which he drew the rune. He now only needed three seconds to complete the Barrier rune, half the time from when he first cast the spell. However, Peniel said three seconds was still too slow. He didn't disagree with her, three seconds would be more than enough time for a melee class to cross the distance and disrupt his casting.

He resumed his casting training while he ate his breakfast. After finishing it, he took the empty tray down. He wanted to find Luciana or head maid Jimena today to ask them about Joselyn, as he didn't meet them again when he was strolling around the mansion yesterday.

He did not find anyone after he came down to the main hall. It was indeed difficult to find someone within this oversized mansion. Since he did not know where to go to find them, He checked on his radar, he would approach the nearest white dot and asked him or her about Luciana and Jimena's work schedule and about where he could find them. He regretted that he didn't ask about it when Winston brought him breakfast.

He was looking at his radar when he felt like he heard something.

"Do you hear that?" Jack asked Peniel.

"Hear what?" Peniel replied.

"I thought I heard a scream."

"Should be your imagination."

"Probably, but since I have no direction to go, might as well check it out," Jack said and headed to the direction he thought he had heard the scream from. When he checked his radar again, he noticed that the scream direction was also where some white dots had gathered, one of the white dots parted away and went in his direction, he decided to approached that moving white dot.

He tried his best to navigate through the maze of this mansion in the direction of that white dot. It brought him to a small staircase that led upstairs. There were just too many damn staircases in this mansion, Jack didn't know which one brought him to where.

He soon heard hurried footsteps coming from above the staircase. Not long after, the plump body of the cook, Tomas, rushed down. He almost fell on the last few steps, but luckily his hands managed to grab the railing and prevent his heavy body from crashing onto the floor. Jack noticed his face was pale, the jolly expression that the cook always wore was nowhere to be seen.

"Did something happen?" Jack asked.

The cook looked at Jack, as if unsure who was in front of him. Finally, he uttered, "Jo… Joselyn…"

"What's wrong with her?"

Tomas couldn't seem to continue his words, he resolved to only point up to the stairs. He then ran away in the direction of his kitchen. Jack looked at him in bewilderment. Since there was little chance to get information from him, Jack then decided to go up the stairs and found out what had spooked the cook so.

When he arrived upstairs, he heard someone was crying in the adjacent room. He went there and saw Luciana was the one crying. Not far from there, he saw a crowd of people. Most of the occupants of the mansion were there. They were standing in front of a door looking inside.

Jack approached them and asked, "what happened?"

But when he looked inside the room, he could see what's wrong without the others telling him. Inside the room, Captain Salem was half-kneeling while checking on a woman lying on the floor. The woman was Joselyn, his eyes were wide open but there was no life in it. The maid who was the main suspect of his quest was lying dead on the floor.

"Wha… What happened?" He asked again, this time he was directing the question to the duke who was standing closest by the door.

"I don't know, she was found already dead when Winston came to bring her meal. I only came soon after hearing the incident," the duke answered.

Jack turned to the butler, "so you are the first one to have found her?"

"I did," Winston answered.

Jack then went into the room, when he passed through the door, he saw on his left another body. It was the guard who was watching over Joselyn. Apparently, he had died as well, in a sitting position on the floor with his back leaning to the wall.

Shit, it was a murder scene. He thought at first the maid did suicide, but after seeing the guard's body, that was no longer possible. This theft mystery quest had further escalated to a murder mystery quest, exactly like those detective novels that he used to read.

'Wait, when NPC died, they didn't disappear like the monsters?' Jack asked Peniel in his mind.

"NPC again? Can you please explain what it means?" Peniel asked back.

'Oh, sorry. I mean the natives. The original people of this world who is not an outworlder.'

"NPC… So that's what you called us? Never mind. Yes, unlike monsters, us natives do not disappear when died. We usually got buried, or cremated, or disintegrated using magic, depending on each tribe's belief."

So the NPCs were similar to real people in his real life, Jack thought.

Captain Salem stood up when Jack approached, he said, "I asked the others to wait outside, so you can see this place as it was first discovered."

Jack nodded, the captain had a forensic sense to preserve the crime scene, which was a good move. But then he thought of something, "You are waiting for me? What if I don't show up until noon?"

"I've asked the other maid and the cook to go look for you," the captain replied.

Jack was speechless, those two people he asked to look for him, one was crying in the adjacent room, another was scared shitless. If he did not stumble onto the cook prior, wouldn't they had been waiting in vain?

"There didn't seem to be any struggle inside this room," Jack said after seeing that the things in the room were still all neatly in their places.

"Yes, they were killed in one and two strikes," the captain informed.

One and two strikes? Jack looked at the body of the guard. He wondered if he could still scan the NPC level after he died.

Castle Guard (Basic Human / Deceased), level 50

HP: 0/42,000

Jack's eyes twitched after reading the description. Crap! He said in his mind.

"What's wrong," Peniel's voice asked in his mind.

'Apparently, this quest is really way out of my league,' he replied.

"How so?"

'I'm tasked to find a thief which is now also a murderer, who can kill a level 50 guard in just two strikes. What do you think the chance of a level 16 adventurer like me have if he decided to attack me?'