"Norman Grunn is from Evil Sect. That is what Melinda is saying, but I have to verify this statement through my own means. But if it is true, then Melinda is pursuing Evil Sect for some reason, and in the process found some clues related to the Celestial Equinox Apocalypse.
Is the Evil Sect related to this incredulous event? In the previous loop, Norman hadn't even come to the academy, and there was no big news of his death, which means Melinda must have found some other lead.. I can only proceed further and examine the consequences. I still don't understand why she suddenly trusted me to complete this job." Luke was deeply considering the various permutations of possibilities.
Eventually he took the magic device with him. It had only been a week since the loop began. If he killed Norman now, wouldn't he directly be led to the Abyss Dungeon? Luke decided to take his time and wait for a couple of weeks. He decided to kill Norman in the week before the Equinox.
In the mean time, he kept tabs on Norman's routine and where he would usually be present. He spent all his time practicing the first control exercise and took pills from Melinda. Melinda was nagging him to kill Norman, while Luke was explaining that he was looking for the appropriate moment to act.
Near the end of the second week, as Luke suspected, Melinda's behavior suddenly changed. When he went to visit her this time, she tossed him a pill without even speaking. Luke saw the book in her hand, it was the myth about Pandora.
Luke took the pill and immediately felt his mind clearing. But he didn't leave the office. Noticing this Melinda began to frown. She looked at Luke and began speaking. "Are you going to do it or not?"
Luke nodded. "I am going to do it today. Did you discover some new clues regarding evil sect in a folktale?" He asked. As their familiarity grew and with a murder contract between them, Luke and Melinda began showing their true faces to each other. Luke didn't hide his intentional snark.
Melinda looked at Luke, clearly trying to scrutinize his emotions, but this new magick was from an incomplete inheritance that she had just recently acquired and she wasn't able to utilize it perfectly. As Luke's mental capacity began increasing along with his experience in hiding his thoughts, she found it harder to read the mana fluctuations around him to gauge the emotions.
"The Evil Sect is planning something huge on the night of the Celestial Equinox. I am trying to stop them."
Luke did not ask any further. "I will kill Norman, but then I will be thrown into the Abyss Dungeon. I need you to give me some of the pills beforehand."
Melinda's eyes turned ferocious. "So you already figured it out? Yes, you'll be immediately caught. Why aren't you backing out?"
Luke grinned. "Because I want to enter the Abyss Dungeon."
Melinda's face lost all color. "What are you planning? If I hadn't verified on our very first meeting through your emotions that you aren't a member of evil sect, I wouldn't have confided all this." She said, but then she sighed. "Very well, go and kill that Norman already."
Luke soon arrived at the grand hall, where he found Norman quietly having lunch along with another girl. Surprisingly, Luke recognized the girl. She was the green haired girl he had seen manning the stall of the Challenge Group.
"Is challenge group a part of evil sect?" Luke thought. He remembered the scary feeling he had felt when he had left that stall. "Something is shady about that community."
Luke saw the girl calmly talking to Norman, who was nodding. He couldn't hear what they were saying, but their behavior looked like they were having a professional meeting.
Luke decided to be careful and not reveal himself personally. He sat down on a crowded table to have lunch and kept the magic device on the table. After eating his lunch quickly, he walked away, leaving the magic device on the table. His neighbor saw the magic device and saw a post it note on it, saying that it should not be activated at any cost.
"Hey look, someone left this magic device on the table, I wonder what it does?" The person loudly announced to his table. Others looked at him. A girl beside the announcer got curious because of the warning and pressed the button.
At that very moment, Norman turned pale. The magic device turned into dust and a black ray of light hit the back of Norman's head. Without any warning, Norman exploded into a blood mist as a look of horror and shock colored every face in the grand hall. Immediately, a thousand shrieks spread out.
From the very opposite end of the grand hall, Luke saw Norman bursting into a blood plume and made his way out. He quickly walked to Melinda's office.
"It's done?" She asked. Luke nodded, before breathing out. She then took out a small card and threw it to Luke. "Go and search his premises. If you find anything bring it to me, but make sure no one sees you."
This had already been agreed to earlier, so Luke had no qualms and quietly entered and began searching through Norman's possessions. Occassionally he would remember that blood explosion, but he had slight heart palpitations.
Finally he found a book. The book was a leather bound grimoire with a lock on it. Its leather had been dyed black. Finding this to be the only relevant thing in the room, Luke returned with it to Melinda.
Melinda saw the book and her eyes glittered. She took out an old cloth parchment which seemed to have some numbers written on it in blood.
"What is that?" Luke asked in shock.
"Nothing you should worry about. This grimoire on the other hand, is a legacy artifact of the Evil Sect."
She quietly entered the number code written in blood on the cloth parchment into the Grimoire's lock, before she took out a black colored candle out and placed it on the desk. As soon as she lit the candle, the flames were black in color and putting out all the light in the room by shining darkness.
"What the... darkness is behaving as light?" Luke asked in shock.
"That is the essence of the Evil Sect's beliefs." Melinda said perfunctorily. The moment the rays of darkness 'shined' over the grimoire, the lock opened and the pages flipped automatically, until it opened to a particular page.
When Luke saw the page, his heart started beating like crazy and he started feeling dizzy. In panic he held onto the desk. On the page, was an image of blood and gore. The home world Ariel had split apart like an egg as a ginormous hand thrust out of the darkness hidden beneath the earth. The hand was trying to grab towards the sky, the direction of the photograph made it unclear whether it was trying to grab one of the two moons Oberon and Cressida or the twin planet Desdemona from the legends. However, the more Luke saw the image, the more he was shocked, because he noticed that the perspective of the image was through a window. This was the last image he saw, before he was shot in the head by the Red Hood in the initial timeline!
"So this is the secret of the Celestial Equinox?" Melinda shuddered in horror. "The planet will die. The warnings that Pandora failed to pay any heed to."