"I am not blaming you for his death. I just wish to know if you noticed anything bizarre around him before he left the academy." Remira asked, her voice holding a bit of force as she questioned the young girl that sat frightened in front of her.
Unaware of the things that Maxim went through, Remira was in the Lucian academy doing the job that she was ordered to. Asking questions and finding the source of how and when Farhad got influenced.
And from what Remira understood, with the security of the academy, it was almost impossible for this to happen. Unless the one who did this was an insider.
Of course, this girl won't know that the insider was the academy's headmaster, to begin with. But my play was flawless and it would be harder for her to find anything in this academy.
It was why I was happy seeing her question the students with zero enthusiasm.
"I.. I didn't even know his father was a hero… If I knew, I would have ever bothered him." Said a female student who was still reeling in from the show of learning who the father of Farhad actually was.
She knew her life was over. The moment the word of it gets out, even her family might not come out unharmed. It was why she was regretting her past actions. Harming a small weak child and not leaving him alone for being weak.
"Focus Thalia, this is not the time. Answer my question or I would just inform Marshall of this myself." Knowing that her words were not going through, Remira warned, her voice holding some authority as she made Thalia look at her once again.
"No… no. I didn't notice anything weird. He never said much and always kept to himself." The more Thalia spoke, the more she started to wonder what drove her to harm Farhad.
He was just living his life peacefully and never bothered her. But for some reason, she always found him a nuisance, and as she said in the past.
She didn't like his guts.
And if I have to say anything, I didn't like this girl's guts as well. But to err is to human and this girl is still young, so I will ignore her for now. Who knows, she might become a better person after this ordeal is over.
But Remira didn't seem to share the same thoughts. "Nothing weird? I have asked some others before you and many of them said he was taking early leave coming to the end of the semester. I wonder if you have anything to say about that?" Thalia was not the first student she asked questions from and neither will she be last.
Hearing this question, Thalia said. "I… I don't know anything about that." She tried to lie, but her little twitching and inability to meet Remira's eyes were plain giveaways. And besides, it was hard to lie from the start anyways.
Because every single student that comes here is forced to drink a truth potion. But as these were still kids, only a highly diluted version of the potion was given to them. This might not stop them from lying, but it would also make their lies a bit more noticeable.
"You do know about it, Thalia. Now if you tell me the truth, we can go our own ways." Remira explains, coaxing Thalia to speak more. "And if you don't, you already know to whom I intend to give this report."
"And whether your name remains on the report will depend on you." Remira lied, there was no way she could hide Thalia's name in her report. Everything needs to be mentioned and no detail can be taken lightly.
But lying to Thalia at the moment seemed to be the perfect method to extract information out of her. One can see firsthand how much fear she holds for the Marshall, so there was nothing wrong with exploiting that fear.
"Please, please don't do that." Thalia pleaded before looking around the empty room, checking if there were anyone else listening in on her. Which made Remira a bit curious.
What did she see that made her act like this?
"... It.., it was me and my friends that called him over… for errands."
It was the story Remira had expected. The reason for Farhad's lowered frequency of attending the class was due to Thalia. She used to often give him different tasks that he needed to complete in the allotted time or suffer her wrath.
"But… but this one time, something happened." Thalia seemed almost fearful of something as she started to look around once again.
"Don't worry, I am here. Nothing will happen to you." Worrying that something might actually be wrong with Thalia, Remira roused her blood and heightened her intuition. Looking forward to Thalia's words.
"He said he liked books, so I gave him the task of bringing a book from the banned library."
*****
Glancing over the shivering body of Thalia, Remira knew that the side effects of the meds were starting to act up. Meaning it was time to end this small interrogation of hers.
Besides, she got what she wanted.
"A book about the moon?" She wondered, recalling the last words that Farhad said before his death.
It was why she stood in front of the banned bookshelf. Looking at the books that smelled of age and decay.
One can see from their state that not many have visited this place in ages nor has it seen any cleaning. Just like its name, it would seem abandoned and if not for the enchantment on the bookshelves, these books might have turned into dust long ago.
It was why the words mentioned by Thalia were a bit odd. Walking closer, REmira approached the keeper of this library, a gargoyle that stands at the entrance.
"Halt." It said as he opened his stone eyes and looked toward Remira "Turn around, this is a forbidden place." It warned.
Which made Remira even more curious. So without delay, she showed him the ID that was given to her by the headmaster, causing the Gargoyle to bow its head toward the badge.
"I apologize for my misconduct… Please, you may proceed." There was a complete 180 in its treatment of Remira. But she didn't move and kept staring at the Gargoyle.
"No need for apologies." There was something that started to irk Remira after seeing this gatekeeper. "But I wonder if there was ever a child that came to this library before me?" She asked, wondering how could a student like Farhad could enter the library that was being protected by a gargoyle.
One shouldn't look down on these small stone monsters. In truth, they were demons under the contract that lived inside these stone statues for protection. And it was highly unlikely for a first-semester student to hide away from the eyes of a demon of this caliber and enter the library.
Which is what was odd with this situation.
"A child?" The gargoyle started to think, before saying. "Of course there was, it was around 16 years ago, he tasted great." The Gargoyle exclaimed, rejoicing at the memories, at the flesh of the unlucky student that was devoured by him.
Though this revelation was not horrifying for Remira, this is what was in the nature of demons.
"I am talking about something recent, in the last two months." She asked once again, just as confirmation.
From Gargoyle's earlier words, she understood that there hadn't been anyone stupid enough to approach this library, but she still wished to confirm.
"No, if there was. I wouldn't have been so hungry these years." The demons sighed.
"Then I pray that you won't be hungry for long." She smiled, before entering the library.
She didn't need to wonder whether the words of a demon were true. If it was a free demon, that might have been the case, but not for one bound by a contract. This demon was a slave and incapable of lying. So she knew that this demon knew nothing about Farhad.
Which made her question whether Thalia was lying to her. Though there was also the fact that Thalia mentioned the book with moons and these same moons were coming up in the visions of Farhad.
'Should he have read a forbidden text relating to a moon deity?' She wondered as this was a common occurrence that happened a lot in this world.
"Moon." She started to look at the books in this small library. Most of the content was just outdated information that would be considered wrong these days and hence they held no value. There were even some books that even attracted Remira's attention. Books that held the true history that people don't want to reach the hands of youngsters, or books that detail the life and works of scholars that went on to become not-so-savory individuals.
And among those scholars, there was a book that made Remira's eyes roll.
"Curse of the silver night - Book by Yethel Ikuras."