After the gathering ended, the next step was simple. The same movement would be repeated, and each group would take different carriages to meet the rest at Warehouse 7.
A little while later. Artilia District. Artiros Street.
Placing the container on his lap, the redhead looked amusedly at the detective in the opposite chair in front of him.
Maric and Sharron left as soon as they delivered his order, the latter saying that she would send the book on making talismans by messenger. So now there were only three people in the room: Klein, Flora, and Adryan.
The white-haired woman stood a few steps behind the red-haired man; her gaze focused on the detective, who wished it were not so.
After the event in the carriage, he didn't think he could look her in the eye without remembering what Madam Sharron had implied.
"Well? You haven't forgotten what we promised, have you?" With his lips slightly raised, Adryan tilted his head to one side.
Not wanting to make this any longer than it needed to be and ignoring the pain in his chest at saying goodbye to his beloved so soon, Klein slid the money he had prepared onto the table.
Adryan grabbed the bills, and after looking at the wad in his hand for two seconds, he carelessly tucked it into a pocket of his tunic.
"A pleasure doing business with you, Detective." Laughing, he placed the container on the table and threw it with little force.
It slid for a few moments before being caught by the hand of a Klein, who had his lips slightly pursed.
'Rich people are the worst! If they had given me that amount of money, I would have counted it ten times to make sure it was all there. I wouldn't just put it in my pocket!' The pang in his heart grew more intense as Klein ignored his emotions and opened the container, breaking the seal of spirituality.
Inside the container and resting on a handkerchief was a heart-shaped, brown, palm-sized root, wrinkled in appearance, resembling an old man's skin. It exhibits slight expansion and contraction, suggesting a degree of vitality.
Seeing this curious object, Klein took out a coin and, repeating 7 times in his mind, threw it into the air.
Opening his hands to catch the coin, the clown watched emotionlessly as it slipped through his fingers and hit the floor, rolling to the other side of the room.
"..." The detective wanted to be swallowed by the earth.
"Pfff-" Flora almost broke down but managed to keep her composure. Her eyes now had a mischievous gleam.
"Seriously, did you really think that was going to work?" her eyes said.
Feeling that the detective was about to explode thanks to his sense as a Provoker, Adryan held out his hand and, with his threads, made the coin fly into his palm.
"You don't have to worry. It's the real deal." As he said this, he threw the coin to the clown, who caught it with a bored look on his face.
"Thank you, sir." Completely ignoring the woman, Klein got up from his seat. "I guess that's the end of our deal?"
"Mhm. That's it." Nodding, Adryan smiled knowingly at the man.
"Next time we meet, I hope you show me a good trick, Mr. Magician."
If the man was surprised that he already knew he was preparing for his promotion, Klein showed no reaction. He just smiled mysteriously and gave a slight nod.
"I'll be sure to prepare a special one just for you, Mr. Kenway."
'Oh?' Not having expected such a response, the smile on his face grew until he showed his teeth. "Then I'll look forward to it, Detective~"
"And you shall." Closing his eyes, the man placed a hand on his chest and bowed gallantly.
With that same grace and nothing more to say, the clown left the room and the warehouse with his head held a little higher.
...
Flora watched as the detective left, her smile gone and a slight frown on her face.
"I don't like him."
"Do you even like anyone?"
"I tolerate you, and that's enough for me."
As he looked sideways at his colleague, Adryan took a transparent vial from his tunic.
Holding it up slightly, he looked at it with a critical eye.
Two fangs, 8 centimeters long and metallic black, were inside this vial. Despite being in the vial, their danger could be felt. It was as if they were still in their owner, ready to destroy and tear apart everything and anyone in their path.
These were the fangs of the Forest Hunter, the last ingredient he needed for his Reaper's Potion.
'I bet they taste good; they look like hard candy...'
Shaking his head, the redhead just sighed at the foolish thought and shook the vial a couple of times, watching as the contact between the fangs generated sparks, and he put it back in his tunic.
He took out two more vials, one containing a short, almost invisible crimson thread and the other a few black hairs.
Looking sideways at his companion, Adryan mischievously shook the vials, "I'm going to do a divination. Would you like to see it with me?"
"It's not like I have anything better to do." Rolling her shoulders, Flora grabbed the opposite chair and pulled it over to his side, leaving a pace and a half of distance.
For his part, the redhead took from his tunic a simple silver mirror as big as his head. Ever since he dominated mirror divination, he always carried one with him.
Calmly, he used his threads and cut off the tip of his left index finger; with the crimson liquid that fell, he began to write multiple sentences and symbols on the edges of the mirror.
Blood, especially human blood, is one of the most important ingredients in mirror divination. There is no better ingredient than that.
Everything could be missing, but never the blood.
If one did not use blood for mirror divination, they were already doing it wrong.
The result could include information that either did not help or could even mislead, giving false information and causing one to end up in dangerous and deadly situations.
What he could take from the vampire was little. Not wanting to risk alerting the man, Adryan had only taken enough to discover his identity and track him down, so he would have to use his own.
And even then, the blood he had was very little.
For a Beyonder with no abilities related to Mirror World, what the Conspirator did was a waste of time and a risk he took in vain.
Only the Sequence 6 Witches of Pleasure could make use of this little blood and use it for their divinations and curses.
If he relied on his own spirituality, mirror divination would undoubtedly fail and could even bring enormous risks. But why would he do that?
Although witches could rely on their own powers to obtain results through mirror divination, they preferred to use the Primordial Demoness to perform them. Not only because of their belief in the Castrated Bitch, but also because the results would be better.
After all, how could they call themselves witches if they didn't contact evil and cruel deities?
Adryan's case was the same. Why rely on himself when he had a 'God' to turn to?
So, with his blood, he finished the first row in the mirror and quickly filled in the second, this time writing his honorific name as the Scarlet Monarch.
Finally, to bring the process to an end, Adryan quickly and skilfully drew the symbol. A spear wrapped by infinity at the foot of which there was an open book.
As soon as the symbol was finished, the blood surrounding the surface of the mirror wept and began to concentrate in the center of the mirror, a crimson whirlpool was quickly formed whose dark center seemed to be a portal to the unknown.
Already accustomed to such a vision, Adryan grabbed one of the black hairs and threw it into the whirlpool. Immediately, it calmed down and stabilized, and the crimson red of the blood quickly changed to an illusory and turbulent yellow.
Within that illusory yellow, a scene began to form...
The duo watched as the first thing to appear was a tender face, cheeks painted soft pink, and large blue eyes.
Her brown hair was well-combed, and she had a small red hat on her head. She was wearing a dress of the same color. She was sitting on a chair, and behind her, a luxurious miniature house was perched, its style matching hers perfectly.
"Is that... a doll?" Flora frowned deeply, somewhat impressed.
Although she wasn't expecting it, her sharp eye could tell the quality just by looking at it. Her instinct told her that it was not only of the highest quality but also very, very expensive.
'This has to be a fucking joke.' An eyebrow twitched, and Adryan could feel the familiar deja vu touch on his shoulder.
If this was who he thought it was-
The scene reflected in the mirror moved away a little, showing more of the place they were looking at.
It was a vast room, easily bigger than the one they were in.
The room was finely decorated and orderly. Multiple tables and shelves full of more dolls with their own little houses. Some had more accessories than others, be it carriages, puppies, or a small mirror, but all were of the highest quality.
It looked like the place of a collector and a very serious one at that. Not a speck of dust was to be seen, and each doll looked as if it had just come out of the package.
On one of the furthest tables, there was a doll. She had black hair, but her roots were blonde. Her eyes were a soft yellow, and they were half closed. She was wearing an elegant, almost saintly black dress.
Behind her, there was an elegant little house, but it was strange. Half of it was painted black and soft yellow, while the other half was painted orchid purple and vintage orange.
Flora saw this and concluded that the doll must be part of a set, so one more was needed to complete the image.
"It seems that your objective has a certain... taste..." Not sure how to feel about such a collection, Flora could only rely on her judgment.
Adryan did not reply, just pursed his lips and frowned more before she could say anything, the door to the curious collection opened and a man dressed in a dark robe entered.
As soon as he entered the room, he pulled down his hood, revealing his anguished face.
He looked to be about 29 years old. His hair was slicked back in a slanted style. He had deep crimson eyes and a high nose, and thin lips. He was handsome but did not look very masculine.
With a pathetic cry, he ran towards the black-haired doll with blonde roots and knelt before her. He looked at her as if she were the most holy of saints and he the dirtiest of sinners.
"Please forgive this infidel, Madam Grish! I won't be able to get Madam Lucy until next week!" The man cried out in pure pain.
"Pff, that's pathetic! What kind of person is so obsessed with dolls? Does he have no friends and takes refuge in his porcelain companions to face loneliness?" Flora burst out laughing at what she saw, tears almost falling from her gray eyes.
'Yep, it's him. No one else would be so fond of dolls.' Adryan stared blankly at the scene in the mirror. His face was expressionless.
One of the 'future' members of the Tarot Club. Mr. Moon. The sanguine Emlyn White.
"What the hell is this guy doing in Lenburg? Shouldn't he be in Backlund?!" Grunting, Adryan touched the middle of the mirror surface with his bloodied finger, pausing the scene.
Grabbing the vial with the bloody thread along with the rest of the hair he had, he put them on the mirror's surface and drew a symbol on them that translated to 'Mark'.
Having done that, he said in Ancient Hermes, "Incinerate!"
An illusory white flame manifested at his voice, covering the hair and bloody thread with fire - they began to decompose on the face of the spiritual fire.
When they turned into a blackish-green paste, the symbol he had written before appeared on the back of the paused Emlym.
Snap!
With the click of his fingers, the scene was broken, and the mirror returned to normal. Adryan grabbed the blackish-green paste and put it in one of the empty vials.
"You have a talent for mirror divination. That's rare in someone from a pathway with nothing to do with mysticism." Flora admitted, looking at what he had done.
Even though she had used the cryptologist's ability to understand what he was doing, multiple details had escaped her.
"I'm sure anyone who reads that book will get a special level. But it is by the blessing of my Lord that I can use it so well." The redhead closed his eyes and gave a greeting to nothingness.
Flora swallowed unconsciously.
'I thought the only deity with authority over the Mirror World was the Primordial Demoness, but it turns out the Scarlet Monarch also has some authority?'
What kind of Ancient Deity had returned?
Not wanting to have dangerous thoughts, the woman quickly changed the subject.
"What did you even do? You said incinerate; did you attack him?"
"Even though I could have, I didn't. I just marked him; if I ever need to find him, there is no place or cave he can hide that I can't find."
"Won't that guy notice anything? Aren't you worried about being discovered?"
"Don't worry. This method is effective, and from what I could see of that guy, I don't think he'll find out what I did." Adryan said confidently as he put the mirror back in his tunic.
He had just cast a little 'curse' on the man, which, while not hurting him or affecting his life in any way, would allow him to find out wherever he was whenever he wanted by simply applying the paste to a mirror.
The redhead wasn't worried that such a curse would be discovered and dealt with since what he had cursed wasn't Emlyn himself but his reflection!
This was one of the reasons why the Witches' curses were on par with and even surpassed some devil families—the ability to curse reflections!
Everything that a mirror saw would be remembered by the Mirror World, never to be forgotten. Whether objects, people, or events, all would be remembered.
Any sufficiently reflective surface could be considered a mirror with a connection to the Mirror World. And therefore, a means to curse depending on the preparations made.
Even a drop of water could be used. Still, only High Sequence Witches would be capable of doing so, and even then, it would require heavy preparations and would only work as a temporary curse, lasting only as long as the drop remained in the air.
All this made curses through mirrors extremely difficult to detect.
A curse of illness could be placed on a person's reflection, and they could die, not knowing what had happened unless special investigations were carried out.
The only way to be freed from the curse is through a ritual with a High Sequence Beyonders of the Sun pathway that cleanses the being itself or an advanced ritual that purifies everything about oneself. For such a ritual to work, it must be aimed at the reflection.
Adryan felt he could make that process even more difficult if he cursed in the City of Calamities but that would be overkill, it wasn't necessary to do such a thing for now.
Sighing a little, Adryan got up from his seat. The skin under his face twisted like worms, and Harvey Wayne's face returned after a moment.
"Let's go home."
He had to do some thinking.