Chapter 28
Chapter 28
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: 028
Chapter Title: Ghostbuster (12)
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Upon hearing the severity of the situation.
Not only the waiting personnel outside the ranch but also members from other special task forces had gathered at the Weekend Farm.
All for the sake of rescuing the kidnapped people still trapped inside.
"The invisible monster vanished after seeing the sunlight... and no further movements have been detected since."
"Still, it might be lurking underground."
Shin Sion formed up with the other agents, her face tense.
"Operation Team 1 is entering. If contact is lost, do not send the rescue team—wait for reinforcements."
She headed back into the mage's underground workshop.
Earlier, she'd been in too much of a rush to escape with Yohan to properly survey the basement.
"........."
Now she could see what had happened here.
The moment Sion had drawn her pistol to stop the pursuing monster.
She understood why Yohan had called it useless.
Sion's calm eyes wavered for a moment.
Gripping her pistol, she stared at the severed human arms and corpses that had been literally butchered.
One Response Special Task Force agent's face twisted as words slipped out involuntarily.
"That's gruesome."
The agents gripped their "Anti-Monster Response" shotguns—brought from headquarters based on Sion's report—tightly.
The basic way to deal with monsters was to exploit their mystical rules.
Most monsters were weak to yang energy, fire. Weak to flames.
Who isn't weak to fire, though...
No, perhaps that's why monsters were vulnerable to it too.
In any case, mystically speaking.
Guns carried both fire and iron attributes, making them effective against monsters.
Of course, "effective" had its limits.
...They didn't work on those they didn't work on.
There were various cases like that.
Usually due to insufficient firepower or types that couldn't be exorcised through normal means.
Sion glanced at the crumpled bullets scattered on the floor and said,
"...Looks like a standard automatic pistol doesn't have enough firepower to pierce it."
The invisible monster that had roared while chasing her and Yohan.
'Gaaaaaaaah-!'
She recalled the invisible beast. Sion's face hardened.
Her mind raced through tales and legends to identify the monster.
The first thing that came to mind was...
A demon recorded in one of the most famous grimoires,
The Lesser Key of Solomon, 25th of Solomon's 72 demons.
Glashalabolas, the prince of slaughter.
A dog or wolf with bird wings, or a scholar with beastly fangs.
A demon that invisibly assassinates those the summoner wants dead and incites murder in its master.
Of course, it was just a possibility.
Sion tried to focus on identifying the transparent monster,
"........."
But for some reason, Yohan's reaction kept nagging at her.
'...It, it appeared in the lecture hall.'
Those words Yohan had uttered upon sensing the transparent monster's presence stuck in her mind.
...Of course, it wasn't that strange.
Yohan had witnessed the professor's throat being slit in the classroom.
Seeing the monster that killed people could naturally remind him of that.
Yeah, it wasn't strange. But it felt off.
She'd observed him directly, even spoken with him, if only briefly.
Unlike her, whose calm facade hid her tension, he was genuinely composed.
Yet...
In a situation where he was being chased by ghouls, a man capable of rational judgment would speak in a trembling voice like he was explaining to someone, as if saying he'd seen it before?
Like a movie director shoving bait into the audience's mouth?
Sion's calm eyes trembled for a moment.
...Then who was the audience?
It was her—Shin Sion—who had been right there with Yohan.
That's when Park Team Leader spoke up, snapping her back to reality.
"According to the civilian collaborator, there's a room that looks like a central control room?"
Civilian collaborator. Obviously Yohan.
"Yes. While fleeing from the ghouls, he hid in a room through a broken door."
"He found luggage from the kidnapped people, a dead woman's body, and a suspiciously wrecked room."
They still hadn't rescued all the kidnap victims, and the ranch incident remained unsolved.
Sion decided to focus on the case for now. She resumed speculating on the transparent monster's identity.
Various thoughts flashed through her mind.
...And one possibility emerged.
A familiar from a certain grimoire she'd seen in archived records.
'Transparent Vampire.'
But if that was really it...
Tension washed over Sion's face.
"........."
The transparent monster wasn't the problem.
The grimoire itself was the bigger issue.
And the central control room whose information Yohan had deliberately shared.
Upon reaching Kim Mireh's personal workshop, the Response Special Task Force agents and Sion beheld.
A room smashed to pieces as if rampaged by a monster.
Like a scene from a horror movie where the entire budget was poured into this moment.
Atop the woman's corpse—headless and armless.
An eerie black iron-bound book drew everyone's gaze with its strange aura.
The agents tensed, scanning the room warily.
"...I'll investigate."
Sion carefully lifted the iron-bound book from the dead woman's body and read the title.
The grimoire containing the Transparent Vampire.
Why did her bad premonition have to come true?
Sion's face hardened involuntarily.
Less renowned than the Necronomicon or Lemegeton,
But due to its danger level.
It was one of the grimoires classified as National Disaster Grade.
The Response Special Task Force first safely rescued the people imprisoned in the basement.
Then, to investigate the underground workshop and wrap up the situation.
They pitched a tent at the ranch for an impromptu operations briefing.
The original plan—to investigate the Weekend Farm and confirm it as a mage's workshop—had succeeded.
But in the process, an enormous item had come attached...
The agents glanced at the table where Grizzly had been until moments ago, now vanished.
...It had disappeared abruptly.
Yohan had judged the situation stable enough and recalled his summon.
But the task force had no way of knowing that.
As usual, they looked to Sion.
Sion opened her mouth cautiously.
"Perhaps when Kim Mireh, the grimoire's owner, died, the familiar vanished with her."
Another team leader continued.
"We found Kim Mireh's fingerprints in the operating room. She seems to be the workshop's mage owner."
"...However, the CCTV recorder in the central control room was smashed during the monster's rampage, so checking the footage will be difficult."
Yohan had ordered Grizzly to smash the device just in case before leaving the room.
And to erase evidence of his brief stay, he'd trashed the room too.
Park Team Leader crossed his arms, frowning as he spoke.
"All the ranch staff and the bred ghouls are dead too."
"................."
Then one of the team leaders spoke up.
"We found a ○○ University student ID in Kim Mireh's wallet."
"That's the university from the professor murder case, right?"
"Yes. Here's how I see it."
The situation was already pieced together neatly.
The task force leaders conversed, filling in any gaps naturally.
One team leader voiced the scenario Yohan desired.
Kim Mireh, who had always been a mage, obtained the Mysteries of Insects.
But she failed to properly control the included familiar, the Transparent Vampire.
Leading to the university murder.
And today, it broke free completely, slaughtering everyone in the underground workshop.
"The kidnapping victims were lucky to survive in the prison."
"And the civilian collaborator, Mr. Yohan, was fortunately spotted and rescued by Team Leader Sion just before it got him. Lucky break."
Sion brought her fist to her lips, thinking, then spoke cautiously.
"...Isn't it a bit early to conclude?"
It all fit together. ...Fit too well.
If that speculation was correct, they'd solve both the backlogged university murder and the current ranch forgery case at once. Too neat, wasn't it?
For some reason, Yohan's calm black eyes flashed in Sion's mind.
"........."
At Sion's words, one exhausted team leader snapped.
"It's great you're passionate about the job, but ease up a bit, missy."
Sion's eyes twitched wide for a moment at that.
Park Team Leader scowled.
"Hey!"
"Let's drop it."
A measured, intellectual voice cut in—not too high, not too low.
A bespectacled man in his mid-thirties who looked scholarly.
Kim Team Leader, who always ate pork cutlet for lunch, intervened.
"We can't settle this among ourselves anyway. Let's wrap up the meeting."
With that, the matter was settled.
Sion stepped out of the tent briefing room.
The rookie female agent waiting outside moved to follow but hesitated, then approached Park Team Leader—the one she'd spoken with most among the leaders.
"Team Leader Park... Why did that other team leader call Team Leader Sion 'missy'?"
Park Team Leader glanced at her face and sighed.
"You didn't know? Sion's the director's daughter."
"What?"
"How else does a 21-year-old get team leader, no matter how good her record?"
The rookie stared at Sion's back in shock.
'Younger than me-!?'
Park Team Leader raised an eyebrow.
"Just so you know, don't think you can ditch your rank just because you're older."
"N-No, I won't!"
The agent glanced around slyly and added,
"So... You've been sticking close to Team Leader Sion because she's the director's daughter?"
Park Team Leader nodded lightly.
"Yeah. She started under me, and the director asked me to look out for her."
The director had opposed Sion joining the task force from the start.
A ragtag guy, but he fretted terribly over his kid.
Yohan was finally learning the official name of the government's secret organization.
Draped in the blanket from the Response Special Task Force, he sipped cocoa.
'...This cocoa's good.'
The recovered Mysteries of Insects was safely in his bag.
Sitting like this, it really felt like one case was fully wrapped up.
In the end, he'd secured the parchment too—mission accomplished.
One job done safely!
...Of course, it wasn't completely over yet.
He watched Sion approaching from her seat.
Yohan and Sion.
Their calm black eyes sized each other up.
As Yohan approached Sion, he thought,
Yeah, you'd be suspicious, right? So what? Just close the case.
Task force or whatever, you're all just civil servants. Easier to wrap it up.
I'll behave from now on too. ...As much as possible.
There are crazy mages like Kim Mireh in the world, and I've gotta survive.
As Sion approached Yohan, she thought,
The reason a hunter chases and catches a man-eating beast...
Is because they realize humans are far too weak.
Today, the task force failed to catch Yohan.
No, was Yohan really the culprit? All she had was her gut feeling.
What if, just what if, delusion.
Even the decisive evidence grimoire Yohan had blatantly left behind couldn't be properly controlled.
The beast had realized the hunter pack it feared was nothing special.
Yohan and Sion stopped, facing each other.
Sion was glad her emotions didn't show on her face as she said,
"Mr. Yohan, thank you so much for your cooperation today. Thanks to you, none of the kidnapping victims died."
At Sion's polite words, I replied with a polite face.
"No, all I did was trust you and follow. And I survived thanks to you. Thanks for carrying me up the stairs."
Sion gave me a faint smile.
"You said you're an exorcist. If it's alright, could I get your contact info?"
"...We sometimes need civilian collaborators."
Refusing here would look suspicious, so I pulled out a Ghostbuster business card and handed it over.
"Here. Call if you need me."
A cartoonish card with a long-armed evil spirit in a comical, surprised pose.
Sion couldn't help but smile at "Ghostbuster" printed on it.
"Thanks."
I recalled the slaughter scene in the basement today.
Ghostbuster?
...I just hope it doesn't become Humanbuster.