Kankdar, on the southern shore of the Conquest Sea.
In the afternoon, on a road at the edge of Kankdar's local residential area, a carriage was slowly moving forward. Inside the carriage, Miss Dorothy and Naifnis sat opposite each other. As they traveled, Miss Dorothy explained the current situation to Naifnis, particularly the significant discovery she made on Mazhar's corpse yesterday.
"That's incredible... The Kankdar government did such a thing to frame Sister Vanya, even killing people who weren't originally dead..."
Hearing Miss Dorothy's words, Naifnis spoke with disbelief, and Miss Dorothy, sitting opposite her, nodded in response.
"Yes... I also didn't expect those guys to be so ruthless, suddenly pulling such a stunt. If I didn't frequently manipulate Corpse Puppets and have such a detailed grasp of the feel of manipulating them, I might have fallen into their trap too..."
Miss Dorothy said with emotion. This conspiracy by the Kankdar government would have had a very high chance of trapping someone else, because not everyone possesses medical knowledge and Corpse Puppet control skills that exceed the average level of the era like Miss Dorothy. It would be quite difficult for an ordinary person to discover the suspicious points on Mazhar's body and confirm the reason for them.
'In those guys' minds, Sister Vanya should have a mysterious power protecting her. After Sister Evi appeared, this mysterious power would naturally be considered the faction Sister Evi belonged to within the Church, a faction that seems to have a deep connection with the Holy Mother faith.
'Within the Church, for Extraordinary individuals on the Holy Mother's Path other than Sister Vanya, although they can use healing abilities, they are not proficient in medical knowledge, possessing only basic level understanding. Therefore, during treatment, they need to pray to the Holy Mother for guidance to ensure the treatment is done correctly.
'This is different from Sister Vanya, who possesses profound medical knowledge, can guide herself from beginning to end, and is both a doctor and a cleric, double qualified. Ordinary Extraordinary individuals on the Holy Mother's Path in the Church are primarily clerics, with a minor sideline as doctors. They have medical knowledge but don't delve deeply into it, as medicine is a profound subject with many classifications and high learning costs. In my previous life, studying medicine required an extra year at university. Extraordinary individuals on the Holy Mother's Path born in the Church are not medical students who are single-mindedly focused on studying medicine. They also have their work and cultivation as clerics, and with limited energy, they cannot refine their medical skills.
'This situation is common among Extraordinary individuals on the Holy Mother's Path in the Church, at least before Scarlet had sufficient lifespan. Holy Mother Extraordinary individuals do not have a deep understanding of medicine. And this time coming to Kankdar, Sister Evi, who is suspected to be Scarlet, does not look like an Extraordinary on the Holy Mother's Path at all. That's why the Kankdar government dared to play this trick, sending Mazhar's corpse over to lure us into the trap, because they were not afraid of Sister Vanya finding anything abnormal.'
Sitting in the carriage, Miss Dorothy thought about this, and then Naifnis, who was opposite her, spoke to Miss Dorothy again.
"Miss Dorothy, since their conspiracy has been known to us, is it time to fight back now? Can we just use the difference between the time of Mazhar's death and the time the Kankdar government publicized as evidence to bring them down?"
"If it were a typical criminal case, this evidence would indeed be quite strong and could help us regain some ground, but unfortunately, this is not a typical case. It is being judged by a group of people whose stance is inherently problematic, so the strength of this evidence is far from enough. Not only will it not affect the Kankdar government, but it will likely lead to those judges adding a charge of stealing a corpse. To bring them down, we need decisive evidence that leaves them speechless."
Miss Dorothy responded to Naifnis's words. From her words, it could be heard that she had absolutely no expectation of bringing down the Kankdar city government by relying solely on the current evidence. Hearing Miss Dorothy's response, Naifnis couldn't help but show some disappointment.
"Such evidence... I feel like it's impossible to find," Naifnis said, scratching her head with some frustration, but Miss Dorothy's response was somewhat unexpected.
"It's not difficult to find, actually. I already have a bit of an idea now. I'm taking you to find the evidence right now."
"Ah? Taking me to find evidence?"
Hearing Miss Dorothy's words, a confused expression appeared on Naifnis's face for a moment. She couldn't immediately figure out what kind of evidence Miss Dorothy needed to take her to find.
Just like that, in confusion, Naifnis continued forward in the carriage. Their carriage drove all the way towards the edge of the City. As the low-rise buildings outside the window became increasingly sparse and the road became more rugged, they gradually began to leave the Kankdar city area and entered the forest.
After moving through the dense forest for a while, the carriage slowly stopped. After the Corpse Puppet coachman opened the door, Miss Dorothy and Naifnis got out of the carriage. Then Miss Dorothy walked into the forest, while Naifnis followed behind with a puzzled expression.
After crossing a small patch of forest, Miss Dorothy led Naifnis to a small open area. Naifnis surveyed the clearing in front of her. She found that several figures of different appearances and heights were already standing there, seemingly all Miss Dorothy's Corpse Puppets. In the center of these surrounding Corpse Puppets, on the ground, was a magic circle that had been prepared beforehand. Judging by the Spirituality symbols on the magic circle, it was a ""Silent"" magic circle.
"This is... a magic circle for summoning spirits? Miss Dorothy, are you going to..."
Looking at the magic circle on the ground, Naifnis, who had read her Grandpa's notes, immediately recognized what it was for. She then looked at Miss Dorothy, who did not directly reply but snapped her fingers. After the snap, four other Corpse Puppets walked out from the nearby forest. They were carrying a stretcher between them, and lying on the stretcher was a fat corpse. Naifnis immediately recognized the face of the corpse; she had seen this face multiple times in the news on the newspaper these past few days.
"This is... Mazhar's corpse? Miss Dorothy, are you perhaps trying to summon Mazhar's soul?"
With a trace of surprise, Naifnis said to Miss Dorothy. A summoning magic circle and Mazhar's corpse, when these two things came together, it was obvious what Miss Dorothy intended to do.
"That's right, I am going to summon Mazhar's soul. His soul is the evidence, or rather, the witness, I'm looking for."
With a slight smile, Miss Dorothy said directly to Naifnis. Hearing Miss Dorothy's words, confusion reappeared between Naifnis's brows, and she continued to ask Miss Dorothy.
"Mazhar's soul... Miss Dorothy, do you think... his soul can testify for us?"
Naifnis asked Miss Dorothy this, and Miss Dorothy responded with a confident smile.
"Heh, if Mazhar had died at the scene of the assassination on the day of the assassination, from a gunshot or poisoning, then no, because he wouldn't be able to tell how he died. But the actual situation is that two days after the assassination, while being secretly detained, he was suffocated to death, and there were even signs of struggle when he died.
"In other words, it's highly likely that Mazhar knew the cause of his death before he died. He knew who captured him, who imprisoned him, and who killed him. Mazhar might have personally experienced the last two days of his life, and only after those guys figured out how to deal with Sister Vanya's poison detection accusations was he sentenced to death… I think Mazhar must have been quite desperate during those two days. After his soul is summoned, maybe he'll be willing to help us without needing a Surgery forced."
Dorothy said this to Naifnis. When she was examining Mazhar's corpse, she found tiny skin flakes and even solidified blood clots under his fingernails that were barely visible even with a magnifying glass. These were all Mazhar's own. These skin flakes led Dorothy to believe that Mazhar had painfully tried to struggle before he died, but because his hands were tied tightly, his struggling was limited. He could only make limited flailing motions with clenched fists. Due to clenching his fists too hard, he scratched a little skin on his palms, leaving trace amounts of skin flakes and blood clots in his fingernails.
Although the scratches on Mazhar's palms were processed along with the bruises on his neck after they were turned into Corpse Puppets, these traces remained. From this, Dorothy could infer the suffering Mazhar endured when he died and determine that he had self-awareness at the time of his death. He knew who killed him? How did he die? Since he knew before he died, his soul must also know after death. As long as his soul is summoned, he will be the best witness.
Let Mazhar himself tell how he died. In such cases, the victim's own testimony is absolutely irrefutable ironclad proof, even on an Extraordinary level.
"Yes… If we can summon this prince's soul to testify, then whatever they accuse us of will be useless. Miss Dorothy, please wait a moment, I'll prepare to summon his soul now."
After hearing Dorothy's words, Naifnis spoke as if enlightened. Then, she immediately sat cross-legged beside the ritual circle to prepare for the summoning. She now knew what Dorothy wanted her to do here today, which was to help summon a soul.
Seeing that Naifnis had sat down beside the ritual circle, Dorothy didn't stand idle. She directly controlled the Corpse Puppet to place Mazhar's corpse on the ritual circle to be used as a medium for summoning. Having a complete corpse as a physical medium creates a very strong attraction for spirits. As long as the soul hasn't sunk below the Realm of No Return in the Nether River, attracted by a great soul to the point where it can no longer rise, it can generally be summoned back.
After the medium was in place, Naifnis closed her eyes, mobilized her Spirituality, and began the soul summoning ritual according to the records in her Grandpa's notebook. Due to the high-intensity reporting in the past few days, there was a lot of public information about Mazhar, so Neff did not lack the necessary spiritual information medium.
Under the guidance of the medium, Naifnis's will began to be drawn to the Netherworld Nether River to search for Mazhar's soul. After searching for a short while, her brows couldn't help but furrow, and then she spoke.
"Miss Dorothy… I cannot find any trace of Mazhar's soul in the Nether River. He only died two or three days ago, which shouldn't be enough for him to sink below the Realm of No Return. His soul did not enter the Nether River… or rather, it did, but it was summoned out by someone else before I could summon him…"
Naifnis said this to Dorothy. Hearing Naifnis's words, Dorothy was not surprised, but a look of 'just as I expected' appeared on her face.
"Heh, as expected, they even put insurance on the soul aspect?"
Dorothy murmured to herself like this. She had also anticipated that those guys would put some protection on the soul level. Mazhar's soul was likely summoned by their own people in advance, and then directly sealed using methods like the Corpse Coffin, preventing others from having a chance to summon it. Given the opportunity, they would likely try to refine Mazhar's soul to eliminate future troubles permanently.
However, at this moment, Dorothy believed that Mazhar's soul still existed. Undead can be expelled, sealed, hidden, devoured, or scattered, but they are extremely difficult to completely destroy. This can be seen from the Corpse Coffin Society. When they captured a large number of essences and Wilderness Spirits from the new world, they couldn't refine them on the spot and could only send them back to large strongholds on the Main Continent. This shows that soul-refining devices are very rare. Even the Corpse Coffin, the largest "Silence" society, only has a few locations with such devices. Other organizations shouldn't even think about it. A Corpse Coffin hunting team doesn't even have the means to destroy souls on the spot; they could only detain and bring back Kapak, who knew their secrets. Other organizations are even less likely to have such means.
"Senior Nefelnis, now change the ritual. Perform a reverse channeling ritual and channel the Wilderness Spirit, Soul Whisker." Dorothy continued to say to Naifnis. For the current situation, she had already prepared a plan.
"Soul, Soul Xu? That little ancestor… Miss Dorothy, have you already discussed this with Elder Uta?" Hearing Dorothy's words, Naifnis said in surprise, and Dorothy nodded in response.
"Yes, this morning, I communicated with that kid Kapak and asked him for a favor to ask their Elder Uta some questions. Now they are ready to send the spirit over, you just need to receive it here."
"Oh… okay, okay…"
After hearing Dorothy's words, Naifnis quickly began to change the ritual and make preparations. After a while, she temporarily removed Mazhar's corpse and changed the soul summoning ritual to a reverse channeling ritual. After everything was ready, Naifnis began a new round of soul ritual.
This ritual went smoothly. When Naifnis's ritual ended, accompanied by a wave of Spirituality diffusion, a small spiritual lynx gradually appeared in the center of the ritual circle. After appearing in the center of the ritual circle, it looked around, then slowly walked to Naifnis with its tail wagging and sat down in front of her, looking up at Naif with an arrogant expression.
Seeing this, Neff immediately reacted by taking out an iron coin from her wallet, which served as a "Silence" storage item, and respectfully placed it in front of the lynx spirit. The lynx spirit nodded in satisfaction after seeing it, then lowered its head and began to lick the iron coin.
"Soul Whisker is a Wilderness Spirit that can smell the aura of souls. And according to Uta, after a person dies, the aura of their soul will linger on the corpse for a period of time, especially in the bones, where it lingers longer. After Soul Whisker finishes sniffing Mazhar's aura, Senior Nefelnis, you will rely on it and use Soul Whisker's ability to find the sealing location of Mazhar's soul."
Looking at the spiritual cat licking the storage item, Dorothy spoke. Hearing Dorothy's words, Naifnis also nodded understandingly.
"Rely on Soul Whisker and then go sniff for souls… Is it the same as during the New Year in Tivian? This is simple…"
As Naifnis understood, Soul Whisker on the other side finally finished licking the Spirituality from the storage item. After stretching and yawning, it lightly jumped into the air and floated towards Mazhar. It first sniffed around Mazhar's corpse, then drilled in and out of the corpse, passing through the flesh to directly sniff the bones. After sniffing, it slowly floated up again and drifted to Naifnis. Upon seeing it, Naifnis also skillfully began the process of relying on it.
After a while, Neff successfully relied on Soul Whisker's soul. When she reopened her eyes, her pupils showed the vertical slits of a feline, and her entire demeanor became somewhat cold and arrogant. Then she lightly sniffed the air and then looked in one direction. There, she had sniffed the target's trace.