Chapter 54: Fait Apli
“Mi, Miss Holmes?”
“……..”
“Why are you acting like this all of a sudden?”
Isaac Adler’s voice, his tone filled with utter astonishment, echoed throughout the room.
<i>– Drip…</i>
But right in front of him, Charlotte Holmes knelt down on the ground, shedding tears like tiny beads.
“Uhm…”
As the game-over warning message shed before his eyes, cold sweat started to form on Adler’s forehead.
<i>– Shhh…</i>
“Calm down.”
After hesitating for a moment, Adler gently embraced Charlotte in his arms.
“… It’s because of me that you’re dying, isn’t it?”
Charlotte’s somber and broken voice whispered in his ear.
“What are you even talking about…?”
“Every time you’re with me, you seem to grow weaker and weaker…”
Caught off guard by her exnation, Adler’s face disyed his astonishment.
“Every time I solve a case, I can clearly see you bing more frail.”
“It’s just a coincidence.”
“Then how would you exin the bleeding just now?”
“That was…”
“How do you exin the state of that body of yours, getting sicker day by day like that?”
As he was momentarily lost for words due to the overwhelming misunderstanding that she was harboring, Charlotte’s somber voice relentlessly pressed on.
“I’m scared to fight with you any longer.”
“……..!”
Then, she finally voiced that sentiment of hers.
“Ever since I was born, I’ve always lived in a state of apathy.”
“Miss Holmes…”
“Whenever an incident urred, I could momentarily escape that apathy but that was all there was to it.”
Charlotte, nestled in Adler’s embrace, continued her story in a trembling voice.
“After every incident ended, it was just an endless series of days filled with debilitating apathy.”
“………”
“The problem is, unlike my sister, my apathy could be ovee with some form of stimtion.”
Lost in her words, Adler silently began to stroke her back before he even knew it.
“Cigarette addiction, Mana Poisoning, and then the next stage… it was only a matter of time before I fell apart.”
“………”
“That was… until you appeared, Mr. Adler…”
The shivers running through her body werepletely felt through Adler’s touch.
“I’ll be honest with you, I can’t live without you anymore.”
In that state, with tear-filled eyes, Charlotte Holmes looked up at Adler.
“I’ve already been devoured by you.”
“That’s…”
“No stimulus, no incident, no drug can ever rece you.”
There was a twisted look in her eyes.
“You are the very definition of stimulus itself for me now…”
“……..”
“If you were to disappear, how would I even continue living?”
Adler, who was about to say something, eventually chose to close his mouth without uttering a word.
“What if I were to surpass you?”
Then, Charlotte, leaning in closer to him, poured out that question.
“What if I destroy the kingdom that the Professor and you are trying to build, and put you guys in prison?”
“……..”
“Then, what should I do with my life?”
But there was no response from Adler.
“I’m scared.”
Charlotte’s faint murmur echoed in his ear.
“I’m afraid…”
The greatest detective in all of London was nowhere to be found…
“I don’t want to do anything…”
All that stood before his eyes was a young girl paralyzed with unbridled fear.
“………..”
Utter silence thus ensued.
“… Miss Holmes.”
After contemting for a while and looking down at the quivering Charlotte in his embrace, Adler spoke to her in a soft voice.
“No matter what happens, I won’t leave you.”
Then, Charlotte began to gaze at Adler intently.
“I swear.”
“How can I trust you?”
In response to her question, Adler snapped his fingers, and a contract written in golden letters appeared out of thin air.
“When ites to contract magic, I am more confident than anyone in the entire world.”
“………”
“So please sign it, Miss Holmes.”
epting the contract, Charlotte stared nkly at it.
“I will be with you forever.”
<i>– Shhh…</i>
As if mesmerized by those tantalizing words, her hand began to inscribe her signature on the contract.
“… Now, you can be at ease.”
Observing this, Adler gently patted her back and began to smile warmly.
“… Yes, I feel safe now.”
And at that exact moment…
<i>– Tssssss…</i>
“Huh?”
On Adler’s lower abdomen, a ck seal made of ominous mana began to imprint.
“I almost got caught just now.”
“What?”
While quietly looking down at the golden seal beginning to imprint on her own abdomen, Charlotte mumbled in an oddly clear voice, far different from the broken voice she had before. It was as if… as if, all of it was a lie…
“Huh?”
Right at that moment, the game-over warning message vanished from his sight.
“… I omitted the vague and unnecessary uses that were present on the back of the contract.”
Presenting the contract she had just signed to the bewildered Adler, Holmes showed him the changed contract.
<i>– Tssssss…</i>
There, Charlotte’s ck mana had already burned away all the escape uses that Adler had previously ced on the back.
“Miss Holmes.”
“……..”
“… How…!?”
With his mouth agape, after looking at the change in the contract he had personally created, Adler soon shifted his gaze toward Charlotte and asked her in a soft voice.
“Since long ago, you would often stare into the void, your eyes unfocused…”
Addressing him, Charlotte’s eyes shone sharper than ever as she began her tale.
“I thought it was a coincidence, but your pupils often contracted at the exact moment when something was about to happen.”
“That’s…”
“And most decisively, after briefly observing you while you were confinedst night, I was able to confirm what I had been suspecting all along.”
Her whisper pierced Adler’s ear and reverberated in his mind.
“Your curse is… having to do things that are against your will.”
“………”
“And the <b>things </b>you have to do appears in front of you in the form of text, doesn’t it?”
Adler’s eyes subtly quivered at her perceptive retort.
“… Every cursees with an ability that others might envy.”
Seeing his reaction and being confident in her deduction, Charlotte slightly tilted her head and murmured.
“So, what is your ability exactly?”
Suddenly, Charlotte leaned in and asked,
“What are you talking about?”
“I tried to intensify my emotions a bit earlier, just for testing purposes. I’m quite confident in my acting skills, you know…”
Her brain seemed to be working faster than ever before.
“Seeing you flustered, which is unlike you, is it something like mind-reading?”
“Um…”
“Or is it an ability to grasp the current situation in one way or another?”
“Miss Holmes…”
“Or perhaps, can you see the potential futures ahead of you?”
“………”
As Adler fumbled for words, Charlotte brought her lips close to his ear and whispered softly.
“Or… is it all of the above?”
Then, there was silence…
“… Well, whatever it may be…”
Charlotte’s whisper continued, causing a shiver down Adler’s back as he felt the gentle yet hot breath against his ear.
“I’ve started to understand you a bit.”
“What…”
“You’ve broken a fewmands for my sake, haven’t you?”
Her voice seemed to have a hint of apology within…
“… You don’t need to resist or struggle anymore.”
She began to gently stroke Adler’s hair with her hands.
“Because I can’t stand by and watch your life force diminish any further…”
Charlotte, looking at Adler who was still spewing out blood with a slightly anxious expression on her face, murmured as she wrapped one of her arms around his waist.
“… And, because you love me so much.”
“…….”
“Far more than a lousy professor who can’t even make such simple deductions.”
Then, she asked with a slightly sharp tone in her voice…
“Right?”
“Huh?”
“Right…!?”
“… Yes.”
As Adler hesitantly answered, Charlotte, who initially looked at him with a slightly dissatisfied gaze, soon wore a smile on her lips.
“Well, with this contract in hand, the conclusion has already been set in stone, more or less.”
And then, she slightly lowered her head, tapping on the contract she had been carefully holding onto her arms to show it to him.
“Indeed, I need to make things a bit more certain, don’t I?”
The very next moment…
<i>– Bite…</i>
“… Huh!?”
Charlotte’s teeth sunk into Adler’s soft neck.
<i>– Crunch…</i>
“…? …..???”
Baffled by her sudden act of sucking blood, Adler wore a perplexed expression on his face.
“Mi, Miss Holmes.”
“… Puhua~”
“Ha, Have you perhaps be a vampire?”
Then, Adler urgently pushed her away and asked that question.
“No.”
“Then why…?”
“I’vee to a conclusion.”
Charlotte, giving that response, gazed intently at Adler while being lost in thought.
‘No matter how much I ponder, there’s only one conclusion I can reach.’
Isaac Adler was her enemy.
Moreover, he was an entity she shouldn’t be entangled with as a detective.
But at the same time, he was an essential part of her life.
“… Charlotte?”
The life of such a being was fading away because of her.
Even if not for that, this struggle would inevitablye to an end one day.
Then, was there no way to keep him by her side forever?
If not that, at least, couldn’t she retain his essence within her?
After a series of logical and rational deductions, there was only one way— only one answer she could reach.
“I’ll devour you.”
Having reached that conclusion, Charlotte wiped away the blood of Adler from her lips with her finger, consuming every drop, and whispered…
“… This isn’t about me being tainted by you.”
At the same time, Charlotte reached out and touched Adler’s head.
“It’s about me tainting you.”
Carefully plucking a single strand of his hair, she ced it into her mouth and whispered those words.
“… Mmm.”
Then, she began to chew thoughtfully, resting her chin on her hand and staring intently at Adler.
<i>– Gulp…</i>
Momentster, with a bright smile on her face after swallowing the strand, Charlotte spoke up.
“Having done this much, we’ll have some good news soon.”
“… Pardon?”
“Watson informed me.”
Adler, initially looking slightly uneasy, froze in ce upon hearing her follow-up words.
“To establish a Fait Apli, gic material is required.”
Charlotte, wiping her mouth with her sleeve and pointing to the golden seal imprinted on her lower abdomen, whispered in a soft voice.
“… Just wait a few days.”
At that moment, Adler was finally able to understand…
<strong>『Hidden Route — ???』</strong>
<b>– Progress:</b> 20% → 50%
The moment Charlotte’s knowledge becameplete, he could sense what was about to happen to him.
<strong>Warning!</strong>
<b>– Probability of ??? — </b>60% → 70%
“… Ah.”
The messages appearing before his eyes faintly foreshadowed the event that would soon transpire.
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