Chapter 55: Powers Of An Imp
"This should be enough proof for you."
Acosta walked closer to Angelia, placing a hand on her shoulder as she silently stared at the empty room. Feeling his touch, she snapped out of her daze.
"Wait." But she refused to give up without being thorough. She activated her powers, releasing streaks of deep blue energy from her root chakra.
The energy crawled across her skin, from her chest to her neck, and continued to rise up. Blue veins popped around her eyes before her pupils dilated and her vision shifted.
Wossh!
Colors faded from her eyes as she started to see distorted images of the room she stood in.
Unlike what she had seen in the attic, the energies here were clearer and more dense. With her will, the energies came to life.
Everything sped back to the time Agnes carried each child down the room one by one. Everything went exactly the same as what Jinn had told her until...
Geralt woke up and said some words she could not hear.
Just as he picked up the part of the shattered wooden chair, the strain on her vision suddenly increased.
The shadow of the past grew undefined; the shadows became less pronounced. In a matter of seconds, the whole room distorted until it finally shattered apart.
"Argh!" Angelia groaned in pain. Her eyes started to bleed, returning to their normal state.
"Oh goddess, Angelia!" Acosta panicked and rushed to support the woman.
"What happened?" He handed her a vial filled with the same white liquid he gave her the day before.
The stubborn woman shook her head and replied, "I am not sure. Everything collapsed almost instantly. I was even so close to seeing what really happened yesterday."
"Was it the artifact that affected your vision?" Officer Chen offered a guess, his face still contorted in disgust. ’I can still smell that disgusting scent of the rotten meat in the air.’
"...I have to try again." Gulping the potion down, Angelia stated while already channeling the dragon energy through her body.
The orange-haired officer looked at the other man in shock, like he was asking for him to stop the crazy woman. But Acosta shook his head.
And just like before, Angelia could not see anything more than she already did.
"I guess this is it..." In the end she shook her head with a sigh, turning to her partner. "With only this, we might not be able to find her. She could be anywhere by now."
"Our Job here is done, Angelia. There is nothing more we can do." Acosta nodded solemnly. "We have alerted the city guards, just in case she is in the city and tries to leave."
"We have law enforcement search every corner and every pit in the city to make sure she is not hiding anywhere." Officer Chen added.
Angelia picked up the artifact known as the breath of the gods from the ground and placed it back in her briefcase before closing it.
"Even with all this power, there is only so much we can do."
The three used an old chair stashed in the corner to climb out of the hole.
The chapel was quiet as the sun’s rays had already broken through the horizon. The noise of the bustling city could be heard despite the distance.
Just as she stepped out of the church, Angelia paused and looked at Acosta. "I want to meet the children."
Acosta appeared to be against that idea. When she saw his hesitation, Angelia shook her head.
"I am not going to interrogate them." She said sincerely. "I just want to check on them."
Acosta kept staring in her eyes for a moment before his expression softened.
"Very well." He turned around and added, "Don’t take long. We will wait here by the front gates."
Officer Chen looked conflicted, but he followed Acosta in the end. Angelia watched them walk away with a heavy gaze before walking in the direction of the orphanage.
Her pace was slow and deliberate, but it did not take her long to reach the second floor.
Standing before Room No. 268, she hesitated before reaching out for the doorknob. She twisted the handle so smoothly that it made no sound.
With a gentle push, she pried the door open and peered inside.
The room was bustling with the noise of children and their antics, and no one seemed to have noticed the gate opening.
Angelia’s gaze moved from one child to another. They paused when she noticed a familiar girl teaching a younger boy like a caring big sister.
Her eyes drooped a little when she saw their bond. While watching them, she caught sight of another familiar child.
Watching him read a book so calmly, she felt the doubts in her mind dissipating. ’What was I thinking...’
’Maybe I have been working for so long that I have been getting suspicious of the smallest things now.’ Angelia almost laughed when she saw Sally sneak a glance at Jinn. And for some reason, her face would flush after a moment, so she looked away from him.
"It is better if I don’t go before them now."
Shaking her head, Angelia closed the door back and left.
The second she had closed the door, Jinn lifted his head from the book he was pretending to read and looked at it with a faint smile.
’Ah... Is he looking at me? Did he notice my gaze?’ Sally flinched when the boy turned, feeling a surge of panic inside her. ’Why did I act like that earlier before everyone? Now I feel too embarrassed to even go close to him.’
A flicker of unease flashed through her eyes as she looked towards the calendar placed on the table before her.
’Tomorrow is the day he leaves, Isn’t it...’
Unaware of Sally’s sadness for him, Jinn looked back at the book while whispering under his breath. "How many souls have we used till now?"
The air beside his shoulder twisted, and the imp plopped into existence. With a snap, it conjured a gust of gray before Jinn, which only the boy could see.
With syllables inked in bloody color, words started to thread together in the fog.
[Souls consumed for short-distance teleportation: 100 per person]
[Souls consumed for altering the echoes of energy: 50]
[ leftover Souls: 9646]
Jinn started at the numbers in silence, but his gaze had drifted to a distant memory he recalled like it was yesterday.
"Like I said, master." The imp spoke up, breaking Jinn out of his trance. "For devils. Souls are everything... even their currency!"