Bang.

The door of the Sorrent security quarters burst open. As usual, the chief, who was sleeping on his desk during work hours, jolted from his seat in a panic. 

“I wasn’t dozing off, Sir Leonard!” Nowadays, he has been having a difficult time because of Kyle Leonard, who visited every evening of the day.

The head of the capital’s security department. Indeed, Kyle Leonard was too superior and powerful that any officer could dare not make eye contact. In addition, he was more terrifying than the rumors paint him to be, and they call him the ‘beast’.

The chief shut his eyes, awaiting Kyle Leonard’s dreadful lambasting.

“Get out of the way.”

“Yes?”

Unexpectedly, however, the chief officer did not receive any reprimand and scurried to the corner clearing the way for the head investigator. It seemed Kyle Leonard was occupied with an urgent matter. He sat on the chief’s seat, and hurriedly switched on the video port on the corner of the desk.

“The capital Tezeba Investigation Security Agency.” 

Immediately after he dialed, the mainspring began to turn and after a beep, a transparent screen emerged above the machine.

“Yes, this is Tezeba Investigation Security. What do you need?” The man who appeared on the screen responded dryly without glancing at Kyle Leonard’s direction.

“Paul, transmit all the profiles of lady Eleonora Asil. The transmission location is here, 10th District Sorrent.”

“Oh, boss?” The face of the man turned pale in an instant upon recognizing the voice.

“I want you to send me all the records of lady Eleonora’s past record, detailed profile, and the case log in the lady’s name. Right now.”

“Yes! I’ll send it right away!” The man named Paul knew Kyle Leonard was not a patient boss who repeated the same words three times, and immediately answered, his hand gesturing a salute.

After issuing his command, Kyle turned the video port off. And in less than a minute, the office’s printing presses began to print out the documents Kyle had requested.

He placed a nearly inch-thick of papers on the desk and began to flip through the pages quickly. 

Eleonora Asil.

Kyle Leonard has been feeling strange ever since he laid eyes on Sorrent’s witch. 

Contrary to his hatred and contempt for Eleonora Asil, Kyle Leonard almost knew nothing about her except her body sizes which include personality, speech, eyes, and furthermore minor hand movements, gait, and stride size, even the thickness of hair and direction of the swirl of fingerprints. It was only natural that he had that information because he had been assigned as a special investigator for Eleonora Asil for five years.

Yet, when he met the witch who had been hiding for two years, she was different from before. Something must have changed, Kyle Leonard thought, but they were trivial things.

For instance, a woman whom he deemed as impeccably clean suddenly has had her house in shambles. The mischievous glint in her eyes has disappeared and her fearlessness no more. She had lost weight and resembled dry firewood. But when he held the witch’s arms unnoticed, familiarity surged in him. 

Eleonora had escaped Kyle Leonard’s chase for more than he can remember, and there wasn’t a single time when he wasn’t hit by the cunning witch. Consequently, Kyle Leonard found it strange when he showed up on the witch’s front door at the crack of dawn and the first thing he didn’t receive was a blow. 

It was only until he attempted to use force to bring her with him for investigation. “So this damned woman finally came to her senses,” he thought.

But again, it wasn’t enough to silence his pestering questions. A few days ago, when he interrogated Eleonora Asil, he had mentioned ‘Lady Eleonora Asil with 15 previous convictions’, and it took her by surprise. 

Why would it shock her? Kyle mused. As many as fifteen times, she was dragged into jail by his hands. Did she forget?

Kyle Leonard stopped flipping through the stack of documents, and glared fiercely at the sheet of paper he held. It was the list of names of Eleonora Asil’s accomplices in her second, seventh, eighth and twelfth crimes.

Adrian Rossinell.

“Have you had any recent contact with Adrian Rossinell?”

“Uh, who?”

“Adrian Rossinell.”

“Who’s that?”

Kyle Leonard’s memory flashed back to his interrogation. 

When he uttered the name of Adrian Rossinell to her, the witch was no more less than clueless. It was at that moment when strangeness peaked and doubts intensified. For him, it absolutely made no sense for such a response to come out because Adrian Rossinell, Laurent’s youngest minister of magic, was the former lover of Eleonora Asil.