“…The orders have arrived.”

Aron spoke in a heavy voice, almost swallowing a sigh, and handed them a letter. The other four friends turned their attention to the letter Aron had tossed down.

They could guess what it contained without reading it. It likely demanded to know if they had found traces of the devil, urged them to submit their reports quickly, and warned that failure to comply would result in a tribunal and interrogation.

This made sense, as they hadn’t written a single report in the past ten days despite their regular reporting schedule. More accurately, they hadn’t had the presence of mind to write reports.

Because Romei had disappeared.

Ten days ago, they had executed a plan using Romei as bait to lure the devil. They had carefully monitored Romei’s presence and arrived at the stream according to plan, but strangely, Romei, who should have arrived before them, wasn’t there.

That’s when they began to feel an ominous premonition, but they waited for her, thinking she might have lost her way. However, no matter how long they waited, Romei didn’t come.

That’s when they spotted the flare shot into the sky.

It wasn’t far from where they were. They couldn’t understand why Romei had taken a detour, but she was the priority, so they rushed there, putting everything else aside.

But Romei was nowhere to be found. All that remained were an old bucket borrowed from a villager, the pouch containing the flare Aron had given her, and a gun scattered on the ground.

“There’s a very faint trace of magical energy left here.”

“No way…”

At David’s words, the same thought occurred to everyone. Something that absolutely shouldn’t have happened had occurred.

“Did Romei fall victim to the devil?”

Martin spoke in disbelief.

Romei was a holy knight like them. She had received the same training and could wield holy power. It was hard to believe that someone like her had so suddenly fallen victim to a devil.

“When Romei said she’d be the bait, we should have stopped her no matter what. Whatever came up in that damn drawing of lots, we should have stopped her!”

Enoch suddenly burst out in anger. His rage stemmed from regret for not having properly dissuaded Romei in the past.

And the other friends felt the same way. They couldn’t pinpoint exactly what had gone wrong, but they all felt guilty about Romei falling victim to the devil.

While Enoch was venting his frustration in a rage, Aron, the calmest and most composed among them, tried to calm him down.

“Getting angry like this won’t change anything, Enoch. What’s important isn’t blaming the unchangeable past but finding Romei.”

“…”

“First, we need to determine Romei’s whereabouts. Romei is our comrade. She wouldn’t have been taken down so easily, and she might be waiting for us to rescue her.”

“Aron’s right. We don’t have the luxury of wasting time arguing here. We need to move right now.”

David supported Aron’s words.

Their friends were right. Getting angry wouldn’t change anything. But unlike usual, his emotions were difficult to control.

Enoch took several deep breaths to calm himself down and clear his head. As the sharp atmosphere began to subside, the five friends decided to search the surroundings.

Aron emphasized repeatedly, just in case:

“Romei disappeared shortly after firing the flare. It’s certain there’s a devil in this area. So never stay alone. Move in groups of at least two, and if you see anything suspicious, signal without delay. Understood?”

“Understood.”

“Then let’s split up.”

So the five friends divided into groups of two and three and thoroughly searched the area around where Romei had disappeared.

But no traces remained anywhere. It seemed like both Romei and the devil had simply vanished without a trace.

In the end, the only evidence they had were the flare, gun, and bucket found on the ground.

The five friends returned empty-handed and sat at the table with grave expressions. They continued to retrace their memories and discuss the situation until the dinner brought by the cook lost its warmth and grew cold.

“We definitely followed Romei’s presence. Although we kept our distance, it wasn’t so far that we wouldn’t notice if her presence disappeared.”

“Right. I was tracking Romei’s presence the whole time. Not once did my attention waver, nor did I ever stop hearing Romei’s footsteps.”

“But the place where Romei fired the flare was off the path we were supposed to take. Romei isn’t the type to arbitrarily break from the plan. She’s closer to a stickler for rules. So why were the flare and gun found there?”

“Maybe the devil appeared midway? She spotted traces and followed them, taking a detour. There’s also that faint trace of magical energy where the gun was found.”

“But given Romei’s personality, does it make sense that she would recklessly chase after a devil? And if Romei had taken a different path midway, we who were monitoring her presence would have noticed.”

“…That forest.”

As the conversation heated up, Aron suddenly spoke. With those words, the table immediately fell silent, and everyone focused on Aron.

Aron began with a serious expression.

“I think there’s something strange about that forest.”

“The forest is strange?”

“Think about it. This was Romei’s proposed operation. Like Edward said, she’s so diligent that she can be rigid—she wouldn’t have deviated from the route on her own.”

“…”

“But it also doesn’t make sense that we lost track of Romei. None of us noticed her leaving the path.”

“What does that have to do with the forest?”

Enoch asked, not understanding what Aron was trying to say. Aron explained:

“The devil interfered in the middle. Made us all confused. Romei didn’t realize she was taking a detour and went off course, while we mistook someone else’s presence for Romei’s.”

“…”

“There’s no other explanation.”

Aron concluded his thoughts with those words. But no one either opposed or agreed with him. His claim that the forest was strange was too abstract.

“…If, like you say, the devil interfered with Romei and us, shouldn’t we have noticed? But we didn’t feel anything. We only found very faint traces of magical energy where Romei disappeared.”

“That’s what I find strange too. Holy knights can detect traces of magical energy, yet none of us felt anything.”

“…”

When it became clear that the questions wouldn’t be easily resolved, a heavy silence fell, like everyone was swallowing deep sighs. It was frustrating that they couldn’t come up with any solutions when they didn’t even know if Romei was alive or dead.

Martin was the first to break the silence.

“Let’s put that aside for now and focus on finding Romei. We shouldn’t think this way, but we need to find at least her body.”

“Martin’s right. Let’s worry about how we lost Romei later and focus on finding her now. Like Aron said, she might be waiting for us to find her.”

David supported Martin’s words, and the rest of the friends nodded. They couldn’t let Romei become another victim in the series of disappearances.

Today marked the tenth day of their search for Romei. During that time, they had tried every method to find her, but no traces remained anywhere.

They had hoped to find at least her body, if she wasn’t alive, but like the other missing persons, Romei’s body never appeared.

Yet it didn’t seem like the devil had moved its activities from Picardin to elsewhere. There had been no news of disappearances since Romei’s.

As Romei’s disappearance remained a mystery, an official letter came down from above because they weren’t fulfilling their duties, meaning they could no longer delay their report.

And since traces of magical energy had been found at the site of Romei’s disappearance, that also needed to be reported.

“What should we do? Report that Romei is missing?”

Enoch asked Aron as he stared at the letter from above. Aron remained silent.

Instead, Edward spoke up.

“We should report it. That’s the right thing to do. If we omit reporting about Romei here, the case might become even more of a mystery.”

“It’s been a mystery from the beginning. We’ve been here for days and searched the forest for so long. Yet we still don’t even know what happened to Romei.”

Emotions rising, Enoch spoke in a rough voice and slammed his fist on the table. The letter on top wobbled limply.

David, who had been lost in thought, suddenly spoke.

“That’s exactly why we need to submit a report. Until now, we’ve been too busy searching for Romei to report, but her disappearance is definitely strange.”

“What’s strange about it? If you’re going to spout nonsense like Aron about the forest being strange, you’d better keep your mouth shut.”

Enoch said, grinding his teeth and suppressing his anger. He had been on edge since Romei disappeared, so David half-ignored his words and continued.

“It’s been ten days since Romei disappeared. When we investigated the disappearances, most people were found in the forest within a week at most. But only Romei hasn’t been found, despite our desperate search.”

“…So? What are you trying to say?”

“Let’s admit that we can’t find Romei with our power alone, submit a report to the higher-ups, and get support. That’s what we should do.”