Tales of a Ninja Magician: Of Games of Body and Soul

Murders Most Foul

After the initial shock of seeing Shukuba's hero laying down murdered and in the pool of her blood, Mana's eyes started racing across the room, trying to figure out who could have done this. There could have been no mistake, Okasune was capable as much as she was intelligent, even given the recent incriminating information that Itemi and Mana got. She would not have just been caught off guard by just anyone.

"There it was. The one of a kind moment that shatters the stained glass window of your life and begins violently breaking down any walls that separate the isolated rooms of your mind's palace. My friend, colleague, and sister-in-arms laid dead, her essence stolen from her violently right after she did the unthinkable - tried to do the right thing. I needed to know the whos and whys, but I just... Kid, I need to know I can trust to involve you in this, give me a rundown of what happened here before the Security forensics do, then I'll let you work with me on solving this."

"Are you serious? A life was taken, there's no time to fool around. We need to work together on this. Work this out by pooling our efforts, not playing games." Mana snapped back at the officer. Itemi's eyes looked dead-serious.

Despite noticing a whole bunch of details all over the place, they just didn't connect. How was Mana supposed to know just what kind of wound the opening on Okasune's chest was? The blood splatter patterns, while distinctive also told Mana nothing. Only one detail of note, one thing Mana has been trained in as a ninja – tracing.

"She was killed by a woman." Mana uttered before covering her face. Staring at Okasune's dead body was just too painful. Initially came the self-blame, Mana did sense something off in the air, there were signs, Okasune felt so worried over Mana yet wanted to remain so distant, almost like she knew she was going to die.

"A woman? What was the kid talking about? I could see a whole bunch of clues, but I could not see any distinctive feminine tracks amongst the blood stains on the floor. Maybe she was making it up? She was desperate to work this case and she did mean well but... Good intentions don't matter. A nice fellow can go fuck themselves for all I care, it's how good you are at what you do that makes it or breaks it in life and right now, the kid was tanking her assignment hard."

"Look, I'm not as well versed in investigations like you. But look at the spaces between these blood stains, they're left by a woman's step, the spaces between the tracks and smears are not wide enough to be those of a man. She was also not as tall or bulky as a man as the front of her tracks are much more defined, meaning the angle of her step made her lean more on the front of her foot, like she was used to wear more feminine footwear."

"The kid may have had a point, ninja could have been trained to track someone, whether someone they had to kill or just someone to capture. I guess we used a whole different way of tracking, reading papers, vouchers, receipts and tracking where the money goes, not the actual footprints. I needed a drink. This looked up to be a pretty long week..."

"Itemi-san, you need my help. I won't leave you, whether you like it or not. It's clear that if you look in deeper, you'll end up the same way as Okasune-san. I cannot allow that." Mana's resolution was iron-hard. She locked her hands below her chest and tapped her heel to the floor.

"The kid was stubborn but delusional. She may have had the force to play some sick marble game with worlds themselves and the speed to move between countries in mere moments but in this town and case she was limited to what her mind could tell her and her mind was that of a child. I won't waste my time training her in this business, people with the skillset of mine and Kita's and the mindset of the Sorceress had a nasty tendency to end up dead and I've had way too much blood soaking my consciousness."

Itemi stepped outside, Mana closed her eyes and tried making a split-second decision. To follow her ass of a... Whatever Itemi was to Mana at this moment, or to try and work out this murder scene and play Itemi's game. It all depended on the girl's confidence to convince the man that he was wrong dismissing her like that but, being confronted by her failure as an advocate and protector of life, Mana had very little of that left to go around.