Chapter 397
Shit-stirring Mentality
“The murder case that occurred in Baker Street, White Queen District last night has been cleared up.”
Eivass sat in the Queen’s study of the Silver and Tin Hall, reading the newspaper delivered that morning and casually reciting the headline: “The dangerous werewolf who assassinated the new Trade Minister, Mr. Griffith, was actually a fugitive from the Iris Kingdom.”
“The Prime Minister of the Iris Kingdom urgently called the Silver and Tin Hall last night to express his deep condolences. The Arbitration Hall has increased its patrol scale and will apprehend the murderer as soon as possible.”
He chuckled, “They are quite fast. They just didn’t explain anything.”
“Indeed,” Lily, the werewolf involved, nodded in agreement.
By shifting between human, wolf, and werewolf forms, combined with shadow stealth, she had barely managed to shake off the griffins all night. She had only returned recently.
After the incident last night, Eivass had rushed to the scene with reporter Dimit.
At that time, Minister Griffith’s mansion was already surrounded by griffins – over twenty white-feathered griffins were soaring in the sky. As they flew, dark clouds gathered in the night sky, and thunder rumbled within them, emitting roars like those of lions.
The minister’s death was no trivial matter; the entire White Queen District was under martial law. The arbitration officers, whom were rarely seen and whose members were all Fourth Tier, had arrived at the scene immediately.
Eivass presented his credentials and, accompanied by members of the Arbitration Hall, smoothly took Dimit and his assistant to capture first-hand photos.
Of course, this accompaniment was essentially surveillance.
It was to prevent Eivass from eliminating any evidence – but Eivass had no need to eliminate evidence.
Therefore, he even invited several arbitration officers to accompany him and actively helped them search for clues.
This was Eivass’s objective all along.
To Eivass’s surprise, Lily did not leave traces of the shadow demon in the villa as they had planned.
Eivass immediately realized that something special must have happened, preventing Lily from acting according to the original plan.
The shadow demon did not immediately return to him for help, indicating that Lily was not in danger. However, Lily had turned into a werewolf… this was enough to show that this change was not for safety reasons but for intelligence gathering.
Without communicating with Lily, Eivass knew what intelligence she wanted to convey to him.
So, he led the arbitration officers of the Arbitration Hall through the most stringent procedures to search the entire scene and preserve the evidence.
They naturally found the hawk feather dagger.
—This was a mark left by the Eagle Eye organization after assassinating someone, serving as proof that the “Eagle Eye organization is responsible.” After all, in essence, the Eagle Eye organization was a comprehensive intelligence organization with political leanings, rather than a simple mercenary group executing assassinations for profit.
After examination, they also found traces of a curse from the mangled corpse that had been bitten.
Clearly, this matter had nothing to do with Eivass anymore.
After the Arbitration Hall reported the clues, the Privy Council held an emergency meeting that night to discuss the matter.
The “werewolf assassin” who appeared last night was undoubtedly a very dangerous criminal. They had even assassinated a minister in the White Queen District, and an account of this matter had to be given immediately. Therefore, the newspapers the next morning also had to express their stance on this incident.
So, in the morning, Eivass received reports from both the newspaper and the Silver and Tin Hall.
Eivass tapped the report from the Privy Council Minister and praised, “This one is written clearly.”
According to regulations, the Privy Council Minister must submit the meeting minutes to the Queen’s study.
Therefore, the only person who could see this report was Eivass, who could move freely within the Silver and Tin Hall.
This was not considered overstepping his bounds. Because Isabel had left Glass Island this morning and was visiting Avalon in a traditional tour. Before leaving, she had written a document authorizing Eivass to handle this matter. She had also written several blank forms, signed her name at the bottom, and left the specific “authorized matters” blank.
Eivass could fill them in himself whenever needed.
What kind of trust was this?
… This was almost like being sidelined by Eivass’s trust.
The appearance of a werewolf on the street, which was discovered by civilians, was an obvious fact.
Ordinary people did not know the political intricacies of the Iris flowers, but knights certainly did.
The “Eagle Eye” organization, as an assassin group that hated the Children of the Moon, was clearly opposed to the Children of the Moon and the “Healthy Party” in Iris, which was led by the Path of Love. Their party emblem was a red heart, and they advocated maintaining the status quo.
Many people longed for eternal life. As a second-best option, the versatile potions of witches, and the witches themselves, whose appearance was greatly enhanced with the advancement of their energy level, were also valuable and rare resources.
In Iris, where witches were basically controlled by the Children of the Moon, potions were essentially a rationed system. As a result, the “Healthy Party,” controlled by the Children of the Moon, was actually a party dominated by old nobles and wealthy merchants.
In contrast, another party, led by the Path of Beauty, was the “Giant Tree Party,” with a green tree as their emblem.
The “Giant Tree” referred to the giant tree where the elves of the Church resided. Due to the constant pressure from Star Antimony, Iris was perpetually preparing for war, leading to high military spending, and thus ever-increasing taxes. Moreover, all adults, regardless of gender, were conscripted unless they paid a high “conscription tax.” Therefore, there was a strong anti-war sentiment among the common people in Iris.
The Giant Tree faction were those who wished to become a permanently neutral country like the elves, opening their ports and trade to all races and nations, focusing on economic development, and remaining independent of the wars between countries. They were primarily composed of urban petite bourgeoisie, intellectuals, and a large number of artists.
These artists became academic cliques, basically controlling the methods for advancing in the Path of Beauty. And undoubtedly, compared to the Path of Love, which was prone to loss of control and madness, the Path of Beauty was more stable and easier to gain public support. It was also one of the few Paths where one could achieve a certain level of Extraordinary Ability simply through diligent systematic study.
Just like when a high-level Alchemist taught their students, as long as the student studied well and had the brainpower of a university student, they could at least reach the Second Tier by the age of thirty. The same applied to great artists teaching their students their self-created “artistic styles”… even those with a little talent could reach the Third Tier.
And with the increasing survival pressure in Iris, a large number of talented young artists had emerged.
It was these young artists from the lower strata, who had an overwhelming advantage in numbers, that allowed the seemingly passive and naive “Giant Tree Party” to become a powerful faction comparable to the Healthy Party. This was also the ruling party of the current Prime Minister.
Few people knew that the “Eagle Eye” organization actually belonged to the “Giant Tree Party.”
The Eagle Eye organization, on the surface, were the successors of the exiled mercenaries from the Black Hawk Duchy.
This was because they not only killed Children of the Moon but also some great artists. In other words, they killed people from both sides. They were just relatively more opposed to the Children of the Moon – and since the Black Hawk and Narcissus were enemies, this was understandable. In addition, they also accepted some mercenary assassination jobs.
And many people – including the Privy Council – believed that the Eagle Eye organization actually belonged to Iris’s third-largest party, the “Imperial Glory Party.” They were a very radical organization that claimed the Iris Kingdom was the legitimate successor to the Hrasal Empire. They incited xenophobia and emphasized extreme nationalism.
The violent actions of the Eagle Eye organization undoubtedly aligned closely with the claims of the Imperial Party.
Not long ago, the Prime Minister, who hailed from the Giant Tree Party, had admitted to the assassination of the Avalon royal family and promised to provide massive compensation. And undoubtedly, this compensation would eventually be borne by the entire populace.
This caused widespread dissatisfaction within Iris towards the Giant Tree Party.
However, the Prime Minister did not admit that the assassination of the minister’s secretary by an Eagle Eye assassin was related to him. Instead, he claimed it was to silence a Star Antimony spy within Avalon, an act of long-range action by the Star Antimony Kingdom – in other words, he claimed that the Eagle Eye organization was connected to the Star Antimony people.
From the perspective of the common people in Iris, they had previously tacitly agreed that “Eagle Eye” belonged to the Imperial Party. And the Imperial Party was happy to tacitly agree with this view to increase the public’s recognition of their powerful capabilities.
As a result, they quickly declared that the Eagle Eye organization had nothing to do with them. But the shit had already been spread, and it was difficult to extricate themselves.
In this incident, both the werewolf and the witch behind the werewolf were highly likely to be members of the Healthy Party.
Therefore, this incident could be interpreted in two ways.
The Privy Council Minister’s report was very clear.
One interpretation was that the werewolf from the Healthy Party was impersonating an “Eagle Eye” assassin, framing the Eagle Eye organization, i.e., the Imperial Party. In anticipation of the Giant Tree Party’s inability to win the next election, they were preemptively clearing out political opponents.
The second interpretation was that someone among the Eagle Eye organization’s assassins had become a “wild werewolf” not controlled by the Healthy Party.
Avalon had no need to investigate the truth. They could simply go with the flow.
If it were the former, Avalon needed to condemn the “Eagle Eye organization,” emphasizing that this incident was the act of an assassin; if it were the latter, Avalon needed to emphasize that it was the act of a werewolf.
According to the investigation by the Inspection Bureau, from Minister Griffith’s incomplete corpse, they confirmed the unique “curse poison” of the Eagle Eye organization, whose composition was consistent with that remaining in the body of John Laff, the former chief private secretary of the late Minister Dross.
The focus of these two speculations was essentially on whether “the traces of curse poison remaining in the body were intentionally left.” As for the hawk feather dagger, it was irrelevant. Eagle Eye organization assassins would leave this item at any assassination scene; it was not surprising that someone collected it.
“The Privy Council’s view is to suggest choosing the second option. This report states, ‘Traces of a bloody demon summoning ritual were found in the basement where the body was located.’ The reason for the successive assassinations of two Trade Ministers was that they were both related to the Star Antimony people.
“If the first option were chosen, it would be irrelevant to the Imperial Party. For their supporters, both Avalonians and Star Antimony people were enemies, with Star Antimony being more hated; so, killing a Star Antimony spy in Avalon was just killing them.
“But if the second option were adopted, we would only need to add a sentence like ‘We have already identified these two individuals as Star Antimony spies’ to characterize this act as silencing them. It would imply that the ‘Iris Healthy Party was colluding with Star Antimony,’ suggesting that this assassination was actually a long-range operation by Star Antimony’s ‘Secret Chamber’ department…”
Eivass’s lips curved slightly, and he lightly tapped the document with his finger. “This will sow discord within Iris and create variables in what was originally a sure-thing party election. Excellent shit-stirring mentality… a truly clever scheme.”
It was likely that the Iris people would be a bit bewildered now.
When the spies from Iris received this information, they might think that Miss Chloe was indeed still alive, just turned into a werewolf.
…My apologies, Miss Chloe.
It seems I’ll have to trouble you to live this one down.
