Tales of a Ninja Magician: Of Where We Come From

No Such Thing As Magic

The two finally arrived at where they previously pointed the next outbreak of violence to be. Just from the first look, the magician realized that it has already happened – they were too late. There was this chilling stench of blood and death in the air, the alleyway, not unlike where the little girl was murdered previously, was dead silent. Only someone's final resting place let out signs like that.

Mana limped around clutching at her gut and sides, hoping that she didn't open any of the bandaged little wounds that she had and examined the place. There was a creepy and serene dripping sound coming from a nearby dumpster so the magician called her friend and asked to have it opened. Meiko looked at Mana questioningly only for the girl to blush embarrassingly.

"I don't want to get any garbage on me and risk infecting my wounds," Mana said. Her own weakness disgusted her but she'd rather have betrayed just how useless she was than risked getting infected over something that stupid. After the explanation Meiko appeared to have no problem with doing as she was asked to do, she opened the dumpster and pulled out a man placed inside. Both girls covered their noses before realizing that the man must've been dead for at least an hour.

Mana knelt by the poor soul and examined him. He reeked not only of death but also of garbage so it was tempting to throw up the horrible lunch she had that day every moment of examination. Still, Meiko probably lacked the sharp attention needed to pick up the right details and by now the blacksmith realized that with her getting the pulling the corpse out of the dumpster part she actually got the easy part.

This time there were signs of extreme resistance. Whatever happened here clearly indicated that the man wanted no part of this and didn't just accept his cold-blooded murder like the little girl before did. His palms and knees looked crushed, some of his joints were awkwardly twisted and snapped. The man's face was also strangely bloated and had a nasty color. Mana had to ask Meiko to drag the corpse closer to a bar light nearby to properly examine the color aspects of the cadaver.

The worst part that there was no way of telling if the two were chasing ghosts or not – this time the angle of the stab appeared to be inflicted from straight up but if the man was knocked down it could've easily still have been done by the same short person they're looking for or a kid. It could've been just a random victim of street crime or a part of the string of murders. It could've been this ritual of death thing or just a random accident, one unlike those that happen every night in the alleyways of the large villages.

"So is it another one?" Meiko asked leaning up closer with her nose still pinched. A smell like that would've knocked out or at the very least forced to throw up any uninitiated and Mana was glad that she had a weaker nose than most her peers.

"Tough to say. If we were Police Force officers we'd have no solid proof attributing this to anything else but common street crime but..." Mana stood up before noticing another detail beside the man – tracks of blood that mixed into the mud, made clearer when the man's body began to bleed all over the mud and the difference between bloody mud and just the ordinary black dirt was clear as day.

"The Syndicate goons told us they're really strict about maintaining public order unless it's them disrupting it." Meiko finished Mana's sentence somewhat questioningly. As if asking for a confirmation that it was what Mana meant to conclude with.

"Exactly..." The magician concluded slowly walking up the steps into a turn to a dead end alleyway. Slowly, step by step, the magician crept into the total darkness, opening her ears and eyes and hoping that her bodily instincts to crank her chakra augmentation up when in trouble was still functional after she regained her physical chakra use, at least in some limited capacity...

"Please don't kill me!" A loud whimper of a cowering elderly man came out, the poor soul was hiding behind another pair of dumpsters placed side by side and in the pitch total darkness, he was completely invisible. It made sense that if he slipped away here he'd have been totally lost by anyone tracking him if he didn't betray his position like he just did forcing Mana to jump up in surprise.