Humans can’t defeat an Investigator. That wasn’t Hinode being arrogant. It was just him stating a fact: humans literally couldn’t hurt Investigators.
All living beings have a strange sort of vitality within them—this vitality is called Energy Condensation.
Non-humans, or as they call themselves, Arcane, have massive amounts of it. Compared to them, a humans’ Energy Condensation is but a raindrop in a storm, and non-Arcane animals maybe have half of that. Just like how a raindrop doesn’t have any effect on the overall storm, humans can’t injure Arcanes. That’s why the Arcane Laws are there: to keep humans safe(-ish).
So then, have you guessed it yet?
None of the Investigators is human. They can’t be, or they won’t be able to defeat a single Malevolent.
What, you ask, is a Malevolent? Malevolents are cursed Arcanes. Ghosts, ghouls, haunted dolls, negative feelings that managed to incarnate into the world—beings like that. Investigators, on the other hand, are the ones that get rid of them to keep peace in the world and let humans remain in ignorance of the danger they’re in 24/7. Investigators are Arcane such as vampires, spirits, and Okami.
Of course, not all Arcanes have to be Investigators.
To get rid of a Malevolent, you have to enter their Case. A case is the Malevolent’s reason for being cursed. Solve the Case, and the Malevolent is dispersed. Fail to solve it, and you die, becoming trapped in the Case forever. Of course, in the modern world, there is a way you can get out of the Case even if you fail to solve it or give up trying to solve it. In this era, only one Arcane has a 100% success rate in solving Cases, and that’s Hinode, known as Sugar to the Arcane world.
By nighttime, an Investigator that puts his life on the line to solve Case after Case. By daytime, a pet groomer that everyone swore up and down would die from eating too much sugar.
How amusing, no?
***
Hinode was tired.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
He trudged into his room and towards his den, Supreme twittering around his head. He was in a bad mood. He’d run out of sweets, eaten the last of his chips yesterday, his den of blankets and pillows needed to be washed, and he still hadn’t managed to gain any leads on the reason Ephemeral Dreams was changing humans.
And Hinode had missed this morning’s class, so now he had to go ask someone to borrow their notes. Annoying.
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“Shit,” he muttered and hurriedly pressed answer. “Hello?”
“Hinode.” Hinode sat up immediately, all thoughts of sleep fleeing. Aphelion never called Hinode by his name when at work, and Aphelion was definitely still at work. And if that wasn’t a clue enough, he sounded grim and strangely terrified. “We have a situation.”
“I’m guessing it’s bad.”
A choked laugh over the receiver. “Worse than bad. Turn on the TV. Doesn’t matter what channel—it’s everywhere.”
Hinode stumbled up, gesturing for Supreme to stay where it was and dove towards the TV’s remote and clicked it on. Instantly, a face filled the screen and Hinode frowned. Wasn’t this woman the creator of Ephemeral Dreams?
“—morning, Arcanes and mere mortals alike. You all probably recognize this body: Josephine Fall, the creator of Ephemeral Dreams. Unfortunately, Fall is now dead, and this body is now mine.
“Humans are probably wondering, ‘what’s she going on about now? What’s she saying? Is this a trick?’ and I will tell you, you wouldn’t understand.” It grinned, teeth sharp and predatory. “Arcanes on the other hand… you’ve probably already connected the dots, haven’t you? Ha!” She—no, it—began to pace.
“Humans! Mortals! You poor, poor fools! You never noticed, did you? You never once thought non-human entities could actually be living amongst you! Well now you know, because I will say it: the strange, the odd, the magical—they’re all real.”
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. What the hell was Aphelion doing? Actually, what were the Arcane technicians doing? Why weren’t they stopping the feed? Was something stopping them?
“They call themselves Arcane and amongst those Arcane, there are those who act as peacekeepers, as the ‘magical police’ of our world. The Investigators.
“And today I—as the queen of the Malevolents—am here today to declare war against them! A battle! A war, not waged in the real-world mind you, but in Ephemeral Dreams. I found a way, you see, to let Malevolents into the game. The reason humans could hurt the Arcane? It was because the Malevolents had taken over their bodies; not that you could tell. Don’t worry though, they’re all gone now, the scary humans can’t hurt you anymore. After all, they were just ploys to get your attention.”
Finally, it stopped pacing and stared straight at the camera with eerie brown eyes. “I’ve sent the details of what our ‘war’ entails to you, President. I do hope you’ll accept.”
Then the video started again and Hinode let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. They were fucked. More than billions of years holding the secret of Arcanes, and everything had collapsed like a house made of cards with one broadcast.
“…Aphelion,” he croaked out.
“I know,” his brother said. “We’re fucked. I got an envelope with the information. That Malevolent… it’s powerful. Very powerful.”
“Yeah, I realized. What happens if we just… pretend we don’t exist?”
“Can’t. A million of the humans logged onto Ephemeral Dreams are realizing they can’t get out right about now. The Malevolent has taken them hostage.”
“Shit.” Hinode slumped against the couch and breathed in deeply. “It called itself the queen of Malevolents. I’m guessing it’s extremely powerful to be claiming that. What kind of war does it want?”
“There’s a thousand of the most powerful Malevolents with the hardest Cases in Ephemeral Dreams. Investigators have to solve them. If we win, the hostages are set free and the Malevolent claims it’ll kill itself. If we lose… it doesn’t say, but I’m going to go ahead and say it’s nothing good.”
“This is bad.”
“I know. I know.” They fell silent, contemplating the only choice they had. Finally, after what seemed like hours, Aphelion spoke up. “I’ll be taking this to the Council. For now, don’t open shop. Don’t go out. Stay safe.”
“You too.”
The call ended with a beep and Hinode groaned, rubbing at his eyes roughly.
“Fuck,” he said. “Fuck.”
***
The results of the conversation with the Council were given to the entirety of the Arcane population the next day.
“We are at war,” he said softly. “We will be contacting the humans at twelve this afternoon. All Investigators, return to your headquarters. All branches, prepare yourselves. All civilians, this does not mean you can go around telling everyone your identity. Sugar, with me.”
Hinode nodded, “Yes, President.”
As the crowd dispersed, he hurried over to his brother and walked side by side with him to Aphelion’s office. “Will you be the one to make contact with them?”
“The Council and I,” Aphelion confirmed. “I want you to come as well, Sugar.”
Hinode slapped the other’s back at the obvious plea. “Of course.”
Oooh! At first I had a hard time understanding what was a Case but now I’m thinking it sounds like the cages in Panguan… I’m already loving the story, world building and Hinode too! Can’t wait for more ❤
Thanks for the chapter~
interesting interesting ✨_✨
im guessing it wont kill itself even if they win
thank yo for the chapter ♥
ooh! I am very intrigued!
thanks for the chapter <3
Sounds like riddle solving. Poor Sugar is already overworked and now he and his bro have this big mess to resolve.😔
Thank you for the chapter 😊
Oh shoot. Things really just went downhill