Early the next morning, Qianshu cheerfully ca to visit, and then took Mugeng shopping.
The reason Qianshu was so enthusiastic was simple: Duanmu Huai not only asked her to be responsible for purchasing Mugeng’s daily necessities and clothing, but also tasked her with buying furniture for his ho. After all, although Duanmu Huai had money, he had no interest in wasting ti on such things. From shopping with his mom before, Duanmu Huai knew that won belong to the type who can spend a whole morning in a mall for a chair, just to find out which one is the best quality and price.
The most miserable thing is when you feel like your feet are about to break from walking, yet after comparing all around, your mom thinks the discount at the first store was the most worthwhile... So you have to frustratingly go back to the start again, if you ask Duanmu Huai, it’s completely a waste of ti, isn’t it...
With MMP, going out shopping with won for things counts as PTSD for Duanmu Huai.
So this equals Duanmu Huai handing Qianshu a black card, telling her to buy whatever she wants, he just wants the result, the cost doesn’t matter. Anyway, Duanmu Huai has a bunch of gems on hand; if he’s out of money, he’ll just exchange them. He doesn’t worry about not having enough to live on.
For Qianshu, isn’t this the best way to satisfy her shopping desire? She can buy relentlessly to her heart’s content; what could be more enjoyable than this!
What? You say the stuff she buys isn’t hers?
Hehe, that sounds like the things won buy when shopping are mostly things they wouldn’t use regularly...
Oh well, it doesn’t matter.
After Qianshu and Mugeng left, Duanmu Huai also headed out to the DA Headquarters — Qianshu and Mugeng went shopping on the streets, while Duanmu Huai headed to the DA Headquarters to investigate the Magic Girl incident with Xitong Lingnao.
The reason for choosing the DA Headquarters is because it owns the city’s largest surveillance and information collection system; to thoroughly investigate the whole city, naturally requires data analysis and support.
First of all, is the target of big data, for which Duanmu Huai is already prepared.
"Because of weakened deaths among girls?"
"That’s right."
Facing Xitong Lingnao’s inquiry, Duanmu Huai nodded.
"I learned from editor Teng Chuan that he once asked forensic experts and found that similar incidents have occurred all over the country. Most of the deceased are young girls, with no external injuries and no signs of drug use, simply dead. Therefore, the police can only declare them as deaths due to weakness... Currently, it seems these weakly dying girls are likely sacrificed Magic Girls. So, I want to see how many people have died for this reason."
"I understand."
Ayano nodded, then quickly typed on the keyboard, soon a map of the whole city appeared on the screen in front of them, then one by one light spots appeared, quickly spreading across the map.
"Also, witches manipulate others to enter the barrier and are devoured; in the real world, these people are generally seen as suicides or missing, so count the suicide and missing persons into the numbers."
"No problem."
"Finally, arrange them chronologically, let’s see... Oh, this is really interesting."
"Indeed, this is really interesting."
Hearing Duanmu Huai’s amazent, Ayano also nodded solemnly. Frankly speaking, if these data are separated, they look completely unrelated. However, when those cases clustered in the sa region are divided and arranged in chronological order, a very obvious pattern erges.
"The initial deaths were all girls, none older than 18, with ages mostly between ten and sixteen."
Staring at the death cases arranged on the map, Duanmu Huai’s voice was deep.
"This really fits the characteristics of Magic Girls."
"True, never thought we’d overlook this kind of clue..."
Glaring intensely at the screen, Ayano also gritted her teeth. The reason these ca together so smoothly is simple: the intervals between these cases are not long.
Simply put, if a girl dies on August 5th, within two months after her death, the area witnesses various suicides, accidental deaths, and disappearances.
If it happens in one area, we might bla bad feng shui.
But similar situations occurring in several districts of a city, you can’t just say all suffer bad feng shui.
Moreover, since this uses internal police data, not publicly available information, these girls’ causes of death aren’t the kind used to fool the dia and families as "deaths by weakness."
Instead — cause unknown.
Yes, in each area, the first girl to die has an unknown cause of death.
This is just the result of Ayano’s analysis investigating only the data from the past few years in this city, as per Duanmu Huai’s request.
"I really didn’t expect such a terrifying thing to be lurking here for so long?! I haven’t received any similar reports!"
"That guy seems invisible to ordinary people."
Duanmu Huai recalled when he first ca to this world, being approached by QB on the street. At that ti, people were coming and going around him, but no one took a glance at the talking animal. It’s likely, just as QB said, only those who are chosen can see it... Well, for an organization like AAA, it’s certainly quite a troubleso problem.
"What should we do now? Investigate every place?"
"There’s no need to make it so complicated."
Duanmu Huai shook his head, rejecting Xitong Lingnao’s suggestion, then extended his hand and pointed to the screen.
"Take a closer look, most of these incidents lasted for one or two months and then ceased. If I’m not mistaken, the witch causing trouble here was eliminated by a magic girl, so no further incidents occurred. Therefore, even if we investigate, I estimate we wouldn’t gain much. So, I suggest doing the opposite and starting from the rear."
"The rear?"
"That’s right, roughly within this week, focus on these areas and then filter the areas where similar incidents occurred during one of these weeks again."
Soon, the map icons changed again, narrowing from several regions to two.
"What’s next?"
"Wait."
Duanmu Huai pulled a chair over, sat down, and quietly stared at the screen.
"If the witch wants to act again, these two areas will definitely see incidents of people attempting suicide or disappearing. We just need to focus on monitoring these two areas’ caras. Of course, if we happen to encounter a magic girl, that would be even better, saving us from collecting information everywhere."
"...Seems like this is the only way."
After hearing Duanmu Huai’s suggestion, Xitong Lingnao paused for a mont, realizing it indeed appeared to be a relatively reliable thod... Or rather, aside from this, they didn’t actually have a better option. After all, the witch was sothing only Duanmu Huai could deal with; Xitong Lingnao, although having defeated demons before, remained very cautious when facing these unknown monsters to avoid any mishaps.
Fortunately, such matters didn’t require two people to monitor; once conditions were given, DA staff would naturally handle it, while Duanmu Huai took advantage to switch machines, using the monitors to watch Qianshu and Mugeng shopping aimlessly.
Whether unaware of the supervision or indifferent, at least from the surface, they seed to be having a good ti. Qianshu was excited like a golden retriever, dragging Mugeng around the streets, running here and there, checking stores here and there. And every ti they ventured out, another large bag appeared—seeing this, Duanmu Huai silently breathed a sigh of relief, thankful he wasn’t there; otherwise, given Qianshu’s shopping frenzy, he might trigger PTSD and drop dead on the street.
For example, when choosing makeup, according to Duanmu Huai’s idea, one should find a store, buy everything needed, and then be done.
Yet Qianshu dragged Mugeng east to buy lipstick, west for blush, south for earrings, north for skincare... Aren’t they all costics? Is it necessary to buy from four different stores?
Buying everything in one store should suffice, right?
"Report!"
Just as Duanmu Huai was secretly complaining, suddenly, the DA staff mber responsible for monitoring the city promptly spoke up.
"There’s abnormal activity in the C-16 District!"
"Show it."
Upon hearing the report, Xitong Lingnao imdiately gave the order, and the big screen flashed, revealing a dark, narrow alley. Soon after, several n and won in suits, appearing like office workers, appeared from one end of the alley, sluggishly moving towards the other end, as if summoned by sothing.
Then... they vanished into the screen, never to be seen again.
"What’s going on?"
Seeing this scene, Xitong Lingnao also exclaid, which was understandable, because this alley had caras near both its entrance and exit, primarily used for monitoring the junction. Therefore, there was a blind spot in the middle of the alley. Although a blind spot, it actually was only a few ters. Reasonably speaking, if a person disappeared from cara A’s view, at most, they only need to take five or six steps to appear in cara B’s view.
However, these n and won disappeared from cara A’s shooting range and several minutes had passed without seeing them appear in cara B’s range!
"This, this is...!"
"Let’s go."
Before Xitong Lingnao could respond, Duanmu Huai had already stood up, heading towards the elevator.
"It’s ti to take action."
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