Chapter 109
They stared at each other in silence; no one spoke, no one moved. Only the whispering night wind slipping through the gaps of the wooden walls and the distant chirping of crickets bore witness to this strange moment.
Arya, who had been standing frozen for some time, observing every movement Nirma made with a mixture of admiration and confusion, finally could not restrain himself any longer.
"Nirma," he called, his voice slightly hoarse from remaining silent for too long.
"What exactly are you doing? You handed our investigation notes to the six suspects, you stared at that empty roof for hours, and now you're just standing here with that mysterious smile. I don't understand, Nirma. Explain it to me."
Nirma slowly turned her head. Her faint smile still blossomed on her lips, and beneath the dimming lantern light her face looked like a living ancient painting—beautiful, mysterious, and filled with riddles.
"Arya," she replied softly, "I just slipped a small little game into the message we sent to the six potential suspects. Nothing obvious. Nothing they would notice at first glance. But if one of them truly is the murderer we're searching for, if they have something they must hide, then that little game will provoke a reaction. And if we are fortunate—if the mystery within this Kapeleion truly unravels tonight—then we will see how the murderer behaves. The murderer who not only took the life of Étienne d'Arques, but also seventeen others, most of whom were crusader soldiers, will reveal himself through the way he responds to the letter we sent."
Arya opened his mouth to ask more, but Nirma had already stepped past him, walking toward the darker, more concealed corner of the Kapeleion.
Arya turned and followed behind her, his eyes fixed on the slender shadow that moved gracefully between stacks of wood and sacks of wheat.
Nirma stopped near a moss-covered brick wall. She glanced around as if searching for something, and then, without warning, she tossed something toward Arya—a small brown object, the size of a date seed, which Arya caught with a quick reflex.
Arya stared at the object in his hand, frowning slightly, then lifted his gaze toward Nirma with a questioning look.
"What is this?" he asked, turning the object between his thumb and index finger.
Nirma's smile widened. One of her eyes glimmered faintly in the darkness, and when she spoke, her voice sounded like a whisper from a distant future.
"That, Arya, is the key to why we have remained trapped in this investigation for so long. We have been investigating this case through the lens of investigators from the year 1101 AD. We think like people of the Middle Ages, act like people of the Middle Ages, and use the methods available in the Middle Ages."
"But we are not people of the Middle Ages, Arya. We are time travelers. We came from a distant future, carrying technology that the people of this era could never even imagine. And we forgot to use it."
Arya blinked.
Once.
Twice.
His eyes remained fixed on the object in his hand—something he had previously assumed was nothing more than an ordinary date seed.
Slowly, understanding began to seep into his mind like water soaking into dry soil.
Nirma was indirectly telling him that even though this case took place in a Byzantine city in the year 1101 AD, it did not mean the investigation had to rely solely on the primitive methods of that era.
They possessed advanced technology from the 34th century—technology they should have used from the very beginning. Technology that would allow them to see what the naked eye could not see, hear what ordinary ears could not hear, and analyze what even all the investigators of the Middle Ages combined could never analyze.
Arya swallowed, his fingers gripping the object more tightly, and without further hesitation he pressed it firmly.
A soft click sounded—so faint it was almost inaudible—and in an instant the object transformed. It expanded, unfolding into a pair of glowing red holographic glasses that hovered precisely before his eyes.
Arya adjusted the holographic glasses on his face, feeling the thin frame made of light particles wrap perfectly behind his ears. It felt nothing like a foreign object, even though in truth it was technology from twelve hundred years in the future.
He blinked several times, adjusting to the streams of data now flowing into his optic nerves—air temperature, humidity, the composition of dust particles floating around him, even his own heartbeat displayed in the lower-right corner of his vision.
Then a gentle voice sounded directly inside his head—not in his ears, but somewhere deeper, more personal, like his own thoughts suddenly speaking with the neutral accent of the 34th century.
"Synchronization under the name Arya Wiratama. Identity verified. Full access granted. Welcome to work, Investigator Arya."
Without needing any command, the glasses began scanning the entire area of the Kapeleion, emitting invisible micro-waves capable of penetrating every gap, every pore of the wall, every particle of soil, every molecule of air left behind from the night of the murder.
Data flooded Arya's vision—thousands, tens of thousands, millions of points of information interconnecting with one another, forming patterns that could only be understood by the artificial intelligence embedded within the glasses.
And then, after a few seconds that felt like hours, the glasses began to visualize something.
In front of Arya, in the empty space between him and the brick wall, a hologram suddenly appeared—faint and transparent, like a ghost made of light and mist—showing fragments of scenes from the past.
Arya inhaled sharply. His hand reflexively reached for the floating virtual buttons beside his temple, pressing them one by one with subtle movements only he noticed.
The scene began to rotate. Not moving forward, but backward, like a reel of film rapidly rewinding.
Arya saw faint shadows passing around him—the Prefect's soldiers who had arrived after the murder, curious merchants, neighbors peeking through their doors. Everything moved in reverse, walking backward, returning to the positions they had occupied before everything happened.
Arya pressed another button, slowing the rotation. And as he approached the moment just minutes before the murder of Étienne d'Arques, he pressed the pause button.
The hologram froze, suspending time at a single point. Arya could clearly see—still faint, still transparent, but real enough to send chills along his spine—a shadowy figure standing in the corner of the alley, leaning against a pile of firewood, waiting.
His face could not be seen, hidden beneath the hood of his loose cloak. But Arya could see his posture—the way he stood with his weight resting on his left foot, the way one hand held something long and sharp.
Perhaps a knife.
Perhaps a short sword.
Perhaps another weapon.
Arya pressed the play button again, and the scene began to move forward slowly.
Another shadow emerged from inside the tavern—a man with striking hair even in the black-and-white hologram, with the firm posture of a Frankish soldier, and steps slightly unsteady from the effects of cheap wine.
Étienne d'Arques.
The victim.
The man stepped out from the back door of the Kapeleion, adjusting his belt before walking toward the dark alley—perhaps to relieve himself, perhaps to seek fresh air, perhaps to meet someone who had already been waiting for him.
To be continued…