According to Aiwass's memories in this life, Minister Drost was a friend of Old Moriarty. They had a fairly good personal relationship.
He was a loyal minister of the queen's faction with real power, and he had a very good relationship with the Moriarty Family. Moreover, he was a minister with strong work ability, integrity, and no desire for power. Without sufficient evidence, such a pillar of the kingdom would definitely be immovable—even with evidence, it might not be possible to move him directly.
"Strong work ability, integrity, and no desire for power..."
Aiwass silently chewed over the key words associated with Old Drost in his mind.
He had felt that something was wrong before, but because of Lily, this walking black history, he hadn't come to realize it.
Now that he thought about it, Minister Drost seemed a little too perfect outside his private life:
An official with strong work ability and integrity would have some ambition to move up; an official with strong work ability who doesn't plan to advance any further would hardly be very upright; and an upright official without the desire for power usually wouldn't have much ability to speak of.
This was basically an impossible triangle, yet Old Drost met all three conditions.
No wonder. It made sense if he was an internal spy.
...Could it be that Old Drost was also one of the chess pieces controlled by Moriarty?
Seated in a wheelchair, Aiwass rhythmically tapped his fingers on the armrest as he fell into deep thought.
On the other hand, Director Gordon of the Supervisory Bureau, along with his men, was conducting a thorough search of every individual on the second floor of the White Ballet Shoes Club.
He took Aiwass's advice very seriously. Therefore, he brought two of the most experienced inspectors to personally check whether there were any documents hidden in the packages or personal belongings of all the members.
Standing quietly in the corner, Croix gently pushed her glasses, unnoticed by anyone.
She had a beautiful and dazzling appearance, along with a head of caramel-colored short curly hair that gave a warm and sweet impression. At this moment, she was not wearing a school uniform but a backless white dress suitable for summer or parties, adorned with the badge of the Crystal Ballet Shoes.
In the early winter of November, such attire was bound to make a lasting impression.
But everyone around Croix acted as if they had not seen her at all. Influenced by her glasses, her appearance and clothing seemed ordinary.
It was as if she was no different from anyone else. The moment one's gaze left her, her presence became impossible to detect again, just like a fleeting illusion.
Croix, holding a stack of books in her arms, hid in the corner and quietly watched everything unfold.
...There are capable people in the Supervisory Bureau.
No, to be precise, it was the young man named Aiwass Moriarty who was somewhat miraculous, Croix thought to herself.
Until just now, the situation had been under Croix's control.
If she hadn't used "Hawk Feather" but simply poisoned him, Avalonians would have had a hard time realizing that Secretary Raff had been killed by a professional assassin. If she had poisoned him in Raff's house, the outcome would probably have been the same—the cause of his death would have been covered up by the Minister of Commerce.
And her mission as an assassin was to make Raff's death conspicuous, to let him die in a suspicious manner in full view of everyone.
Because of Raff's unique cause of death and the documents he left behind, the Avalonians will start to suspect that Raff was engaged in intelligence trading with foreigners, and that he was immediately silenced after giving away crucial information.
Then, they will begin to investigate those documents.
Although the documents are mainly composed of coded language, Croix believes in the young man from the Hermes family's analytical and decoding abilities. He has already exposed the "Sweater Brothers Association" and discovered some alchemical bombs. It is presumed that he will soon realize that these documents must be connected to the smuggling case at the port.
After that, the Minister of Commerce will naturally be implicated. His connections with the Star Antimony people may be discovered, and even other ministers with connections to Star Antimony could be uncovered as well.
And this is the task of Croix as a spy.
Although for the Iris Kingdom, neither Avalon nor Star Antimony are desirable, it is crucial for the Iris Kingdom right now that Avalon does not encounter problems at this point in time.
They need to maintain hostility between Avalon and Star Antimony as much as possible, but at the same time, they need to keep a balance between the two. They must ensure they do not enter a state of war, yet still continuously weaken the strength of both nations. Enjoy exclusive chapters from мѵʟ
In Avalon, there are quite a few spies like her who have infiltrated.
Their goal is to alleviate the Avalonians' hostility toward the Irisflower People within Avalon's territory, and to increase their hatred towards the Star Antimony people. At the right moment, help those knights who are bound by their armor to break free from the many restraints entangling them—
The knights of Avalon are limited by their Path binding and must follow orders; they are also bound by their loyalty oaths and cannot harm the royal family.
But in fact, as long as they do not harbor thoughts of "usurpation," they will not stray from their Path.
In other words, they just cannot attempt to seize royal power.
So, as long as the royal family continues to exist but loses their power to control them, that is sufficient.
The knights can then take off their armor and, following the example of the Iris Flower, form a cabinet.
The power belonging to the Path of Authority is ultimately top-down and oppressive—the mystical skills of the Path of Authority are "leadership" and "speech," and have nothing to do with loyalty.
Even if some knights willingly submit to the royal family from their hearts... if someone kindly helps them break free from their restraints, they surely will not feel distressed by it.
Just as the Path of Beauty may lean towards Balance or the Path of Dusk, the Path of Authority may also converge towards Transcendence and Love.
Power grows ambition and amplifies desires. She knows all too well how to handle those inclined toward love.
Croix's main task is to propagate the dangers and horrors of the Son of the Moon in Avalon.
This is to prepare in advance for the possibility that the Son of the Moon may join Avalon after being expelled by the Iris Kingdom.
Then a few days ago, she suddenly received a task from her superiors—
The superiors asked her to find a way to thwart the conspiracies of the Star Antimony Kingdom and to expose the Minister of Commerce as much as possible, or at the very least force him into a dormant state. As a lead, her superiors gave her the name "Raff" and a way to contact him.
She managed to steal the "Noble Red" ring stored in the Supervisory Bureau, and she swapped it out for a fake. She used it to forge her identity and sent the ring along with a letter for an urgent meeting to Secretary Raff, arranging a meeting here.
Fortunately, the "Sweater Brothers Association" stronghold was discovered by Sherlock Hermes; otherwise, it would have been quite difficult for her to arrange the meeting.
With great effort, she managed to lure out Secretary Raff, who was carrying the documents.
...It would have been better if Aiwass hadn't shown up here today.
Croix furrowed her brows.
She had, in fact, just seen Princess Isabel. For safety's sake, it would probably be best for her not to take action.
But she was not a member of the Noble Red Society after all, and if Secretary Raff went back and communicated with the Minister of Commerce, it would be easy for him to see through her false identity. It would then become more difficult to arrange another public meeting with him.
So after thinking it over, she decided to take a risk.
It was a risk, but undoubtedly also a rare opportunity.
Since this matter involved the safety of the princess herself, with an unidentified Transcendent assassin infiltrating the club... Raff would inevitably be thoroughly investigated.
What Croix did not expect was that Aiwass instantly realized she might have taken some of the documents.
The power of a Transcendent from the Path of Adaptation allowed her to conceal her presence, as well as to listen to conversations clearly from such a distance.
Her mind was filled with doubts and amazement.
—How had Aiwass figured it out?
Taking part of the documents had been an impromptu decision on her part.
Because Princess Isabel was there, Croix worried that the Minister of Commerce would react too swiftly and immediately arrange for all the documents to be secured. Hence, she deliberately left part of them behind as evidence.
The documents had scattered everywhere when Raff fell, so it would not be unusual for one or two pages to go missing. Perhaps someone at the scene had stolen them.
If the Minister of Commerce tidied up the situation cleanly, Croix could anonymously publish the documents she had secreted away. This would continue to pressure the Minister of Commerce.
Doubts filled her heart.
Before acting, Croix had also carefully thought through her actions with a detective's reasoning.
Logically, if someone wanted to silence Raff to obtain information, they could have taken all the documents. Taking only part and leaving the rest would make their actions more conspicuous; such behavior would not make sense and did not align with primary interests. But if they took everything, the Supervisory Bureau might have to investigate for a while before they noticed the documents were missing...
So from that perspective, if Aiwass was truly a competent detective, he should have dismissed the possibility that someone had silenced Raff after trading information and should have considered the problem to be more complicated.
—Yet Aiwass had indeed stopped at that point, requesting Director Gordon to check their documents.
No, do you really have a clue?
Raff falling with a pile of documents was conspicuously unnatural. Would a real assassin make such a rudimentary mistake?
From the viewpoint of Croix, who knew everything, it was clear to her that Aiwass' reasoning was conspicuously unnatural.
Was he truly all reputation and no substance?
Yet if that were the case, why would he actively interfere with Director Gordon's investigation?
He even directly mentioned that the documents were in the books—as if he had seen her actions firsthand.
Because she had indeed hidden the documents inside a book.
The information itself was coded. If it was just one or two pages, folding them up and placing them inside a book would prevent them from being easily noticed.
No one ever steals just one or two pages from a stack of documents when stealing information. If Director Gordon had investigated on his own, his experience would definitely tell him that this was impossible.
Yet Aiwass had convinced Director Gordon to come up and search personally.
That was problematic.
The biggest issue here was that Gordon was very strong.
Her glasses were enchanted with the ongoing spell of "Unseeable" from the Path of Authority, granting her the ability to go undetected by people's gazes. Those inspectors with lower energy levels couldn't see her at all, just as the club members couldn't see who had killed the secretary.
Gordon might not be able to defeat her, but his strength was comparable to hers. Plus, he was a true Transcendent of the Path of Authority.
He might see through her psychologically hidden presence.
Although as a top-tier agent, Croix was confident that Gordon wouldn't be able to kill her. In a one-on-one situation, she was likely to kill him quickly.
But she had also heard that there was a large detachment of Sky Cavalry outside.
She did not want to run into those military folks.
However, due to Aiwass's instructions, Gordon had already come to search personally.
Croix couldn't move now. Any motion would be detected, and Gordon would become aware of her presence as he came close. Unless Gordon turned around and left before getting to her, it could be said that she was already exposed.
However, Croix was not very nervous.
Because she still had a trump card!
Even though the Sky Cavalry completely surrounded the outside, making it impossible for her to break through directly, as a Transcendent from the Path of Adaptation and an elite assassin, she had plenty of ways to survive should she fail to infiltrate.
With that in mind, she looked towards Aiwass.
Before Gordon got close, Croix pushed her glasses up again. Holding a pile of books, her body quietly melted into a dense shadow.
This was the characteristic of her path, the thrice-chosen "Shadow Affinity."
—It was also the reason for Croix's confidence that she would definitely be able to escape.