Miss Witch’s Devotion Has Gone… Twisted-Chapter 70: The Great Detective Loren

A week of peaceful life passed, and Luna finally mastered the techniques Loren taught her. Now she could cast many spells just by playing the flute.
Although she wasn't proficient yet, her casting speed was indeed much faster than before. Not only that, but learning new spells had also become much easier.
The second-tier spell Verdant Rapid Growth, which Luna had studied for a long time without success before, was successfully learned by Luna in just one day after seeing Loren's simplified version.
Excited, Luna made the entire yard of Loren's house grow full of crops. Later, Loren donated all these crops to the Church. He was too lazy to deal with them;
it was more convenient to just buy ready-made ones.
Another day of peaceful life, Loren was still playing with the bird. He broke the biscuits into small pieces and threw them into the air for Starnight to catch.
"Is Master Mentor here?"
"Oh ho, work's here."
Suddenly, there was a knock at the door. Loren placed the biscuit in his hand on the table and went to open the door.
However, Starnight didn't eat the biscuit left on the table. She wasn't like Anna;
she wasn't gluttonous, she just enjoyed playing with Loren.
The visitor was a nun. She wore a nun's habit, her movements were reserved, and beneath the habit were legs clad in white stockings.
If it weren't for the branches growing out of her eyes, she would be quite cute.
"Great, you're here...
"Recently, many people have gone missing in the town. The Scarecrows have all gone to the Royal Capital, and now there aren't many people left in the Church. We've investigated for a long time but couldn't figure out why, so we can only trouble you."
The nun had run all the way here. As she spoke, she bent over, panting heavily. A white fruit grew on the branch protruding from her eye, swaying with the nun's movements.
That was actually the nun's eye. This eye had many uses;
if plucked out, it would grow back again.
The plucked eye could be used as surveillance, but its shelf life wasn't long;
it would lose its function after rotting.
Another use was eating it. Consuming it provided healing effects, which was also the main method nuns used to treat the wounded.
"Alright, I'll pack up and go to the Church to find you."
Every time Loren felt daily life was going beautifully, something would suddenly pop up to remind him of this world's distortion.
"Kids, come with me to solve the case!"
It just so happened these past few days were relatively idle. Having something to do was good, and perhaps Loren could even find an opportunity to level up. After all, Loren was only one level away from unlocking his next talent.
Nothing major should happen in this small town;
otherwise, this town wouldn't have existed at the start of the game. So, when setting out, Loren didn't bring much with him, only five hundred bullets.
Loren strapped the High Explosives to his waist and set off. Except for Mirrorheart, who stayed behind to do housework, everyone else followed behind Loren.
Luna was somewhat excited. This seemed to be her first time going out with Loren, although there were quite a few people following along.
"The Church probably doesn't have many people. Those with any ability have likely all gone to the Royal Capital. Otherwise, someone of my rank wouldn't have been summoned by a nun."
Although Loren sounded a bit overconfident, he wasn't wrong. From this, Loren deduced some useful information, such as the current Church having no combat power left. A single magical beast attack could probably flatten the town.
Clearly, the Royal Capital was more important than this border town, even though half of it had already been flattened.
...
"Master Mentor, you've finally arrived."
When Loren entered the Church's chapel, only some nuns and priests were inside.
The nun at the front was the one who came to find Loren. Among those who remained, she held the highest position.
"Brief me on the situation."
Following behind Loren, Luna also enjoyed the feeling of being revered by everyone, though she was still a bit reserved. In contrast, Anna had already started ordering nuns to bring her some pastries.
As a Witch, Luna usually avoided Church members as much as possible. Today was the first time she had voluntarily entered a Church.
"Starting three days ago, people have been continuously disappearing in the town. Although this kind of thing happened before, it's been too frequent recently. Over three days, more than ten people have disappeared."
In this worldview, people disappearing occasionally was completely normal. A few might be taken by cultists of evil gods today, a few snatched by magical beasts tomorrow. However, the recent disappearances were indeed far too frequent.
So, the culprit most likely wasn't followers of the Outer Gods;
they rarely did such exhaustive, unsustainable things.
"Do the missing persons have any common characteristics?"
The nun shook her head and said:
"No, men, women, old, and young have all gone missing."
"What about the time period of the disappearances?"
Loren suddenly felt like a detective, but he knew he didn't have much talent for detective work. What he had to do was simply filter. He knew every type of creature in Finale;
he just needed to filter out which one was responsible.
"Mostly at night. It's not just people who disappeared;
the animals around them vanished too."
"Were any traces left behind?"
If it were some magical beast, traces would definitely be left. Even flying creatures couldn't leave absolutely no traces.
Now that the Scarecrows who usually protected the town had left, it was indeed a good opportunity for magical beasts to attack the town. And there weren't many creatures nearby that could take both people and animals away.
Speaking of magical beasts, Loren realized it seemed like a long time since he had seen something so... normal.
"There were no traces at all."
"No traces?"
If that were truly the case, then it was troublesome.
"Give me the list of victims..."
"Master Mentor looks so handsome when he's serious..."
Watching Loren analyze, Luna became infatuated.
"Mmm... indeed..."
Anna, her mouth stuffed full of pastries, mumbled in agreement. Upon realizing her muttering was heard, Luna suddenly let out a strange shriek, scared into taking several steps back, drawing everyone's attention.
"What's wrong? Luna."
"Uh... nothing..."
Luna bent over, covering her face as she kept backing up, finally tripping over a chair and falling to the ground.
"Hahaha, even clumsier than me."
Scarlett openly mocked Luna;
she was quite self-aware.
By the time Loren helped Luna up, she looked like she was about to faint. She was so embarrassed she wanted to die.
But just then, the nun brought the list of victims, so Loren didn't pay too much attention to Luna's reaction.
The list was very rough, containing only names, ages, genders, and occupations. Loren's requirements weren't that high;
he was just surprised to have a list at all.
"Let me see... farmer, coachman, prostitute, patrol member, merchant... Did this child also go out at night?"
"Yes."
"In that case, this missing patrol member was probably on night patrol, and the merchant visited the brothel, correct?"
"The patrol member was indeed on night patrol. I'm not sure about the merchant..."
By this point, Loren already had a general idea. These people all disappeared at night, or rather, during times when there were few people around...