The apartment is silent except for the ticking kitchen clock and sirens swelling beyond the rain-streaked windows. A body lies beneath a sheet near the sitting-room desk.
Beside it, a locked case gapes open. Empty folders and torn paper remain inside, but the blackmail photographs and letters are gone.
The Family Lawyer stands over the scene, one hand gripping the case lid. He turns sharply as Ace enters, blocking the quickest path to the desk.
Harold Pike
You arrived after the door was forced, but before the police. Someone was already here.
Harold Pike
Harold Pike. That is my name, and I represent the family. I touched nothing except the case, trying to see what had been taken.
Ace
The case was locked, yet the lock shows no fresh damage.
A siren cuts off outside. Pike steps aside from the desk, revealing a faint wet footprint between the open case and the apartment door.
Harold Pike
Tell me what you see, Ace. The officers will want an explanation, and I need to know whether that footprint belongs to the killer.
✓ Quest Accepted
Confirm the corpse's identity
✓ Quest Accepted
Identify who stole the blackmail photographs and letters
“I inspect the wet footprint without disturbing it.”
SUCCESS (Legendary Perception, rolled -1)
Ace lowers his gaze and studies the footprint from the edge of the floorboards, careful not to let his shoes cross its outline.
The print is sharp enough to show a broken chevron tread and a narrow smooth patch along the outer heel. Rainwater still beads inside the impressions.
Ace
The tread is fresh, but the shoe was already worn before it came inside.
A second detail emerges. The sole carried a pale grit that does not match the apartment's clean entry tiles. Tiny grains lie in the deepest grooves.
Harold Pike
That tells you where they came from?
Pike shifts his weight away from the desk, exposing the footprint's line. It points from the door to the case, then stops. No matching print leads toward the body.
Outside, tires hiss over wet pavement. Pike glances toward the windows, then back to the undisturbed evidence.
Harold Pike
The police are turning onto this street. Do you follow the grit, or examine the body before they seal the room?
“I examine the corpse before police arrive”
SUCCESS (Legendary Perception, rolled +1)
Ace crosses to the covered body without disturbing the footprint. He lifts the sheet from the shoulders and folds it back just far enough to inspect the face, hands, and clothing.
The face matches the framed photographs Pike keeps on the mantel. An old surgical scar crosses the left wrist, and a signet ring bears the same Pike family crest as the identification papers on the desk.
Harold Pike
That scar was from a childhood operation. The ring is his. There is no mistake. This is Martin Vale.
Pike steps closer, then stops himself at the edge of the clean floor. His certainty settles the immediate question: the corpse is genuinely Martin Vale, not a substituted body.
Ace
The corpse's identity is genuine.
The police siren swells outside. On the corpse's damp sleeve, Ace spots a dusting of the same pale grit found in the footprint, caught beneath the cuff where rain could not reach it.
Harold Pike
They are at the entrance. Do you preserve that grit for them, or go back to the footprint before anyone crosses it?
Quest Complete
Confirm the corpse's identity
Skill Upgrade: Stealth Mediocre