She is one of the rare weak supers with an omega ability. She can give life to objects. Those objects won't become living things as they won't be able to eat or reproduce, but they will gain sentience and awareness, if only temporarily.
It is a powerful ability that can even reanimate the dead for short periods of time. But the dead are more complex than objects. Plus, they contain cell memories and identities that resist the infusion of her ability. This makes it very taxing to use her ability on corpses.
But people offer her a lot of money to keep using her ability. If she had advanced to the professional league, she would be stronger by now and wouldn't feel so tired after each use of her ability, but her ability doesn't give her the confidence to risk the danger.
Rewind, on the other hand, was filled with excitement after getting their first real lead. He said, "Let's go and catch this Jerry. I can't wait."
Count shook his head. "No, we are not. This only proves that the killer looked like Jerry. It doesn't prove that it was Jerry that killed her. It will explain why they opened the door for him and why they weren't guarded against the killer."
"Most of the particulars of the murderer fit. According to the camera in the lobby, Jerry was indeed here today and around the time of the murder. But the real Jerry is not 400 kg."
"Jerry is also not strong enough to kill one of them, much less the two of them without resistance. So there is something out of place here. In any case, we still need to confirm the identity of the killer before we go ahead."
Rewind sighed. "Fine. But you better hurry."
He didn't need to say that last part because preparations had already been made. Abel the First Curse arrived a few minutes later.
Count was already regretting picking him after the the spirit scrying technique pointed Jerry out as the killer. He felt that Thorin would have been a better fit.
But it was too late now. He had already paid the money and Abel was already on the way. So he thought it would be better to see what Abel would make out of this. Besides, failure is also useful information.
Abel was received warmly. He was an old man with a tall wooden staff as a walking stick. The staff had a round head that made it look like a club. This head looked gnarly and ancient. It looked like the bulb of a flower had dried and turned brown.
Abel was a man of few words. He went over to the two corpses to examine them. Then he picked Stella's corpse to use for the tracking.
He said, "This one had a lot of interactions and impact from the killer. There was even a special interaction of their abilities. It is quite a sight."
The old man got to work immediately. He took a piece of her corpse and fed it to the staff. This caused the round head to unfurl. It turned out to be a dead flower bulb.
At its center was an eye. It was a red eye with three pupils. The eye glowed in tandem with Abel's eyes. The two of them pulsed with red light for a few seconds. Then the corpse on the ground began to pulse too.
A red glow appeared over Stella's body. But there was one region that glowed with another light. This light was golden, and it was in the shape of a handprint.
Rewind asked in curiosity, "What's that?"
Abel replied, "That's where the killer touched the poor girl before killing her."
Rewind shook his head. "That's not possible. The blood tracking technique says the killer didn't touch either one."
Abel shrugged and said, "I don't know what to tell you. I am being paid here to do a good job, and my job is to tell you as it is. That is as it is. The killer did have physical contact with the victim. This contact is more than enough to find him or her."
Rewind wanted to argue, but Count held up a hand that stopped him. Count didn't say anything. He too was thinking about this contradiction.
Eventually he said, "It doesn't matter. We will know the whole story once the killer has been caught."
So they waited patiently and in silence for Abel to finish his work. The old man's eyes continued to pulse with a red light. This continued for a few more seconds. Then the glowing died down.
The staff curled up its petals again, hiding away the eye with three pupils. The corpse also stopped glowing.
Abel said, "You have good news and bad news."
Rewind said in a hurry, "Let's hear the good news first."
Abel shook his head. "I get to decide how to break the news, not you."
Count spoke before the matter could escalate. "Let the man do his job, Rewind."
Abel fiddled with his staff before saying, "The bad news is that you can't catch the murderer."
Then he waited for dramatic effect before continuing. "The good news is that the murderer is dead."
Count sighed in relief and stopped preparing to cover Rewind's mouth before the boy said something rude. He was relieved that the money he had spent hadn't gone to waste. He was also relieved that Rewind wouldn't have to say something untoward about Abel's skill.
But he was glad about that last one too soon. Rewind asked with skepticism, "Are you sure?"
Abel chuckled and replied, "My ability can be trusted. If I can't find the target, then it means the target is dead. The target is not hiding, as I didn't feel any resistance. He or she simply doesn't exist anymore."
"My guess is that the killer was killed soon after the murder and their body was scattered into ashes, which is why I can't even sense their corpse."