Chapter 174: Leonard’s Reminder

Chapter 174: Leonard’s Reminder

Backlund, North Borough.

On a night when the red moon was hidden behind layered clouds, everywhere was pitch black. Only the gas streetlamps lining the sides of the road gave off a little light, illuminating the path ahead and the doorways of the nearby houses.

The mailbox at 7 Pinster Street quietly hid on the boundary between light and darkness, bathed in the cool wind blowing from the side, as though it had already fallen asleep.

At that very moment, its delivery slot suddenly poured out newspapers, bills, and letters from who knew whom.

These things seemed supported by invisible hands. They floated in midair, flew toward the door, and slipped inside through the cracks.

Inside the house, in the entrance hall, the newspapers unfolded on their own and quickly flipped through themselves until the final pages. Then they casually fell onto a chair, stacked together with others of the same kind from before.

The bills and incoming letters continued flying inward, entering the living room. The former soon stopped, shook themselves several times, then drifted unsteadily onto the surface of the tea table, arranging themselves in neat order. The latter, those with envelopes, removed them, while those without envelopes swiftly opened themselves and displayed their bodies in midair.

After some time, some of these letters flew to the shelves in the first-floor study. Others rushed toward scissors, helped the scissors cut themselves into pieces, then lined up and flooded into the washroom, throwing themselves into the toilet.

Splash!

The toilet’s mechanical button pressed itself down, flushing the paper fragments into the sewer.

7 Pinster Street thereupon returned to normal, quiet like any other house without inhabitants.

Southern Continent, East Balam, City of Gurain.

Leonard Mitchell, who had arrived here not long ago, was resting in the residence arranged by the local Evernight Church.

Suddenly, the slightly aged voice in his mind sounded:

“Kid, you have an important letter.”

“What letter?” Leonard asked in a low voice. At the same time, a guess had already formed in his heart.

There was only one person—no, two—who would send an important letter to 7 Pinster Street yet not care whether anyone was there:

Klein Moretti and Dawn Dantes.

As for why the old man named Pallez Zoroast could read the contents of those letters received at 7 Pinster Street clearly despite being separated by the Berserk Sea and half the Northern Continent, Leonard could more or less guess. After all, he had once helped the old man catch a ghost.

His judgment on this was:

The old man had definitely split off a Worm of Time and parasitized it within that ghost, making it his eyes, ears, and mouth left on the Northern Continent.

At that moment, Pallez Zoroast answered the question he had asked.

“A letter from Klein Moretti. He says Dawn Dantes discovered traces of Ince Zangwill on Midway Island in the Berserk Sea while traveling to the Southern Continent.”

Leonard instantly fell silent. His mouth opened, but he failed to say a single word.

After a long time, he finally whispered in a slightly hoarse voice, “He really has not forgotten revenge…

“What can I do?”

“What can you do? You are only Sequence 6. Even if Ince Zangwill did not possess 0-08, you still would not be qualified to take revenge on him. He only needs to partially reveal his mythical creature form, and you would lose control on the spot or become a madman. Your chance of successfully taking revenge is zero! That is the qualitative change divinity brings,” Pallez Zoroast said in a rather serious tone.

He paused, then chuckled.

“Fortunately, compared with before, you can recognize yourself more clearly. In the past, you would definitely have said, ‘I want to pass Ince Zangwill’s intelligence to the Church and join the pursuit and capture team.’ Now, you understand enough to ask what you can do.”

Leonard wanted to retort several times, but he never spoke.

Pallez Zoroast continued, “What you can currently do is give Klein Moretti some intelligence, wait for him to reply to you, then coordinate according to the arrangements inside.”

“Not find an excuse to inform the Church of Ince Zangwill’s whereabouts?” Leonard asked in a low voice, rather astonished.

Pallez Zoroast chuckled.

“There is no need to rush. Do that at the critical moment.

“Although 0-08 very much enjoys killing its owner, it is even less willing to return to a sealed state. As soon as you inform the Church of Ince Zangwill’s whereabouts and launch the corresponding pursuit, it will immediately know and make sufficient arrangements.

“This is something you must remind Klein Moretti of.”

Leonard froze for a second.

“Old man, you seem very familiar with 0-08.”

You never showed that before!

Pallez’s slightly aged voice laughed once.

“Of course I am very familiar. In the Fourth Epoch, 0-08 caused the fall of an angel.

“I cannot tell you too much, because if you know about it, it also knows about you. The more you understand it, the more likely you are to become a character in the story.”

From the old man’s vague words, Leonard truly tasted the terror of 0-08. This had already surpassed the mysticism he could understand.

After thinking for a moment, Leonard asked out of habit, “Then how should I remind Klein Moretti without letting 0-08 know, or so that even if it knows, it will only possess a shallow understanding of me, merely making me a passerby in the story…”

Before he finished speaking, Leonard’s hands clenched. He gritted his teeth, not waiting for the old man to answer, and spoke to himself:

“A side hint? Tell him that I will temporarily not pass Ince Zangwill’s whereabouts to the Church… I think he should be able to understand from this that there is a certain problem here and realize that we must be more cautious than cautious. Even if he cannot interpret it, that hidden organization of his has members who understand the Fourth Epoch well enough to provide help.

“Also, write one normal sentence: ‘If you know about it, it also knows about you.’ Do not mention 0-08. Use the pronoun so that Klein can guess what it specifically points to…”

Pallez Zoroast quietly listened to the end, then laughed in a low voice.

“People really do need pressure to grow.”

Leonard exhaled, rolled over, and sat up. He found paper and pen and wrote the meaning he had just considered into a letter.

Immediately afterward, he arranged a ritual and summoned Gehrman Sparrow’s messenger.

…

Berserk Sea, Midway Island, aboard a passenger liner moored at the pier.

Many travelers had not disembarked. They were curled up inside the lower-deck cabins, waiting to arrive at the Southern Continent and begin a new life filled with hope.

—Even the fare for only a few days had been extremely difficult for them to scrape together. They belonged to the Loen citizens who had been forced into this risk by circumstances.

Klein, playing the millionaire Dawn Dantes, was different from them. He stayed inside a spacious, clean, almost luxurious first-class cabin and, by candlelight, opened the letter Reinette Tinekerr had just delivered.

“Temporarily will not inform the Church of Ince Zangwill’s whereabouts… For Leonard, although the source of the intelligence would make him bear a certain level of risk, it is nowhere near impossible to do… Did he not join the Red Gloves precisely for revenge? In other words, he has a reason he cannot report Ince Zangwill now…”

As Klein thought, he looked at the remaining contents of the letter.

“If you know about it, it also knows about you.”

Suddenly, Klein gave an “Eh.” He felt that this description was somewhat familiar!

“This is very similar to the Twilight Hermit Order. Whenever it is spoken, it will be known… So, 0-08 is a sealed artifact of the Spectator pathway? Leonard is not informing the Church because he has concerns in this respect and wants to wait for a better opportunity? This should be something the old grandfather inside him told him…”

Klein nodded thoughtfully, somewhat glad that he had not opened his mouth earlier to ask Reinette Tinekerr for help.

For Miss Messenger, this was likewise a very dangerous matter.

“Moreover, most importantly, I have not prepared anything yet. If I rely only on helpers I invite, the plan will very likely be detected by 0-08 in advance, causing it to manufacture a series of coincidences and make targeted arrangements…”

Klein sighed soundlessly. He felt he should do something, yet he did not know where to begin.

From the perspective of improving his own strength, obtaining the corresponding ingredients from the Bizarro Bane and the Spirit World Plunderer depended on the City of Silver’s Chief making a later request, and on how long it would take Miss Magician to obtain the specific location coordinates from her teacher. All of that belonged to external factors. It was not something Klein could accelerate simply by wishing.

The only thing he could do was digest the Marionettist potion as quickly as possible.

And now that the “acting rules” were almost fully summarized, actual operation had become even more important.

Therefore, Klein believed it was necessary for him to obtain two marionettes within a short period of time!

He had been dragging the matter out earlier because there had been no suitable targets, and because he was in Backlund, surrounded by a group of servants. Unless the marionettes were special, concealing their existence would have been very difficult. Now, however, he was almost at the Southern Continent. He decided that no matter what, so long as he confirmed that someone was a villain deserving the gallows, he would first turn them into his marionette, and replace them later if he found a better target.

Perhaps using ordinary marionettes to accomplish difficult things could also accelerate digestion… Heh, my requirements for marionettes have now dropped to the lowest point. As long as they understand Dutanese, that is enough. Then I will not need to find another translator. In any case, I can share their senses…

Klein quickly made a decision, planning to write again to Leonard Mitchell once he had a more complete plan.

…

East Balam, City of Gurain.

Carrying his suitcase, Klein stepped onto the pier and onto the Southern Continent’s soil.

He gazed toward the layered city built against the mountain and silently said in his heart:

“When I leave this place, I must have two marionettes.”

Before that, however, he still had one thing to do: shake off the hidden “followers” the military had arranged.

The spy skills of those two gentlemen were actually quite good. But in Klein’s eyes, they were as conspicuous as fireflies in the night, because no matter how they disguised or changed themselves, Klein could still rely on a Faceless’s ability to observe and remember human bodily features and facial characteristics, recognizing them at a glance.