Chapter 155: An Urgent Meeting

Chapter One Hundred Fifty-Five
An Urgent Meeting

After settling his emotions, Klein went underground and arrived outside Chanis Gate. He knocked on the open doorway of the guard room.

Royale Reideen, seated inside, had long since packed up her personal belongings. Seeing her relief arrive, she immediately smoothed her hair and stood, preparing to leave.

After the two nodded at each other in greeting, Klein suddenly spoke.

“My progress in mastering the potion has been rather good. I just shared my experience with Frye and the others. You can go speak with them.”

Royale, who usually had no expression, looked at him with slight surprise. Her lips moved several times before she answered, “All right.”

Madam, I hope you can still maintain that calm after a while… Right now there is a roomful of wooden people sitting in the recreation room…

Klein smiled and walked behind the desk. With practiced ease, he picked up the silver-inlaid tin can Dunn Smith used to store Fermo coffee.

After preparing a cup of rich, fragrant coffee, Klein sat down leisurely, gazing at the silent, empty passage outside the door and allowing his thoughts to drift.

“I hope everything goes smoothly with Mr. Azik’s actions, and that he leaves no clues… No. Even if there are clues, I will pretend I did not find them…

“I wonder where the Mutated Sun Sacred Emblem is sealed behind Chanis Gate… Mm. It does not possess living characteristics, so leaving enough space should be fine…

“Speaking of which, I still have not been inside Chanis Gate. I have no idea what it is like in there… To be able to keep those dozens of large and small, bizarre and strange Sealed Artifacts from causing harm or escaping supervision, there must be something unusual about the place. For example, Saint Selena’s ashes?”

…

As all kinds of thoughts tumbled through his mind, Klein suddenly heard hurried footsteps. He quickly pulled his attention back and looked toward the door.

He saw Old Neil, wearing a black classical robe and holding a felt hat of the same color, appear in the passage. The old gentleman quickly entered the guard room, stood opposite him, and without saying a word began examining him from top to bottom.

“…Mr. Neil, did something happen?”

Klein laughed dryly twice and raised the fragrant coffee for a sip.

Old Neil studied him a few more times, then sighed.

“You actually drew inspiration from the Mystery Pryers’ maxim and Daly’s case…”

“For this, praise the Goddess, and thank you for your teachings,” Klein answered with complete seriousness.

Old Neil dragged out a chair with a creak and sat down heavily. Looking rather dispirited, he said, “If—if only it had been twenty years earlier. Twenty years earlier…”

Knowing that Old Neil’s age and physical condition no longer permitted him to consume another potion, even if he had completely digested his current one, Klein remained silent and did not speak.

He felt that anything he said in such circumstances would only irritate the man.

“At the beginning, I also tried to find a way from the Mystery Pryer’s maxim to master my potion more quickly. Unfortunately, I was never able to reach the correct path. Later, Daly’s success did give me some inspiration, but by then, I was already over fifty. I had already given up trying. Subconsciously, I believed it was the special nature of a genius, something ordinary people could not imitate.”

Old Neil rubbed the corner of his brow and described his loss in a low voice.

He remained silent for several minutes. Then he raised his head and looked at Klein.

“What a pity. I have only realized at this age what exactly I missed.”

Old Neil should have had some blurry understanding of the acting method. Once my shared experience nudged him, he immediately understood a few things…

Klein comforted him.

“In truth, it would not have made too great a difference. The Church does not have the Sequence 8 corresponding to Mystery Pryer.”

“Perhaps the Sanctuary does… No. If they did, they would at least tell the branch the name… The underground market is not impossible either…”

Old Neil murmured a few sentences, propped himself up against the table, stood, and shook his head with a smile.

“At least I have not lost control. I have lived soundly for decades… Praise the Goddess.”

He drew a crimson moon over his chest. With a gloomy expression, he left the guard room, his usual slyness gone.

Klein watched his back disappear from sight and suddenly let out a long sigh.

He increasingly could not understand why the Church’s upper ranks had to keep the acting method sealed away.

After a long while, Klein recovered and turned his attention toward the Nighthawks’ internal materials before him.

Ever since he had pulled the boy from the City of Silver into the Tarot Club and learned that many things there still preserved ancient names, Klein had consciously strengthened his studies in that area, working hard to master the correspondences between ancient and modern names for different objects.

At some unknown point, he again heard footsteps—steady, unhurried footsteps.

Almost simultaneously, the image of Dunn Smith wearing his black knee-length windbreaker appeared in his mind.

Now that I have completely digested the Seer potion, my spiritual intuition has also improved…

Klein nodded thoughtfully. A few seconds later, he saw the Captain.

“Your letter.”

Dunn raised his right hand, flicked his wrist, and tossed the letter in his palm toward Klein.

Klein raised a hand elegantly, attempting to catch it. But his judgment and reaction were both just a little short.

Pap!

The letter fell to the floor. Klein’s right hand remained awkwardly raised in the air.

In the suddenly quiet atmosphere, his right hand first froze, then continued upward, conveniently smoothing his hair.

“The glow of the gas lamp still is not bright enough,” Klein casually bluffed. He bent down, picked up the letter, and glanced at the envelope.

Mr. Hornacis… A letter from Daxter Guderian…

He came to a realization, nodded, opened the drawer, and took out a letter opener.

According to the Nighthawk team’s rules, if there was a clear and correct recipient, Rozanne and the other civilian staff would hand the letter directly to that person. If the recipient was anonymous or could not be found, it would be sent to Dunn, who would make inquiries or decide what to do.

Carefully cutting open the envelope, Klein pulled out the paper inside, unfolded it swiftly, and scanned the contents.

He discovered that Daxter, the asylum doctor, was requesting a meeting as quickly as possible—at two o’clock that very afternoon.

Has he obtained the Telepathist formula? Or is it some other matter?

Klein lifted the letter paper in his hand, looked up at Dunn, and said, “Captain, my informant—the one from the Psychology Alchemists—wants to meet at two this afternoon.”

“Did he reveal what it is about?” Dunn asked, as though he had anticipated this.

“No.”

Klein shook his head.

Dunn thought for a moment, then said in his mellow voice, “Later, let Leonard take over guarding Chanis Gate for you temporarily. I will follow you there and hide nearby. This sort of urgent meeting request carries a considerable possibility of being a trap. I have seen and heard far too many similar cases. And if there truly is important information, this will also allow us to act at the greatest speed.”

…Captain, you really are experienced… Mm. Whenever it comes to proper business, you are a reliable, trustworthy Captain who forgets nothing…

Klein nodded at once.

“All right!”

…

At two o’clock in the afternoon, inside small shooting range Number 9 of Zouteland Street Shooting Club.

Klein glanced at the bullet-riddled target, then looked toward the asylum doctor, Daxter Guderian, who seemed noticeably uneasy.

“What happened that made you hurry in such panic to the Hound Pub to look for a mercenary team?”

Only through that method would Wright, the owner of the Hound Pub, immediately deliver the letter to Blackthorn Security Company instead of waiting for Klein to go collect it himself.

Daxter observed Klein’s subtle expression and body movements. In a deep voice, he answered, “I feel that Hood Eugen has been somewhat abnormal recently.”

Hood Eugen was the asylum patient who had developed Daxter into a member of the Psychology Alchemists.

“What abnormal behavior has he shown?” Klein asked with admirable professionalism.

Daxter secretly released a breath, as though he had found support. Choosing his words, he said, “He—he seems, seems to have truly gone mad…”

“Truly gone mad?” Klein asked back in astonishment.

Had Hood Eugen not pretended to be ill and infiltrated the asylum in order to train corresponding abilities of the mind domain, influencing those patients from both positive and negative angles?

He had actually become sick—actually gone insane?

“I believe so…” Daxter paced anxiously back and forth. “Previously, I could communicate with him normally and receive instruction on how to use my Beyonder abilities correctly. But over the past few days, his thoughts and his state have become very strange. Often, there is no way to communicate with him—just like when I face the other patients. Although, although this did allow me to successfully obtain the Telepathist formula, I cannot confirm whether it is true or false, and I am even more afraid of uncontrollable changes.”

No problem. As a diviner—especially one with the mysterious space above the gray fog—truth and falsehood will not be confused…

Klein first relaxed. Then he frowned and asked, “Before he became abnormal, whom did he come into contact with?”

“Only those patients. I—I cannot be certain. I am not at the asylum every day, every hour. I also have time off.”

Daxter’s expression was grave as he answered.

Klein lightly nodded, looking as though this was only a minor matter.

“Do not be nervous. I will send people to protect you from the shadows. You should figure out as quickly as possible whom Hood Eugen came into contact with beforehand. In addition, you must be careful that he might be testing you. Uh, it would be best if you also report this matter to other members of the Psychology Alchemists and see how your organization’s upper ranks respond.”

“All right.”

Daxter pushed up his gold-rimmed spectacles and regained the calm peculiar to a Spectator. Then he took a sheet of paper from his pocket and handed it to Klein.

“This is the Telepathist potion formula. I am not certain whether it is correct.”

“We will verify it,” Klein answered with a smile. He unfolded it on the spot and glanced at it.

“Main ingredients: the complete pituitary gland of an adult Seven-Colored Lizard Dragon; ten milliliters of spinal fluid from a Farsman rabbit.

“Supplementary ingredients: five grams of chestnut sprout spores, eight grams of dragon-tooth grass powder, three petals of pure white elf flower, and one hundred milliliters of pure water.”

“Excellent.”

Klein offered praise, then folded the paper neatly and placed it in the inner pocket of his tailcoat.

After exchanging a few more words and confirming that Daxter’s “auditory hallucinations” had improved, he said farewell and left. Cautiously, he proceeded to the shooting range belonging exclusively to the Nighthawks, where Dunn Smith was waiting inside.

“Captain, my informant gave me the Telepathist formula as thanks for helping him control the potion’s backlash, but he is not certain whether this formula is true or false.”

Klein passed the paper to Dunn with proper seriousness.

“In addition, he mentioned one matter…”

Dunn browsed the formula while listening to Klein describe the matter of Hood Eugen. At the end, he nodded.

“I will immediately organize personnel to monitor the asylum in shifts. You have not yet received professional training in this kind of matter, so you do not need to participate. Go back and continue guarding Chanis Gate.”

At this point, he looked deeply at Klein and said, “With this formula included, once you pass the examination, you will not need to accumulate further merit. You will be able to obtain the Clown potion directly…”