Chapter 90: What Was “Seen”

Chapter Ninety
What Was “Seen”

Sir Deweyville’s bedroom was larger than the living room and dining room of Klein’s home combined. It was divided into several areas: bedchamber, sitting area, dressing area, washroom, and a section fitted with bookshelves and a desk. The furnishings were elegant; the details were luxurious.

Yet in Klein’s senses, the room felt dim and sunless, and the temperature was at least half again lower than outside.

At the same time, by his ear, he seemed to hear weeping—again and again—as well as groans like those of someone struggling on the verge of death.

Klein was briefly dazed. Then everything before him returned to normal. Brilliant sunlight pierced through the windows and filled the entire bedroom. The temperature was neither high nor low. The police officers, bodyguards, and butler around him stood in silence without speaking.

This…

He turned his head toward the classical, splendid bed and saw, within the shadows, one pair of blurry eyes after another circling there, like moths drawn fearlessly to a gas lamp.

He took a few steps closer. Yet within his spirit vision, the scene he had glimpsed a moment ago disappeared.

Not a standard wronged spirit, and even less an evil spirit… What exactly is it?

Klein frowned, searching through the mysticism knowledge he had mastered during this period.

In his opinion, if today’s mission had been handed to a Corpse Collector, Gravedigger, or Spirit Medium, it likely would not have been difficult at all. But this was plainly not his strongest field.

Suppressing the impulse to divine the direction of the investigation, Klein slowly looked around, searching for other traces that might support several guesses in his mind.

“Inspector,” Sir Deweyville said after a brief hesitation. “Have you discovered anything?”

“If it were so easy to discover something, I do not think my colleagues would have waited until now.”

Klein spoke a polite formula and unconsciously glanced at the famous philanthropist.

Just as he was about to look away, he suddenly noticed that the mirror behind Sir Deweyville had reflected a pale-white figure.

No—one figure after another, overlapping, twisted, and pale-white!

The image vanished in a flash. Klein seemed once again to hear indistinct weeping.

Hoo…

He exhaled the stale breath in his chest, soothing the fear that had nearly made him draw his gun.

Raise inspiration, activate spirit vision, and sooner or later I will scare myself insane…

Klein used self-mockery to ease his tension, then returned his gaze to Sir Deweyville.

This time, he saw something different.

As Sir Deweyville stood inside the bedroom, pale-white, distorted shadows flashed around him from time to time, making even the light in that area appear slightly dimmer.

And each time those shadows appeared, they were accompanied by illusory weeping and groaning, sounds ordinary people would find difficult to hear.

Difficult for ordinary people to hear under normal circumstances? Because it is daytime?

Klein nodded thoughtfully.

He now had a preliminary judgment regarding this case.

What was haunting Sir Deweyville was resentment—one remnant after another of human spirituality, created by emotions that had been impossible to let go of before death.

If that resentment and those remnants accumulated for a while longer, if they grew several times stronger, they would become terrifying vengeful spirits.

But Sir Deweyville is a famous philanthropist. Even Benson, who is so picky, respects him greatly. Why would so many “death resentments” cling to him? Is he different on the inside from how he appears? Or is this the method of some ill-intentioned Beyonder?

Klein guessed at the possibilities in confusion.

After a moment of thought, he looked at Deweyville and spoke.

“Honored Sir, I have several questions.”

“Please ask.”

Deweyville sat down, tired and weak.

Klein organized his words.

“When you left this place and went elsewhere—for example, to the countryside, or to Backlund—did you obtain at least half a night’s brief peace? Then the situation gradually returned, growing worse and worse, until even if you slept in the daytime, you could still hear groaning and weeping?”

Deweyville’s half-closed eyes abruptly opened wider. A little light returned to his blue pupils.

“Yes. Have you found the root of the matter?”

Only then did he realize that, because of long-term sleeplessness and his poor mental state, he had actually forgotten to tell the police such an important clue.

Seeing Klein receive a positive answer, Inspector Tolle inwardly breathed a sigh of relief. He understood that the Nighthawks had found a lead.

Sergeant Gate, meanwhile, was both shocked and curious. He could not help examining Klein, the “psychological expert,” several more times.

It matches the nature of resentment gradually coiling around him and accumulating bit by bit…

With feedback obtained, Klein basically confirmed his answer.

At this moment, he had two ways to help Sir Deweyville escape his torment. First, he could directly arrange an altar around the man and rely on ritual magic to thoroughly cleanse the “death resentments.” Second, he could use other mystical methods to locate the source of the problem and solve it from the root.

Considering the regulation that ordinary people should, as much as possible, not be made aware of the existence of extraordinary powers, Klein decided to first attempt the second method. If it failed, he would pray to the Goddess.

“Sir, this is a psychological illness. A mental issue.”

He looked at Deweyville and lied solemnly.

Sir Deweyville frowned and asked back, “You mean I am a madman and need to be sent to an asylum?”

“No. Nothing so serious. In truth, most people have some psychological or mental problems to varying degrees.”

Klein soothed him casually.

“Allow me to introduce myself again. I am a psychological expert from the Awwa County Police Department.”

“Psychological expert?”

Deweyville and his butler turned at the same time to look at Inspector Tolle, whom they knew.

Tolle nodded solemnly, indicating that this was indeed the case.

“Very well. Then what must I do to cooperate with treatment? Also, I do not understand why my butler, my bodyguards, and my servants can all hear the weeping and groaning…”

Deweyville held his cane with both hands, his face full of doubt.

Klein answered with great professional composure, “I will explain that after the fact.

“Please have your butler, servants, and bodyguards leave. Inspector Tolle, Sergeant Gate, please leave as well. I need a quiet environment for the initial treatment.”

Using spells for “treatment”…

Inspector Tolle silently completed the sentence in his mind and nodded to Sir Deweyville.

Deweyville remained silent for more than ten seconds before saying, “Kallen, take them to the sitting room on the second floor.”

“Yes, Sir,” Butler Kallen answered without objection, because the request had come from an official police officer, a probationary inspector, and a psychological expert.

Watching them leave one after another and shut the door properly, Klein looked at the dark-golden-haired, blue-eyed Deweyville and said, “Sir, please lie on the bed, relax your mind, and try to sleep.”

“…All right.”

Deweyville hung his coat and hat on the coat rack, walked slowly to the bedside, and lay down.

Klein pulled all the curtains shut, making the room dim.

He unwound his pendant and swiftly used the pendulum to make a simple judgment of good or ill. After that, he sat down on a rocking chair not far from the foot of the bed, outlined a sphere of light in his mind, entered meditation, and allowed the world of spirituality to unfold before him.

Then he leaned back against the chair and fell asleep, letting his Astral Body come into contact with the outside.

He was using the technique of dream divination, allowing himself, within a dreamlike spiritual environment, to communicate with the resentments entangling Sir Deweyville.

Only by communicating could he obtain the answer. Only by obtaining the answer could he resolve the problem.

Woo, woo, woo…

Sad weeping circled Klein’s ears like something unreal. He “saw” one pale-white, transparent figure after another emerge around him.

Hah… hah… hah…

Painful groans followed. Klein, barely recovering his ability to think, extended his right hand and touched one of the figures.

All at once, the figures became moths diving into flame, one after another hurling themselves toward him.

Klein’s vision blurred. It was as though his head had been split into two halves: one remained cold and detached, calmly observing; the other saw a “mirror.”

Within the “mirror” was a strong young girl dressed as a worker. She walked through a factory filled with dust, and pain pulsed again and again through her head.

Her vision blurred from time to time. Her body grew thinner by the day.

She seemed to hear someone calling her Charlotte, saying that she had ordinary hysteria.

Hysteria? She looked toward a mirror and saw, on her gums, a faint blue line that seemed both present and absent.

…

The “scene” changed. Klein seemed to see again, to become again, a girl named Mary.

She too walked through a white-lead factory, young and lively.

Suddenly, half her face began twitching continuously. Then the arm and leg on the same side twitched as well.

“You have epilepsy,” she heard someone say as her whole body convulsed.

She fell in spasms. The convulsions grew more and more violent, until finally she lost consciousness.

…

Then another girl. She was gloomy and dispirited, wandering blankly through the streets as though she had grown stupid. Even her speech had begun to fail.

Her headaches were extremely severe. There was a blue line on her gums. From time to time, she convulsed.

She met a doctor. The doctor said, “Laverty, you have been affected by lead.”

The doctor looked at her with pity, watching as she convulsed again, several times in succession, and watching every glimmer vanish from her eyes.

…

Scene after scene appeared in Klein’s mind. Half of him sank into them, while the other half observed calmly.

Suddenly, he thoroughly understood what these girls had suffered.

They were female workers who had been exposed to white lead for a long time, forced to endure dust day after day.

They had died of lead poisoning.

And under Sir Deweyville’s name, there was one lead factory and two porcelain factories, all employing relatively cheap female workers.

Klein silently “watched” everything and felt that only one point remained unclear.

Such “death resentments” were extremely faint. Even if their number accumulated, they should not have been able to influence reality or Sir Deweyville.

Unless—unless there was a stronger, more persistent resentment that had bound them into a whole.

At that moment, he “saw” another girl.

The girl was no older than eighteen and was glazing porcelain inside a factory.

“Helene, how has your health been lately? Have you felt headaches? If it is very serious, remember to tell me. Sir Deweyville has said that anyone with serious headaches cannot keep coming into contact with lead. They must leave the factory.”

An older woman asked her with concern.

Helene touched her forehead and answered with a smile, “A little. It is all right.”

“Then tell me tomorrow whether it has become serious,” the older woman reminded her.

Helene agreed. After returning home, she pressed her forehead from time to time.

She saw her parents and brothers return from outside. She saw grief filling their faces.

“Your father and brothers have lost their jobs…” her mother said, wiping away tears.

Her father and brothers lowered their heads and murmured, “We will go to the docks and look for work.”

“But we do not even have money for bread the day after tomorrow… Perhaps we will have to move to the innermost part of Lower Street…”

Helene’s mother, eyes red, looked toward her.

“When will you receive your pay? Ten soli, yes?”

Helene pinched her forehead again.

“Mm. Saturday. Saturday.”

She said nothing else, as quiet as ever. The next day, she returned to the factory and told the supervisor that her headache was gone and that there was no problem.

She smiled, walked five kilometers to work every day, and walked five kilometers back home. The number of times she rubbed her head became more and more frequent.

“Have you still not found work?”

Helene looked at the black bread boiling in the soup and could not help asking her father and brothers.

Her father answered bitterly, “The economy has been poor lately. Many places are dismissing people. Even at the docks, one day of work is followed by one day without. In a week, we can only earn three soli and seven pence.”

Helene sighed and said nothing more, remaining quiet as always. She only silently hid the left hand that had suddenly begun to twitch behind her back.

The next day, she once again walked to work. The sunlight gradually grew bright, and the pedestrians on the street slowly increased from few to many.

Suddenly, she began convulsing. Her whole body convulsed.

She collapsed by the roadside, white foam spilling from her mouth.

She looked at the sky. Her vision began to blur. She saw people coming and going. She saw someone approach. She saw a carriage pass by. She saw the white dove crest of the Deweyville family, wings outspread as if about to fly.

She worked hard to open her mouth, but no sound came out.

And so, she still said nothing.

Just as she always had: quiet.

But unlike before, this time, she died.