Lord of the Mysteries — Extra: An Ordinary Person’s Daily Life P4

An Ordinary Person’s Daily Life (4)

Tamara… Barton chewed over the name, thinking about what it represented.

He was no longer like he had been the first time he discovered that he could hear sounds others could not, when he had panicked, looked all around for who was hiding in the shadows, and been ready at any moment to grab a wooden stick, rush over, and strike the other party. He stood where he was with considerable calm, thinking while observing the reaction of Pacheco, the deputy supervisor of the Compliance Department.

Pacheco glanced at him.

“Have you studied Fourth Epoch history?”

“To a certain extent,” Barton answered modestly.

At this moment, he did not pretend to know nothing about Fourth Epoch history. First, his personality would not allow it. Second, his position came from his academic cultivation in history. If he had major deficiencies in this field, he might be fired by the Foundation tomorrow.

Pacheco looked toward the door.

“Then have you heard of the surname Tamara?”

“I have.” Barton instinctively turned his head and glanced at Pacheco. “In the scattered and rare historical records from the Fourth Epoch, the surname Tamara appears several times. Its frequency is second only to Tudor, Solomon, and Trunsoest. Based on that, one can preliminarily judge that it represented a great noble family of one of the empires of the Fourth Epoch.”

At this point, Barton paused and said, “Vernal recently discovered some ruins left over from the Fourth Epoch.”

Because the hotel attendant was still beside them, he did not directly point out that the surname Tamara might be related to Vernal’s current abnormal situation.

Pacheco gave no response. He turned to the hotel attendant and said, “I am an officer in charge of criminal cases. I suspect the guest in this room has met with misfortune. Please fetch the key and open the door immediately.”

As he spoke, Pacheco took out an identification document and showed it to the other party.

The hotel attendant was first startled, then examined the document carefully.

“All—All right. I’ll get the key!”

As he spoke, he turned and ran toward the stairs.

“You’re a police officer?” Barton blurted in astonishment as he watched from the side.

Pacheco looked down at the document in his hand and laughed.

“This document is absolutely genuine and was obtained through legal channels.”

Why make it sound so complicated… Barton answered out of habit, “I don’t care whether it’s real or fake. I only want to know whether you’re actually an officer.”

Pacheco laughed.

“That depends on how you understand it.”

Such an answer made Barton somewhat irritable. However, as a standard Loen gentleman, and understanding that the other party was unwilling to give him a direct answer, he politely closed his mouth.

Of course, the fact that the other party was the deputy supervisor of the Compliance Department was also a factor.

Amid their silence, the hotel owner and the attendant returned to the third floor together.

After carefully checking the document in Pacheco’s hand and comparing the photograph with the real person, the hotel owner took out the key and opened the door, grumbling in a low voice as he did.

“How could something happen? There wasn’t any movement at all.”

If a high-end hotel had a criminal case involving human life, it would absolutely affect its image, perhaps even causing bankruptcy.

“Don’t worry too much. Perhaps it is only a small problem,” Pacheco said in an approachable tone, comforting him.

“I hope so. May the Goddess bless us.” The hotel owner withdrew his hand, tapped four times clockwise on his chest, and drew the stars.

Then he pushed the door gently, letting it slowly open.

At that moment, the inside of the room seemed finally connected with the outside world, and a faint scent of blood spread out.

“Oh…” The hotel owner sensed it and could only express his disappointment and fear with a single interjection.

Only an environment like this could make an envelope carry the scent of blood without being stained by blood… This was the first thought that flashed through Barton’s mind.

Only then did he notice that inside the room, the furniture was arranged neatly, and the carpet showed no obvious wrinkles. This contradicted the scent of blood spreading through the air.

It doesn’t look like there was a fight… Killed by a single shot? Barton’s hobbies included reading popular novels, especially the kind mixed with murder and romance. Therefore, he had quite rich “experience” with situations like this.

Among all bestselling authors, his favorite was undoubtedly Fors Wall.

At first, it had been his wife who bought several of Fors Wall’s novels. Barton had only occasionally flipped through them, but unexpectedly became immersed in them.

Of course, he would not reveal that in front of his wife. Instead, he always said in an authoritative tone, “This kind of novel is vulgar, shallow, and valueless. It is only suitable for passing time.”

As thoughts churned in Barton’s mind, Pacheco put on a pair of white gloves and stepped into the room.

After looking around, this senior solicitor walked to the desk and picked up the stack of writing paper printed with the lavender castle pattern. He asked the hotel owner and attendant, “Do you know how many sheets there originally were?”

“We, uh, don’t replenish it every day. Not every time,” the attendant said, glancing at the owner and stammering slightly.

What he meant was that, after several changes of guests, he no longer knew how many sheets of writing paper had been left when Vernal checked in.

Pacheco gave a short laugh and shook his head. Turning to Barton, who had walked to his side, he said, “This is why the world needs order and rules.

“If they had a strict set of behavioral standards, and if they remembered to replenish the writing paper to a fixed number after each guest checked out, then we could use that to find clues.”

“I don’t quite understand what you mean,” Barton answered honestly.

Pacheco smiled.

“Simply put, only where there is light can there be shadow.

“Of course, sufficient chaos also means opportunity.”

Hearing this, Barton nodded.

“Yes. Emperor Roselle once said that chaos is a ladder.”

“No one knows whether he truly said that. There are far too many people in this world who dare not express their own views directly and can only borrow someone else’s name.” Pacheco answered casually.

Then he picked up the blank sheet of writing paper on top and brought it near the sunlight passing through the glass, examining it for a while.

“My favorite kind of person to face is someone careless,” Pacheco suddenly laughed.

After saying this, he put the sheet of paper back in its original place.

The next second, he took a sharpened pencil from his coat pocket and lightly rubbed it over the sheet.

Before long, the impressions of one Loen word after another emerged, forming passage after passage of fragmented sentences:

“…I am being watched…”

“…There are traces of religious worship left in those ruins…”

“…I took the item from the altar…”

“…It—it saw me!

“…No! It has always been beside me!”

When writing those sentences, the archaeologist Vernal seemed to have been in an extremely intense emotional state. Therefore, he had used particular force, leaving behind the most obvious impressions from the fountain pen.