Xia De actually kept a diary, but he did not write a real diary. Instead, after inheriting the diary of the previous detective, he wrote five or six days a week, “There is no client today, and the deposit has decreased” or ” Useless sentences like “Little Mia ate too much and is considering asking Miss Gold for money”.
Professor Drake is different from Shade. He has a good habit of recording his life every day. His diary is well preserved, and all the records before and after the adventure more than ten years ago are also there. Although on the surface, the contents of those diaries were very normal, Shade discovered that a few days before the professor set out for the “Lake of the Cherubim”, he had complained in his diary that his eyes were red and swollen, and he would appear when looking at things. Ghosting.
Perhaps this is just a small problem in the eyes of ordinary people, but for a ring warlock like Shade, when investigating an abnormal event and the person involved in the event has an eye problem, there is a high probability that this person will suffer from eye problems all over his body. has a problem.
As for the letters, Professor Drake had intensively communicated with friends and academic colleagues from other places to discuss issues before going to the Lake of Cherubim. The letters themselves were just trivial matters such as publishing papers, inviting visiting students, and asking if there were any student recommendations, but they made Shade wonder if Professor Drake had encountered strange things before going to the “Lake of Cherubim” , perhaps he wrote to other professors of history and folklore to inquire.
So, Shade can search for Professor Drake’s old friends to ask whether Professor Drake asked any unusual questions more than ten years ago. The reason why he had this idea was because he found a familiar name in the pile of yellowed old letters:
“Professor Tiris Manning of Tobesk?”
He handed the old letter to Professor Drake at the desk. In the letter, the two were discussing the issue of cat worship, and believed that the worship of cats was related to the original moon worship. Therefore, they believed that the extremely ancient tradition of moon worship still existed in the Karas Mountain area, and they agreed to have time to see one together. look.
“Oh, Professor Manning, we haven’t contacted each other for many years.”
Professor Drake looked through past letters with a nostalgic expression:
“What, Mr. Watson, do you know him?”
“As you know, I’m from Delarian. When I was in Tobesk City, I once visited Professor Manning to discuss the connection between cats and dreams.”
Xia De said with a strange expression, thinking of the [Happy Dream Pen] incident, and then thought that Professor Manning really had a wide range of friends, and had amazing connections in the academic circles of history and folklore. The folklorists Shade met in different cities, either normal or eccentric, were all more or less able to relate to Professor Manning.
“Professor Manning seems to be three or four years younger than me. Is he okay now?”
Professor Drake asked.
“The professor is in very good health.”
After Professor Manning encountered the “Happy Dream Pen” out of control incident, his body quickly recovered, which is something that even a lustful young man cannot do.
“I still have some friendship with Professor Manning. I will write to Professor Manning. He may have clues.”
Shad said, Professor Drake nodded, holding the letter as if recalling the past.
“Diary” and “letter” are the more obvious clues, but the third clue is a bit vague.
That is the professor’s old book “On the Development of Folklore”, which should be an old textbook from the past. When Shade touched the book, “she” reminded Shade that there were extremely thin traces of elements on this book, which was almost equivalent to none at all.
After Shade opened the book, he found a line of strange characters written diagonally on the side of the illustration on the last page of the book. The characters are like a series of tadpoles, obviously not contemporary writing. Shade relied on his own knowledge of words and tilted his head to translate the meaning of that line of text:
[Knowledge is power. 】
“Professor, what text is this?”
Shade handed the book to Professor Drake, who was looking at a stack of old manuscript papers at the table. The professor struggled to take it, but after taking a look, he shook his head:
“I haven’t seen this kind of writing before.”
“Didn’t you write this?”
The professor hesitated:
“At least I don’t remember this.”
Xia De then took this book and temporarily left it as the third clue. Perhaps this was another distraction that, like the “Swamp Witch”, had nothing to do with the goal of his investigation. But these are the only clues in his hand, and no detail can be missed.
Shad spent the entire afternoon of Thursday at Professor Drake’s house. By the time the information was sorted out, the sunset had already appeared in the western sky. Seeing that the professor looked tired, Xia De said goodbye and left, promising to sort out the information in his hands as soon as possible and contact the professor immediately if there were new clues.
After a quick meal in the city, Shade did not return to the White River Valley Vineyard, but went to Mr. Bernhardt’s manor in the east of the city.
The Bernhardt family is one of the oldest families in the local area. The vineyards, farmland and land occupied by the family cover an area that outsiders cannot imagine. Although he only has the title of Viscount, Mr. Armand Bernhard’s quality of life is extremely favorable, and coupled with his high level as a ring warlock, he is almost the best leader of the clan among the local vampires.
Different from the dark and scary castles where vampires live in horror stories, Mr. Bernhardt’s manor is bright and majestic. It is even said that when it was completed more than 300 years ago, the city’s priest was invited to bless it. .
Because this was not his first visit to Bernhardt Manor, when Shade rode his horse to the door of the manor in the night and rang the bell, the servant who came to open the door recognized him almost immediately.
When Shade saw Mr. Bernhardt, the latter was looking through a roll of parchment in the study with a sad face. When Shade came in, he asked:
“Xia De, how is your ancient writing skills?”
“Which era of writing?”
Even though he could understand any words, Shade still asked, not only to hide the secret, but also to show humility.
“Writing written around 2500 in the Fifth Age, but I’m not sure where it originated.”
He handed the parchment in his hand to Shade, and then ordered the servant to bring tea:
“I have systematically studied ancient writing, but I’m not good at it… I’m not born stupid, I’m just not good at it.”
The middle-aged vampire sighed, Shade glanced at the content on the parchment:
“Oh, this, I learned it in my elective course at St. Byrons. It says…”
He scanned the words roughly. Although the words containing strange knowledge would affect the spirit, at least the words on this parchment could not affect Shade:
“It’s really weird. ‘Emotions’ are regarded here as symbiotic parasites residing in the soul, and the story of the interaction between parasites’ emotions and people is described. But the content here should not be complete, neither the beginning nor the The end.”
“Yes, yes.”
Mr. Bernhard seemed very happy and stood up from his desk:
“The education level of St. Byrons is indeed very good, and it is worthy of being one of the three major thaumaturgy academies famous in the material world. This is an excerpt from “The Book of Seven Emotions”, including the parts of ‘anger’ and ‘jealousy’ . A friend lent it to me, but neither of us understood the text.”
“Please give me paper and pen, and I will help translate. Mr. Bernhardt, you are really lucky. I bet that other local correspondence ring magicians may not be able to recognize these words.”
Xia De said, the parchment in his hand contained only more than 200 characters in total.
“That’s great, Shade, I didn’t expect your cultural level to be so high.”
Mr. Bernhardt complimented him, but he was not polite to Shade.
After the servant brought the black tea and snacks, Shade had almost finished translating the short text. The two went to the sofa to talk. Shade picked up the black tea and let the heat hit his cheeks. Mr. Bernhardt joked:
“Princess Margaret visited Tobesk, but the big news recently is that there is news about Tobesk every day. I heard some rumors about Lakeview Manor the night before yesterday. I hope I remembered the place name correctly. , the grand banquet at Lakeview Manor, Shade, are you already familiar with Princess Margaret?”
“This news has reached Kasenlik?”
Xia De, holding the teacup, said in surprise.
“This kind of interesting news always spreads very fast. Ordinary people may not have heard of it, but I have a special way. Detective, there are only a few ways for people to entertain themselves, among which they talk about rumors and news about the royal family. , even the ring wizards love it.”
After speaking, he raised his eyebrows at Sha De:
“Have you tried to persuade Princess Margaret to sell you the royal family’s White Valley vineyard?”
Shade does have this plan. After all, this is the only member of the Anjou royal family he knows:
“Princess Margaret and I are not that familiar yet. However, the princess invited me to participate in the reading salon next week. I think I should express myself appropriately. The White River Valley Vineyard is really important to me.”
He is not shy about his thoughts, and Mr. Bernhardt understands this:
“Her Royal Highness Margaret Anjou was a difficult girl to deal with when she was in Willendale. Before that, I heard that she hated dealing with men, and there were some not-so-good rumors about this. .”
This is because Her Royal Highness the Princess still wants to become Miss Sylvia’s apprentice.
“Although His Highness is good at socializing, he is not someone who is easy to please. Shade, to what extent is your relationship with His Highness now?”
Mr. Bernhardt asked with great interest. Just as he said, in an era when there were few entertainment methods, talking about the news about the royal family was a rare national entertainment activity:
“Last week I was asked to help transport those smuggled… ahem, those tobaccos, because we are distant relatives, otherwise how could His Highness be so polite to me.”
Xia De thought for a while:
“Our relationship…we played a guessing game and then she gave me her personal handkerchief.”
The vampire showed an expression of awe, but felt that it was not an exaggeration. He vaguely remembered that the young man in front of him had done something more exaggerated, but he felt that he could not remember what it was.
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