Hao Ren had never expected himself to find ‘King of Blood’ in the diary of a commoner. Things became to make sense when the MDT finished parsing the remaining writing on the parchment.
‘Heimerwin’ in the diary matched the name on the plaque that Hao Ren found outside the big house. By now, he was certain that this Heimerwin was the seigneur of Domir town and the area around it. The person who left behind these parchments did not leave behind his own name, but one thing was sure, he was the butler of Heimerwin. The diary recorded what was happening before the town underwent changes. Reading between the lines, Hao Ren could feel the emotion and uneasiness of the writer when a series of grotesque events, shadows and turbulence befell Domir.
It seemed that an infectious disease started it all. The voices that Lily heard and the text on the parchment confirmed this. Children in the town were infected with a strange disease that gradually robbed their strength, and there was no medial cure. During the dark period, events like this always created an air of horror, where people would inevitably link it to witchcraft and curses. Heimerwin, the seigneur did not do anything to arrest the spreading of rumours. Instead, his personality changed and he was listening to an unknown scholar. Instead of finding cure for the disease, he put the witch on trial. Obviously, the foreign ‘scholar’ was the one instigating this.
Record about the witch was scarce. It was hard to tell whether she was only a normal woman who was framed or a real witch who knew magic. Only when the witch’s body was burned and it produced so much ash that it became a concern. This explained the black ashes that existed everywhere in the town. If she was a real witch, then the ashes was probably a curse.
Hao Ren and Vivian zoomed in on the ‘scholar’. The wizard was undoubtedly the one leaving behind the ‘King of Blood’ ritual.
While reading the parsed text, Hao Ren asked Vivian, “Is this very common in the past?”
“You mean the wizards and curses?” Vivian arched her eyebrows. “Sort of. Witchcraft, magic, cursed cities and villages, the fights between the exorcists and demons, and the commoners that were caught in between. It was a chaotic era where demon hunters and otherworldlings hadn’t completely faded out of the commoners’ life, the number of people who died from unnatural causes was just astounding. But what had happened to this town was still uncommon; it was dragged into an alien dimension. The wizard who could do this was definitely very strong, and he certainly had the help from some external forces, for example, the gate of Inferno. No ordinary wizards could do that.”
Hao Ren suddenly stopped what he was doing. “You mean the power of the Inferno gate traps the town in this dimension?” he asked.
“The gate to Inferno should be the beginning of space-time distortion, but now the gate must have been closed.” Vivian waved her hand. “Inferno is very unstable and it couldn’t keep the gate open for centuries.”
Then Hao Ren continued reading the manuscripts. The record that the old butler left behind contained this message:
“…I found that the scholar always holds a black book. When he reads the book, he always has a weird look on his face. No one who is blessed should have such expression especially when reading a good book… I asked him about the book, and he gave me a cold reply. He said that it was a handwritten Bible, but for some religious reasons, he would not let anyone touch it. This is enough to cause suspicion in him: What kind of Bible will reject a person of conscience to touch it? Unless it is the book of the devil…
“…I finally found an opportunity, and I took a glance at the strange, black book he had in his hand. The insidious man quickly discovered my move. He suddenly had a heinous look in his eyes though only for a short while. At that time, he finally took off the glorious mask of ‘scholar’. I think I would never forget that a person’s eyes could be so sinister… the eyes that one would get when he sells his soul to the devil. It was as cold as glass; his real eyeballs must be hanging on the devil’s mantelpiece! But the weirdest thing was the book itself… there was no text, what I saw was only a blank page. Now I can only believe that God uses His miracle to protect His devout servant. The page must be filled with blasphemous symbols, and I was fortunate not having seen them.”
The MDT flashed twice, which meant it had finished parsing the texts.
“Is black book mentioned in the text the magic book we found?” Hao Ren said to Vivian, feeling perplexed. “We didn’t find the text on the magic book disappearing though.”
Vivian shook her head. “It should be another book. It is improbable that the wizard had only one magic book. Anyway, we know who the wizard is now. I suspect he was the one behind the plaque and the witch incident. He seemed to have systematically dragged everyone in the town into some kind of ritual… but based on the information at hand, I couldn’t tell what kind of ritual it was.”
The two rummaged around in the room, but found nothing. Hao Ren tucked the parchments and they went back down to the long hall on the ground floor.
Soon the others had also returned. When they all gathered, they did debrief on the spot.
“I’m no expert in witches, wizards, curses and things like that,” Lily muttered, pointing to her own eyes. “I saw ghost shadows lurking around. They looked like the servants who worked here. I presumed Heimerwin the seigneur is among the shadows. But it was too chaotic that I couldn’t tell who is who. Unfortunately, I didn’t find anything related to the wizard, nor his shadow. Probably, his spirit isn’t here.”
“Sanba and I had checked the basement.” Nangong Wuyue raised her tail. “There were rotten potatoes and barrels, and more ashes. Other than that, nothing else.”
Turcan and Kassandra shook their heads one after another. They did not find anything in the side wings.
“The wizard must have lived here, but where did his hide his magic books and spellcasting props?” Hessiana scratched her chin. “This stuff are as important as a wizard’s life, it was impossible that he didn’t carry them with him all the time…”
Hessiana suddenly paused. They turned their head and looked into the direction of the stairway on the upper floor. Nangong Sanba suddenly broke the silence. “Did you hear what I heard?”
Lily’s ears shaking. “Yup. I heard footsteps.”
Turcan and Kassandra immediately raised their guard and drew their sword and a large calibre pistol respectively. These were standard armament of the Hessiana family. The two then trod carefully towards the stairway. After moving just a few steps, they saw a shadow suddenly ‘walked’ down the stairs!
The shadow was made up of ashes, dark and dirty as soot, in the figure of a human. The figure paused on the stairway for a moment before it continued to walk down clumsily. Ashes dropped from the figure as it moved. Then the incredible happened; the figure had shook off the ashes and revealed the underlying clothes and skin. It had the contours of a human. When it finally came down to the long hall, it almost appeared like a human.
Everyone held their weapons on guard but was curious at the same time until the ‘thing’ finally revealed itself as a tired-looking, middle-aged man.
The middle-aged man looked about forty years of age, his hairstyle and clothes suggested that he was the wealthy during the Medieval Period. The man was still in a stupor. But he quickly came out of it and stared at the strangers, wide-eyed.
The man froze for a few seconds before he screamed, turned and ran back up the stairs onto the upper floor.
Hao Ren snapped. “Go and get him!”
A white shadow lunged up the stairs; Lily had caught up with the man. She yanked a brick at the man and knocked him down. Hao Ren’s heart missed a beat when he saw Lily’s action; she could have broken up the man if he were made up of ashes.
The man fell but he quickly got back to his feet as if nothing had happened.
Before the man ran again, Lily lunged forward and overpowered him, and dragged her ‘trophy’ back down. “I’ve got him!”
Lily tied the man up with a rope. The man looked at Hao Ren, terrified. “You… what are you going to do? Are you humans or ghosts?”
Hao Ren thought he had the wizard, but this man did not sound like one. He asked the man, “Who are you?”
The man replied in fear. “I… I’m the seigneur here, Heimerwin Ahtisaari…”