Steampunk: Sixth Era Epic-Chapter 651 - The Spy and the Vampire Kind
Chapter 651: Chapter 651: The Spy and the Vampire Kind
Chapter 651: Chapter 651: The Spy and the Vampire Kind
“Oh!”
Shard’s physical prowess was simply too strong, so it was the other party who got knocked down. Emitting a cry of pain, the stranger nearly fell to the ground if not for someone catching him. This, however, was not an attempt at fraud on Shard’s part—the stranger was just too old.
“Sorry.”
Shard offered a slight nod as an apology, and the elderly gentleman he bumped into shook his head, indicating it was nothing.
Shard’s pupils contracted slightly as he recognized the man who seemed eager not to draw attention to himself—it was Ruhr Higgins, the language scholar from the United Kingdom of Carsonrick, who lived on the fourth floor of the Sicarl Inn, whom he had just thought of an hour before.
Without showing the surprise he felt inside, Shard helped Professor Higgins pick up his fallen hat before continuing on his way.
[Aren’t you curious?]
“Of course, I’m curious.”
Although he said that, Shard didn’t turn around:
“Take a look for me, has he stopped at the doorway of warehouse number 18?”
[No, he kept walking forward.]
“As expected, cautious.”
Shard turned right, entering an alley that connected with Punjab Avenue. He counted to thirty while standing in the alley, and when he emerged again, Professor Higgins was no longer visible on the street.
He hailed a boy selling newspapers, bought a copy of this morning’s “Sicarl Morning Post,” then entered the tobacco store across the street, thinking of buying some tobacco leaves for a pipe, to express his gratitude for the Arcane Technique provided by the Priest. Incidentally, he could also arrange to meet Priest Augustus this coming Sunday.
This Sunday, Shard would meet with Sister Delphine and see the boy who was said to be able to see through death. After meeting Priest Augustus, Luviya could use two or three coins for Divination to determine whether Shard truly encountered The Chosen One that day.
While they still limited their suspicions to three people, this also meant that they could now verify whether their current guess was correct.
After all, they didn’t have spare coins to test each one by one.
During his time shopping at the tobacco store, Shard’s eyes still kept watch over warehouse number 18 from across the street through the store window. Sure enough, about twenty minutes later, Professor Higgins, with almost the exact same movements as Shard had earlier, pressed down his hat and darted out of the warehouse door, then walked towards the street corner hugging the wall without looking back.
This proved that Shard’s guess was correct, that Professor Higgins was also a man of the Grey Gloves. And compared to over twenty minutes ago, the only thing that had changed was an additional black leather briefcase in his hands.
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“Receiving a shipment, and it’s just a briefcase? What could be inside?”
Shard thought in surprise, stopped chatting with the shopkeeper about the earthquake, paid for his tobacco leaves, took his newspaper, and left the shop. By that time, Professor Higgins had already gone quite some distance, but if Shard wanted to follow, he could still catch up before Higgins got in a carriage or turned at the next street corner.
[So, are you going to follow?]
This time, Shard didn’t say he was uninterested. He didn’t want to get involved with the merchandise and cause trouble before the real goods appeared, but now that the goods had appeared, they seemed to be just a briefcase.
He was indeed curious about what it exactly was, but he was still weighing whether following it would get him into other trouble.
“However, the fountain pen no longer contained any information. How did Professor Higgins know the location and time of the warehouse?”
After hesitating for a moment, Shard decided to follow. If the professor was heading straight to the train station and leaving Draleon Kingdom, then Shard would pretend he knew nothing. But if the professor was going back to the inn, then Shard would probably decide based on the circumstances whether to see what was inside that briefcase.
“It’s four o’clock in the afternoon now. I must leave Midshire Fort before five-thirty, no matter what happens. That way, I’ll be able to reach Feather Quill Street by six-thirty, meet Yodrothy for dinner, and tell Lecia about the quantity of the goods in the warehouse.”
Having made his arrangements, Shard quickly walked forward and caught up with the silhouette of Professor Higgins.
Actually, for this agent from the United Kingdom of Carsonrick, the safest method would have been to take the briefcase and return to the southern foothills of the Rommel Mountains in the United Kingdom of Carsonrick immediately. But he didn’t choose to do so. Instead, he really returned to the Sicarl Inn.
Shard intentionally dawdled for five minutes before entering the Sicarl Inn. He had thought the professor would have returned to his fourth-floor room by now, but unexpectedly, the man was sitting in a corner on the first floor, talking with a strange man while holding the briefcase.
The stranger appeared to be about thirty years old with golden hair tightly fitting his scalp. His skin was very pale, but it was that unhealthy kind of pale. He was wearing a somewhat dirty black coat, and his boots were covered with mud.
When Shard caught his first glimpse of the man, a red aura of blood almost immediately rose from him and then condensed above his head into a symbol of a blood-red little bat that could even be described as somewhat cute.
Only Shard could observe this scene. He felt a bit surprised and then realized it was the new effect added to his “Echo of Blood” by the God of the Vampire Race during the last banquet, which was the ability to easily identify vampires.
“This method of identification is indeed simple.”
Shard took another look at the little bat symbol floating above the man’s head, then went to the counter to order a drink. Mr. Tels, the innkeeper, certainly remembered “Mr. John Watson” who had smoothed things over with the policemen for him, greeted him warmly, and recommended the special-price drink of the day.
At this moment, Shard roughly understood how Professor Higgins got the information about the warehouse.
Whether vampires belong to the Undead Race has been disputed among Circle Sorcerers, but they are indeed adept at necromancy. Hence, if Professor Higgins could find a way to break into the police station and steal the fountain pen, he could also find a way to have vampires help with necromancy on a corpse.
“Now that I think about it, the deputy chief of the police did mention that on the night the fountain pen was stolen, the body that was shot dead on the fourth floor had also been tampered with. So it was necromancy… How interesting. Could it be that this professor, through the uncle and nephew living on the fourth floor, made contact with the local Vampire Kind? Or perhaps the Grey Gloves themselves have a connection with the local vampire community?”
Speculating in his mind, Shard sat at the counter, chatting with Mr. Tels the innkeeper absentmindedly about the earthquake that had happened in the mountains yesterday. He planned to wait for Professor Higgins and the strange vampire to finish talking, then he could use “Echo of the Past” to try his luck and eavesdrop on the content of their conversation.
But the conversation between the professor and the vampire was not going well. After a short while, the two had a quarrel. The pale-faced man who looked quite down and out suddenly stood up and said loudly,
“This won’t do, you promised me 200 pounds! If you don’t pay now, you can’t leave!”
