"Who's out there?"

Lu Li allowed the calm voice to be heard in the hallway outside, carried the oil lamp to the window, and silently pushed open the window.

"Detective, we want to commission an investigation." The voice outside, deliberately lowered, returned to normal.

"Let's go."

Lu Li picked up the frame, stepped onto the couch, and stepped out the window frame, arriving on the cool and quiet street, speaking to Anna, who looked at him with curiosity.

"Detective?"

The officer outside asked for the second time while knocking on the door, then they noticed the light stretching out under the door crevice had vanished.

"The oil lamp is out, break in!"

"Wait, officers—"

The landlord who came with the key couldn't stop the officers; the old wooden door couldn't withstand the impact either, with a dull thud, the door panel was knocked open, and two officers rushed into the living room.

The oil lamp in hand illuminated the dim Detective Agency; they saw footprints on the sofa, the opened window, and curtains fluttering with the breeze.

…

The warm haze from the street's windows made the long street, shrouded in night, cold and quiet but not lonely.

Occasionally, you could see residents returning home late, holding oil lamps, hurrying past.

Dodging another passerby, Anna appeared beside Lu Li, the oil lamp light passing through her ethereal form, her eyes clear as ever.

"Aren't you afraid of me?"

"Not afraid."

"You should go to the Police Station and confess your crime."

Anna lagged behind Lu Li a bit, staring at the back of his head pondering whether to knock him out— she was helping this robber! So Anna thought, and then felt discouraged. Doing so herself would more likely get caught and then exorcised...

"It was just an accident." Lu Li progressed along the street edge: "I have more important things to do."

"More important things?"

Bored by the dull, tedious gallery life, Anna felt her silent heart start to beat, floated over to Lu Li, turned and curiously asked him.

Handsome and mysterious, rational and calm, he seemed full of stories! Was it the revenge of a fallen young noble or…

"I had no money to buy items, so I tied up the shop owner and took things." Lu Li answered truthfully.

He didn't mention the Spirit-Calling Gun, that would frighten Anna.

Anna's imagined scene, as vivid as it was thrilling, cooled swiftly; she was still unwilling to give up: "Well... was that person bad? Did he have a vendetta against you...?"

Recalling Hades selling the Spirit-Calling Gun worth 300 shillings for 2000 shillings deceiving him who had just arrived, Lu Li gently nodded: "Kind of."

This answer Anna could grudgingly accept. It's inevitable to judge others by their looks; the handsome and the ugly doing the same thing would receive different treatment.

Especially for Anna, still merely a girl.

Arriving at the end of the Sailor District at the carriage service, Lu Li used the few remaining coins and the deposit from the previous carriage rental to lease a carriage, clattering horseshoes disturbing the quiet night.

Soon, the hurriedly chasing officers ran past on the roadside; they neither noticed nor recognized Lu Li driving the carriage.

Passing several districts, the carriage reached the avenue connecting the top of Sugard Mountain with Rodest Port, driving along the slope.

Anna's cheek quietly passed through the carriage, like a phantom face growing from the wooden board, cute yet eerie.

She obliviously asked: "Robber, where are we going?"

"To the west."

Lu Li didn't let Anna know the destination to prevent influencing his own mood.

This was what Lu Li thought of, a way to maintain the dream.

"Why did you bring me along?"

No answer came, Anna asked again: "Don't want to say? Then why did you go to the gallery to buy… take me? It might also be robbing me..."

"Because you are my family."

"You are part of the Bessey Family too!?" Anna exclaimed in surprise, then excitement replaced brief inexplicable loss: "Are you my brother or sister, but why do you have black hair and eyes."

"Not that kind of family."

For Anna, meeting Lu Li for the first time, she couldn't understand the meaning behind that term.

"A lover."

After a brief silence, Anna's faltering words began: "Are you saying... you like me?"

"Yes."

"But, but we don't even know each other..."

Anna shyly withdrew back into the carriage, but soon began telling her story.

Lu Li patiently listened for the third time, occasionally responding.

During the journey, the carriage crossed Sugard Mountain, reached the mountain's back, passed through the bustling night commercial road, Watch Town, and continued onward.

No moonlight tonight, shadow enveloped the earth.

Drawing the carriage was an old horse, able to advance along the trodden dirt path with only the dim oil lamp light.

But they were not alone, occasionally seeing dim continuous lights like stars glowing ahead and behind.

However, by now the wild was no longer safe. As midnight approached, the final glimmer disappeared in the distance, solitude and darkness encircled the carriage—

Then, dispersed by the dim oil lamp, the muffled hoofbeats and rolling wheels, and the voice rising in the carriage.

At a certain moment, Lu Li saw a darker than shadows surging blackness, wandering like fog in the wilderness.

The old horse snorted uneasily, deviated from the path, wanting to bypass that dark mass.

Lu Li did not stop it, and dimmed the oil lamp.

Moseying around the wandering darkness, Lu Li kept watch behind until it was no longer visible, then returned to the road.

Following the journey, the carriage encountered no further oddities.

"Robber, where have we reached?"

Approaching dawn, Anna's voice rang out.

"The outskirts of Himfast."

Anna emerged from the carriage, the darkness before dawn was past, in the faint glow she saw the brightly lit city afar.

"Why come here...?"

"This was your former home."

It was also Anna's once obsession place, longed for, yet feared.

"The former manor is now a school, Aunt Mary is now the school's principal." Lu Li said.

Anna quietly gazed at the City of Art, filled with anticipation yet hesitating, even overlooking asking how Lu Li knew these.

The carriage slowly entered Belfast, along the dim dawn awakening street, arriving at the former Bessey Family manor.

The manor's front gate was chained locked, as Lu Li prepared to knock the iron bars to call the Gatekeeper, Anna stopped him.

"Follow me."

With a complex expression, Anna led Lu Li to the manor's side, pulled a loose railing.

This is the "Secret Passage" she used to play outside when young.

Going through the secret passage, Anna was standing again in the former manor. Despite the shrubbery and flowerbeds being withered and abandoned, she could still recognize everything here.

Anna's obsession had completed, Lu Li could leave the dream at any time.

"Annie..."

She spotted a dead sapling, instinctively approached, gazing at it.

Lu Li stood beside Anna, under the long-withered tree.

At this moment, Lu Li suddenly heard a weak familiar voice belonging to Annie emanating from the bark.

Emotions stirred Lu Li's heart, like a plucked string triggering deeper power, akin to a storm shattering the dream like shards—

Lu Li awakened from the dream.

Branch tendrils of the sapling spread softly from his back.

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