"You looked like you had lost your soul at that time, and you couldn't speak. If I hadn't smoothed things over for you, you would have been embarrassed and left a bad first impression on others."
“Uh, hehe…”
After hearing his companion's words, Cobo did not explain any more. He just shook his head slightly, smiled without saying anything, and continued to browse the form document.
"Oh, but to be honest, that lady is indeed beautiful...
"It's not that I'm short-sighted. I used to be a security guard at a high-class banquet and have seen real rich ladies and aristocratic mistresses. But even those spoiled ladies are rarely that pretty."
My colleague put his arm on the table and muttered in a self-absorbed manner:
"So you're a vampire... Could it be that you have racial superiority? If that's the case, you should just give up. We're not from the same world, so there's no possibility...
"But she is really pitiful. Such a thing happened after coming to our country. I hope there will be a good result..."
"I've confirmed it," Cobo picked up the form on the table and interrupted the other person's muttering in a cold tone, "I'm going to the transmission room, you stay here."
"you?"
My colleague looked a little surprised:
"Isn't it me who is responsible for operating the magic communicator?"
Cobo glanced at him, without explaining, and walked away from the counter with the documents, heading towards a door in the corner of the hall.
Seeing that the other party ignored him, the colleague did not dwell on this issue. After all, the sending and receiving operations of the civilian magic communicator are very intuitive and simple. As long as you can read, you can basically learn it. This division of labor is just a formality.
With a stern face, Ke Bo held the documents and pushed open the soundproof wooden door of the interrogation room. He looked inside for a while with a slightly nervous look. After confirming that there was no one there, he walked in and closed the door behind him.
"Snapped--"
With the dull sound of the wooden door closing, Cobo hurried to the magic communicator placed in the corner and operated the panel that looked like an old-fashioned microwave oven. The machine emitted a series of regular ticking and mechanical sounds.
Soon, the magic communicator was debugged. After completing all this, he stretched out his fingers and quickly typed a string of numbers on the mechanical keyboard embedded in the machine panel.
This is the number of the magic communicator of a superior department in the municipal building next door, which is equivalent to a fax phone number. Each machine has a unique number, through which point-to-point and one-to-one message sending can be achieved.
If it is a general petition matter, it will not be processed so quickly. It usually has to wait until after get off work in the evening before it is handed over to the back-end staff for processing. Of course, their unit is a leisurely position among leisurely positions, and there are often only a few businesses in a week.
The reason why they chose to deal with it on the spot this time was because the two of them gave the highest priority to the matter of the vampire girl named Bernice.
Apart from the fact that some people feel sympathy for the girl, more importantly, this matter involves the personal safety of foreign citizens. If it is not handled properly, it may escalate into a diplomatic incident, so it must be taken seriously.
Of course, whether what the girl described was true was not something that the two receptionists should consider. Their superiors would naturally have credible enough means to confirm it.
"Beep beep!"
A few minutes later, the green light on the top of the magic communicator flashed three times in succession and the expression made a sharp beep, which meant that the message was successfully sent.
But Cobo did not leave immediately. Instead, he looked around again with a furtive look.
Then, he lowered his head and entered another number on the magic communicator.
After sending a mysterious message to a number that was not on the petition office's contact list, he bent down and scanned the lower part of the magic communicator with a serious look, finding an inconspicuous bulge.
He stretched out his hand and pressed the bulge with a little force, and the outer shell of the magic communicator was opened to reveal a square window half the size of a palm, revealing a dense area of lines and spots.
Cobo frowned and took out a small object shaped like a pencil from his inner pocket. He carefully poked the "tip" of the pencil at a certain position in the window, and then slid it gently in a very slow and extremely precise route.
It can be seen that as the "pen tip" moves slowly, the lines and spots exposed in the window are vaguely erased.
——He deleted his second “message record” and only kept the normal record of the first message he sent to the superior department.
After a minute or two, Cobb withdrew his hand, put the pencil-shaped object into his inner pocket, covered the window again, and restored everything to its original state.
Then he took the form document, pushed the door and walked out of the information room, then sat down behind the counter.
"Why so slow?"
His colleague glanced at him lazily.
Soon, he got a response from Cobo:
"You know, I rarely operate the magic communicator, so I'm not very skilled."
The two of them sat behind the counter in a daze for about ten minutes until the door was pushed open again.
The person who walked in was a tall, middle-aged man with strong limbs. He had a rough and coarse face, no chin, and looked ferocious and violent.
But he was dressed like a gentleman, wearing a neat dark brown suit, formal brown leather shoes, and holding a cane with a gold-plated tip in his right hand.
The two people at the front desk were a little confused by each other's strange combination and did not greet them immediately.
While the two were in a daze, the man in the suit walked straight towards the counter with his crutches and slowly said:
"I'm Alacart from the Municipal Diplomatic Office. I'm here to pick up the girl who claims to be a vampire tourist."
His voice was very hoarse and deep, like the sound of two heavy, hard rocks rubbing against each other.
"Someone from the Diplomatic Office?"
Cobo's colleague was stunned, and then saw him take out a neatly folded leather-bound photo card from his suit pocket, spread it out in front of the two of them, and then immediately put it back.
Because the other party's movements were so casual and quick, the colleague could only vaguely see that it was an identity certificate with words like "Special Agent of the Diplomatic Department" written on it.
"Take me to see her quickly. I need to confirm the authenticity of her words."
He urged in a serious tone:
"This matter is very important, don't delay."
Because his tone and demeanor were so certain and unquestionable, as if he carried a convincing majesty, and it was obvious at first glance that he had an extraordinary identity, his colleagues did not doubt the authenticity of his identity, but nodded hurriedly:
"Yes, sir, I will bring her to you right away!"
After saying that, he immediately hurried upstairs, leaving Cobo where he was.
"..."
Cobo had a calm expression. He looked at Arakart, a hoarse-voiced man who was half a head taller than him, and nodded slightly in silence.
A few minutes later, a colleague led the vampire girl Bernice down from the second floor and came to the hoarse-voiced man Alacart, and explained respectfully:
"Your Excellency, this is the young lady."
Arakart's expression remained unchanged. He leaned on his cane with one hand and looked Bernice up and down for a while. His eyes were sharp and cold, making the latter shudder as if in fear.
"I will take her back to the Diplomatic Office for detailed questioning."
Then, he said in a deep voice, turned around and walked towards the door, without looking back, he ordered:
"Follow me."
"well……"
Bernice lowered her head, her eyes flickering, and responded timidly, then followed him reluctantly and walked out of the door of the Diplomatic Office.
A four-wheeled carriage pulled by a horse was parked on the street outside the door. The door was not a conventional cloth curtain, but a solid door with hinges and bayonet.
Cobb watched the two men disappear into the dark carriage, and suddenly he let out a long breath, as if he had let go of some long-standing burden:
"finally……"
Muttering in a voice that only he could hear, he and his colleague turned around and sat back behind the counter.
"Ear~!"
Amid the loud and powerful neighing of the horses, the carriage sped away and disappeared from sight in the blink of an eye.
Chapter 322: Trapped
"Gulululu, Gulululu..."
Beneath my body, I felt the vibrations and bumps caused by the wooden wheels rolling over the asphalt road.
Mixed with the continuous sound of rotation, rolling non-stop.
On the left was the door of the carriage, which was tightly closed, and the window panes and gaps were covered with curtains, making it completely airtight. Only the dim sunlight barely seeped in, illuminating the various vague outlines in the field of vision.
"Well……"
Bernice sat on the hard bench, her head hanging, her eyes staring blankly at her knees, her hands clasped together, her slender white fingers twisting together anxiously.
She didn't look up to the right, but she was sure that the hoarse-voiced man in the old-fashioned brown suit was sitting next to her, like a marble statue, motionless and silent, and it was impossible to judge his thoughts and purpose.
She was completely unaware of her current situation.
It was unclear whether the people in the carriage—such as the hoarse-voiced man named Alacart who claimed to be a diplomatic agent, and the silent and gloomy coachman outside the carriage—had bad intentions...
It is also unclear whether a robber or the like will suddenly appear while the vehicle is driving on the road and kidnap you.
It was even more unclear what the situation was with this trip. Was it a conspiracy by the bad guys who had been eyeing her and her daughter, or were they really just personnel sent by the human government? She was out of danger and safe.
The only thing she could confirm was the solemn promise made by 1005 beforehand:
"You can report to the police directly. I will keep an eye on you from behind the scenes. If anyone tries to harm you, I will immediately subdue them... Of course, according to the original agreement, the total duration is only seconds."
"One Zero Five... Is she really there?"
Bernice couldn't help but murmur to herself as she nervously paid attention to her surroundings.
Although her reason told her that Yao Lingwu was a legendary strongman who had reached the level of a smelter, and she, a mere budding vampire, would naturally be unable to detect her hidden whereabouts.
But compared with invisible and intangible protection, the fear and sense of crisis caused by being in an unknown environment and sharing a room with strangers are more real and more gripping.
In short, her heart was in her throat. She forced herself to sharpen her senses to the extreme and pay attention to every sound around her.
“…Plop! Plop!…”
There was the noisy and boring sound of vehicles driving and pedestrians shouting in her ears, but Bernice felt that it was extremely quiet now. The whistling sound of air in the throat when breathing and the sound of blood rushing in the blood vessels when the heart beat were all clearly audible.
Her temples and deep in her neck were throbbing with her pulse, making her a little breathless. Her mind was slightly confused for a moment, and her messy thoughts were flying around uncontrollably.
"that……"
After suffering in this almost suffocating and oppressive atmosphere for an unknown period of time, Bernice finally couldn't bear it anymore. She raised her head, slowly looked at the man on the right, and said tremblingly:
"How long are we going to sit here?"
The hoarse-voiced man named Alacart didn't move his neck or head, but just glanced at her sideways, and said briefly in a rough, low, and uncomfortable voice:
"soon."
"Forehead……"
Bernice was disturbed by the other party's perfunctory and cold answer. She wanted to ask a few more questions, but when she saw Alacart's face, which was as cold as stone, she swallowed and said nothing.
Instead, he turned around and reached for the left door, trying to lift the curtain covering the window pane a little to see what was outside.
"Susu..."
Arakart did not stop her, and Bernice opened the curtains a little, and suddenly the golden morning sunlight streamed in from outside, causing Bernice, a vampire who liked darkness and hated light, to feel a little uncomfortable in her eyes, and she could only see a dazzling whiteness.
"Well……"
Squinting her eyes slightly and adjusting to the bright morning light, she could see clearly where the carriage was now.
What comes into view is a low dark green hill. At the foot of the hill is a desolate and bleak weedy plain with a few dilapidated wooden buildings sparsely and irregularly distributed on it.
Further away, there are higher mountains that have not yet been developed, lurking in the pale blue mist of the early morning. The bizarre and powerful hazy outlines are like the corpse of a giant crawling on the ground, revealing a pale breath.
And underneath the carriage, there was no longer a dark blue asphalt road, but rather compacted mud with ruts, which was rapidly moving backwards with the sound of the wheels rolling and crushing.
"……this?!"
After seeing the scene in front of her, Bernice was stunned.
She was not completely unaware of such scenes.
More than a month ago, when she and her mother arrived in Twilight City, they took a hired carriage from the deserted suburban roads to the prosperous and magnificent urban area.
Before entering Twilight City, the scenery she saw along the way... was very similar to what she saw now!
It was all scraggly grasslands and low hills, with misty mountains in the distance.
Which means... right now, she's in the suburbs of Twilight Town?!
However, judging by her own sense of time, it has only been a dozen minutes at most since she got on the car at the municipal petition office.
Twilight City is one of the few super-large cities in the human world. The core urban area alone is incredibly large and covers a very large area.
Even if the road was smooth and there was no traffic jam, it would take more than ten minutes with the power of an ordinary horse-drawn carriage. Not to mention the city, even the upper city where the municipal building is located cannot be left.
So...how did they get themselves to the suburbs? !
Then what happened during the ten minutes when I was not observing the outside world?!
