The following Sunday, Xia De had intended to go to the mental sanatorium with the doctor to find a suitable subject for creating a mind crystal, but Saint Delan Square No. 6 had been renovated and required his personal inspection.
The inspection process, along with having the workers move the furniture from the basement upstairs and arrange it, took an entire morning. By the time all the workers had left, it was nearly 1 PM, and Xia De, along with Mia, also left the house.
He first locked the door, put the key in his pocket, then smilingly took out the key and opened the door.
Although he could open the door without a key, it was a ritual now.
He pulled the door open and walked in with the cat. Turning to close the door, he faced the stairs and took a deep breath:
"Look, Mia, this is all ours!"
He himself laughed, put the key into the cookie tin in the shoe cabinet, and then, holding the curious cat that was poking its head around, not knowing what it wanted to do, turned into the basement behind the stairs.
He reached out and turned the gas light switch on the wall, and bright light illuminated the front. The basement walls had been painted, and now a small amount of construction supplies, such as metal pipes and bricks, were piled there. Several wooden shelves, which Xia De had asked a carpenter to build, also stood by the wall. When he later converted this place into an underground alchemy workshop or potion studio, the bricks and shelves would all be useful.
"This is truly good."
He said, and then, with the cat, returned to the first floor.
Unlike the floors above, the first floor was not divided into Room No. 1 and Room No. 2; it was a single residence. Now, the kitchen, washroom, bedroom, living room, and study on the first floor were all decorated, and the water pipes, gas pipes, and steam pipes were all connected. The gas lights and curtains were styles Tifa had chosen for Xia De, and the living room fireplace had already been connected to the chimney on the roof, so it could be used normally in the winter a few months later.
Although Xia De and Mia had been living on the first floor this past week, he still walked through every room on the first floor with joy, finally pulling open the curtains and standing by the window behind the sofa, looking out at the bustling Saint Delan Square:
"This is truly good."
The second floor had not changed much, so he led Mia past the second floor to the third floor.
The structure of the third floor was identical to the second floor. After a week of renovation, and with the installation of gas lights and a waterproof layer on the walls, it was now completely different from its terrible, mold-ridden state a week ago.
He opened the two newly installed wooden doors on the third floor. There was no furniture inside, and like Room No. 2 on the second floor downstairs, they were empty. Given that Xia De still believed there might be unforeseen hidden dangers in the house on Saint Delan Square, he planned to use the two rooms on the third floor as functional rooms rather than guest rooms, with the three bedrooms on the first floor serving as guest rooms.
Of course, this also made it convenient for Mia to run around.
"This is truly good."
Finally, he ascended to the attic via the stairs at the end of the third-floor corridor. The attic’s area was about two-thirds of the floor below, though it was somewhat low.
Xia De climbed up, his head bowed. Now, there was only a small cardboard box in the corner.
The smile on his face disappeared. He put the cat aside, then squatted down and opened the cardboard box. Mia did not run around; perhaps sensing the change in Xia De's mood, the small cat waited with wide eyes, watching Xia De's actions.
This ordinary box in front of him was found by the workers behind a decorative wall that originally existed in the attic when they were renovating the third floor. Of course, that useless wall had now been removed.
There wasn't much in the cardboard box: travel postcards and old photographs from various places in the Old Continent. Although the photos were all landscape pictures with no people, Xia De somehow knew for certain that these must have been left by Sparrow Detective. This was not only because the house had only been used by Sparrow Detective in recent decades but also because of intuition. Aside from spies and secret agents hiding their identities, he couldn't think of anyone else who would take so many landscape photos without people while traveling.
Sparrow Detective knew he would die. Since he had time to train Xia De, he must have already disposed of sensitive items that could expose his identity, such as handguns and private letters. As for his personal belongings from before he came to Tobesk, he must have destroyed some, but ultimately chose not to destroy these photos that represented memories.
Xia De flipped through the postcards and the landscape photos that did not include Sparrow Detective himself. Upon closer thought, the locations on the postcards covered almost all the famous cities in the Old Continent. It seemed that Sparrow Detective must have had a very rich and colorful experience in his youth.
He planned to take the box down to the study. Compared to those fake diaries complaining about no business and dwindling savings, these photos were Sparrow Detective's true relics. And Sparrow Detective's act of not destroying the photos allowed Xia De to see another side of this deceased middle-aged man for the first time, beyond the image of a "Carson Rick spy."
After walking around the house, a wonderful sense of satisfaction made Xia De almost want to take Mia out for a big meal to celebrate the complete opening of the entire house. But he suppressed this urge, as overeating was not right after all.
The doctor had already gone to the mental sanatorium alone, so Xia De went to find Luvia in the afternoon to ask about Mr. Riddle, the Diviner from the fifth epoch.
He could enter the time point of winter 1784 in the fifth epoch for the second time tonight, and Xia De did not want to waste time. When he found Luvia, she was performing a divination for someone else, so Xia De had to wait a moment.
Luvia gave him some good news:
"I have already obtained some of Slitch Riddell's biographical documents and have hand-copied the parts that might be helpful to you."
She handed the thick document bag to Xia De, a troubled expression on her face:
"This gentleman's life experience is very fragmented, and the Association is only willing to open up part of the content to me. You want to find eight major events he experienced, but I've summarized the information, and there are probably only four."
"It's okay. The first time was two experiences, the second time is four experiences. This can at least help me complete this exploration."
Xia De squeezed the document bag in his hand, judging from its thickness that he would probably spend the rest of today reading these materials.
"But what about the third time? Will you keep waiting until my application can be approved? Or do you have other documents? Did Miss Felianna's notes mention this person?"
"Of course not."
Xia De shook his head:
"We, standing in the sixth epoch, already know that that gentleman must have successfully left Terror Castle, so even if my mission fails, it will not cause Mr. Riddle to die there. This is really tricky. Besides the Prophet Association, there are no other channels. No matter how rich his life experience, he was just an ordinary man from the fifth epoch; other organizations would not record such information. In that case, I think I can wait for half a month."
"Half a month and if there's no other way, you'll give up?"
Luvia raised an eyebrow; she didn't think Xia De was someone who gave up easily.
"Of course not. In half a month, Darkness will arrive. Since we have decided to deal with him, we will definitely get some valuable information about him then. You report this information to the Association, and then use Slitch Riddell's information as a reward; the Association will not refuse."
"That's a good idea."
Luvia nodded, then frowned again:
"Also, I was very curious about that Level 0 relic you mentioned that can summon a deity, so I investigated it a bit."
"Did you find any information?"
"I found it."
"Hmm?"
Xia De showed a surprised smile. Neither the Prophet Association nor Saint Byron's should easily disclose information about Level 0 relics, so he hadn't even thought of looking up information on that table.
"When you mentioned that relic, I felt like I had heard of it before. Xia De, is it this?"
Luvia took out another photo and handed it to Xia De. It was a black and white photo, already a bit yellowed. The photographer's skill was poor, and the lighting at the scene was bad. From the angle, the photographer seemed to be taking the picture with a tilted camera, but the appearance of the table against the wall in the Darkness was captured very completely, and Xia De could clearly see the twenty grooves on it.
At that moment, he felt as if he was back in Terror Castle, challenging a deity on the tabletop with Mr. Riddle. But soon he realized that he had only seen the relic in a photograph, and the person next to him was not the slovenly middle-aged man who hadn't bathed in who knew how long, but the pretty girl he was familiar with.
But crossing the ancient passage of time, nearly fifty centuries later, this table was surprisingly seen by Xia De again.
"That's it, but what kind of camera could take a picture of a Level 0 relic?"
He was even more surprised, while Luvia shook her head:
"This is not a Level 0 relic, nor can it summon the projection of a deity. This is a keeper-level relic, the 【Life Gambling Table】. In the sixth epoch, in the common era 721, the Association recovered it in the old goods market of the then capital of the Slavic Principality in the southern Old Continent."
The Slavic Principality was a defunct country; in 721, the Carson Rick United Kingdom had not yet unified the south.
"When two Ring術士 whose levels differ by no more than two levels sit on either side of the gambling table, the relic's characteristic can be triggered. Through the gambling method you mentioned, the winner can obtain a Ling Rune from the loser, and the loser will die directly. But the winner also has to pay a price; the abnormal way of obtaining a Ling Rune will pollute their own spirit and elements, making subsequent advancement more difficult."
Luvia said, tapping the table with her finger. This was a habit to prevent bad things from happening to herself when she thought of them:
"However, the most important function of this relic is to allow Ring術士 to display the specific appearance of enemies they have encountered, to confirm what those unknown enemies actually are. As long as one party in the gamble declares giving up the stake at the end of the game, then both only need to pay the spirit to start the game."
"That's a very good use, but why would the ability to summon a deity disappear? Where is that table now?"
Xia De immediately asked. If he really couldn't win the gamble, perhaps he could win in other ways by relying on his knowledge of the gambling table.
"That means cheating."
A voice came from beside him, but Xia De ignored her.
