Since the police had found the murderer and believed they had discovered the truth, the case was considered closed.
According to common practice, the hotel owner still needed to go to the police station to make a statement, but when Xia De indicated that he needed to speak with the owner, the chief immediately said the statement could wait until tomorrow.
“It’s like this, I want to understand some things related to the local fire-worshipping tradition.”
After the police and the murderer were sent off, and the body was carried away on a stretcher, the uneasy hotel owner, Mr. Thales, invited Xia De to the hotel’s backyard.
Only there was no one there, and the two spoke by the chicken coop.
“Oh, that~ I thought it was a tax audit… Ahem, I mean, no problem.”
Mr. Thales visibly sighed in relief:
“I believe in the Lord of All Things; this faith has been passed down from my ancestors.
As for fire worship, I think this can also be considered part of the Lord of All Things faith, after all, fire is also a part of nature.”
“But I want to know, are there any strange legends about fire worship here locally? I’m actually a Writer.”
The bearded owner clearly didn’t believe him.
He thought for a long time before hesitantly saying:
“There are indeed.
I heard my parents mention it when I was a child.
It’s said that beneath Sicar Mountain, there’s a huge creature that can breathe fire.
A long, long time ago, it protected the ancestors who lived on this land.”
“How many strange things are there under Sicar Mountain?
Could this be the Ancient One that sealed the mountain top passage?
Breathing fire… a dragon?”
Xia De thought to himself, then hesitantly asked:
“What is that huge creature?”
“I don’t know that.”
Mr. Thales shook his head, but then added:
“Father mentioned that before the Natural Church moved into Middelsburg, our ancestors believed in and worshipped fire.
Later, our ancestors accepted the Natural Church’s faith and recognized that fire is a part of the Lord of All Things.
But even so, some symbols and records from that primitive fire worship period were left behind and accepted by the Natural Church as part of its own.
Now in the Middelsburg area, some indigenous people whose ancestors lived locally will write specific symbols on their kitchen walls to pray against fires.
This is also considered part of the local architectural style and folk customs.”
What Mr. Thales described was the process of faith integration in the Sicar Mountain region.
If studied carefully, it would even be enough to write an excellent paper, such as “A Study of Primitive Fire Worship and Faith Integration in Middelsburg.”
Unfortunately, Xia De was not a folklorist:
“May I visit the hotel’s kitchen?”
“Of course, this way, please.”
He led Xia De into the kitchen, and Xia De indeed found some ancient or modern texts related to “fire” on the walls, but none of these had much significance.
He still wanted to ask Mr. Thales a few more things, but the hotel owner suddenly slapped his head:
“I remember now, Father also left a red stone, telling me to bury it under the kitchen floor.
He believed it could ward off fires.”
“No, no, there’s no need to dig it up.”
“No need to dig, I don’t believe in such superstitions, so I didn’t bury it at all.”
Mr. Thales said with a smile, then searched alone in the warehouse and found an irregularly shaped, nearly circular red stone.
It didn’t look like a ruby, but rather some kind of crystal:
“This is for you, thank you for helping me deal with the police’s trouble.”
Mr. Thales said, but Xia De still insisted on paying.
“If you look at it against the sun, sometimes you can see a pretty pattern inside.
This is probably some kind of optical phenomenon.”
Mr. Thales reminded him again, so Xia De picked up the stone and held it up to the sun.
He kept trying to adjust the stone’s position, and finally, within the red stone, he indeed saw a vision—
It was a huge flying bird soaring with its wings spread.
He put down the stone, slightly surprised:
“This doesn’t look like a pure-blooded dragon.
Could it be—a Phoenix?!”
It was already half past three in the afternoon when he left the hotel.
Xia De planned to wait for Priest Augustus at the intersection of Oak Street and Punjab Avenue.
With his hands in his pockets, he looked left and right at the empty carriages parked on the street, then turned his head to look at Sicar Mountain in the distance:
“Is there a Phoenix in this mountain?
Is the fire worshipped in the local traditional fire-worshipping faith actually it?”
That shouldn’t be a deity, just an exceptionally powerful Ancient One.
“How interesting, how many more secrets can this great mountain and this City possibly hold?”
At twenty past four in the afternoon, Xia De successfully met Priest Augustus at the intersection.
He was worried that the Church might send people to follow the Priest, so after seeing the Priest from afar, Xia De cautiously nodded to him, then turned first and walked towards the first alley on the left side of Oak Street.
Unexpectedly, the Old Priest immediately caught up:
“Oh, why are you walking so fast?
Do you really think I’m a young man your age?”
The Priest asked, and after Xia De expressed his concerns, he immediately shook his head:
“Don’t worry, I haven’t aroused any suspicion.
After all, how am I different from the other missing people?”
Since the Priest said so, Xia De also relaxed.
The two first sat for a while in a small pub facing the street.
The Priest told Xia De what happened after he led the missing people out of the Between Life and Death yesterday.
Then it was dinner time, and Xia De unceremoniously asked Priest Augustus to treat him to a meal at a restaurant in the City.
Xia De had taken great risks, venturing deep into the Between Life and Death to rescue the Priest, which deeply moved Priest Augustus, so treating him to a meal was certainly no problem.
The Old Priest, who was quite familiar with the City, finally chose the Montongus Restaurant at the foot of the mountain in the south of the City.
This restaurant was located in the southern suburbs of the City, a bit remote, built against a cliff face.
The restaurant used a pure wooden structure, building stairs and dining spaces on the rock face.
Aside from the relatively spacious first floor, each subsequent floor consisted of small private rooms, with their size influenced by the protrusion of the rock face.
The other end of the rooms featured large windows made of several panes of glass.
From the rooms on the top, third floor, one could vaguely overlook a small part of the City.
The terrain here was very high, and it wasn’t in the urban area, plus the prices were somewhat high, so only wealthy people dined at Montongus Restaurant.
People dressed in formal wear and evening gowns moved through the restaurant under the gaslight.
In contrast, Priest Augustus, who had changed into casual clothes, and Xia De, who had no clothes to change into, looked quite inconspicuous.
The culinary style of Middelsburg incorporated characteristics of the North Country, the South Country, and the mountainous regions, forming a style distinct from Tobesk’s typical North Country cuisine and Coldwater Port’s seafood cuisine.
And in the current autumn, the price of mountain goods was exceptionally low.
While game, which was expensive in Tobesk, was still not cheap here, at least Xia De and Priest Augustus could afford it.
This might also be because the capital region itself had a premium.
During dinner, Xia De told the Priest about what he had seen that afternoon and sighed at how many Carson Rick people there were in Middelsburg.
“Actually, there are also many foreigners in Tobesk, but most of them are not within your usual activity range.
As for Middelsburg, most foreigners who come here are merchants, so you see them often.”
The Old Priest said cheerfully:
“I heard the local church’s Bishop mention that at least 20% of Middelsburg’s permanent residents are not from this country.”
“Oh, that number is really exaggerated.”
“After all, it’s one of the largest Cities on the eastern border.”
The old man stirred the thick soup in front of him with a ladle.
“If these people knew what was under our feet, Middelsburg probably wouldn’t be as lively as it is now.”
Xia De stomped his foot.
Priest Augustus shook his head and lowered his voice:
“Regarding the Between Life and Death and the potential death impact, it currently seems impossible to evacuate the citizens of this City in advance.”
“Why?
For potential political and economic impact?”
“Of course not.
Because… having a prosperous City above the Between Life and Death is part of the seal itself.
The Between Life and Death connects to true death, so there must be enough living people on the other side to form a…”
“Balance.”
Xia De said, understanding the Priest’s words.
“Then is that place really… Unknowable-level?”
He asked again, after all, the Spiritual Cultivation Order, a non-Orthodox Church organization, had only guessed.
The Priest nodded cautiously:
“The Gap itself contains three passages to be considered a complete Unknowable-level.”
The desire that Xia De encountered in the basement of Aurora Manor in Coldwater Port was also Unknowable-level.
At that time, the desire did not show any combat power.
Now that he thought about it, even if it had been sealed by divine power for hundreds of years, its ability could never have been as simple as what Xia De saw.
“What does the Church plan to do now?”
Xia De also lowered his voice, cutting the steak on his plate:
“Beyond that door, in the open space before the water, a reddish-gold bonfire is burning.
Before that bonfire extinguishes, the door under the mountain will not have problems.
And when that bonfire extinguishes, I will have a premonition.”
That bonfire was the external manifestation of the Kiss of the Tree sealing the Death Door.
Because it was Xia De’s Mystic Lock, even if the two were in different worlds, Xia De could vaguely know the general situation.
Moreover, his Miracle, Death Door, could open a crack at any time, allowing Xia De to glance “over there” and confirm the burning state of that bonfire, so he could always know the information about the passage at the foot of the mountain Gap.
