Chapter 33: Confirmation

After a few seconds, Lu Mi looked into Aurora's eyes and slowed his speech:

"The Lenten festival is still several days away?"

He suspected his sister had been playing a reverse prank just now, but for so many years, he had never seen her display a frivolous attitude regarding important matters, and the current moment was a critical juncture involving the existence and destruction of the entire village, including himself and his sister.

Aurora looked Lu Mi up and down a few times:

"Did you take a nap and sleep yourself stupid?"

"Today is March 29th, 1358. The Lenten festival is still several days away."

March 29th... Lu Mi chewed on this date, suddenly feeling as if he were dreaming.

He had clearly experienced that celebration which started with joy and ended in bloodshed, clearly saw Ava's head being chopped off by the shepherd Pierre Bery with an axe, and blood spraying into mid-air...

Whether it's a dream now or a dream before... No matter which one is a dream, it's too realistic, isn't it? Lu Mi couldn't find any traces of lying on his sister's face.

Of course, this could be explained by Aurora's superb acting, but Lu Mi believed Aurora was absolutely not that kind of person.

In these five years of getting along, there were countless details. It was impossible for him to be deceived about what kind of person his sister was!

There were only two possibilities for Aurora to deceive him about the date:

First, she was controlled by the parish priest or someone in the dark;

Second, the matter had been perfectly resolved, so she had the mood to joke and play a prank.

If neither of these possibilities held true, then what she said was highly likely the truth:

Time had really returned to March 29th, several days before the Lenten festival.

According to Lu Mi's common sense, this was clearly an impossible thing that shouldn't appear in the real world, but his sister's attitude left him at a loss.

I have to find a way to confirm it... Lu Mi tried his best to recall the experiences of this period and found that he could still remember the vast majority of the details. For example, on that March 29th when the Lenten festival celebration had "successfully" been held, Aurora was indeed wearing this light blue long skirt, and that night, he had also met the three outsiders—Lyra, Ryan, and Valentine—and taken them to the church to catch the parish priest in the act.

"What's wrong?" Aurora reached out her right hand and waved it in front of her inexplicably stunned brother.

Lu Mi came back to his senses and said hurriedly:

"Aurora, I suddenly thought of something and have to go out for a bit."

"I'll be back soon!"

The best way to confirm whether time had really returned to March 29th was to find Ava!

If she was still alive, Lu Mi would have to seriously consider whether to accept this incredible change.

Without waiting for Aurora to agree, Lu Mi bypassed her and ran hurriedly toward the door, fearing that if he were a second late, he would be chased by the indescribable nightmare and completely swallowed.

"Call me sister! Don't miss dinner!" Aurora raised her volume and exhorted.

After leaving his house, Lu Mi ran wildly toward Ava Lizier's house, fearing that if he were a second slow, he would be chased by the indescribable nightmare and completely swallowed.

Along the way, he attracted the side-glances of many villagers, but no one stopped him to ask why, fearing that this was a prank he had directed and acted in, waiting for them to fall for it.

Finally, Lu Mi arrived at his destination.

Ava's father, Guillaume Lizier, was a famous shoemaker in Cordu village and this mountain area. His family wasn't rich but wasn't bad either. The gray-blue two-story building they lived in was also semi-underground, with a vacant lot behind it piled with grass and firewood and a goose shed.

At this time, close to dinner time, several figures were busy in the kitchen.

Lu Mi walked directly in through the open door and saw Ava at a glance.

This brown-haired girl with water-blue eyes was wearing a gray-white long skirt, helping her mother prepare dinner, her hands and feet nimble, her eyes lively—she looked like a living person.

She really didn't die... Lu Mi subconsciously looked at Ava's neck, trying to find traces of stitching.

In one of Aurora's horror novels, there was a bridge where corpse parts were stitched together to impersonate a living person.

However, Ava's neck was slender and clean, without even a single scar.

"Lu Mi, is there something wrong?" The shoemaker Guillaume Lizier, sitting on a kitchen chair, discovered this uninvited guest.

His brown hair was messy, and he was wearing a slightly greasy brown-white apron. He stood up slowly and greeted Lu Mi.

Hearing her father's greeting, Ava stopped what she was doing, turned around in surprise, and looked at the door.

She then saw Lu Mi standing there, both stunned and bewildered.

"Is there something wrong?" she asked as well.

Lu Mi came back to his senses and intended to make up a reason to prevaricate.

But the shoemaker Guillaume Lizier walking over gave him an inspiration.

He weighed his words and said:

"Uncle Guillaume, did Bery's Pierre order a pair of leather shoes from you?"

Lu Mi remembered very clearly that he and Raymond "would" run into the shepherd Pierre Bery tomorrow morning, surprised that he had returned to participate in the Lenten festival celebration regardless of the danger and hardship of the long journey and not tending to the sheep.

And at that time, Pierre Bery was already wearing a pair of brand-new, soft-textured leather shoes.

Unless he went to a finished shoe store in Dariège, making a pair of leather shoes takes time. This meant Pierre Bery had returned to the village at least two or three days ago!

"How did you know?" Guillaume Lizier was quite surprised. "Pierre Bery returned a few days ago, but not many people in the village know. He also told me not to tell anyone else."

Sure enough... Lu Mi made up a reason:

"I saw someone who looked very much like him and thought I was hallucinating."

"Because that person was wearing new leather shoes, I came to confirm with you."

"It's him." Guillaume Lizier gave a positive answer. "At that time, he was also herding three or four sheep, saying they were given to him by his employer."

Isn't it early May when the sheep are allowed to return to the village for shearing and milking? How can you herd a few sheep back now? The high-altitude pasture is still in the grazing ban period... Lu Mi thought the more he thought about it, the more he felt the shepherd Pierre Bery's behavior was extremely abnormal.

And his performance at the end of the celebration proved Lu Mi's judgment.

But Lu Mi still had no way of knowing what he and the parish priest and these people wanted to do, or what they had already done.

Thinking of this, Lu Mi smiled at the Lizier family and Ava:

"I'm relieved that it's really him. I thought I drank so much that my brain and eyes were having problems at the same time."

He then waved to the Lizier family:

"Goodbye."

After leaving the Lizier house, the smile on Lu Mi's face settled rapidly.

He was now quite sure that today was really March 29th.

Is time flowing backward, or did I have a precognitive dream? A dream couldn't be so realistic, realistic to the point where every detail... Lu Mi walked while trying his best to think.

Whether it was time flowing backward or a precognitive dream, he had only learned about it from Aurora's novels and had never thought it would happen in reality.

On the way home, Lu Mi specifically detoured to the square and came to the side of the "Eternal Blazing Sun" church.

That stained glass window, which should have been completely shattered with the window frame flying out, was embedded in the wall intact, the Saint Siss preaching picture depicted on the surface shimmering in the glow of the sunset.

Lu Mi looked at this scene with an extremely complicated mood, feeling that all kinds of thoughts in his mind were rubbing against each other until they were about to smoke.

On the way back to the square, he saw a familiar figure coming out of the main entrance of the church.

It was the parish priest Guillaume Bery, with a slightly hooked nose, majestic temperament, and wearing a white long robe with gold threads.

Lu Mi felt a tightness in his heart, his legs slightly apart, and his body slightly arched.

This was both a preparation for launching an attack and a precursor to running away wildly.

Guillaume Bery glanced at him and nodded expressionlessly:

"Come pray tomorrow."

Uh... That's right, the him on the evening of March 29th hadn't been caught in the act by me and others, hadn't torn his face with me, and there was no worry that his secret plotting was about to be exposed... Thinking of this, Lu Mi made a reaction instinctively.

He stood straight, spread his arms, and said:

"Praise the Sun!"

"Praise the Sun!" Guillaume Bery returned the same posture.

After leaving the village square, Lu Mi habitually recalled what had just happened.

Suddenly, he discovered a point he had ignored earlier because he was shocked by "time flowing backward."

His supernatural abilities were still there!

He was still a "Hunter"!

Whether it was the fact that he didn't pant much after running wildly to the Lizier house, or his reaction of immediately assuming the best posture when facing the parish priest, all showed that his physical fitness and corresponding state were far beyond what they were before drinking the potion!

Lu Mi made a judgment:

The previous experience wasn't a precognitive dream!

He was already a Sequence 9 Beyonder!

Try entering that special dream tonight to see if I can still enter and if there are any changes... Lu Mi quickly had his next plan.

Returning home, he pretended to be nonchalant and shared dinner with his sister Aurora.

Because her brother often caused trouble and didn't want her to clean up the mess every time, he had similar expressions from time to time, so Aurora saw it and didn't ask much.

After washing the dishes and cleaning the kitchen, Lu Mi said hello to his sister and headed straight for the old tavern.

He wanted to confirm whether those outsiders who didn't belong to Cordu village would appear.

Entering the old tavern, Lu Mi sat at the bar and greeted the owner and bartender Maurice Bery, the thin middle-aged man Pierre Guillaume, and others.

"A glass of sour wine," he said familiarly.

Sour wine refers to inferior apple wine, which only costs a bit more than some beers in the tavern and is often sold by street vendors in the city.

"Stingy kid, don't you like the pain of absinthe?" Maurice Bery nagged.

"Are you treating me?" Lu Mi said familiar words.

This gave him a sense of trance.

Maurice Bery immediately stopped talking, poured a glass of sour wine, and pushed it to Lu Mi.

Lu Mi drank the wine in small sips while waiting.

Not long after, he heard the sound of tinkling.

He turned his head and saw Ryan, wearing a simple dark round top hat, a brown coarse wool jacket, and light yellow trousers.

And what attracted the eyes of almost all the men in the old tavern was Lyra, who was still wearing a white unpleated cashmere tight skirt paired with a cream-colored small jacket and Marsier boots, with two small silver bells tied to her boots and the veil acting as a headscarf.

Similarly, Valentine was wearing a white vest, a blue fine wool jacket, and black trousers, with a bit of powder on his yellow hair.

Under the gaze of one eye after another, they walked to the bar and sat down in order beside Lu Mi.

A glass of Dariège red wine, a glass of rye beer, a glass of "Spicy Heart"... Lu Mi didn't look up and muttered silently in his heart.

Ryan took off his top hat, placed it aside, and then said to Maurice Bery:

"A glass of Dariège red wine, a glass of rye beer, a glass of 'Spicy Heart'."

Hearing this, Lu Mi let out a long, long sigh.

"What's wrong?" Ryan turned to look at him.

He drank a sip of sour wine and said in a low voice:

"I am a failure, I don't pay much attention to whether the sun is shining or not, because there is no time..."

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 34 =====