Chapter 565

After hearing the content of the cooperation proposed by Louis Berry and the promises he was willing to make, Juan Oro again doubted whether something was wrong with his ears.

It wasn't that the other party's demands were too excessive or too ridiculous, making one feel like he was telling a joke; on the contrary, the cooperation he wanted was something the Fishermen's Guild could do without much difficulty, and without having to pay any substantial interests.

This was completely beyond Juan Oro's expectations.

Before he came to find Louis Berry, he had actually prepared himself psychologically to be heavily "blackmailed," after all, the other party and the force behind him had very easily controlled Lato Giallo, showing strength sufficient to confront the Fishermen's Guild. Who knew that Louis Berry was much easier to talk to than he had imagined.

This instead made Juan Oro feel whether the other party was deceiving him, and would suddenly turn against him during the cooperation and break his promise.

Lumian watched the old man with deep wrinkles quietly, without explaining his intentions, because explaining might expose his truest purpose, and it wasn't the time yet.

After weighing it for a moment, Juan Oro sighed with an aged look:

"We can agree to your request."

But in the process of cooperation, we will also increase our vigilance and prepare a backup plan.

Lumian smiled, stood up from the armchair floating in the void, and extended his right hand to Juan Oro:

"Happy cooperation."

Juan Oro shook his hand in the void and said:

"You aren't as crazy as you appear..."

Lumian pondered for a second, curled his lips slightly and said:

"Of course, I have always been an adventurer with brains, reason, and manners."

Juan Oro had no intention of chatting, nodded to Louis Berry and said:

"Since you don't want our cooperation to be known by others, I should leave now, otherwise I will be discovered having been here."

Lumian thought for a moment and said:

"Tomorrow night, I will send my companions hiding in the dark to Milo Village. You bring all the sailors who survived last year's ceremony to your main house in advance and control them initially."

"Good." Juan Oro didn't refuse, this was one of the cooperation contents just discussed.

Seeing the old man leaning on his cane about to turn and leave, Lumian called him to a halt and said thoughtfully:

"I am very trustworthy. I promised Georgia that I wouldn't tell anyone else the content of the commission, so I definitely won't say it."

"But I want to ask you one thing, has any 'Child of the Sea' from the Paco family gone missing recently, or hasn't appeared for a long time?"

He hinted that his question was related to the commission from the Paco family.

Juan Oro's expression sank, he recalled for a dozen seconds and said:

"All those 'Children of the Sea' from the Paco family have appeared recently."

"I initially thought that Rubio's mother, Marta, had some strange changes that were inconvenient for us to know, but it turns out she is fine, just seriously injured."

No "Child of the Sea" from the Paco family is missing? Then where did that humanoid lizard come from? Lumian was shocked.

His first thought was that the Paco family was dealing with another "Child of the Sea," and his second thought was, had some "Child of the Sea" from the Paco family been replaced?

A fake family member is active in the appearance of the real one, while the real one turned into a humanoid lizard and died at the hands of the great adventurer?

Thinking of replacement, thinking of being active in the appearance of the real one, it was hard for Lumian not to associate it with a Sequence name:

"Faceless"!

That is the Sequence corresponding to the "Lie" earring, that is the Sequence before "Puppet Master" Loki!

Could it be that after Loki was resurrected, he came to Santa Harbor, quietly replaced an important member of the Paco family, and lurked down, with the purpose of setting a trap for me, and doing something during the Sea-Praying Ceremony to continue what was left unfinished last year?

Thinking of this, Lumian felt both excited and inevitably felt a certain amount of fear.

But in a flash, he ruled out this possibility:

If it really was Loki who replaced an important member of the Paco family, then there wouldn't be a humanoid lizard appearing at all. He could have quietly solved the problem, cleaned up the traces, and wouldn't have left such an obvious loophole!

Besides, the Paco family doesn't just have one "Child of the Sea" like Rubio Paco, and Marta, the old grandmother, as a "Handmaiden of the Sea," also has the sea's residual power in her body. How could they not handle a humanoid lizard whose strength level doesn't reach the middle Sequence, and have to risk leaking secrets to invite the great adventurer Louis Berry from outside to handle it?

The more Lumian understood the Sea-Praying Ceremony and these "Sea Kin," the more confused he became about the Paco family's previous choice, believing that there must be very important information hidden in it.

He looked at Juan Oro and organized his language:

"Can descendants of the same 'Handmaiden of the Sea' not attack each other?"

"There is no such thing." Juan Oro denied Lumian's guess.

Lumian deliberately muttered to himself:

"Then why did the Paco family specifically find an outsider like me to handle that commission, instead of having their own Beyonders do it?"

Juan Oro maintained the same sunken expression as before:

"It's precisely because I have such confusion that I had people monitor the Paco family, sent the 'Little Devil' to ask you, and insisted on seeing Marta."

You call that wrinkled monster that looks like a little old man "Little Devil"? Lumian nodded gently:

"The Paco family must be hiding a not-so-small secret."

He didn't ask again, watching Juan Oro turn his body and walk away leaning on his cane.

Soon, the "void starry sky" around him receded, and he "returned" to the master bedroom of the suite with the curtains drawn, "returned" to the armchair in front of the desk.

Lumian smiled, turned his body halfway, grasped the curtains, and pulled them open with a swish.

The morning sunlight shone in instantly, bright and brilliant.

…………

The next night, Milo Village, inside the Oro family's ancestral house, which is one floor lower than the "Sea Viceroy's" mansion.

This building, which has been renovated many times, has both ancient and modern features, both old and trendy, next to the blackened gray stone walls are concrete-cast pilasters, and under the roof covered with seaweed are pieces of red cylindrical tiles.

The small living room on the first floor had already closed its door, leaving only Juan Oro, the old man leaning on a black cane, his most valued grandson Fernandez Oro, and seven or eight Milo Village villagers who were unconscious on the floor.

Suddenly, in the corner of the room, shadows moved, and a figure walked out.

That figure was a little over 1.7 meters tall, with an ordinary face and no special features. He wore a brownish-green short-sleeved shirt with narrow sleeves, a pair of brownish-yellow loose trousers, leather shoes without laces with breathable holes, and a felt hat with a low crown and round brim.

"Who are you?" Juan Oro asked in Intis.

As one of the most powerful sea merchants in Santa Harbor, he had gone to sea to do business many times between the ages of thirty and fifty, so how could he not understand Intis.

That person replied in fluent Highland language:

"I am Louis Berry's companion, you can call me Chanem."

Doesn't look like the spirit-type Beyonder Lato encountered... Louis Berry really has more than one companion hiding in the dark... Juan Oro felt a bit lucky that he chose to negotiate first to test the waters.

As his thoughts turned, he looked at Fernandez, whose face was still a bit pale, knowing that he was not very happy in his heart.

Young people, this is very normal, they always calculate who suffered a loss and who took advantage, forgetting what the most important purpose is.

"You can start questioning them." Juan Oro said to the man who called himself Chanem, "Actually, over the past year, we have used many methods to determine whether they were lying, and even utilized the special traits of other Sea Kin, but all the results indicate that they told the whole truth, without concealment, and the failure of the Sea-Praying Ceremony has nothing to do with them."

Chanem curled his lips and responded with a smile:

"How would you know if it works without trying it yourself?"

He walked to the unconscious sailors, took out a dagger, pricked their fingertips one by one, and smeared the corresponding blood in different places on the back of his hand.

In such pain, those sailors woke up one after another.

Chanem took out a mirror in front of them and said to them with a smile:

"Your blood will tell me whether you are lying, whether you are the real person. Whoever deceives me, his blood will burn on the mirror, and he himself will have the same ending.

"Alright, answer in turn."

As Chanem spoke, he unhurriedly moved the blood on the back of his hand onto the mirror, letting all the sailors see that the blood eerily seeped into the glass.

The sailors looked at Juan Oro, and at the same time understood that this was still an investigation into the cause of the failure of last year's Sea-Praying Ceremony, so they very skillfully recounted their experiences without any omissions.

After listening, Chanem asked thoughtfully:

"Was it Iru and Sara who were responsible for transporting the lamb offerings?"

"Yes." All the sailors answered in unison.

Chanem asked further:

"Did they both die in the Sea-Praying Ceremony?"

The surviving sailors nodded one after another, indicating that the two companions were thrown off the ship in the giant waves of the ceremony's failure, fell into the sea, and never floated up again.

Chanem turned his head to look at Juan Oro:

"Are there any relics of Iru and Sara? Clothes they wore many times, toothbrushes they hadn't discarded, etc., etc.

"I want to try to summon their spirits. Although a year has passed, their spirits must have dissipated a lot and can no longer remember effective information, but the state of their spirits themselves will also reveal some things, such as deep resentment and hatred, etc."

Juan Oro shook his head:

"After the Sea-Praying Ceremony, we tried, but couldn't summon their spirits. People swallowed by the raging sea also have their spirits swallowed."

Chanem smiled and said:

"Try one more time, trying won't lose anything."

Juan Oro thought that was true, and immediately instructed Fernandez to take the diseased tooth of Iru and the clothes of Sara that had been used for spirit channeling.

Then, they saw Chanem set up an altar and hold a summoning ceremony:

"I!

"I summon in my name:

"The sailor from Milo Village, Santa Harbor, a man named Iru Edra, the owner of this tooth..."

A whistling wind blew, and the altar's candle flame was dyed with a gloomy green color.

A blurry figure soon stood out.

Succeeded? Actually succeeded? Fernandez looked at the top of the candle flame with dilated pupils.

That figure vaguely presented Iru's appearance, but there was no sign of drowning such as being soaked all over or having pale, bloated skin. Instead, the face was full of blood shadows, and there was an obvious wound on the forehead.

The eyes of this ghost were full of pain and hatred.

(End of chapter)