Chapter 1581: The Edwards Family's Secret

The journey through the city and the countryside held nothing worthy of Xia De's attention; whether it was the urban landscape or the rural scenery, the Green Lake region lacked any particularly striking features compared to the cities he had visited in the past.

When preparing to cross the border at the checkpoint, the coachmen indeed produced the special pass that Captain Lades had given to Xia De, so they did not need to wait in line for registration. While the coachmen showed the pass to an officer Xia De had never seen before and the carriages were temporarily stopped, Xia De also saw from the carriage window that there were more people waiting in line at the border to cross than he had seen last time.

The long queue was barely organized amidst the shouting of the soldiers. After the line wound in a circle through the camp, the very end almost reached outside the camp. Xia De's hearing was quite good, and from the noisy voices of the people, he learned that there was a monthly market in the village on the side of Michaela Blast Furnace City today, which was why it was so lively here.

He did not see Captain Lades, so Xia De did not get out of the carriage. The coachmen quickly handled the border crossing procedures, and the two carriages crossed past the people in line and entered the neighboring country directly.

Then followed another boring journey. At a little past ten in the morning, a yawning Xia De jumped off the carriage and looked at the "Glass Blast Furnace" in the distance, saying to the pharmacist miss who had also stepped off the carriage not far away:

"Next time, let's take a boat. Although it's a detour, at least the journey will be more interesting. Taking a carriage by myself is really too boring; if I had known, I would have brought my cat."

The sorceress did not respond to Xia De's boring words and beckoned to him: "Come with me, this way."

Saying this, she was about to lead Xia De away from the Glass Avenue where the carriages had stopped and into a small alley. This road was also the main street where Xia De had last seen the police drive away the disabled boy; it was the city center of Michaela Blast Furnace City. And this time, he indeed did not see the begging disabled boy sitting on the side of the street again.

He followed behind the pharmacist miss into that nameless narrow alley. After walking a dozen steps in the alley, he heard quite dense footsteps coming from the main street behind him, as well as the sound of someone speaking loudly through a megaphone.

He turned around in surprise and soon saw a crowd of people walking past on the street. The person speaking loudly was calling on the citizens to protest this negotiation action, because the Pantanal region originally belonged to the Kingdom of Carcenrick, and the negotiations desecrated the glory of Carcenrick.

"Their destination is the City Hall. This week's meeting is being held in Michaela Blast Furnace City. They are probably trying to take advantage of the lunch break in a while to give speeches at the square in front of the City Hall."

The pharmacist miss said to Xia De, then signaled for him to follow:

"Don't pay attention to such boring activities. The final result of the negotiations will not be decided because they walked a few steps."

In the big cities of this era, there are always small alleys as complex as a maze. And to find a specific shop in such a continuous complex of buildings, one would probably get lost for a long time if no one led the way.

The destination of the two was an old bookstore hidden in the alley. The pharmacist miss pushed the door open and walked in directly, and Xia De followed behind her, strictly ensuring he did not get within 1 meter of her.

There were no other customers in the bookstore. The pharmacist miss led Xia De through the bookstore and then pushed open the back door that had a sign hanging on it that read "Please Do Not Enter Without Permission." They passed through the backyard and entered the rear warehouse of this bookstore, and the warehouse was the trading place for this black market.

"I made an appointment yesterday to pick up that box of things."

She said to the fat woman guarding behind the counter and took out a badge as proof. The woman nodded, took a black old suitcase onto the tabletop, and pushed it to the pharmacist miss. The latter opened it herself, and what was inside the box were old clothes, old books, rusty buttons, and other messy sundries.

"What is this?" Xia De asked curiously.

"The guys who go to the island sometimes, even if they can't find anything of value, will take away the sundries and then sell them cheaply to the local black market. So when we went to the island last time, although most of the furniture was still there, the inside was empty. Not only the black market for Ringed Sorcerers, but even the local ordinary grocery stores or second-hand shops might discover things from the Edwards family. In the eyes of local occult researchers and busybodies, this family is quite legendary, and some people even specialize in collecting old items from the Edwards family."

【Continuation of previous line】

The pharmacist miss explained while rummaging through the things in the box. According to her, these sundries were all used by her ancestors a hundred years ago.

She quickly found a red-covered notebook the size of a palm from the box. After flipping through it quickly, she nodded and threw two alloy coins with a value of 1 Krone onto the tabletop. She stuffed the notebook into her pocket, closed the box, and signaled for Xia De to help carry it.

"Why do I have to help you carry the box?" Xia De raised his own question.

"Don't you have the ability to store sundries? Besides, isn't helping out when acting with a pretty girl something a gentleman should do?" The sorceress said as a matter of course, signaling that Xia De could leave:

"We will take a boat into Green Lake. If you don't mind, you can have lunch on the boat in a while." "I certainly don't mind, but could you wait a moment?"

He put the suitcase behind the side flap on the right side of his coat, patted it, put the toy into his pocket, and then asked the fat woman behind the counter who was watching the two communicate:

"Ma'am, do you have any coin-type relics here?"

So, ten minutes later, Xia De was following the pharmacist miss out of the bookstore in high spirits, holding a small cloth bag containing two coins. The Poet-level relic 【Sorrow of the Lute】: in a confined space, throwing the coins onto the floor with force can cause a sorrowful lute piece to play randomly in that space, with the price being that the user will completely lose the ability to speak for one hour.

This was that kind of useless Poet-level relic, so the price was still quite cheap. And when Xia De got them, he also saw fine Ancient Elvish on the side of the coins:

【I hope the performance of the rest of my life can be as sorrowful as it was at Liana's funeral.】 The appearance of this kind of coin obviously also had a very complex story.

"However, why did you ask about the local grave-robbing gang just now?"

When passing through the alley to go to the banks of the Duin River, the pharmacist miss who was leading the way also asked curiously.

"Someone took something they shouldn't have. Although I have already found that thing, I still want to know where they got it from."

Xia De gave the answer, and the pharmacist miss nodded thoughtfully. She wanted to help Xia De find it, as she also had a lot of influence locally, but thinking about what the two had to do, she decided to wait until this matter was over before talking about it.

The steamship waiting for them on the banks of the Duin River was very similar to the one that was destroyed last time, except that there were already two Nine-Ring ladies waiting for the two on the ship.

"These are my followers. To prevent what happened last time, they are going with us. However, they are not going to the island, but waiting for us at the pier."

Because she was worried that Xia De would misunderstand, the pharmacist miss specifically explained. Xia De didn't care either. After boarding the deck and watching the banks on both sides move backward, he was thinking about what he would encounter on the island this time.

Last time, because they entered the big lake from the direction of Deraerion on the north shore of Green Lake, the landing point was the pier from the center to the north shore. But this time, they started from Michaela Blast Furnace City, so the landing point was the south shore of the island. When the ship entered the thick fog area, Xia De realized that the docking position this time was different from the last time.

Sure enough, as the ship slowed down, the shadow of the island in the fog became clearer and clearer, and Xia De gradually saw that what was connected to the pier this time was no longer a small forest, but a small path on a low hill.

"The northern part of Green Lake Island is flat; the pier, cemetery, town, and farmland are all over there. The south is low hills; the Edwards mansion, orchard, and lighthouse are all in the south."

After the steamship gently hit the pier and stopped, the pharmacist miss carried the cloth bag containing reagent bottles and was the first to come to the pier, with Xia De following behind her. As for the two Nine-Ring sorceresses who had been silent all along, they stood on the deck watching them walk away in the fog:

"Then what is this pier used for?"

"This is the private pier of the Edwards family. The pier connects to the mansion on the hill and is responsible for transporting some things that are inconvenient for the townspeople to see. When Green Lake Town was still prosperous, the lord's family often took a boat from here to go to Michaela Blast Furnace City for vacation. Although there was no strict rule, the townspeople rarely took the initiative to go to the hills in the south of the island; they tacitly agreed that this was a private territory where no one other than the Edwards was allowed to set foot."

【Continuation of previous line】

Their destination was not the Green Lake Town cemetery in the small forest in the north of the island. Although most of the townspeople and the Edwards were buried there, according to the pharmacist miss, in fact, there were no corpses in the Edwards' graves in the cemetery; all members of the family were buried separately in various hidden corners of the island.

As for the reason, this sorceress also couldn't explain clearly:

"It sounds like some kind of ritual, using bloodline as a guide to affect the entire island, but I can't explain the specific situation. Judging from the relics and letters left by my father, this is a rule left by the first-generation lord of the family, Klein Edwards, and my ancestors have always been following it."

What she was looking for this time was the grave of the wife of the younger brother, Sloth Edwards, in the second generation of that root map. To prevent the situation of suddenly losing a sense of direction midway and being forced to wait, this time the two did not waste any time on the journey, moving forward along the path connecting the Edwards mansion and the southern pier, then turning into a side road midway, and after more than ten minutes, saw the lighthouse standing at the highest point of the island.