Chapter 2192: Sparrow Hamilton's Notes

This time the Countess's divination went smoothly. Even though she didn't know much basic information, based on her understanding of Xia De—that is, things related to this man were definitely not small matters—she guessed the truth for the first time in front of Xia De:

"This is the house of the Gray Gloves' ace, that Gray-Headed Hawk?"

"Yes, but not entirely correct. We generally call such houses safe houses."

Xia De corrected:

"【Dice Story Collection】, you knew that I had a relationship with the intelligence organizations of both countries, so you shouldn't be surprised that I know this place, right?"

The witch blinked:

"Not surprised... the safe house of the Gray-Headed Hawk is actually in this kind of place. Do you know? He is also a legendary figure to me. When the nobles of Moon Bay wanted to seek independence, the Gray-Headed Hawk continuously murdered many important figures. I was still a little girl who didn't understand anything. In my eyes, he was the same as those big bad wolves in fairy tales that snatched away disobedient children."

She said with a smile, and then felt incredible:

"So speaking of which, that Gray-Headed Hawk actually died? When did this happen? Such a big thing, and there is not even a bit of news inside Karsner? Wait a minute, I remember hearing about the Gray-Headed Hawk some time ago. Although it was just a rumor, various evidence all indicated that the Gray-Headed Hawk was still active."

"Yes, what you said is not wrong at all."

Xia De nodded, still looking at every tightly closed door on the second floor:

"The Gray-Headed Hawk did indeed die, he died last summer."

"Then why..."

"The Gray-Headed Hawk is indeed still active; someone inherited this code name and is actively operating. And that person—"

He turned to face the Countess, who pointed to Xia De hesitantly:

"Is it you?"

"Yes."

Xia De nodded, continuing to observe those doors, while Miss Beilindier took a deep breath:

"Yes, I found that I am not very surprised. After all, compared to other things, the identity of an ordinary person really doesn't count for anything. Then did you come to Moon Bay this time related to this identity?"

"It has nothing to do with the Gray-Headed Hawk's affairs. The Gray-Headed Hawk shouldn't have appeared in Moon Bay; he had other missions. Oh, found it, here."

He walked toward the broom closet, and after moving everything inside away, he groped on the wall of the narrow broom closet.

"Did you murder the Gray-Headed Hawk?"

Miss Beilindier asked curiously again, and Xia De immediately shook his head:

"Of course not, but he did indeed die in front of me. At that time, no one knew of his death. He arranged his affairs before he died, and I even went to the cemetery to visit him during festivals like the Year-End Festival."

Speaking of this, Xia De was startled, and then realized that he had actually forgotten to visit him at the cemetery on the anniversary of Detective Sparrow's death. Xia De felt remorseful in his heart, and at the same time wondered what he was doing at that time, and how he could have forgotten such an important thing.

【You were probably "busy" attending your own birthday banquet at that time; those girls are not easy to deal with.】

"She" reminded with a smile, so Xia De understood why he had forgotten such an important day. Of course, Miss Beilindier was behind him at this time, so she didn't see his expression.

Soon, Xia De found an area on the wall of the broom closet that could be pressed. As he exerted a little force, the innermost wall of the broom closet had an extremely narrow passage.

Even for Xia De and Miss Beilindier, who had standard body types, they had to turn sideways to walk into it, and behind the passage was a secret room the size of a cloakroom. The secret room was built so small out of necessity; a secret room that was too large would allow anyone with a heart to see at a glance that a piece of area was missing in the house.

Just as Xia De had once thought, Detective Sparrow had indeed sent someone to handle things here before he died. In the narrow room, there were small beds, chairs, small tables, and numerous bookshelves spliced together with metal pipes and metal plates. And now these pieces of furniture were still there, but the materials and documents on the bookshelves had clearly been destroyed to some extent.

Traces appeared in the files that should have been placed closely together, and the remaining files, after Xia De and Miss Beilindier looked through them, were all investigation reports on the Seven Great Families of Moon Bay, as well as transcripts of confidential documents from the Moon Bay City Hall.

"There is actually information about my family here. Let me see... oh, this is a photo of my eighth birthday. He could even find this kind of photo?"

The witch was greatly surprised, and seeing Xia De stretching his head to look, she pushed his head back:

"I was not quite the same when I was young as I am now. In short, you are not allowed to look."

She put that photo back into the file, and decided to ask for Xia De's opinion in a moment, and then move all these materials away.

These remaining materials were absolutely precious. The fact that the Gray-Headed Hawk could collect them so detailedly, besides his own credit, the entire Gray Gloves organization should have put in a lot of effort.

And the fact that these materials could be left behind showed that the destroyed materials were even more precious.

Xia De tried to listen with "Echo of the Past" and confirmed that he heard nothing, so he signaled the witch to divine.

The latter immediately showed a smile:

"Look, divination is still very useful."

Because it didn't involve Ringed Shushis, this divination was very successful:

"Fire, those materials were burned directly. The destruction location was in this house, but not here. This place is too enclosed; no one would be stupid enough to ignite paper in a secret room."

After her confirmation, the location where those documents were ignited was the kitchen on the first floor of the house, and the time was the turn of spring and summer last year, that is, before Detective Sparrow died. Since this house was still connected to gas, the person who came here to handle the documents naturally used the stove.

However, after the two came to the kitchen, they found that the kitchen had also been cleaned very cleanly, and there was no possibility of "paper not being burned completely, leaving small scraps of paper with important information."

"Help me check if there is any fly ash."

After thinking carefully, Xia De said again. Although Miss Beilindier didn't know what he wanted to do, she nodded and agreed.

Xia De's "Breath of Time" could reverse time, but he couldn't make a book reappear by reversing the time of the table just because a book had been placed on the table and now the book had been taken away.

To restore items through "Breath of Time," at least there had to be remains of that thing, no matter how small the remains were. This was just a question of how much spirit was consumed.

Fortunately, although the person who handled those documents was not careless enough to leave behind paper that had not been burned, the person who cleaned the hygiene was not particularly careful. Finally, they found a small piece of paper ash after burning in the sewer and under the trash can, respectively.

Xia De put the two pieces of ash together on the stove, then took out the "Ring of Longevity" and wore it on his right hand and rotated it, and only then took a deep breath:

"Breath of Time."

The current maximum limit for reversing time with Breath of Time was three years, so it was quite effective for these things that had been burned more than a year ago. In the witch's perspective, she only saw that with Xia De's inhalation, two gray air currents that were almost impossible to detect rushed into his nostrils, and those two small pieces of ash were actually reversed in time and restored to their original appearance.

The two pieces of ash seemed to come from the same item, because what was lying on the stove now was a brown leather-bound notebook. The side of the notebook was fastened with a magnetic metal buckle. After Xia De opened it, he saw that it was full of words that could not be recognized as expected:

"Encrypted ciphertext."

"It seems like something is clipped inside."

Miss Beilindier reminded. Xia De then flipped back, and found a total of 3 photos in the notebook. These photos were all landscape photos, and they were very similar to those Xia De found in the mezzanine of his own attic. It seemed that they were also places Detective Sparrow had been to.

The witch leaned over to identify them on the side:

"This one is the Beilindier Big Ben. Look at the banner hanging here; I was still a little girl that year. This one is... it seems to be the Steel Capital, Gangduo City, in the east of Deraerion."

Xia De knew this city. Mr. Johnson at the garbage disposal station who connected with him in Tobesk had mentioned that the Gray-Headed Hawk had stolen a batch of special alloy smelting records for casting steam cannons in Gangduo City, but that was also many years ago.

"What is the last one?"

He asked again. The first two were city landscapes, while the last photo was taken in the mountains and forests. Even a yellowed black-and-white photo could show that the shooting time was at night, and the only conspicuous landmark in the photo was the side of that high tower hidden in the mountains in the upper left corner.

Miss Beilindier thought for a while. Just when Xia De thought she couldn't recognize it, she suddenly waved her hand:

"I remembered. Although I haven't been here, I have seen such scenery in the teacher's travel notes. This should be the scenery of Karas Mountain in Deraerion. Look at that high tower; that is the ancient ruin that collapsed last spring. You can't see it now."

"What?"

Xia De turned his head abruptly to look at her:

"Karas Mountain? That Karas Mountain with the ruins of the Moon Gao Ta? Are you sure this photo is the scenery of that mountain?"

Miss Beilindier nodded hesitantly:

"Sure. Since knowing you, I haven't seen you so surprised. Why, is that mountain very important?"

That mountain was naturally not important. What was important was the ruins of the ancient Moon Gao Ta. Of course, now it was the ruins of the high tower. The outlander, although he "woke up" on the Day of the Silver Moon Shining in the midsummer of 1853, had always suspected that he had actually arrived in this world in the spring of 1853, or that this body had done something very important in that spring.

"I really didn't expect before that he had also been to Karas Mountain..."

Xia De felt heavy incredulity, and then asked the witch again:

"Is there any way to divine the specific shooting time of this photo?" ===== CHAPTER 2193 =====