Chapter 635

Tonight Dorothy is going to hold a ritual in Xia De's attic, promoting from the low-ring fourth ring to the middle-ring fifth ring, so Xia De doesn't intend to go to Midhillburg this Sunday.

It's just that after breakfast, Xia De first went to Old John's pawnshop. Because he arrived too early, Old John had only just opened the door, and even the small sign placed outside hadn't been taken out:

"Coming to me so early, is there something you want to buy?"

The gray-haired old man finished greeting his neighbor before yawning and standing at the shop entrance asking Xia De, who was walking along the street. Tobesk in the early morning was so peaceful, especially for those who didn't have to toil for a living:

"Detective, help me take the padlock on the door to the counter."

"Okay, but Old John, is the steam pipe at your door leaking? Why is there a basin here to catch water?"

Xia De asked curiously.

"Already notified the pipe company to come and repair it; this can't be delayed, otherwise it will freeze and crack when winter comes. Speaking of which, what exactly are you here for?"

The two walked into the shop together; the light in the morning wasn't very good, and the gas lamp in the shop was on.

"Do you have moonstone?"

"Of course I do, the first business of the day is actually so small? Detective, how much do you want?"

As he spoke, the old man flipped through the cargo list under the counter to check how much stock he still had.

"Just a small piece is fine; one of my strange arts needs casting materials, but it only consumes a very small amount each time, so a small piece of moonstone can let me use it for a very long time."

"Always carrying stones in your pocket, it must be inconvenient, right? And it's easy to lose."

Old John looked up at Xia De.

"Then what do you mean..."

"I happen to have a ring made of moonstone here, and it's written with runes that can enhance the effect of strange arts in the moon script of the Fourth Era ancestors, and not only that, it..."

"You can just name the price."

Xia De said with a smile:

"So early, you really have the mind to earn my banknotes."

"Considering you introduced Lu Yisha to me to place a large order, this time I intend to sell it to you at cost price!"

Old John said with his neck raised, finally collecting 1 pound 8 shillings from Xia De and handing him the ring that looked like it was made of gray stone.

The surface of the ring was relatively smooth, engraved with a circle of tiny, slender inscriptions; those letters looked like a waning moon.

The meaning after translation was quite normal:

【May the moon be with you.】

After returning home, Xia De didn't wait for the blonde female writer, but instead, an unfamiliar carriage stopped at the door of his house.

Subsequently, a middle-aged woman who called herself the "owner of the Aikedi clothing store" greeted the shop assistants to carefully take down the twenty-something sets of clothes from the carriage and send them to the second floor for Xia De.

"It was ordered for you by Miss Princess; she gave us the size information."

The puzzled Xia De only knew it was clothes sent by Lei Qianya when he took the cargo list from the female shop owner to sign for it:

"How many gold pounds did these clothes cost?"

The cargo list only had information about these purely handmade tailored clothes, and there was no price.

"Miss Princess's servant told us not to tell you the price; it was requested by that young lady."

Xia De nodded and signed his name on the receipt. In this way, he wouldn't lack clothes to wear this autumn.

Xia De was at home for the whole day, while Dorothy didn't come until 10:00 in the morning. She looked somewhat nervous, constantly checking the documents she got from the academy to see if her ritual had any omissions.

Xia De suggested inviting Priest Luweiya and Doctor Shi Nai De to help in the evening, but was rejected by Dorothy. Her ritual required as few people as possible here, otherwise, it might affect the success rate of the ritual.

To let Dorothy relax, after dinner in the evening, Xia De took Dorothy to the university district to walk the cat. Subsequently, they didn't go home, but sat together on the lawn of the Tairarier River embankment that passed through the university district to watch the starry sky.

The two talked about many things, and this conversation under the starry sky was very relaxing for Dorothy. In short, when they returned home at 9:00 in the evening, the blonde girl looked completely fine.

The time chosen for the ritual was 10:00 that night; to prevent Mia from causing trouble, Xia De locked it on the second floor in advance and prepared the cat food it liked and the two rings it liked, letting the cat not make too much noise.

At 9:50 in the evening, Xia De and Dorothy came to the attic together. Xia De looked up at the star map drawn with chalk on the attic's sloped ceiling:

"If it goes smoothly, the ritual can end in twenty minutes. But I'm quite curious, when you promote, will it cause any reaction from Lei Qianya a few streets away?"

"When Lei Qianya promoted to the fifth ring, I just felt my body was a bit hot, and there were no other abnormal phenomena. But once I promote this time, we will be at the same level again, and the connection will also be strengthened. So, Lei Qianya hid in her room an hour in advance to prevent accidents."

Dorothy stood in the center of the floor filled with ritual items, looking at the floor-standing mirror in the center of the ritual base. This mirror was an antique, said to have been used by the princesses of the Cavendish family three hundred years ago, and was borrowed by Dorothy from Old John.

Although Old John was a bit stingy, the goods in his hands were absolutely authentic.

Dorothy's core spirit rune was 【Writer】 【Role-player】 【Another Princess】. At the low ring, she used 【Writer】 as the system core, used fairy tales as the means of power, and drew power from enlightenment until she could summon characters from fairy tales as summons to assist in battle.

Lei Qianya's low ring was also such a means, and the two ladies' middle ring intended to utilize 【Role-player】. Besides continuing to connect the sublimation words of fairy tales and summoning characters from stories, they tried to "role-play" those characters in the stories themselves, letting themselves possess the power in the fairy tales.

Therefore, besides thoroughly connecting the sublimation words of the low fourth ring—【Outside the Illusion of Matches, the Writer Pities the Frozen Person】, she also needed to activate the power of the core spirit rune as much as possible to prepare for the system construction after the middle ring.

This resulted in Dorothy already being dressed as the "Match Girl" at this time. That is, barefoot, wearing patched coarse cloth clothes, a headscarf on her head, pot ash smeared on her face, carrying a small basket in her hand, and matches in the basket.

Probably to show the feeling of "scantily clad," Dorothy's clothes were somewhat... unsuitable for wearing on an autumn night, but a fourth-ring mage wouldn't easily catch a cold, so there was no need to worry about her physical health.

Now on the ground, besides the ritual traces painted with special chalk, the precious metal charms bought from the academy, the potion bottles on the cabinet by the wall, and the ritual symbols used as antiques, there were also matches standing upright. The matches were stuck on clay and fixed on the floor so they wouldn't tilt; fixing these matches was the most troublesome step in setting up the entire ritual.

"Attention, ten seconds left!"

Xia De, who could accurately perceive time, said, walking quickly to the attic window and opening it. The night sky tonight was still covered by thin fog, but the moon could still be seen.

The moonlight shone on Xia De, and he stood at the window and turned around:

"Five seconds! Summon the Life Ring!"

Stretching out both hands, huge brass rings appeared behind both of them at the same time, and four-colored spiritual light immediately overflowed in the attic.

"Three seconds! Silent Moonlight!"

Moonlight shone obliquely from outside the window, directly covering Xia De, helping him accelerate the recovery speed of his spirit. Of course, this beam of light could only be seen by himself.

"Two seconds! Maze Lock, The Little Match Girl!"

Xia De, who only had the third ring, certainly couldn't use this strange art completely.

But the first-ring him could summon snowflakes, the second-ring him could vaguely summon the moon above his head, and in the third-ring state, while his spirit was consuming rapidly, his body and life ring resonated with the moonlight outside the window, subsequently the starry sky and the star map on the attic ceiling vaguely overlapped, actually looking like the ceiling became transparent, letting that brilliant galaxy hang upside down directly above the two people's heads.

Large rituals can also use maze locks; Dorothy used the bonus from betting on the big city player some time ago to set up a maze lock ritual, just to let Xia De use 【The Little Match Girl】 with all his might at this moment.

"One! Dorothy, time is up!"

Dorothy stood in the center of the attic, eyes closed, facing that huge copper-framed floor-standing mirror. The moonlight outside the window and the starlight above her head shone on her at the same time, and snowflakes fell on her head and shoulders, then slowly melted.

She carried the basket on her left arm and held the story of "The Little Match Girl" she hand-copied in her right hand; this was the original version of the story provided by Xia De, the creator of this story, symbolizing the source of the sublimation words.

The parchment scroll flew into the air automatically, and the curled paper scroll unfolded bit by bit under the illumination of Dorothy's spiritual light, subsequently flames ignited from the tail of the parchment and then spread to the upper part.

The ritual base on the ground lit up with light, and the three hundred and sixty-five matches that hadn't been lit originally lit up together under the snowy ceiling.

In the flickering firelight, the surface of the floor-standing mirror, which originally reflected this strange scene in the attic, gradually blurred. Eerie white fog covered the mirror surface after the parchment scroll burned out completely. And Dorothy still kept her eyes closed, her right hand elegantly swinging in front of her, subsequently a match appeared between her fingers.

Shaking the match slightly, firelight appeared on the match head. She opened her eyes and nimbly threw the burning match toward the mirror surface.

Surrounded by hundreds of matches, surrounded by the ritual base lit up on the ground, surrounded by moonlight, starlight, and spiritual light, that match ignited the white fog on the mirror surface. After the firelight, the scene of the snowy street appeared inside the mirror.

Xia De, who was trying hard to maintain the starlight and falling snow, breathed a sigh of relief; this meant the ritual was proceeding very smoothly.

Dorothy, carrying the basket, watched herself on the street of the snowy town in the mirror; the reflection of Dorothy in the mirror was curled up on one side of the street, with obvious frostbite marks on her fair skin, looking at the snowy town with a pale face.

"Outside the Illusion of Matches..."

She said softly, and the reflection of Dorothy in the mirror seemed to have noticed the "other Dorothy" in the mirror as well, standing up shivering.

The prepared potions were drunk bottle by bottle by Dorothy, and subsequently, the dust made of 【Forged Philosopher's Stone】 as material was evenly sprinkled under her feet.

The spiritual light on the life ring behind her shone more and more brightly, the matches burning on the ground didn't shrink, let alone gradually extinguish; that firelight became brighter and brighter, until it illuminated the entire attic like broad daylight.