Chapter 1: The Dying Man

"Have you remembered everything I said?"

Snapping out of his daze, Xia De looked at his surroundings with some confusion. One second ago in his memory, he was helping a friend handle funeral arrangements; the next, he had arrived here.

This was a bedroom... absolutely not a bedroom from the twenty-first century. The bright yellow light inside wasn't very strong; the somewhat darkened wooden floor was fairly clean, but the walls had already turned somewhat yellow. A stack of books piled in the corner leaned crookedly as if about to topple, while the bookshelf beside the pile held some metal pitchers and picture frames among other ornaments.

Those photographs were all black and white.

Besides oil paintings, two metal pipes ran along the walls. One could faintly see that the clamps connecting the pipes were somewhat rusted; one of the thinner pipes branched off near the desk. That brown wooden desk was covered with sheets of paper, its drawers on both sides half-open, revealing documents and papers inside.

On the desk, the lamp connected to the brass-colored pipe was still lit; the heavy lamp's trumpet-shaped mouth was a very novel style—

"Hmm? Not an electric lamp? A gas lamp?"

It was hard to tell through observation whether it was a gas lamp, but the pipes clinging to the wall and the wall lamps connected to those pipes certainly did not look like electric lamps. That warm yellow glow wasn't bright, illuminating only the area around the desk, yet inexplicably made Xia De feel warmth.

By this light, he saw the decorative oil paintings on the wall, the black-and-white single portrait on the desk, and the newspaper spread out in the shadows of the floor. He couldn't make out any content on the newspaper, but he could see that the script was not square characters, but letters.

With this sense of era, no matter where this place was, it was no longer his homeland.

A scent of decay permeated the air, but it smelled more like a funeral home. Xia De remembered this smell; after all, just moments before, he had been helping his unfortunate friend who had passed away...

"Have you remembered everything I said?"

The voice sounded again, and only then did Xia De fully wake from his trance. The young man reacted quickly, sensing someone gripping his right wrist; now that his consciousness and body had completely merged, he thought to look down.

He stood beside the bed in what seemed to be a nineteenth-century man's bedroom; the bed was a four-poster, but curtains hung on only three sides. The visible parts of the bed frame and headboard all shimmered with a metallic luster under the gas lamp at the head of the bed.

That bedside lamp was shaped like a little angel holding it up; Xia De was momentarily captivated by this exquisite design.

The person holding his hand was precisely the man lying in the bed. This middle-aged man, who might be the owner of the bedroom, wore dark checkered pajamas; except for his head and right hand, everything else was hidden beneath the covers.

His facial features were clearly those of a white man, except his eyes were sunken, his cheeks sagged, and the right hand gripping Xia De's wrist was terrifyingly thin and dry. This appearance was just like that of someone about to starve to death; Xia De even believed that if he spoke slightly louder, he would have to beg the man not to die.

Xia De currently knew nothing and needed to understand the situation from this man.

"So... this is transmigration?"

He thought to himself, thus gaining a rough understanding of his current situation.

Fortunately, although the man in the bed was weak, at least there were no livor mortis spots on his body. Otherwise, Xia De would truly have to worry about his current predicament.

"Have you remembered everything I said?"

The frail man on the bed asked for the third time, his brown eyes deeply sunken in their sockets yet staring fixedly at Xia De. Although Xia De did not understand why he had inexplicably transmigrated here, at least he knew that it was best to play along for now, understand the current situation first, and then make plans for the future.

He opened his mouth to speak, only then realizing that the other party was not speaking Chinese, nor any language he knew, yet Xia De inexplicably understood it. Wanting to answer in the other party's language, he slightly opened his mouth, only to find that while he could understand, he absolutely could not speak it.

"No way? I can understand but can't speak?"

In an instant, a buzzing sensation appeared in his ears, and his back itched from tension. Being unable to speak the language of the otherworld's inhabitants was something he had not anticipated; this was the worst-case scenario.

A buzzing sound appeared in his head; immediately after, he realized this sound was not caused by his own nervousness. He understood the voice in his head; it was a woman, a woman speaking, a murmuring sound:

[Sixth Era, Universal Calendar 1853, Summer, Day of the Shining Silver Moon, you have come to this gloomy world. You understand you need an identity, so you must inherit everything of this inexplicable body. Now is the first step: go prove, prove that you can enter this world.]

"Sys..."

His instinctive reaction was that this was the legendary System, but he immediately realized this was absolutely not a System.

That woman's voice was exceptionally elegant and soothing, as if reciting poetry in a murmur, making one intoxicated. But the language she used was different from Chinese, and different from the language of the frail man on the bed.

That language was more ancient, more profound, as if a breeze from an ancient era had pierced through the veil of time and suddenly blown into the present. The language itself was concretized mystery; even merely understanding the meaning of the language made Xia De feel as though he was gazing into the deepest darkness.

Although Xia De understood this second language as well, merely understanding the language itself made his head buzz, and his new body's stomach produced a nauseous reaction.

This was a sense of spiritual oppression; the language used by the voice in his head itself possessed extraordinary power.

"This is this world's language family! The voice in my head isn't a System; this is something that existed in the original body!"

Xia De made his judgment; as his pupils contracted slightly, an even more terrifying speculation arose from what he saw before his eyes:

"A new world, this world that resembles the Victorian Steam Age, is a world of the extraordinary and the mysterious!"

He was not the type to reject reality; since transmigration had occurred, the existence of the extraordinary was not entirely unacceptable. However, the first task now was still to clarify the current situation, answer the man's question, and figure out his own identity.

Thus, Xia De tried his best to use his own language to convey information to the voice in his head:

"No matter who you are, listen well. I wish to accept everything of this body, but I do not have this body's memories, nor this body's linguistic habits."

[Now, you do.]

It was as if a brick had been forcibly stuffed into the crown of his head and maliciously stirred around a few times. Xia De considered it a miracle that he had not fainted.

He had not obtained the original body's memories; instead, some knowledge had been forcibly stuffed in—knowledge regarding the "Northern Kingdom Human Common Language, Dralion Kingdom Language." But this knowledge merely existed; like a translation machine, he had not immediately mastered it, understanding all the slang, dialects, religious cultures, allusions, or linguistic habits.

"Sorry, sir, my condition is somewhat poor; could you please repeat what you asked me to remember?"

Relying on this knowledge, he haltingly translated Chinese within his mind into the otherworld's "Northern Human Common Language," then deliberately spoke it aloud with a translated accent. The frail man holding Xia De's hand suddenly exerted force; it was hard to imagine such a thin wrist possessing such strength:

"You are still like this, your brain not working very well... Fine, I will say it again..."

It seemed the original owner of the body was not very bright mentally; Xia De's words temporarily aroused no suspicion.

"Xia De (Shade)..."

The pronunciation of the name was very similar.

"I am about to die. I knew three months in advance that I was going to die, so I chose you from among the vagrants. I changed your life, gave you a new name, taught you simple literacy and some common sense. After my death, you will obtain everything of mine: my detective agency, all my assets. But you must do one thing for me, a very simple thing—"

Although his tone was extremely weak, his terrifying eyes stared at Xia De like a dying lone wolf. The great terror revealed in those eyes made the outsider, who knew nothing of this world, feel somewhat chilled at heart.

But Xia De kept his breathing as steady as possible, yet did not bravely meet his gaze. It was not that the current Xia De was afraid; rather, from that sentence just now, he had preliminarily understood the original owner's situation.

Therefore, at this moment, he absolutely should not meet the man's gaze; instead, he should fearfully avert his eyes, as this fit the known character setting.

"Inherit my detective agency; no matter what you use this place for, at least maintain its operation continuously. Until September 5, 1853, three months from now, you will receive a letter. Retrieve that letter and burn it; this is the price for you to obtain my entire estate."

His hand tightly gripped Xia De's hand; even though Xia De, acting according to his performance, pretended to struggle slightly, he did not believe in the slightest that he could break free; the other party's strength was truly great:

"This is I, Sparrow Hamilton, leaving my estate to you, Xia De Hamilton, my sole requirement."