Secrets: Priestess

Chapter 78 Chase
"Thai!"

Claire blurted out!
An indescribable emotion surged from the bottom of her heart, and a tingling sensation spread from her tailbone upwards, making her tremble all over!
Hatred and love, along with anger, turned into a torrent of emotions. Claire stood up from her seat, but when she wanted to rush towards the "Queen", she was restricted to the area around her seat by some unknown force and could not leave.

Klein, who was presiding over a private transaction between The Hanged Man and Justice, looked at the out-of-control Priestess with a bewildered expression, recalling the complex emotion of the word "Tay."

泰？
The Tai that Senior Claire mentioned?
Could it be... Tai Perslan?

The “Queen” is Tai Purcell? !
Because the Queen never prayed to him, Klein had yet to figure out the Queen's true identity.

In Klein's knowledge, Tai Perslan was a wanted criminal among the Nighthawks, a sorceress who had taken the "witch" potion, and the former partner of Claire who had kidnapped her!

What a scumbag!
Ah, no, or should I say she is a scumbag!

Klein was also filled with righteous indignation, but… after some thought, he realized that as a “fake evil god,” he couldn’t punish Tai Perslan at this moment…

It's not that I don't want to help you, Claire-senpai... but I'm only a Sequence 9 with limited abilities...

Klein decided to continue to keep the Fool's mystery and observe how things developed.

"Claire."

There was a hint of teasing in the lazy voice of the "Queen".

It was indeed her! "Claire"!
Claire really wanted to pounce on him and tear through the thick fog, venting the surging emotions in her chest.

But when she was isolated in her seat, she looked at the Fool sitting at the head. The Fool maintained his unchanged sitting posture, indifferent to their conversation.

Claire took a deep breath, calmed herself down, and said, "Mr. Fool, please let me communicate with the Queen alone."

"Yes." Klein naturally agreed to this request and separated the "Priestess" and the "Queen" together.

The first wave of emotions had passed, and Claire had regained her composure. She sat down again and asked the "Queen," "Why did you treat me like this?"

Klein, who was sitting at the head of the table, nodded. Exactly! Why would Tai Perslan do such an outrageous thing to Senior Claire?
The Queen didn't answer the question, but sighed softly, "I never thought you'd become a Beyonder. And I certainly didn't expect to meet you in this way."

Klein, who was just watching the show, frowned upon hearing these words. The other party had actually avoided discussing Senior Claire's key question. Tai Perslan was truly despicable.

"Answer my question!" Claire frowned.

Klein secretly admired his senior's attitude. This kind of momentum was what he needed to display in such a situation!
The Queen was silent for a few seconds, her voice trembling slightly. "Will you still accept me in my current state?"

Claire sneered, "You look like this? You asked for it."

Klein resisted the urge to nod. "That's right! Ty Perslan! Didn't he drink the potion himself?"

Uh… Klein paused at this thought. He thought of Jie Shi. Judging from Jie Shi's example, the man who drank the "Assassin" potion might have been tricked or forced…

Could it be that Tai Poslan was forced to drink the "Assassin" potion, and then when he was promoted to a "Witch" he found out that he would change his sex to become a woman, so he was forced to break up with Senior Claire?
Klein thought of the hatred in the Queen's words when she discussed the Witch Cult at a previous gathering, and felt that he had guessed the "truth."

Facing the silent "Queen," Claire continued to ask questions, seemingly filled with endless questions:

"Why are you running away? I've carefully read every case file you've ever had. You've been targeting extremely heinous criminals. Even if the Night Watchers caught you, they'd typically develop you into an informant and gradually recruit you into their ranks... So, why are you running away?"

The "Queen" remained silent.

Klein, who was watching from the sidelines, wanted to complain in his heart. No wonder they were able to get together as a pair before. These two were both Riddlers!

After a long silence, just when Klein was about to collapse from the headache,

Claire said, "I will catch you myself."

The Queen replied, "I'll be waiting for you."

After the conversation between the two of them ended, Klein instantly removed all his shielding and said to all the members at a faster pace than usual, "Today's gathering ends here."

After saying this, Klein didn't wait for these people to say any lofty farewell words and directly severed everyone's connection with the gray fog.

The Fool's unusually hurried style made "Justice" and "The Hanged Man" think about it. But before they could say anything, the figure behind the bronze table collapsed and disappeared...

After regaining consciousness from the gray fog, Claire was still sitting at the table in a daze. A moment later, someone knocked on the door, and she finally came to her senses.

When I opened the door, Sharon, wearing a light green dress, stood outside with a smile on her face. Her deep eyes were like twinkling stars, filled with tenderness. "I want to go shopping. Can you accompany me?"

Claire looked distracted at this moment. She said in a hoarse voice, "I want to rest on Monday."

"Are you sick?" Sharon placed her slender hand on Claire's forehead. Her fingers were delicate and soft, and her movements were gentle and careful.

The sunlight dappled into the house and onto Sharon's soft profile.

This made Claire's heart fragile and tremble for a moment.

Claire took a step back and coughed lightly to hide her emotions: "I'm fine... Since you want to invite me to go shopping, then I'll go with you."

"Let's go." Claire said as she was about to head out the door.

But Sharon grabbed her wrist.

"How can you go out dressed like this?" Sharon pulled Claire towards the closet and said, "Let me help you get some clothes before you go out."

"Don't bother with that..." Claire sighed.

Sharon smiled lightly: "No objection, since you agreed to go shopping with me, you have to listen to me from now on."

Under Sharon's command, Claire undressed and dressed, changing out of one outfit after another, and finally put on a simple and pure dress.

The upper part of the dress is a slim-fitting white shirt with a slightly open neckline, showing the delicate collarbone line and graceful neck line.

The lower part of the dress was a long white skirt that was loose and light, and was tightened at the waist, highlighting Claire's slender waist.

Especially when standing close to Sharon who was wearing light green, the two of them looked simple and pure, like a breeze in early summer, giving people a feeling of tranquility and elegance.

Looking at herself in the mirror, Claire's head was buzzing. Even she herself was attracted by this kind of beauty. She felt in her heart that Sharon was really good at matching their clothes.

Finally, Sharon put a dazzling pearl necklace on Claire's head, and put on a small black hat with elegant white lace around it. She tucked her handbag into her arms, took Claire's arm, and said with a smile, "Let's go."

Sharon hired a carriage. Instead of taking Claire to Phillips Department Store in the Golden Sycamore District, which had become a social gathering place for the aristocracy, she asked the driver to take her to Harrods Department Store in the Hall Street District.

Although the clothing, shoes and accessories at Harrods are not as fancy, they are equally rich in style.

Drinking tea, shopping, trying on different styles of clothing, looking at Sharon who was smiling happily, Claire also felt a little bit of the fun of this kind of leisure shopping.

That was a completely different kind of pleasure from the satisfaction she gained from increasing her strength.

One is the satisfaction of ambition, the other is the satisfaction of life.

But it’s actually the same.

It's all about satisfying desires.

This time, Claire and Sharon played until dark and still felt like they had had enough.

Sharon smiled and said, "Can you take me home? I'm a little afraid of the dark. After you drop me off, do you still want to go to the Dragon Bar?"

Claire didn't believe Sharon was afraid of the dark, but at the moment, she wisely treated Sharon like a timid little white rabbit and nodded, "Okay. And I have to go home and change into my training clothes. I can't go to the Dragon Bar in this dress."

Sharon's lips curled up in a beautiful yet helpless arc, and she sighed softly in the night: "The first half of the sentence is acceptable, but the second half is redundant."

After sending Sharon home, Claire changed into her knight training uniform and a black robe, then went to the bus stop and boarded a public carriage to the docks.

When Claire walked into the Dragon Bar, she found the atmosphere there was a bit strange.

There were far fewer customers in the bar than usual, and most importantly, the younger Mandated Punishers who usually hung out in the bar were nowhere to be seen.

Because of the underground trading grounds and fighting arenas, there were always Mandated Punishers on duty in the bar. This was considered the Mandated Punishers' second base in Tingen City.

Claire walked towards the underground ring and met the curly-haired young man guarding the gate. She asked, "What happened?"

When the curly-haired young man saw Claire, he immediately stood up and politely replied, "There's a fraudster in Tingen, and the boss and his brothers are going to look for him."

Claire asked in confusion, "A fraudster? Isn't that the responsibility of the police? Why would Boss Swain be concerned about something like this?"

Everyone else was out, and the curly-haired young man who stayed behind to watch the door was eager to talk. He told everyone everything he had learned. "This fraudster has defrauded too many people. The police have calculated that the total amount of money defrauded is over ten thousand pounds, including friends and relatives of the brothers. Oh, and Gawain's niece was also defrauded of hundreds of pounds. I heard she couldn't bear the pressure and fainted and is in the hospital."

Claire frowned when she heard this. "Where did Boss Swain and the others go to arrest that person? What's that person's name?"

The young man pondered, "Lan... Lanevus, yes, that's Lanevus. I don't know where the boss went to arrest him, but everyone's spread out to search Tingen... The scammer suddenly vanished without a trace. Maybe he's already escaped Tingen."

"Is Mr. Gao Wen coming tonight?"

"I came, and after I came, I followed the boss out."

"Lend me a room and give me one of Swain's belongings."

Although the curly-haired young man didn't know what Claire was going to do, he knew that Claire was a popular contestant invited by the boss, so he cleared out a bar room for Claire and gave her a set of Swain's spare naval officer's jacket.

After locking the door, Claire created a spiritual wall to block out the sound, quickly performed a simple prayer ceremony to the Goddess of Night, and used her coat to search for Swain's current whereabouts.

The goddess gave feedback.

Right in the dock area!
By the river!
Not far from here!

After getting the answer, Claire gathered up the materials she had arranged, turned around and ran out, heading towards the real dock area.

The night wind was cold, and a large number of inland cargo ships were docked at the docks. Claire, relying on her night vision, plunged into the pitch-black darkness to search for Swain.

Finally, when they approached the deck of a ship, Claire saw Swain fighting with the same figure.

That trickster? The trickster who could go toe-to-toe with Swain?

But the figure doesn't look like...

Claire moved closer to take a closer look.

A person out of control!
He was over 1.8 meters tall, wearing a shirt and trousers that were tattered beyond recognition. The exposed parts of his body were covered with dark green scales, and the gaps between his hands and feet were covered with membranes, like the webbed feet of some aquatic animals.

It has a wrinkled head that vaguely resembles a human.

That look was very similar to the face of a senior member of the Mandated Punishers.

Claire had seen that man come to Swain for a drink.

Swain introduced them as his old team members who had followed him for over twenty years. They had helped him kill water monsters that had crawled ashore and captured cultists who had tried to escape from the Tussock River...

The "monster" was about to break free from Swain's obstruction and run into the river.

Without giving it any more time to think, Claire quickly pulled out her revolver, raised it, and pulled the trigger. With a loud "bang," the demon-hunting bullet shot out like a cannonball and hit the monster in the chest.

The dark green scales blocked the demon hunter bullets, but there were deep cracks on the scales, and dark red blood oozed out.

The monster, with a strong desire to survive, roared in pain and ran faster towards the boat, trying to jump into the river to escape.

But he was grabbed by Swei, who was covered in blood and wounds.

Swain desperately entangled with the monster. The monster held its hammer in its fists and was about to hit Swain on the head.

Claire, who was getting closer, raised her pistol again.

"boom--"

Interrupt the monster's attack with one shot.

"boom--"

A single shot accurately struck the broken scales at the monster's heart, penetrated it, and took the "monster's" life...

(End of this chapter)