I loaded the Mysticism panel.

Richard was walking down the street when he suddenly heard shouts.

"The booklet has been updated, and the new edition is still priced at one penny!"

He suddenly stopped halfway through his journey.

Wait a minute, I haven't written that booklet recently, so how come there are updates?

He went straight back, took out a penny, and handed it to the newsboy.

As soon as he got his hands on the paper, he felt something was even more wrong.

Mr. Dawn could identify that batch of papers with his eyes closed.

The thickness and rough edges are about the same, and the paper feels delicate. The other party has always given me good paper.

The paper I have in my hand is incredibly rough, and the cover has an unfamiliar title printed on it: "The Alleyway Collection".

"Are you sure you're not mistaken?"

The newsboy quickly wiped his nose with his sleeve:

"This is the one we have now. We just got a new one last week, and it still costs one penny."

The fact that pirated copies appeared so quickly was still a bit of annoyance on Richard, even though he had a vague idea of ​​it.

He found a shed under the eaves to shelter from the rain and opened the booklet.

The small print and formatting at the top of the first page are almost identical to mine.

The story is about the family next door:

The lights in that house were still on at two in the morning;

Every Thursday, I send a letter to the post office, and the envelope has one more stamp than the normal person would.

His youngest son pronounces a certain word more forcefully than the other children at school.

Richard turned to the last page of the booklet.

On this page of his own collection, there are rules like "three things you shouldn't do when someone knocks on the door at midnight," but this page is printed with "How to Identify the People Around You."

First, the lights in his house were still on at two in the morning;

Second, when he mailed letters, he always used one more stamp than most people.

Third, he never went to church on Sundays, but instead walked eastward;

Fourth, his children refused to sing the national anthem.

The bottom column used even bolder font:

This magazine is asking: Do you have a neighbor like this in your life?

Please send your letters to the editor of this publication at xxx printing house. Once published, you will receive a complimentary copy of the complete set of "Neighborhood Collection".

How could they even copy this? Richard felt a surge of anger.

He prepared to write a letter to Charlotte, which read:

"In the next volume, I will write about this in a booklet, about someone who uses the booklet to identify whether there are spies around them."

After several days of trying to recognize people, the first person I finally recognized was actually my own father.

Mr. Dawn's letter arrived soon after.

"The charity pamphlets that were sold were priced very low per unit."

It's rare to get more than a few of these booklets approved throughout the year, as they require a lot of stamps to be affixed.

But the money came from a private company, whose accounts were linked to a wartime procurement line.

This means that this booklet may have some official backing.

Richard turned back to the last page of the booklet and continued reading:

Article 8: Shops with a simple storefront and a signboard consisting of only a small bronze plaque;

Article 9: The characters on the bronze plaque are so small that they cannot be seen without getting very close;

Article 10: Only serve regular customers, do not display price lists, and do not allow strangers to enter.

The more he read these descriptions, the more familiar they sounded, and for some reason, they reminded him of the shops on Flower Moon Street.

He remembered the massive crackdown last year, folded the booklet and put it in his inner pocket, grabbed his coat and ran to the mailroom.

He planned to write a letter to Mrs. McNeil and also make a phone call to his grandfather.

What happened next quietly took the direction Richard least expected.

On this day, the shops selling atmosphere on the outer street of Huayue Street remained open as usual.

Incense, roasted chestnuts, and a bit of cheap incense behind the storefront were all baked together by the afternoon sun, making the street sticky.

Three groups of people surged in from different directions.

The group from the east came from the back street of the dock, while the group in the middle was carrying iron bars.

The group on the west side was the most orderly, walking in two rows, some carrying stacks of booklets, distributing them as they went:

"It's free, no money required. Take a look, and you'll know why we're here."

At 4:20, the first group of people turned into the doorway leading into the wall.

There's nothing here, of course—no guards, no iron gates, just brick walls on either side, blackened by decades of cooking soot.

They went in, and after about two minutes, they came out through the doorway... and the ones who came out were the same ones who came in.

"What happened? Did we go the wrong way?"

"How could you possibly get lost in such a small place?"

The leader cursed, then turned and plunged back in.

This time he counted his steps, and when he reached the 307th step, he looked up and saw the same blackened bricks on both sides.

On the outer street, at the chestnut stall, the owner was turning the chestnuts over with an iron shovel.

He stood there for a long time, saying, "It seems I was right, this place is eerie."

By 4:50, more than 200 people had gathered in front of the gate.

Everyone who came out of there was telling their companions how eerie the place was.

Seeing that the situation was not good, the shops on the outer street have begun to close one after another.

The chestnut vendor stuck his shovel into the pot and pushed his cart south.

After walking a dozen steps, his car wheel got stuck in a crack in the stone slabs. He simply abandoned the car and ran away, looking just like a night market vendor being chased by urban management officers.

The door to Mrs. Mary's house at No. 17 Flower Moon Street was also closed, and the black cat on the steps was gone.

Someone tried to pry open the door with an iron bar, but after trying for a long time, it was no use.

At 5:10, the air raid siren sounded.

The sound originated from the dock on the other side of the river, consisting of one long and two short sounds.

Then the West District followed suit, and the South District followed suit, and the sirens of the entire city sounded in one minute.

The hundreds of people on the street reflexively began doing what they had become most familiar with throughout the year.

They all squeezed into narrow spaces, against the walls, and into doorways.

Those who squeezed into the doorway no longer had the strong desire to "go in"... they were forced in by the people behind them.

And so, hundreds of people crowded onto that curtain wall almost at the same time.

At 5:14, the etheric field of the curtain wall shattered completely.

The person at the front stumbled and fell half a step forward before regaining their balance by grabbing the wall.

He looked up and saw that the stone-paved road stretched out into the distance, with simple storefronts on both sides and small copper plaques embedded in the door frames for signs with extremely small characters.

"Great! So that's where it was. We finally found it."

He said something, and hundreds of people followed suit and surged in.

………………

The copper bell jingled once, and the door was pushed open from the outside, the sound exactly the same as when guests entered on ordinary days.

"Your name is Tang Na?" The person standing at the front was holding a copy of "Lixiang Ji" (a collection of books about alleyways and back alleys).

"This name doesn't sound like someone from our empire."

Donner took half of his glasses off his nose:

"Sir, my grandfather opened this shop on this street in 1845."

"I'm asking about your name."

"My grandfather boarded a ship in Anatolia, and going back three generations, he came from Persia."

His hands were spread out on the counter.

"Where is Persia?" someone asked from behind.

"It should be to the east, right?"

"Exactly how far east?"

"I don't know how far it is, but it must be across the sea!"

Donald shut his mouth; he had already realized that these people were not guests at all.

He instinctively reached under the counter, but the person who came in thought he was about to pull out a gun or a knife.

The counter was immediately overturned, and the bronze candlesticks rolled all over the floor.

The glass of the old picture frame shattered piece by piece, and the stone bowls on the middle shelf smashed onto the wooden floor.

Donner was pulled out from behind the counter. He was very small, and when his collar was grabbed, both his feet were dangling in the air.

"What's behind this shop?"

"What's hidden behind that? Is it a spy hideout?"

The tapestry woven with the phoenix's rebirth pattern was ripped down, and then they set their sights on the pillar of the fire temple.

There are also mysterious forces on Flower Moon Street.

The old gentleman who kept the clocks heard the commotion and rang all the clocks in the shop at the same time.

The people who were rushing forward all stopped in their tracks.

This tactic only lasted for less than two minutes before someone in the crowd shouted in a shrill voice:

"Didn't you hear that? I told you something was off here!"

Mrs. McNeil also blocked many people.

She only dared to use a spiritual artifact very cautiously, and gently brushed it over.

Those people immediately stood there, dizzy and disoriented, wandering around aimlessly.

A woman saw it from behind and screamed:

"They've been cursed! They've cursed these people!"

The glass shop at the end of the street can help people polish mirrors so that they don't reflect their image.

Someone grabbed a brick and smashed it into the shop window, where several polished mirrors stood.

The brick flew in and was sucked directly into the mirror.

The people in that area hurriedly took a few steps back, but then continued to surge forward, with an even stronger momentum than before.

Everyone on Flower Moon Street has some skills, but none of them dare to use them on ordinary people who are not from the mystical side.

Mrs. McNeil knew why her teacher hadn't shown up at this time.

This street is home to all sorts of people, and for many years they've been doing shady businesses.

If a highly skilled psychic medium, who was already suspected of being a fraud, were to use genuine mystical methods in front of hundreds of ordinary people, the future of this street would be completely uncertain.

At 6:40, a tailor shop without a sign caught fire.

………………

"Williams! You have a call!"

Richard rushed downstairs and grabbed the receiver.

"Grandpa? What's wrong?"

"Something happened on Huayue Street. The entire outer street was smashed, and the barrier inside the wall was completely broken by 5:10."

The staff from the branch office came once, stood there for half an hour, and then left.

"It's been withdrawn?"

"You've probably heard that the higher-ups' message: prioritize police resources for key areas.

Richard held the receiver without speaking.

"I need to make this clear to you first: I'm not calling to persuade you to help."

"What do you mean?"

Gerard's tone was very calm:

"Let me explain the pros and cons first."

If you don't go, nothing will happen. You can sleep in your dorm as usual tonight and go to class as usual tomorrow.

"Whether they investigate further or question you, nothing will implicate you."

"What if I go?"

"Going there will definitely cause trouble. There are officials present there, and your name is already in the archives."

Moreover, although no one dared to touch Lady Mary during the various investigations, if you actively tried to get close to her, you would definitely become a target of the investigation.

In short, you'll get into a lot of trouble if you go there.

"Your grandfather's old face can only shield you a little bit."

"And what are the benefits?"

"There's only one benefit: this highly skilled medium will owe you a favor."

After Gerrard finished speaking, he fell silent.

Richard spoke up: "Grandpa, I don't want to settle this score like this."

"speak."

"Old Biggs taught me the basics of clairvoyance and divination back then; he was one of Mrs. Mary's students."

And that night at Whitcomb, that night at Black Gutter—if it weren't for Mrs. McNeil, I might not have made it back.

Moreover, the embossing on the ring on my chest was personally repaired twice by Mrs. Mary, without charging a single penny.

In March, when that invitation with teeth marks appeared on the doorpost of your house, you asked someone to deliver a message to her.

She made an exception and accepted it even though it was during her closed-door period.

Richard switched the receiver to his other hand:

"I am now considered half a student under her tutelage."

Just watch as the street under your teacher's jurisdiction gets vandalized, and you just stay in your dorm and sleep soundly?

Grandpa, if I had someone like that in my life, I probably wouldn't contact them again.

There was a long silence on the other end of the phone, followed by the sound of a teacup being picked up again.

"Your maternal grandmother said something similar to me back then."

"What did she say?"

"I don't remember," the old man answered quickly.

"Anyway, I was so speechless after she choked me."

He coughed and said, "Wear a thick coat; it might rain tonight."

"understood."

"There's one more thing."

"Please speak."

Don't go there by yourself.

"If you were there, there would probably be one more person getting hit."