Marvel Magic Case Files

Chapter 1417 Irrelevant Answer (Part 2)

To prevent all the planted seasonal flowers from being eaten, Dinah decided to tighten the management of the stables. Simply put, every night she would herd the goats that used to roam around the estate back into their proper stables, and release them again at afternoon tea time. At the same time, she planted rose bushes next to the seasonal flowers to prevent the goats, who would want to nibble on anything, from tasting the flowers.

At the same time, Salomon also intensified Milia's education.

Unsurprisingly, the witch and Wanda's party had already begun, and he was carrying Milia around the manor. It was just a women's party; his presence wasn't important. He just needed to make it to Wanda's sleeping time—Salomon knew Milia's behavior stemmed from the strict upbringing of the Sisterhood Abbey in her initial memories. In the Sisterhood Abbey of the Immortal City, Tita's methods were almost brutal in order to quickly rid the girls from the outside world of their bad habits and get them into combat training and cultural studies. Milia, as an anomaly within the abbey, had suffered greatly due to her excessively rapid physical growth.

He told Milia never to feed the goat anything strange, and if she couldn't eat that much breakfast, she could honestly tell him and the witch. No one would blame her; the manor was different from the monastery, and no one would force her to eat all the food. He also promised to let her aunt visit her at the manor, even though Milia had no idea who her aunt was, let alone her blood relation to Anna. "Where are you taking the girl?" Joan shouted, opening the window and looking at the figure strolling through the garden covered in a thin layer of snow. She was carrying a bottle of tequila, and the thin layer of snow in the moonlight was almost the same color as her hair.

"It's a girls' party, remember?" She shook the bottle. Bayonetta and Wanda were already enjoying their liquor, and Salomon even saw Wanda pulling the confetti cannon. "Milia's in too!" Joan exclaimed. "She counts!"

"Don't let her drink! She needs to go to bed early and get up early!" Salomon said, then looked back at Milia. The silly girl was still a little flustered that her behavior had been discovered. "I believe they'll catch you. Do you believe them?"

Compared to the "cozy" atmosphere of the manor with its ubiquitous heating, Laura Crawford's situation was far more dire. Her difficulties went far beyond the chilly air created to preserve the books. Stacks of wooden bookshelves lined the walls, books piled high, a thin layer of dust covering everything. Everywhere she went, the scene was identical. Ever since she followed the somewhat erratic woman through the library, turning several corners and entering a narrow path crammed with books, Laura Crawford had been frequently turning back, trying to remember the way she had come.

Without a doubt, she failed. She couldn't even drop breadcrumbs on the ground or hold a ball of yarn, because she hadn't prepared those things. "Who are you?" she couldn't help but ask, rubbing her icy hands. "Are you a ghost? Where are you taking me?"

"Me?" The woman tilted her head. "I'm not a ghost."

"Then why are you here?"

"Because I saw you here," the woman said, uttering what she believed to be a logically sound statement, "so I came."

Laura Crawford nodded, puzzled. "So you're a director?"

"No, no, no, I'm a tourist."

Laura Crawford shut her mouth.

Not only was she unable to extract any useful information from the woman, but every time she opened her mouth, she felt her body heat visibly drain away. Fortunately, after her first experience of the library's frigid temperatures, she immediately donned the cold-weather gear she had worn during her Siberian expeditions—she entrusted a handwritten letter to the Royal Guard, requesting that it be delivered to the butler, Winston. She hadn't considered the psychological impact a giant aircraft's forced landing at Abington Manor in Surrey would have on the poor old man, but luckily, Winston had provided her with all the necessary tools for the adventure—wearing Siberian-standard exploration gear, Laura Crawford finally felt capable of exploring the library. However, she was wrong; she even got lost inside. The library wasn't as small as it appeared; its interior space far exceeded its apparent size in the material universe.

"If you don't mind," the woman in the thin, dark blue long dress suddenly stopped and gestured to Laura Crawford. She pointed to a spot next to her, "please stand here."

"Why?" Though the question lingered in her throat, Laura Crawford complied. She'd barely reached the spot when a terrifying whooshing sound swept past behind her, a chill more piercing than the library's stale air stinging her nerves. She turned in alarm, instinctively drawing her pistol and releasing the safety. But apart from the candlesticks overhead, the library corridor remained shrouded in deep darkness; she could see nothing. "What's that?" she hurriedly asked, turning back to the woman. To her surprise, the woman moved again, continuing deeper into the library. "Aren't you going to explain?"

"These books are powerful, and many things want to possess them." The woman's tone remained cheerful throughout. "Some... demons, about the size of a speck of dust, almost invisible." She gestured with her fingers. "They want to come into this world, to devour the knowledge and magic within the books to make themselves stronger."

Laura Crawford felt a chill run down her spine.

"So all of those were..."

"No, those are just enslaved ghosts. They're responsible for cleaning the library. But they're angry because they think their work is enough to atone for their sins in life, so they never do a good job," the woman said, shaking her head. "Every now and then, someone replaces a batch of ghosts. I heard someone is planning to use the bodies of sinners with machines to make them clean the library, because that would make it cleaner."

Laura Crawford sighed, convinced she wouldn't get anything out of the woman. This woman reminded her of children's books—specifically, the Harry Potter series in the UK—and she thought the woman resembled a character she used to adore named Luna Lovegood. While she used to love those aloof characters, this orange hue in reality, and in such a crucial place, was something Laura Crawford couldn't bring herself to like. She was so angry she'd forgotten that she'd just brushed past not cleaning staff, but a horde of terrifying ghosts. So when the woman asked if she liked Doctor Who, Laura Crawford didn't answer, but instead posed another question.

“I’m looking for a book,” she said, “about illegal religious armed groups in the late Byzantine period.” But the woman’s eyes seemed to ask, “What is that?” and “Is that edible?” She merely glanced at it twice and then continued on her way. “Where are you going?”

"Shall we go find a TV?"

"What?"

"A television? That's a recent invention." The woman seemed worried that Laura wouldn't understand her idea, so she gestured with her hands as she walked. She tried several times, finally drawing a square with six fingers and two lines extending from it. "I can use it to watch Doctor Who. I've been using it to watch TV shows for hundreds of years, but the signal wasn't very good back then. After all, they were just a pile of sand back then, and not very complete."

Laura Crawford decided to filter out all the nonsense. "You live here?"

"There's a door here that leads to my room, and I only recently discovered it. One night I got up to use the bathroom, and when I opened the cupboard, I slipped and fell, and that's how I ended up here," the woman said calmly. "So I'm still looking for that door, trying to find my way back." Even when facing soldiers corrupted by the Holy Source in Kit City, or the overwhelming Feathered Serpent God, Laura Crawford had never felt such despair.

However, she is an optimistic person.

"Okay, looks like I'm not the only one stuck here." She shrugged, shining her flashlight beam across the bookshelves beside her. Luckily, she could read much of the writing on the spines; the problem was, the books weren't arranged by language but by content, making it difficult even for a learned archaeologist to decipher. "I don't mind looking at some books here," she said, stopping and asking the woman, "Are you going to keep going?"

"I have a ball of yarn." The madwoman pulled a red ball of yarn from her pocket. "Back then, street vendors in Crete were selling these things because Theseus was famous and had caused their king a lot of trouble."

"If you don't mind... I have some food here." Laura Crawford took a deep breath. She felt she couldn't be so irresponsible as to let a woman with intellectual disabilities wander around like this; it was a responsibility that a kind person would never refuse. "I brought a lot of high-energy food, enough for the two of us to last until someone comes looking for us. I think they'll realize we're missing... at least I hope so."

"I want chocolate."

“I have chocolate,” Laura Crawford forced a smile. She simply couldn’t bring herself to be angry with this woman; her morality and reason wouldn’t allow it. “I also have a sleeping bag and an alcohol stove for warmth. But I suggest we avoid setting the bookshelf on fire, what do you think?”

"You're my good friend now, Laura Crawford," the woman said. "I'd love to try camping and baking bread."

How do you know my name?

"Because you're here."

“You’re right,” Laura Crawford shrugged. She decided not to ask the woman any more questions. While the alcohol stove was being lit, she carefully examined the woman's appearance. Since the woman refused to remove the comical eye patch, Laura could only judge her age by her skin—however, Laura saw not a single wrinkle. Not only was her skin clean and neat, but even her fingernails were trimmed neatly, showing no signs of malnutrition or neglect. “Want to try on the sleeping bag?”

"Don't move, you ugly child! If you move again, I'll throw you out the window!" Joan shouted at the window, twisting the writhing Milia in one hand. She shook the half-full tequila bottle again. "Where are you going? Do you think there's no entertainment after the ladies' party? Or are you angry because this is a ladies' party, you stingy little thing?" Joan had sensed something was wrong when Salomon threw Milia at her from the garden, and seeing Salomon wearing the Sling Ring only confirmed her suspicions.

"Or do you want me to beg you to come to the party? Don't even think about it!"

"I'm going to Kamar-Taj. Hammurabi, come find me at the estate. No need for a flying vehicle, but I need you to bring the molten metal." Salomon brushed the snow off his shoulders and held up two fingers in the air. The veil between the material universe and the illusory world flowed away from his fingertips like water, and supernatural power quietly gathered. "There are some things I need to take care of. As long as you finish your drinks today, I'll definitely be back before you turn the estate upside down." Salomon's seriousness from the previous call vanished, replaced by a broad smile. He even gestured to Milia, who was being held up by Joan of Arc, "How about I get you a glass of Napoleon brandy?"

Laura Crawford felt like a pirate who had stumbled into a treasure trove.

Due to her years of archaeological work, she needed translation software that could be used offline. When she made this request, the Martian technologist immediately took her phone. When the phone was returned, she found that its casing had been completely replaced with shock-resistant material. Apart from the screen and the internal system, most of the phone's hardware had been replaced, and the translation software she wanted was inside the phone. Using the camera to translate a book she picked up at random, word by word, Laura Crawford discovered that she had never known this world before—this book was actually an archive documenting the pursuit of a dark sorcerer by Kamar-Taj in the first half of the 10th century. The book detailed the traces left at the crime scene, from the posture of the corpse, the autopsy report, cult rituals to records of interviews in the surrounding area. The Kamar-Taj sorcerer in charge of the case at the time had recorded all the clues he found, just in case, so that his successors would be left without a starting point if something happened to him. Compared to the current tactics of using saturation firepower and surgical strikes, every investigation and capture mission that Kamar-Taj carried out in the past was fraught with the risk of death, and no one knew how many lives would be lost in this investigation.

Laura Crawford glanced at the quill-drawn portrait of the dark wizard in the book but didn't pay it any mind.

"Do you think anyone will discover that we're here?"

"I don't know," the woman answered cheerfully. Lying in her orange sleeping bag, she wriggled around like a caterpillar. "I only know I can watch TV in my room."

Please vote for me!

(End of this chapter)