Steampunk: Sixth Era Epic

When Shard returned to No. 6, Saint Delan Square with Mia, it was already 10 p.m. He changed shoes in the foyer on the ground floor and as he climbed the stairs, it felt as if centuries had passed since he last descended them.

Priest Augustus had placed Shard's belongings in his study. The Scribe Level Relic "Orb of Silvermoon" was damaged due to the dream from the day before, and the Scribe Level Relic "Vampire Ring" turned to dust for overreaching in its absorption of God's power.

Now, the only Relics Shard possessed were the manuscript pages of poetry, the "Spear of Kindness," and "The Twenty-Sided Die of Destiny." Even "Puppeteer's Script" had completely lost its transcendent trait, as all its pages were used up.

Looking at the calendar on the wall, the month known as the "Sunlight Moon," June, had passed. It was now July, a month people referred to as the "Thunder Moon."

He sat in the chair behind his desk, examining the items on the opulent desk, summarizing his gains and losses from the Lakeside Manor affair. Because of Baron Lavende's invitation to the open-air banquet at Lakeside Manor, he had acquired a special Roder Card "Ancient Fairy Tale: Matchstick Girl," got the gun, and gained divinity...

Behind him, hot steam emerged and, turning around, he saw the silver Desecration Spirit Rune "Gluttony" moving along the metal ring on the rotating brass life ring. This was Shard's first Spirit Rune.

"With the Divine Afterglow State gained and 'Gluttony' acquired, a Circle Sorcerer needs one of each of four different runes to level up. Now that I've easily met a quarter of the requirement, the gains from last night far outweigh the losses," he murmured to himself.

Moreover, "The Mad Light Chaser" would most likely bring him an Enlightenment Element Spirit Rune related to the concept of "light" within three months; and from the task given by the Ancient God "Father of the Infinite Tree," he also awaited the wonder "Echo." Looking at this, if he disregarded pairing it with the Sublimation Incantation, it seemed he wasn't far from reaching the Second Ring.

In fact, he might even be promoted within a few months.

The only pity was that although the Divine Afterglow had already appeared on Shard, the key to unlock it would take a week. It was only Monday now, and he had to wait until the early hours of Thursday.

No matter the bounty reaped at Lakeside Manor, it was a result of very special fortune, and he didn't believe that kind of luck would grace him again.

Besides the silver Desecration Rune "Gluttony," (which was acquired last night), the greatest gain was undoubtedly his understanding of the Silvermoon. Although he couldn't replicate that inverted step in front of the Silvermoon, Shard hadn't forgotten the scene of standing on the ridge and gazing up at the colossal Silvermoon in his dream.

"From this perspective, the 'Orb of Silvermoon' can also be considered a good value for money," he thought, recalling the Relic he had destroyed. His fingers traced the air, tempted to try the "Silvermoon Slash" again, but suddenly stopped. After all, he was in his study, and he would be saddened if anything here were to be destroyed.

Rising from his study chair, he walked into the living room, pushed open the door to the hallway and descended the stairs to the foyer on the ground floor. Standing in the foyer, he faced the sealed wooden boards on the first floor.

Amid the sound of clock chimes and steam whistles, the giant brass life ring materialized in the steam behind him.

He chanted ancient Spell Words, his fingers making a light gesture in the air.

With a dazzling flash of silver light, an arcing Light Trace appeared in mid-air, followed by the sound of splintering wood. The sudden noise surprised Mia who was peeping around the corner of the staircase on the first floor, eager to see what Shard was doing.

But this time, the orange cat wasn't scared away; instead, it crouched with its tail between its legs, unsure whether it should go to "rescue" Shard.

The foyer itself wasn't very large, and Shard was struck by the splinters of wood, thankfully, with not too serious an injury; just a scratch on the back of his hand.

"Hmm?"

With the wooden boards shattered, a brown object fell out with a clatter from behind the crack. Squinting under the gaslight in the foyer, Shard looked at the bulky wallet, clearly full of banknotes. His expression tensed as he contemplated his initial "grand investigation,"

"Come to think of it, I only thought that room number one on the second floor was the detective's inheritance, I never checked the first floor... Hm..."

In truth, even if he had searched the ground floor originally, it's most likely he wouldn't have found it; the wallet was too well hidden.

Looking up at the tightly-sealed brick wall behind the wooden board on the third floor, a bleeding hand picked up the wallet:

"That plank must be removable, so hiding the wallet here is indeed something no one would think of, and it's very convenient to take money out whenever I leave the house. Detective Sparrow and the original owner should both know about this spot, but I haven't inherited the memory."

Shard didn't know quite how to feel; happy that he had finally found the wallet, yet astonished that the answer was so simple.

So he opened the wallet to check, and indeed it was all banknotes, totaling up to 28 pounds and 12 shillings, enough to sustain the operation of his office for three months, and support the modest lifestyle of a single man quite comfortably.

"But the value of that cane must be more than 15 pounds, and the price of high-end tea won't be low either. The inheritance left by Detective Sparrow can't be just these, could it be that he deliberately calculated this amount of money to be just enough for three months' normal expenses?"n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

Holding the wallet, he went upstairs, intending to clean the hallway, while summarizing his impressions of Detective Sparrow in his mind:

"Very meticulous in his work, he wrote in his diary every day, and his accounting was clear and orderly. His detective skills were strong, but some of his detective records were not true; some clients had a poor impression of him. He had a high taste for tea, an expensive cane, and liked to read novels about knights, wars, and court affairs...

Although this image became much more rounded, I still couldn't see what secrets he might have."

His footsteps suddenly stopped, prompting the cat that was climbing the stairs ahead of him to curiously look back. Shard squinted his eyes slightly, but in truth, he saw nothing:

"Wait, if everything I experienced on that night at Lakeside Manor was the result of luck, then could the things I didn't understand correspond to those unknown events?"

Amongst the many matters at Lakeside Manor, the most incomprehensible was the "Witch Council" intelligence he overheard by the stables, along with the intelligence of a Carsonrick United Kingdom spy he heard after breaking into the Garden Maze.

"The Witch Council" definitely had nothing to do with Detective Sparrow; after all, any way you look at it, the detective was a man, and it was confirmed by many that he was indeed an ordinary person. On the contrary, Shard was somewhat suspicious that the intelligence about "The Witch Council" pointed to "that lady" who was also present at the time.

As for the spy—

"If I follow this line of thinking, the identity of a foreign spy indeed fits the setting of 'a person with huge secrets but just an ordinary person'."

He continued to climb the stairs while thinking, and the cat, unable to wait any longer, already started scratching at the second-floor door:

"Extremely meticulous in his work, which is the caution of a spy;

Writing in his diary every day, a disguise of his identity and movements as an ordinary citizen;

Clear and orderly accounting, so as not to leave clues for others and to facilitate the falsification of sources of funds;

Strong detective abilities, in line with the characteristics of a spy;

Unreal detective records, obviously covering up information, while strengthening the image of an ordinary detective;

A poor impression with some clients, he must have done something extraneous or used a gun along with taking on assignments;

High taste for tea, his true personal hobby;

An expensive cane, possibly the only personal item he brought from his homeland, with sentimental value;

Like novels, maybe those novels are codebooks, but I can't understand them..."

Shard opened the door for Mia, and the nocturnally active cat immediately leapt into the living room. Standing at the doorway, he looked at the place where Mr. Sparrow had lived. The moonlight passed through Saint Delan Square and shone into the living room from the window, but the brightness stopped at his feet, leaving half of Shard's face in the doorway shrouded in shadow:

"So, Sparrow Hamilton, couldn't really be a spy from Carsonrick, could he?"