Chapter 289
Translator: Kris_Liu Editor: Vermillion
The creepy smile on the clown mask never changed, but the voice coming from behind it was rather deep, “Not really. Lucien Evans seemed to be quite frank and open with why he sent the message to Granneuve using Grace. Maybe he’s not the one we are looking for.”
“You really think so? He is the only one we can investigate right now who is directly related to Professor,” said the battle priest, Juliana, who lowered her head in dismay and held some of her black hair in her hand unconsciously.
Professor was just a code name, and it had not been used much anymore. If they lost the clue here, they had to rely on using the spies in the Congress of Magic to steal files for them, which the grand cardinals would never allow them to, since it was such a waste of resourses.
Minsk, the Red Dragon, growled like a real dragon: “Impossible! Lucian Evans for sure has something to do with Professor! At least he knows who Professor is! Professor first appeared because there were apprentices asking him information. Then Professor dragged us into the fight against Argent Horn. He killed the traitor, and also, Lucien Evans’ uncle and aunt were rescued. During Lucien’s absence, Professor never showed up again…”
Hearing Minsk’s words, both Juliana and Lend slightly shook their heads. Minsk was just trying to justify his opinion, and what he said was not completely true. For example, after killing the traitor, Professor had already never showed up, and Lucien left Aalto almost half a year later.
“Although Minsk’s reasoning isn’t that persuading, we shall not forget the message from Djibouti parish. Felipe and Professor, the two famous men on the Cleansing List, once showed up together on the land once possessed by Wilfred,” said Clown.
Before, the Church did not know about the Feast of Death. However, the fact that Felipe forced his way through Storm Strait leading a whole bunch of sorcerers pissed the Church off, and they also noticed that they were all necromancers following the ancient magic system, thus the Church started to intensively investigate the area once possessed by Wilfred, since it was the only place that could gather so many necromancers.
Even if Felipe did good preparation before they set off, facing the Church’s focused searching, finally a magic apprentice was caught by the Night Watch. Therefore, although the Inquisition
failed to get the name list for the Feast of Death, they still got the basic information from the apprentice—there were two famous men attending the event. One was Hand of Rehabilitation, and the other was Professor.
Involving two men on the Cleansing List, Djibouti parish sent the information to the Holy City, Lance. Then, the cardinal in charge passed on the message to all the parishes and inquisitions.
“Others may not know, but we’ve been watching Lucien Evans for so long! He was in Djibouti at the same time, exactly in the Wilfred area! That was the exact time when Professor attended the Feast of Death!” Clown raised his voice angrily, “But when we reported this to the Violet Inquisition, they did not care at all! They said that there was not enough evidence, and they even did not bother doing some investigation! Don’t you know why?”
“I think, like the inquisitor said, the biggest chance should be that the princess sent Professor to protect Lucien Evans on the way,” said Lend, the Devil Hunter Knight, who was not as emotive as Clown.
A parish’s inquisition had three main positions—Executer, Censor and Arbiter. However, powerful parishes, in order to control all the inquisitions, always sent a cardinal to each inquisition, who was the one who really got the power.
Minsk growled, “Plus all the coincidences? If Lucian Evans doesn’t have anything to do with the Professor, I’m willing to be sent to hell! Lend, I’m telling you… those people in the inquisition do not want to piss off the princess… that’s why. Princess Natasha was a faithful follower, the future duchess of Violet, an important weight in balancing the power between the nobles and the Church! The inquisition just won’t investigate her sweet lover just because a middle-rank mage killed some useless night watchers!”
“You tell me, Lend… Have you forgotten Salvador’s death? He died on his way saving Natasha, and his body was reduced to ashes!” said Clown with a sad voice, “At that time, only a few grand knights were chasing after Natasha. Salvador could fly, and he had powerful divine items, but he was just killed like that, before anyone could come to help. Guess who he met at that time, and who killed him?”
The muscles of Lend’s face twitched a bit and he buried his head. “I don’t know.”
Hearing Clown’s words, Juliana was the saddest one among all the night watchers. She sobbed, “No inquisition cares. Our leader, a level five pastor died, and no one ever tried to investigate this thoroughly. The princess was only imprisoned for three years. The life of a devoted guard of God only deserve that? I chose to be a night watcher because of the sentence in the Canon—at the foot of God’s throne, all his devoted lambs shall be equal. But now… I finally realized that lambs are never equal… Although I’d still rather believe that this isn’t the will of God.”
Hearing that, while crossing in front of their chest, they all prayed, “Only truth lives forever.” The way Clown and Minsk drew the cross was closer to the classic cross before the Saint Calendar.
“Next, what should we do with Lucien Evans?” Lend calmed down a bit after praying.
Clown turned around to look at Lend. “We directly attack Lucien Evans to see if he’s a sorcerer or not.”
“What?!” Lend did not expect Clown to be this crazy, “This would annoy Natasha so bad. Right now she is a radiant knight with the well-known title, the Sword of Adjudication! And the Blue Tide, Camil, always follows her around. The two can directly destroy the entire Night Watch in the duchy, and the inquisition is not going to protect us for sure…”
After becoming a radiant knight, Natasha also got her own honor title.
Clown laughed, like a real creepy clown, “Sure, they can, but they cannot always keep an eye on Lucien. I’m a level five grand knight, I have my own way of doing this. No matter who Natasha sent to protect Lucien in Aalto, they should hardly be above grand knight level. They would not notice how I approach Lucien. Don’t forget how they called me before—I was the Killing Puppet in the Dark Mountain Range. All I need to do is to secretly enter his place, control his mind and get the information I want. If Lucien only has the power of a knight in training like what we know about him, this should be just a piece of cake. If he casts magic spells, that’s exactly what we’re waiting for…”
Looking at the creepy clown mask, Lend could not say no. He nodded lightly.
…
A few days later, late at night.
An almost invisible figure secretly entered the garden villa owned by Lord John. The guards from the Intelligence Department did not notice anything special.
On the corridor, a maid was walking downstairs holding a candlestick. Earlier today, she left a piece of her accessory in the living room, so she hurriedly got back and tried to find it back.
The dim candle light and the early spring temperature made the maid a little scared. Suddenly, the wind lightly swayed the curtain and the maid shivered. She saw some illusion-like figure flashing across, like a ghost!
However, a second later, when the maid looked around, there was nothing there.
The maid hurriedly went back to her room, drawing a cross in front of her chest. She decided to come to the living room the next day.
The door of the guest room where Lucien lived opened silently, and a creepy clown mask appeared in the darkness.
Clown, wearing a colorful costume and plain black gloves, lifted his hands and started to move his fingers like playing piano, as if he was looking for the invisible threads in the air.
Suddenly, in the bed, Lucien’s body bounced up! His arms and legs looked distorted. However, silver light shimmered around his hands, and the invisible threads were pulled apart.
“Level five grand knight?” Clown was very surprised. At one moment, he got nervous, because facing a grand knight, he might not have much chance to win.
However, soon Clown realized that the power came from an extraordinary item that Lucien was wearing. No matter who, either Professor or Natasha, gave Lucien this, that was very generous.
Seizing the chance. Lucien’s left hand pulled apart the threads on his throat and shouted out loud:
“Assassin!”
The young musician’s voice spread well.
Although he tried, Clown failed to completely control the musician. Instead, Lucien managed to grab the blue sword to protect himself from the many threads in the air.
Knowing that the power only came from an magic or divine item, Clown was confident that he still had the chance to fulfill his task.
However, the secret guards from Intelligence Department, before Juliana and Minsk could do anything, had already lit the signal flare. The firework light lit up the sky.
Staring at Lucien’s face for two seconds, Clown decisively turned around and jumped out of the window. He ran as fast as he could in the darkness, since he knew that if he wasted another second, the princess or Camil would definitely come after him.
Lucien did not use magic. Right now he was using the sword to cut the puppet threads. The threads could not only control one’s body, but could also poke into the body to hurt the organs.
“Are you alright, Mr. Evans?” A guard ran into his room and asked concernedly.
A thought flashing across, Lucien started coughing hard to let the blood come out from his throat, “I’m okay… just some small injuries…”