The old man watched Pandora drink all the hot water and was dumbfounded. Fortunately, Richard spoke up in time to draw the old man's attention and said: "Old gentleman, please tell me about the castle. You just said When you saw the two of me walking out, your reaction was a bit abnormal, what’s going on?”
"Uh, what about this?" The old man composed himself, then hesitated, "How should I say this..."
"Whatever you want to say," said Richard.
"Okay..." The old man took a deep breath and spoke slowly.
After a while, Richard learned a lot about the situation.
The old man in front of him is the current head of the village of Arubak. According to the old man, the castle existed before the village. No one knows when it was built.
Strangely enough, although the castle has always existed, no one has ever been seen coming in or out. It seems to have been vacant. However, at night, you can occasionally see light shining through some of the windows of the castle, as if it is haunted.
Some bold village youths once had the courage to enter the castle and explore to see what was going on... But...
"Gudong -" the old man swallowed, with a horrified expression on his face, and slowly said the result, "But... as long as you enter that castle, no one can come out alive."
"Is there such a thing?"
"Yes." The old man tried to calm down, picked up his cup of wheat tea, took a sip, and said extremely seriously, "That's why I was so scared when I saw you and this little girl coming out of the castle just now. , I thought you were... Gudong... ghosts."
"Ghosts?" Richard smiled, "We are not ghosts. Ghosts can't be active during the day, right, old gentleman?"
"That's true." The old man nodded and agreed, "No matter how bold the ghost is, he won't come out until night. So who are you and why do you want to enter that castle?"
"This thing is a bit complicated to say, but to put it simply, someone told me an address. I followed the address to find this place. Then I saw the castle, so I went in and took a look. After looking at it, I found that the castle was empty. , I had to walk out, hoping to find some other clues, and then I saw you."
"If you really want to find any clues or people, I would recommend you to go to several nearby big cities and take a look." The old man said, giving advice very kindly.
"A big city nearby?"
"Yes." The old man nodded, "For example, Ajia City in the north, Duer City in the south, or Morton City in the east. There are more people there and there are all kinds of characters, which may help you find what you want. The person you’re looking for.”
Richard's eyes flashed after hearing this, and he nodded after thinking: "It makes sense, thank you very much."
"You're welcome." The old man said, "But please allow me not to send you away. After all, my old bones can't stand the torment. Just now I felt like I was falling apart when I ran away because of fear. Now my whole body hurts. It’s terrible, the cold air keeps getting into the seams of my bones, I need to drink more hot tea to warm myself up.”
As he spoke, the old man picked up the wooden cup with slightly trembling hands, and kept taking sips.
Richard stood up with a smile and said to the old man: "That's right. Old sir, just have a good rest. I won't disturb you anymore. Let's leave now. By the way, please accept this silver coin as my thanks." "As he spoke, Richard placed a silver coin on the table.
Old man: "Uh..."
The next moment, Richard nodded to the old man, said nothing more, took Pandora, turned around and walked out of the thatched house, walking towards the distance.
In the thatched house, when the old man saw Richard leaving, he slowly stood up, glanced at the silver coins on the table, reached out and picked them up, and then walked to the door.
Seeing the direction in which Richard was leaving, the old man's eyes flashed. He didn't know what he was thinking, and the silver coins kept spinning in his hand.
After a moment, the old man suddenly remembered something he had neglected. His face changed slightly, and with a "pop", the silver coin in his hand was instantly crushed.
"It's broken!" the old man said, "I said the wrong thing! But... that kid may not have noticed."
"Well, I probably didn't notice it." The old man said in a deep voice, slowly retreated, closed the door, and sat in front of the wooden table. He said with a gloomy expression, "There is a high chance that he didn't notice it. It should be..."
…
the other side.
Richard and Pandora walked out of the village. Richard was thinking about whether to go to a nearby city to settle down as the old man said. In this case, you can research things and explore the secrets of the Dark Soul King while looking for the cat slave girl Heidi.
Just as he was thinking this, Richard blinked and suddenly said: "That's not right!"
"Huh?" Pandora, who was following, tilted her head, looked at Richard suspiciously, and asked, "What's wrong?"
"That old man is wrong." Richard said, "I remember I didn't tell him who I was looking for, I just said I was looking for some clues. In this case, how did he know that my purpose of looking for clues was Looking for someone? And also told me, where can I find the person I’m looking for in Aga City, Duer City, or Morton City?”
Pandora's eyes widened and she hesitated: "Are you... asking me?"
Richard did not respond. He turned to look aside and muttered to himself: "There is obviously only one explanation. The old man should have known my purpose a long time ago. He pretended to be that way on purpose. Maybe he is the person in the castle. , knew where the people in the castle had gone, and deliberately led me to the wrong place."
After saying this, Richard fixed his gaze, took Pandora and returned to the way he came.
"Walk!"
…
A few minutes later.
Richard reappeared in front of the familiar thatched house and opened the door with a creak.
In the thatched house, the old man was sitting behind the table, drinking tea. Hearing the sound of the door opening, he slowly put down his tea cup and looked up. After seeing it was Richard, his expression didn't change much, and he just asked slowly: "What are you doing back here?"
"I want to make sure of one thing." Richard stared into the old man's eyes and said, "That is, old gentleman, how did you know that I was looking for someone without me telling you 'I'm looking for someone'? "
The old man was silent and said quietly for a while: "Do you want to confirm this? Or are you already certain?"
"So, you admit that you lied to me?"
"Boy, since you can see it, the smartest thing to do is not to expose all this." The old man said, his rickety body gradually straightened up, and a gloomy and cold breath emanated from his body, "All existences have It's reasonable. Doing something reckless like you will only make things worse."
"How bad could it be?"
"As bad as it is now!" the old man roared, and with a wave of his hand, a large amount of black energy surged out.