The strange man spoke in a low but clear voice, and it was obvious that he did not have a local accent:
"Ma'am, is this person staying at your hotel?"
He first took out a banknote, and then took out a photo to show Mrs. Sang Mei. Because of the angle, Xia De couldn't see what the photo looked like.
Shad put his arms on the counter, sat on the round stool in front of the counter and looked at Luvia. When the latter raised her eyebrows, he signaled her not to speak. Then he continued with the previous topic and complained to Luvia that the technician Miss Mary did not tell the truth.
"Where did this high-level warlock come from? Has the church already found out about this place? Should I leave then?"
This is the voice in the heart.
The opponent is at least a twelfth-ring warlock, most likely a thirteenth-ring warlock.
"Thirteen rings?"
Xia De was even more surprised, but his expression did not change:
"The thirteenth rings of the Orthodox Church in Tobesk are the Sunlight Great Sword of the Church of the Sun and the Iron Right Hand of the Church of Creation, but this one is obviously not one of them. The Church will not arbitrarily dispatch thirteenth ring warlocks across dioceses, and even if there is a clue about Darkness, according to the operational norms of the church ring warlocks that I learned from Iluna, the thirteenth ring warlocks will not be allowed to set off directly... ... So, this stranger is not the thirteenth ring of the Orthodox Church."
Thinking about it, the female shop owner frowned and looked at the photo, then shook her head decisively:
"I know all of our guests very well. No one who looks like this has stayed at my hotel in the past three months at least."
Shad continued chatting with Luvia, and Luvia probably realized that the man who was talking to the store owner was a little unusual, so she responded to Shad's words enthusiastically.
"So, who are the guests staying at the hotel in the past three days?"
The man in the dark red coat asked in a friendly manner, and Shad realized that his accent sounded somewhat like the accent of the southern mountainous area of Delarion. He had heard a similar accent when he and Captain Rades visited the Veterans Club.
"Guest, I can't just tell you this."
Mrs. Sang Mei shook her head:
"No matter how much money you offer, if I tell you about this, no one will dare to stay at my hotel anymore."
"Yes, that makes sense."
The man nodded, then coughed violently.
He hurriedly took out a white handkerchief from the chest pocket of his coat and put it in front of his mouth. He coughed a few times and put the handkerchief away again. Xia De seemed to see blood on the white handkerchief from the corner of his eye:
"Can a thirteenth-ring warlock get sick? I remember that a middle-ring warlock is immune to most common diseases, and a high-ring warlock will never get sick."
"Then why not, take a look at this."
The stranger in the dark red coat took out a document from his pocket. After Mrs. Sang Mei took a look at it, her eyes widened suddenly:
"Okay, I understand."
She bent over and took out the account book from the counter, flipped through a few pages and pushed it to the person outside the counter:
"Everyone who has stayed at the hotel for the past three days is here."
"Okay, thank you for your help."
The man said with a smile, looking even weaker because he seemed to have coughed up blood just now.
He lowered his head and carefully checked the account book. The business of the Three Cats Inn was quite good, so it took him a while to finish reading it:
"Okay, thanks again for your help."
He closed the account book and handed it to Mrs. Sang Mei, picked up the hat and put it on his head, then nodded politely to Xia De beside him. The man then turned and walked towards the stairs leading to the second floor.
When the other party disappeared around the corner of the stairs, Shade stopped talking to Luvia about the commissioned task, moved his seat, and sat back in front of Madam Sangmei:
"Who was that person just now? You actually handed him the account book?"
He asked in a frivolous tone, trying to seem like he was just curious.
"I can't tell you that."
The female owner shook her head, but her expression was a little confused.
"Wait, Shade, she's not in the right state."
Seeing this, Luvia suddenly reached out and touched the other person's forehead. Mrs. Sangmei slowly stopped her movements, then slowly lay down on the counter, as if she had fallen asleep.
"She was just influenced by someone else. The documents she thought she saw might not be real documents."
Luvia said seriously:
"We were right next to it, but we didn't sense any traces of the elements. The man just now was definitely very strong."
"Thirteen rings."
Xia De said, pulling the account book that Mrs. Sang Mei was pulling, quickly turning to the last page, and then looking forward to the content.
"What? Ten..."
"Keep your voice down."
Xia De immediately reminded him, took out the notebook he carried with him, and copied the contents of the account book:
"Did you see the man coughing up blood just now? That's really strange. Is he seriously injured? He's still working despite being injured like this. It seems like it's not easy for a thirteen-ring warlock."
"Thirteenth Ring, coughing up blood?"
Luvia lowered her voice and turned to look at the stairs in disbelief:
"Oh? Could it be him... But how dare he return to the Old World, since thirty years ago..."
"Thirty years ago... Coughing up blood... Suspected of looking for Darkness... Blood Weeper?"
Xia De stopped writing and looked up at Luvia:
"I heard from the witch a few days ago that the Blood Spirit School seemed to have sent high-level warlocks from the New World to hunt down the traitor Darkness."
"Yes, I think so."
The purple-eyed fortune teller looked solemn:
"The 78-year-old thirteenth-ring warlock of the Blood Spirit School, 'Blood Weeper' Hermons, is the actual controller of the school. Thirty years ago, for his thirteenth-ring promotion ceremony, he colluded with criminals to obtain the blood of babies, thus committing a major crime that affected half of the kingdom. However, he was ambushed by the Orthodox Church during his promotion and was seriously injured. Therefore, he led the Blood Spirit School to migrate to the New World and has never dared to set foot in the Old World again in the past thirty years."
"How dare he come back for the second chosen one?"
As he spoke, Xia De started copying the information again. After he finished copying, he put the notebook back into his pocket and put the account book back into Mrs. Sang Mei's hands.
He nodded to Luvia, who tapped Lady Sammi's head again.
The latter uttered a loud mumbling in his sleep, and then slowly woke up:
"Why did I fall asleep? It seems that I really didn't get enough rest these days."
The confused female owner still couldn't immediately regain her usual shrewdness, and Shad didn't say anything more to her. After ordering drinks and food again, he and Luvia returned to the table next to the poet playing the lute and sat down.
It was already noon, so Shade and Luvia had lunch here. A powerful thirteen-ring warlock appeared at the Three Cats Inn, and neither of them dared to take any action rashly.
So we just came here to relax, eating and talking about interesting places in the downtown area.
Luvia even knew that there was a relic trading place similar to Old John's Pawn Shop in a nearby alley, but the security there was nowhere near as good as that of a pawn shop.
It was 11:15 in the morning. Xia De was sharing with Luvia his experience of helping a client find a cat on Tuesday. The short and thin man in a dark red coat came down from upstairs with a tall man whom Xia De had never seen before.
The two went to the counter first, and judging from the way they handed over the keys, they should have checked out of the hotel room, and then left the Three Cats Inn together.
Xia De did not get up immediately. He waited for five minutes before signaling to Luvia that it was okay.
He went to bother Mrs. Sangmei again and asked for an empty room on the fifth floor.
After climbing the stairs with Luvia and entering the room with the number 7, Shade took out a notebook from his pocket:
"Darkness and the Bloodthirster should have left. Luvia, try to divine which of these rooms is the one Darkness once lived in."
Shade pointed out the room numbers he had recorded, which were the most likely rooms. After the Blood Echo effect ended, their search became much more difficult.
The female fortune teller frowned and looked at it:
"Choose one from four? Because it involves a 13th level sorcerer, I can't guarantee the accuracy of the divination."
"It doesn't matter. Two on the fifth floor and two on the fourth floor. You can do your best to divine. I will confirm through the crack of the door whether the cleaning servant will pass by here soon."
So Luvia borrowed the Rhodes deck from Shade again. She evenly spread the 54 cards on the bed and tried to turn over three of them. After thinking for a while, she turned over three more cards until all the cards were turned over.
During this time, Shade really saw through the crack in the door that the fat maid of the hotel was pushing a cart welded from abandoned gas pipes, humming the tune played and sung by the poetess downstairs, and passing by the door of the room. There were buckets, rags, brooms, and mops on the cart, and the metal wheels made a loud sound when rolling over the wooden floor.
Ten minutes later, the fat maid passed by the door again and walked towards the broom closet at the staircase. After the door of the broom closet was opened and then closed, her footsteps disappeared at the staircase:
"Now I'm cleaning the room. It looks like it's indeed a room on the fifth floor. Now I have to choose between the two."
Xia De at the door made a cautious judgment. Luvia was standing by the bed collecting the cards.
"If it is indeed the fifth floor, then I think it is the farthest room on the fifth floor, Room 1."
"Okay, let's go to room 1 and check out the situation."
Xia De nodded, opened the door and looked around. Seeing that there was no one in the corridor, he took Luvia out of the room. After unlocking Room 1, the two of them walked in quickly and locked the door.
"Detective, I'm glad you didn't become a professional thief, otherwise no one would be able to stop you. The magic that the old god gave you is really useful."
While Luvia teased, she did not forget to throw the Silencing Note Spell at the door.
Xia De shook his head without commenting. Instead, he carefully opened the curtains and looked behind, then opened the closet and looked inside, and finally lay down to check under the wooden bed covered with white sheets.