novelraw Chapter 767: The Newspaper
Chapter 767: The Newspaper
Rustle...
Returning home, the husband took off his coat and hung it on the rack behind the door.
“Papa!” a brown-eyed boy cried out, rushing from the bedroom. He threw himself into his father’s arms, breathing in the familiar, comforting scent.
His wife, who was in the middle of preparing dinner, leaned out from the kitchen, an apron tied around her waist. “Darling, why are you so late today?”
“I went to get a newspaper,” the husband answered, gently ruffling his son’s soft hair.
He pulled a rolled-up newspaper from his pocket.
“A newspaper? But darling, you don’t know how to read.”
“But you do, and that’s what matters.”
“Hold on a moment, I’ll get some water.” His wife went back into the kitchen and reappeared shortly, having taken off her apron. She took the newspaper and read the headline in confusion: “Hero of a Bygone Era, the Exorcist Who Wounded the Third Calamity, Has Returned Today?”
“Yes, it’s all anyone is talking about,” the husband grumbled. “I barely managed to get my hands on a copy. Even tore my trousers in the process.”The husband deliberately lifted his leg to show his wife the tear in his trousers, but her attention was already captivated by the newspaper.
“Oh, he’s so handsome... and so young. Is he really an exorcist from the past? Or was he just born in that era?”
The husband rolled his eyes. “Please, just look at my trousers! And tell me what’s written in there.”
“Alright, alright...” his wife tore her gaze from the blurry photograph and began to read. “Sitting before me now is: an exorcist of a bygone era, bearer of the Cursed Title ‘Beacon,’ the last exorcist to be granted an honorary title, the man who announced the demise of an evil god—Lu Li.”
“The moment I saw Mr. Lu Li, his appearance and demeanor left an indelible impression on me, and his wondrous aura seemed to beckon me closer...”
“It’s called an interview. A new trend from Vinnelag,” Professor Deizi Shmidt was explaining to Lu Li in the conference room. “A newspaper reporter asks you a few prepared questions, takes your photograph, and then your conversation is published in the paper.”
The other professors and onlookers had been asked to leave. Inside, only Lu Li, a reserved reporter named Ternasi, and his assistant, Sean, who was fussing with the camera, remained.
Lu Li nodded slightly. Of course, he knew what an interview was.
“Are the technologies on the Main Continent different from ours?”
“Yes, there are some differences,” Professor Shmidt replied. “Steam engines, factories, electricity, telephones... Though I’m from Midnight myself, I imagine you’re far more familiar with them than I am.”
Midnight had neither steam engines nor factories. They used fluorite lamps instead of electric lights, and the telephone was a sort of mystical means of communication, created with the help of the Great Tree.
Just as Professor Nuno Alexandrovich had said, Vinnelag and Midnight had developed along entirely different paths.
As for the Lennon Archipelago... most of its inhabitants perished when the islands began to crumble. Now, only a few survivors eked out a wretched existence on the remaining fragments.
The Arable Lands had been silent for over twenty years. No one was willing to cross the ocean to see what was happening there.
But when the clouds parted and the illusions stopped obscuring the sky, people could still see the black ring hanging over the Arable Lands.
Things there were still grim.
Once the camera was set up, the reserved Ternasi and his even more reserved assistant, Sean, opened a window in the conference room, signaling that they were ready to begin.
“Mr. Lu Li, if you could look over here, please,” Ternasi said, gesturing to Lu Li. Once he turned, Ternasi ducked behind the camera and pressed the shutter.
Flash!
A magnesium flare momentarily illuminated the room with a brilliant light, raising clouds of acrid smoke.
Sean quickly fanned the smoke out the window with a black cloth he had at the ready.
Ternasi set aside the camera, preparing for the interview.
“Professor Shmidt... why did you choose me?” Ternasi finally blurted out. The question had been weighing on him for a while.
“Because you’re a lucky man,” replied Professor Shmidt.
He refrained from mentioning that the owner of the "Midnight Chronicle" was, at that very moment, in discussion with Rector Lawrence in the adjacent room.
“I see...” Ternasi said, his voice trailing off in disappointment. He had been nurturing a hope that the exorcist had chosen him personally, but thinking about it, that was impossible. After all, Lu Li didn’t know him.
“But... but I haven’t prepared any questions...”
The young Ternasi was more overwhelmed with fear than joy at this sudden opportunity.
“Don’t worry. Here, just ask these,” Professor Shmidt said, handing Ternasi a sheet of parchment with a list of prepared questions.
The questions were crafted to highlight the greatness of Lu Li’s past deeds while subtly mentioning that it was the Clarence branch of Claire University that had been the first to find the exorcist.
As the interview progressed, Ternasi gradually calmed down.
It seemed that, in addition to his approachable aura, Lu Li had a way of making people feel calm and composed.
After about fifteen minutes, Ternasi looked at the last question on the parchment: “You’ll need time to adjust to the modern world. What are your plans for the future?”
Ternasi expected Lu Li to say that he would continue exorcising anomalies. That would have been the ‘correct’ answer. But Lu Li responded differently.
“To find my family,” he said.
The interview was drawing to a close. Ternasi watched Lu Li rise calmly from his seat and was suddenly struck by an overwhelming impulse.
“Wait, Mr. Lu Li, I have one more question...”
“Will you give us back the past?” he asked, the words tumbling out before he could stop them.
Mr. Lu Li answered calmly, “My power and knowledge are no greater than yours. I am no savior. You are the only ones who can lead yourselves out of this.”
His wife set the newspaper aside.
The husband looked at her, as if roused from a dream. “Is that it?”
“That’s it. The rest is just... a thank you to the Clarence branch of Claire University for their assistance with the exorcist’s return.”
“I want to be an exorcist, too!” the boy exclaimed after hearing the story.
All children dream of becoming heroes.
The husband gently patted his son’s head and opened his mouth to speak, but then he heard his wife mutter, “If exorcists were really that powerful, things never would have gotten this bad...”
He looked up and saw a scratch under his wife’s eye.
Noticing her husband’s intense gaze, his wife instinctively reached up to her eye. Her fingers brushed against the scratch, and she flinched, a flicker of fear in her eyes.
“I’ll go finish dinner,” she said, picking up her apron and disappearing into the kitchen.
A flash of pain crossed the husband’s eyes. He gave the boy a gentle pat on the shoulder. “Papa has some work to do. Why don’t you go help Mama in the kitchen?”
“Uh-huh!”
Once his son had scurried into the kitchen, the husband stood and walked into the bedroom. He shut the door behind him, went to the writing desk, pried up a floorboard, and retrieved a black notebook from the space beneath.
The notebook was filled nearly to the end with incomprehensible, terrifying symbols. It felt as though staring at them for too long could get the very essence of your soul devoured.
The husband picked up a quill and continued writing on a blank page.
Madness gleamed in his bloodshot eyes. A whisper dissolved into the scratching of the quill on paper.
“We are the only ones who can save ourselves...”