The Bizarre Detective Agency

Chapter 776: The Secret Room

Warmth from the fireplace spread throughout the room.

Neatly arranged bookshelves lined the walls, and a writing desk stood nearby, two unopened letters resting on its surface. A bed was tucked into one corner, while a small dining table with pastries on it stood against another wall.

This place felt more like a secret study than a prison cell.

Lu Li even noticed that the shackles on his wrists were loose, easy enough to slip off like a bracelet.

He examined the runes etched into the shackles and a nearby coverlet. They seemed to share a similar origin.

Loose shackles and a room that was more of a study...

Had someone of high rank brought him here? Did they not consider him an imposter? Was he being watched?

The truth was veiled in strangeness.

Lu Li walked over to the desk and examined the two letters.

"To Mr. Lu Li," read the inscription on one, which was only partially folded.He opened the envelope, but found no answers inside, only investigative reports concerning the Shadow Maiden and the Merchant.

The first letter reported that due to the information blockade caused by the Age of Anomalies, and the fact that the Shadow Maiden had not attacked any cities, the latest intelligence on her ended in the Hillerwig Mountains.

This meant that to find Anna, Lu Li would have to travel to the Hillerwig Mountains.

The second letter concerned the Merchant. As a partner to an exorcist from the Old Era, he had vanished along with him, taking their vast wealth. Only the Underground Trading Guild had managed to locate one of the Merchant’s vaults in the Wastelands.

Furthermore, a preserved body of a Merchant was on display in a museum in Vinnelag.

Lu Li reread the information on the Shadow Maiden, then placed the letters back on the desk.

The shelves were filled with books, but they all contained "useless" knowledge. The only potentially valuable item was a geographical atlas, but even that, given the massive changes of the Age of Anomalies, could serve only as a rough guide.

In any case, whoever had brought Lu Li to this room clearly had no intention of keeping him locked up.

Lu Li waited for the person behind all this to reveal themselves.

The wait was longer than he had anticipated. There were no clocks in the room, but by his estimation, nearly a full day had passed before he heard indistinct sounds from outside.

Another half-day later, Lu Li, who was sitting by the fire flipping through a book on botany, finally looked up.

The stone door creaked open, revealing a knight clad in dark gold armor.

They had come for him.

Lu Li placed the book back on the shelf, picked up the two letters, and followed them down a long, ascending corridor.

A dungeon?

Lu Li’s suspicion was quickly confirmed: after a short distance, he saw cells lining one side of the hallway.

It was indeed a dungeon, and his room had been the sole exception.

Many cells were empty or shrouded in a strange gray fog that obscured any view inside.

But as they neared the upper levels of the dungeon, the cells changed.

They were all covered with tarps, and the narrow corridor was thick with the heavy stench of blood.

"What happened in these cells?" Lu Li asked, his eyes catching the dark stains of blood on the floor.

They were fresh, as if they had only recently dried.

The knight, who had been silent until now, replied, "Heretics broke in."

"Heretics?"

"Followers of evil gods. Conspirators."

Lu Li began to understand their objective, and the reason for the noises he had heard from outside.

After a long walk, they seemed to reach the dungeon's highest level. There were no more cells here, only a relatively wide corridor.

At the end of the corridor stood an archway formed of dense fog.

The knights led Lu Li to the misty arch and gestured for him to enter.

"Where does it lead?"

This time, there was no reply.

Lu Li stepped into the archway, passing through the thick, gray fog...

The mist cleared, and Lu Li found himself in a cramped space, walled in on three sides. In front of him was a low threshold.

Beyond it lay a spacious office with no visible boundaries, enclosed by transparent blue crystal walls. From this height, he could see all of Midnicht.

All except for the part obscured by the trunk of the giant tree that covered half the city.

Two figures were seated on a sofa near the crystal wall. Next to them was another, empty sofa.

They were waiting for him.

Lu Li stepped over the threshold and glanced back at the door he had just come through.

It was a wardrobe.

"We call it a ‘door,’" said one of the seated figures, an old man with sickly pale hair and a matching beard.

He wore a light green robe, and on his chest was the insignia of Claire University.

"A door?"

The word caught Lu Li’s attention. It was strange, but in the twenty-four years since his return, the ‘doors’ had never reappeared.

"It’s a tool developed by the university," the old man replied with a smile.

"The dungeon has no physical exit. The ‘door’ is the only way in or out."

"I am Ernie Hamilton Wayne, a professor of mysticism at Claire University. And this is Megi, from the Church of Midnicht."

"Are we in an Alchemical Tower?" Lu Li asked, gazing at the city beyond the crystal wall.

He was incredibly high up, nearly level with the branches of the giant tree.

"In the Alchemical Tower of Resa, one of the five," Professor Wayne confirmed.

"Did you save me, or are you here to tell me the truth?" Lu Li asked calmly.

"Worthy of the exorcist of legend," Professor Wayne said good-naturedly.

"You’ve guessed the truth."

"Which one?"

There were no riots or plumes of smoke rising from Midnicht, so it was unlikely to be a faction war.

"The second one."

Megi from the Church of Midnicht remained silent, so Professor Wayne explained what had happened. Claire University, in its attempt to do a good deed, had inadvertently made a mess of things. Wanting to restore a hero to his rightful glory, the university had gone to great lengths to spread his fame, albeit while also serving its own interests.

But these idealists, living in their ivory tower, were too detached from reality. They had been far too optimistic about the situation in Midnicht.

Heretics who wanted to capture Lu Li, conspirators weaving plots around him, anomalies trying to destroy Midnicht and its hero, and even representatives from the city administration and the aristocracy, all seeking to pull Lu Li to their side.

Therefore, the neutral powers—the giant tree, the Church of Midnicht, and a portion of the city council—devised a plan to hide Lu Li, draw out all the conspirators, and then deal with them.

"Is Yenard Matthews also under protection?"

"No, he’s our double," the wise Professor Wayne said with a mysterious smile, glancing toward the wardrobe.

"Please, have a seat and wait a moment. He will be here shortly."

Lu Li sat down on the only empty sofa, and soon, a figure emerged from the ‘wardrobe.’

Yenard Matthews.

This time, the usual self-assured smile was absent from his face. He climbed out of the wardrobe somewhat awkwardly and approached them.

"Now you can tell Mr. Lu Li the truth," Professor Wayne said.

Yenard Matthews straightened his posture, lifted his head, and declared, "My name is Stan Losano. I’m a stage actor."