Trafford's Trading Club

Chapter 853: The World of Lies (1)

Due to the explosion caused by a "gas leak," the location of the "Crimson Lips" bar had turned into a dilapidated building—of course, this was the official claim.

(Note: Previous translator used Flaming Lips. I prefer Crimson Lips for clarity and to induce a more demonic vibe since this bar is run by Lucifer.)

The sky was somewhat gloomy, and in the basement of the ruined "Crimson Lips" bar, several figures arrived.

Charlotte, Wolfgang, and Noah, whose face was hidden beneath a hood.

When Wolfgang brought this friend for a visit, Charlotte had specifically wanted to observe this member of the Transcendents organization. However hard she tried, she could never catch a glimpse of the person's true face.

She only knew that this person was named Noah; beyond that, she knew nothing. For Charlotte, Noah’s presence was somewhat strange—it felt as if someone was standing in front of her, yet separated by countless worlds... an extreme sense of distance.

"What exactly did His Highness Lucifer encounter..." Wolfgang surveyed the environment of the bar's basement.

This was the first site of Lucifer's power release, the place that had recently endured Lucifer's force. Wolfgang picked up a piece of broken marble from the ground, but the moment his fingers touched it, the whole piece turned to dust.

Wolfgang exclaimed softly, stood up, dusted off his hands, shook his head, and then looked at Noah, "Noah?"

Noah nodded, then stepped past Wolfgang and Charlotte, entering the basement after the great battle. He extended a hand that resembled white jade, fingers slightly spread.A uniquely designed book floated before Noah's palm, quickly flipping open. At the same time, ripples began to form from under Noah’s feet. The ripples spread outwards in circles, covering the entire edge of the basement.

The environment of the whole basement began to change rapidly... reconstructing the scene!

The shattered stones and decayed sofas returned to their original appearances one by one. Charlotte couldn't help but gasp in astonishment, while Wolfgang remarked, "This isn't about restoring things; it's just bringing time back to before, merely the residual effects of time."

In other words, it was a retracing of past events, a technology akin to projection—but even so, it was enough to astonish Charlotte about Noah—only someone well-versed in the laws of time could achieve this.

This guy, even within the Transcendents organization, must be quite special, right?

Thinking this, the basement had completely returned to its original appearance—bright, soft, luxurious, and filled with colors that intoxicated Charlotte, resonating with her memories of Lucifer.

Suddenly, the big door of the basement opened, and in walked "Lucifer" and "Charlotte," both dressed in red dresses.

They passed right through Wolfgang and the other three, eventually arriving at the center of the basement, where they began discussing something.

A snapshot of time!

At that moment, Charlotte felt a sudden fear towards Noah’s power—if even time could be glimpsed, then what secrets could possibly remain in this world for this mysterious individual?

Charlotte couldn't help but feel a surge of tension—but the tension didn't last long; in the impression of the time snapshot before her, "Lucifer" was taking out a document she had obtained from Wolfgang and was discussing it with "Charlotte."

Charlotte inwardly cursed, because she clearly remembered that Lucifer should be discussing how she had tricked Wolfgang at that moment—and now, the main person was right here.

Charlotte couldn't help but secretly glance at Wolfgang and quietly reached behind her—just then, Noah suddenly waved his hand, and the strange book in front of him flipped to another page.

The time snapshot before her resembled a fast-forwarded film, skipping over a lot of content and arriving just a few seconds before the explosion of Lucifer's power.

Charlotte couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief... whether Noah had fast-forwarded this segment on purpose or was just trying to directly obtain the most important information was unclear.

At this moment, within the time snapshot.

"I don’t know who you are, but if you want to target my prey, aren't you going to pay a price?"

As "Lucifer" spoke this line, it was a scene from Charlotte’s memory... the great Queen of Hell immediately spat out blood afterward and collapsed to the ground.

After this, the events matched perfectly with Charlotte's memory, as "Lucifer" began to leak a portion of her true power, followed by a confrontation between "Lucifer" and the mysterious chains.

However, what astonished Charlotte was that the scene in the time snapshot differed somewhat from what she remembered...

"Lucifer" had vanished, and those mysterious chains had also disappeared! Yet the basement was still experiencing severe destruction, and "Charlotte," due to the impact of some force, crashed into the wall!

"How could this happen!" Charlotte exclaimed in surprise.

If one were to compare the time snapshot before her to a recorded videotape, then in this recording, the existence of "Lucifer" and the chains seemed to have been directly removed, transforming into a strange impression of things suddenly being destroyed, leading to "Charlotte" unexpectedly crashing into the wall!

At this bizarre impression, Wolfgang frowned in silence, while Noah waved his hand again, flipping through the pages of that strange book.

The time snapshot rewound back to before "Lucifer" spat blood and collapsed, then continued playing in order.

Even upon replaying, "Lucifer" still directly vanished from the next images.

"Hmm?" Noah voiced a note of confusion and rewound the time snapshot again—however, after several repeated attempts, he still couldn't change the fact that "Lucifer" had been erased.

"Hmm..." Ultimately, Noah closed the book and fell silent.

"Noah?" Wolfgang waited a moment but could no longer contain himself. "What exactly happened?"

Noah slowly replied, "Someone erased this segment of reality... erased it from the temporal perspective."

"Divine Forbidden Zone? Who could it be?" Wolfgang suddenly became serious.

Time and space were considered rigorous and significant topics, even within the Transcendents organization, and they were realms that most Transcendents could not touch.

They referred to time and space as forbidden zones.

The forbidden zones of time, space, and life—collectively known as the three great forbidden zones—were ultimately categorized within the domain of the divine.

These referred to true definitions of divinity, not the gods recognized within human consciousness today.

"It may not necessarily be a true Divine Forbidden Zone," Noah pondered. "For instance, my gemstone sword can also achieve something similar, but the gemstone sword is used for cutting through space. So, some particularly rare treasures might also be capable of this, and even beings inherently possessing temporal powers might be able to as well."

“Could the chains Charlotte mentioned be such rare treasures?” Wolfgang said solemnly at this moment.

However, Noah simply shook his head in response. “In the long history, I have not encountered chains capable of manipulating time… Any traces of Lucifer here have been erased; this is beyond what an initial foray into the forbidden zones of time can achieve.”

“So, that means we still can’t find Lucifer, right?” Charlotte had no mood to deal with this; she was only concerned about Lucifer's whereabouts, and her tone carried a hint of dissatisfaction—didn't you, Wolfgang, say you were so impressive? Yet the result is that you know nothing?

“Let’s leave here first,” Noah suddenly waved his hand.

Wolfgang seemed to realize something… The Transcendents were constantly monitored by the will of the world. Although they used special methods to exempt themselves from the gaze of the world’s will for a short time, it was not a long-term solution.

Especially when Transcendents used their powers within the main world, the exemption time would be greatly reduced. Therefore, the time that Transcendents could act with their own power in the main world was very brief.

This time, Noah directly utilized the time snapshot ability of the ‘Book of the Void,’ which likely provoked a reaction from the world’s will…

Wolfgang quickly nodded, and then he and Noah hurriedly left the place, not even saying goodbye to Charlotte.

“Wait, what’s going on?” Charlotte was a bit confused by the sudden actions of these two, frozen in place.

She then heard Wolfgang’s voice calling from a distance, “Miss Charlotte, don’t worry, we’ll be back to find you soon.”

“What’s going on?” Charlotte couldn’t help but feel a mix of amusement and frustration... These Transcendents were so unreliable; she might as well use her own divination techniques!

Sighing, Charlotte took out her crystal ball.

However, at that moment, a large man wearing a wrestling mask quickly approached Charlotte from the rubble. The masked wrestler lowered his head and said, “Lady Charlotte, I still haven’t found any trace of my brother and Qiqi; they’ve also disappeared…”

“What?”

The other masked wrestler and the three-headed dog Qiqi had been sent by Charlotte to search for a missing three-star demon, but it turned out they also lost their whereabouts after going there—this made Charlotte acutely aware of the seriousness of the situation.

With Lucifer, the Queen, now missing, and demons under her command disappearing one after another, Charlotte suddenly had a feeling—like something was manipulating events from the shadows.

Charlotte gritted her teeth and resolutely said, “You gather all the demons back; tonight I will perform a blood sacrifice… I will use great divination!”

The masked wrestler was stunned for a moment, opened his mouth, but did not dare to defy Charlotte's orders and could only leave quickly.

The so-called blood sacrifice was a ritual that used the lives of demons as offerings to greatly increase the accuracy of divination; she just didn’t know… if this great divination could compete with the inherent “guiding light” attribute that Lady Charlotte possessed?

“I have a feeling that ahead is a bottomless abyss…”

The masked wrestler sighed and began to gather the demons hidden in the city.

...

...

The sound of water from the showerhead drowned out the voices.

In the bathroom of Room 403, Arnold was on a call with Boston. Since he had university exams in the coming days and needed to keep an eye on Caroline, Arnold hadn’t exchanged identities with Hailey—yet he couldn’t just ignore Boston and his gang.

Arnold was well aware of the kind of people in Boston's gang: a group lacking self-discipline, not very bright, and prone to making mistakes.

Arnold didn’t like to see his efforts wasted because of their momentary slackness.

Currently, Arnold had assigned two main tasks to Boston's gang. The first was to temporarily stabilize the sale of zombie bath salts, allowing the influential big shots to eliminate each other while his side remained dormant, waiting for the right opportunity—actually, Arnold was already considering whether to create some conflicts among these big shots to accelerate their mutual depletion of strength.

The second task was to keep close to lawyer Carlo. This side had a substantial fortune tied to a luxury apartment sale. Lawyer Carlo intended to swindle Nia’s life-saving money, while Arnold planned to steal it outright.

“Lawyer Carlo has been running around a lot these days and meeting many people. It seems the property sale should be completed soon.”

On the other end of the phone, “Big Cousin,” who had been sent to follow lawyer Carlo, reported to Arnold.

Arnold nodded in satisfaction, then carefully instructed “Big Cousin” a few more things. After that, he called Boston to ask about Hailey’s current situation.

When he learned that Hailey's emotions had been increasingly unstable in recent days, Arnold didn’t say anything—Hailey had a significant tendency toward violence; otherwise, he wouldn't have mistakenly killed their father back then.

In fact, Hailey almost had an episode every so often, so as long as he was locked up for a while to let his rage settle down, it would be fine.

Arnold thought about how, last time in the classroom, he had stabbed Hailey's palm with a knife, which had made him recall the bad things from their past. The impact had been too great, so it wasn’t surprising that he needed some time to calm down.

So, he said to Boston on the other end of the phone, “Keep him locked up; it’s not the first time. We’ll talk when he cools down.”

Boston on the other end casually replied but then suddenly said, “Boss, are we really not selling drugs temporarily? The brothers have been spending a lot, and the remaining money is almost running out. Can we…?”

“I said, don’t sell for now,” Arnold frowned but knew he couldn’t control Boston and the others with an iron fist. So he promised, “I understand. I’ll transfer 50,000 to you later; you can distribute it to the brothers. Spend wisely. If we can just get through this period, we won’t have to worry in the future. Patience is key to success.”

“Got it, Boss Arnold,” Boston replied weakly.

After a few simple instructions, Arnold hung up the phone and began to freshen up before stepping out of the bathroom.

At that moment, Caroline walked over from the microwave with a bowl of apple pie. Seeing Arnold come out, she smiled and said, “I made this according to the recipe. I’m not sure if it tastes good; would you like to come try it?”

Noticing the smudge of flour still on Caroline’s nose, Arnold smiled and walked over, “Sure.”

Watching Caroline slice the apple pie with a knife, Arnold narrowed his eyes—he was somewhat unclear about what had transpired between Hailey and Caroline while Hailey was impersonating him, but it was evident that he could now clearly feel Caroline's considerable fondness for the identity of ‘Arnold.’

Perhaps it was merely a feeling that arose from shared adversity, or maybe it was a tactic Caroline used to gain better assistance—women often liked to bind men through emotions.

But regardless of which it was, Caroline was likely in a state of dependency on the identity of ‘Arnold’ right now… Thinking this, Arnold picked up a napkin and gently patted Caroline’s shoulder.

While Caroline was surprised, Arnold carefully wiped the flour off her nose with a napkin.

At that moment, the campus broadcast suddenly announced a notification: a certain college's exam originally scheduled for tomorrow would be postponed for a day and moved to the auditorium for a memorial event.

Hearing about the exam's last-minute cancellation, Arnold merely frowned but didn’t think much of it—after all, Hailey’s state was unstable, and he hadn’t yet gotten the information he wanted from Caroline, so he wasn’t in a hurry.

However, Caroline clearly froze.

Because she heard the broadcast mention that this memorial event was held in honor of… Dr. Franky.

The old man who shared his plight with her by the artificial lake… had he already passed away?

“Caroline, what’s wrong?” Arnold noticed Caroline’s unusual reaction and couldn’t help but ask curiously.

Caroline shook her head. “Speaking of which, is this your college? I remember one of your degrees is in the Department of Mechatronics, right?”

Arnold nodded with some resignation. “Yeah, it seems attendance is mandatory. It looks like I have to go. But it’s also nice to pay my respects; after all, I’ve attended a few of Dr. Franky’s classes, and he was indeed a talented person.”

“So… you knew him?”

Arnold casually replied, “Well, it was just an elective course. I’ve seen him in the big lecture hall. We knew him, but he didn’t know us… let’s not talk about this anymore. Let me taste it; it’s going to get cold.”

Caroline gave a sweet smile, then forked a piece and brought it to Arnold’s mouth.