The Master of the Strange Realm

He regained consciousness in a daze, revealing his feet that were stiff from the cold. Something was moving in the quilt in front of his chest, and it was obviously the chocolate that got in because of the cold.

"What's going on? Is the heating broken?"

He rubbed his face and sat up from the bed, holding the cat in his hands, and went to find the switch of the gas lamp at the door in his slippers. But no matter how he pressed it, the light would not turn on.

Jenkins frowned, summoned his monocle and looked around, lit the candlestick on the table with the flame of his finger, and walked out of the door yawning.

"Hi~ Mr. William!"

Garcia, who lived next door, also came out at this time. He looked strange in his pajamas and coat.

"Is this a broken pipe? I found that the steam pipe and gas lamp are not working."

Jenkins said, and knocked on Quick's door side by side with Garcia. A few minutes later, there were three men in the corridor.

There was a sound in the corridor on the other side where the ladies lived soon. After several people met up, they went to find the servants in the house to inquire about the situation. Among the dozen people, only Jenkins was wearing only thin pajamas. Miss Rick suggested that Jenkins add a piece of clothing, which delayed everyone for some time.

There were few servants in the huge house, and the old housekeeper was the one with the most responsibilities. The group met him at the stairs on the first floor, and the old man was walking out with a candlestick.

"There should be a problem with the town's gas pipeline. Look, there is no light over there."

The house is located on a higher ground and can overlook part of the town. And there was no light in the town at this time, which was incredible even at night.

As for the steam pipeline, after a simple inspection, it was found that the steam engine in the yard seemed to be broken. Now it was one o'clock in the morning, and he regretfully announced that everyone could only maintain this situation and endure until dawn.

Although it was very unpleasant to encounter such a thing on the first day of the trip, it was not something that could be changed by human power. After learning about the situation, everyone could only ask the old housekeeper for more quilts and hoped not to catch a cold because of the low temperature tonight.

Ten minutes after returning to their rooms, Jenkins walked out of his room again with chocolate silently, and looked up at the oil painting in the dark in the hall on the first floor. A few minutes later, Hathaway also came out from upstairs.

After the two approached, Jenkins stretched out his finger to make a gesture of not talking, and then walked out of the main door together.

Because all the gas lamps could not be used, it was dark around. After making sure that no one could hear the conversation between the two, Jenkins said:

"Follow me, I just saw something wrong."

"What did you see?"

"A suspicious thing."

They went around the back of the building, and Jenkins got a crowbar to pry open the large stone slab on the ground, revealing the underground steam valve. Before this, they did not check the underground pipes through here, but Jenkins knew it was here.

"Be careful."

He warned, and then held a candle to illuminate the small area underground. On the rusty and muddy pipe, a bunch of things like weeds were tightly attached to the pipe wall. Jenkins originally thought it was some kind of thriving moss plant, but immediately realized that it coincided with the shape of the aura he saw.

"What is this?"

He asked Hathaway. As expected, this was the culprit that caused the mansion to stop heating.

"I've seen this plant in a book. It seems to be a plant that lives on heat. It grows mostly in extremely cold areas and will spontaneously attach to the warmest object nearby. If it attaches to a human, it will cause the human body to quickly lose temperature and die. The name seems to be... cold snake grass."

The temperature of the steam pipe is much higher than the temperature of the human body surface, so it appears here. But after learning that the pipe was damaged, the old butler had asked the servants to stop supplying fuel for combustion. Once the temperature of the pipe dropped to a certain level, the grass would definitely attack the humans in the house.

"But why did this thing appear here? I mean, it obviously appeared tonight. When we came here, the steam pipe was still normal."

Jenkins asked again, but Hathaway couldn't give an answer.

Chapter 675 Chapter 663 Villa

The nemesis of the plant, the cold snake grass, is extremely high temperature, so Jenkins easily burned it to ashes with his own fire. The volume of this mass is much larger than the visible part, and it can rapidly multiply in a short period of time by absorbing heat.

But according to its growth habits, the entire Fidictli Kingdom is not a suitable place for it to grow. Jenkins was very worried that there were extremely dangerous people in this town, but unfortunately there was no sage's church in the town.

But no matter what, he was just traveling. Even if he wanted to investigate the dangers in the town, he could only set off again with his friends the next day and head to the mountains covered with snow.

The young people obviously did not sleep well. They were not used to the winter nights without heating. The hermit blessed that no one caught a cold, otherwise the trip would end before it even began.

The convoy meandered along the path in the mountains, and Jenkins leaned against the window to look at the scenery outside. Away from the city, he even forgot that this was a world with extremely developed steam industry, but perhaps many years later, even this pure land of mountains would be occupied by humans.

The convoy stopped for a break during lunch. Although there were very few large carnivores in the mountains in winter, the guard still reminded everyone to be careful. The cold food was obviously not very appetizing, and Jenkins ate even less of it than the chocolate.

He stood not far from the carriage and looked at the mountains, and saw a strange bird flying on the top of the distant peaks. It didn't look like an eagle, or any bird Jenkins knew. Considering that the mountains in the distance are truly inaccessible, it's only natural that there are some rare animals.

Everyone was wrapped in thick cotton clothes, and even the chocolate couldn't come out of Jenkins' clothes. After entering the mountains, the temperature became even lower, and everyone wanted to get indoors as quickly as possible.

There are large patches of dark clouds drifting over in the distance, which means a blizzard is coming. Somehow, Jenkins suddenly had another ominous premonition.

The blizzard came just as Jenkins expected. When their carriage passed the only bridge, the snow and wind were so heavy that they could not see the buildings in the distance clearly. Therefore, when the carriage drove hard into the Snow Mountain Villa, no one had reacted yet.

By the way, when I was crossing the bridge, I looked down at the mountain stream. I couldn't see the lower end between the wind, snow and clouds.

"If this bridge breaks...hey, don't I have a flying mount?"

Thinking of this, he felt much more relaxed.

Snow Mountain Villa belongs to the Mandela family and is named after Mandela Villa. There are servants who are responsible for guarding and cleaning the villa all year round. With the addition of servants and guards brought by travelers, the originally deserted villa immediately became lively.

The person in charge here is Mr. Joel Bangus, who is dressed like a butler. He holds a black umbrella and waits for everyone at the entrance of the villa, and arranges for the servants to provide blankets for everyone to keep warm temporarily.

The villa was warm and comfortable, and a sumptuous dinner was prepared, which made everyone smile from afar. The warm yellow candlelight and steaming bath water warmed their bodies and minds, and the fatigue caused by the two-day long journey was swept away.

The allocation of rooms has also been prepared. In the three-story main building, men are on the second floor and women are on the third floor.

All rooms here are open to guests so they can enjoy a perfect holiday.

"What are you thinking about?"

In the warm lounge on the first floor, Jenkins sat directly in front of the fireplace, leaning forward and looking at the fire. The eyes showed the flickering fire, and the glass on the side also reflected the warm yellow-toned interior. It was dark night and blizzard outside, and the clouds seen during the day really brought about this bad weather.

"When I think of snow and mountains, I think of avalanches. Such a thing shouldn't happen here, right?"

he asked quietly.

"Don't worry, unless the entire mountain in the distance collapses, this villa is in an absolutely safe position."

Not far away, two men were playing pool, and the girls were standing in front of the cabinet talking about the handicrafts placed inside. They planned to take a thorough tour of the villa in the evening—even if they came every year.

It is a shocking blizzard outside, but it is precisely because of this that people indoors feel at ease and comfortable. It was a feeling of relief that danger had been avoided, and Jenkins felt the same way.

It was Hathaway who was talking to Jenkins, and she didn't care to have a few words with Jenkins alone.

"I found that Chocolate liked this warm carpet very much. He didn't seem to hate leaving his territory as much as the average cat. But he was not an ordinary cat... Speaking of which, the three golden hairs behind his ears How did it come about? Malnutrition?”

"Malnutrition?"

Jenkins repeated the phrase in a mocking tone, and the cat raised its head to look at him alertly. Although Jenkins has given up on the kitten's weight loss plan for now, Chocolate remains wary.

"I think the possibility of overnutrition is higher. Let's talk about other topics. In fact, I am very curious whether there are any weird rumors in a mountain village like this far away from human settlements, such as the existence of a village named ' The Shining’s monster or something.”

He made a joke that no one knew the meaning of.

"The Shining? What is that?"

Hathaway shook her head indifferently, her long red hair swaying in the air:

"But there are indeed horrific rumors about this villa. Every year the boys tell such stories. What do you think they want to do?"

Jenkins certainly knew what they were trying to do, and it couldn't be a more boring tactic. But he didn't think he should say what he knew, otherwise the conversation might take a direction he didn't expect.

"They are also writers, so they want to collect materials?"

The woman behind him shook her head. This answer was obviously pretending to be stupid. She knew it would be like this. The man in front of her didn't understand everything, but sometimes he just didn't want to understand. But it doesn't matter, with Miss Michael here, she doesn't know what to do now.

"But why should I think about such things? It's impossible for me to be with him..."

She subconsciously looked at her lover, and Miss Michael happened to be looking here as well, smiling happily at the two of them.

Everyone in the villa is not worried about the snowstorm outside, because the food and fuel stored here are enough for them to survive the entire winter. I just hope that the snowstorm will not delay the trip. I originally planned to hike to find the hot spring that never freezes all year round.

Today's journey into the mountains made everyone a little tired, and everyone also had plans for tomorrow, so they returned to their rooms one after another around nine o'clock.

Chapter 676 Chapter 664 The extra door

After everyone went back, Jenkins was the last person left in the lounge. He asked the servants of the villa not to pay attention to him, and sat on the softest chair in front of the fireplace with the "Investigator's Record" in his hands.

This is a novel that Jenkins found on the bookshelf in his room. Judging from the publication date, it was printed half a century ago, and the content is somewhat interesting.

Jenkins rarely stayed up late, and would never go to bed past twelve o'clock, even if he encountered interesting novels. He held the book in one hand and stroked the chocolate on his knee regularly with the other. The cat is very satisfied with the current state, but hopes that Jenkins can be more gentle.

"Get ready for bed."

When the clock on the wall rang again, it was already half past eleven. He stood up with the sleeping cat in his arms, put the book on the chair, then squatted down and used a poker to cover the flames of the fireplace, and then stretched and prepared to go upstairs.

There were portraits of some people hanging at the top of the stairs, but Jenkins didn't recognize them. He held a candlestick and walked in the dark corridor and looked around. This was a villa in the snowy mountains, so there must be no gas pipes.

Jenkins' room was the innermost one at the end of the corridor. When passing by his friends' rooms, no sound could be heard inside. Tiptoeing to the door of the room, the faint moonlight shone through the wind and snow, making Jenkins' shadow fall on the other end of the corridor. There was something tentacle-like dangling next to the shadow, which was Chocolate's dishonest tail.

"Tomorrow's plan is..."

He was stunned for a moment and did not open the door immediately. Instead, he leaned back and looked to one side, which was further inside the corridor.

"I remember my room was the innermost one."

He remembered this correctly, and the house number was correct, but now there was indeed an extra room in the corridor.

"What does it mean?"

The door of the extra room is completely different from the standard door of other normal rooms. In fact, the stone door does not match the decorative style of the entire villa.

"Mottled colored auras, and numbered items? There was no such thing when I came here just now."

He stood at the door and hesitated for a while, not recalling what this corresponded to.

"Speaking of which, I encountered something like this on my first day here. Is this the price of getting a new savior emblem?"

He stood in front of the unfamiliar door for a while, trying to reach out to the door handle. Unexpectedly, the pocket watch chain in his pocket immediately vibrated like crazy. In the end, he didn't dare to touch the handle. Instead, he turned back to his room and sat on the edge of the bed for a second before standing up, leaving the exact same shadow standing beside the bed in a sitting position.

"Wait for me in the room."

He also put his cat down, because the [real phantom] only affects itself.

"If I'm not back within an hour, go find Hathaway, you know?"

The kitten looked up at him, then nodded hesitantly, and then Jenkins returned to the corridor carrying the candlestick.

He hadn't decided yet whether he should go in, he just wanted to observe again. But unexpectedly, the door had disappeared.

"..."

I tapped on the wall with my fingers, but didn't hear any strange sound.

"Oh, I was already prepared for an exciting adventure."

He couldn't tell whether he was lucky or regretful. He shrugged his shoulders and went back to sleep.

It was a dreamless night, and it was only six o'clock in the morning when I woke up again, but I no longer felt sleepy at all. The curtains are tightly closed, but you can still hear the howling wind and snow outside the window. It seems that everyone's outing plans today will be delayed.

The cat was still sleeping, so Jenkins tiptoed into the hallway wearing slippers. It was dark and the corridor was still pitch black, but Jenkins, wearing the monocle, was not afraid of such an environment.

He took another look and saw that there were no more strange doors deeper in the corridor. If Chocolate hadn't noticed the door last night, Jenkins would have even suspected that he was hallucinating.

"Strange."

He took advantage of breakfast time to tell Hathaway what he had discovered. But the girl didn't know what it was. Together, they asked their companions about the supernatural legends about this snow-capped mountain villa, but they couldn't find any that matched the situation last night.

"Since it disappeared, it means that it is something that can be transferred at any time. We just need to be careful when opening the door and not go in the wrong direction."

Hathaway comforted.

The original plan for today was for everyone to follow a fixed route, walk toward the east, and enjoy the scenery of the snow-capped mountains in front of a cliff. However, due to the sudden blizzard, the travelers could only be temporarily trapped in the villa.

But this villa also covers a large area. If you want to kill time, then there is no problem in spending a few days here.

Throughout the morning, Jenkins sat in front of the fireplace and continued reading the Investigator's Journal. During this period, Miss Michael came over and invited Jenkins to go out to see the snow with them, but Jenkins, who was reading about the wonderful place at the time, could only refuse with regret.

I have to say that this semi-documentary novel is very exciting, and Jenkins even thinks that the current hot-selling "The Legend of Detective Knight" is not as good as it. I just don’t know why this book didn’t become popular half a century ago. At least Jenkins never heard about it from his elders.

He planned to spend the whole day today to finish reading the book, so as to avoid delaying the next few days' trip.

During the reading, Chocolate was lying on Jenkins' knees very obediently for him to stroke. It didn't run around, which was beyond Jenkins's expectation. He planned to make a big meal to reward the cat after returning home.

Near noon, Quick passed by the door of the lounge and informed Jenkins to get ready, as lunch was about to start. He put down the novel, stood up and stretched, and then took the cat to the corridor.

"Are Miss Michael and the others back?"

He asked the butler beside him.

"Not yet, Mr. William."

The servant replied.