Whispering Verse

Shade played with the ugly little wooden sculpture in his hand, and the priest suddenly stopped and motioned to Shade to look aside:

"Here we are."

No. 12 Hangleton Garden Street was the original residence of the Freeman family. Now the family has moved away. The priest who visited them, relying on his strong personality and charm, actually borrowed this house that has not yet found a buyer. key.

The family seemed to have left in a hurry, and the rubbish from the move was still scattered in the neglected garden where weeds had grown wildly. But they haven't moved away for too long, so the place looks only a little messy.

The priest took a bunch of keys and opened the iron lock wrapped around the fence. After walking more than ten steps along the path to the door, neither Shade nor Priest August felt anything strange.

"Judging from the information obtained so far, except for Mr. Freeman, no one else in the family suffered any accidents. Mr. Freeman's death also went through a very long cycle, so I don't think the danger here is particularly great. .”

The priest took the key and said to Shade who was looking at the garden:

"But don't let down your guard. Whether it's an evil spirit or a relic, it has the ability to kill us directly, so we must be cautious for a while."

"I understand, priest."

The old man nodded, lowered his head and closed his eyes and prayed quietly to [Mr. Dawn]. Then he held the Holy Emblem hanging on his chest and confirmed that this magical item with the ability to exorcise demons was OK. Then he used the largest key in the key chain. That one opened the door to the house.

I didn't smell any strange smell after entering the door, but because the house had been closed for a while, after suddenly opening the door, I could see fine dust floating in the air under the sunlight.

Shade closed the door smoothly, then reached for the wall and turned on the gas lamp in the foyer.

Priest Augustus was holding up his Holy Emblem, turning it around at an even speed, and muttering something in his mouth. So Shade also used thaumaturgy [Echo of the Past] and [Echo of Blood] to investigate the surrounding situation. The former only allowed him to hear the voices of neighbors passing by on the street outside, while the latter could not see any obvious blood stains. .

"Probably not an evil spirit, but there's definitely something evil here."

The old priest frowned:

"If it is really a relic, then we may be in trouble. In this way, I will first take you to the place where Mr. Freeman died. After he fell from the trap door of the attic, along the road connecting the third floor and the second floor He fell down the stairs and unfortunately broke his neck."

Even though it was daytime, the place seemed safe, and the two of them had no intention of moving separately and searching separately. It was safest to walk together in such a dangerous place.

The house has almost been emptied out. Only the few debris scattered on the floor and the dust marks from picture frames placed on the walls all year round can tell that this was originally a warm home.

There was no trouble in the process of going upstairs. At the corner of the stairs leading up to the second floor, Shade's eyes finally saw a clear blood-red light. The blood stains on the ground were scattered in patches. It should be the blood that flowed from the place where Mr. Freeman was hit when he fell to the ground.

The old priest squatted down, and a corner of the life ring behind him was revealed. After the [Necromancer] spirit rune radiated spiritual light, the priest touched the floor with a hand that was slightly emitting gray light. Shade maintained the use of the spell and looked up.

What is very strange is that clear blood stains not only remain on the landing at the corner of the stairs, but also on the stairs, and they spread all the way down from higher up. Although the amount was not large, it also showed that Mr. Freeman had been injured before he rolled down the stairs.

"Were you injured when you fell from the attic to the third floor, or were you injured in the attic?"

Shade speculated in his mind, and Priest August also stood up at this time:

"I felt the fear of the soul. He experienced great fear before his death. It is not the fear of death, it is completely different from that feeling."

"How was Mr. Freeman's body disposed of?"

Shade asked, if there was a corpse, he could actually use [Soul Echo] directly.

"In accordance with the wishes of the family, he will be cremated and buried in the public cemetery in Tobesk."

said the priest, looking up with Shade. In fact, even if it is not a cremation, according to the current weather, the corpse may not be enough to support Sha De's channeling.

"We continued walking up and I saw some blood."

Shade suggested.

So when we went to the third floor, the blood stains indeed extended from the trap door leading to the attic. Shade found the small mechanism that activated the trap door from the window. Amidst the sound of gears turning inside the wall, a square hole appeared in the ceiling, and an iron ladder was lowered.

The two of them still couldn't feel any trace of the elements, so Shade walked in front and the priest followed behind, and climbed into the attic together.

The attic was also emptied, leaving only some cardboard boxes along the walls. The blood stains appeared from the right side of the attic, but it was too clean now, so it was useless to see the blood stains.

"Actually, I had doubts."

When Shade knelt down to look at the cartons, Priest August suddenly said:

"I once suspected that Mrs. Freeman was behind all of this. She made some noise at home to threaten Mr. Freeman, and then used drugs to affect Mr. Freeman's mental state. Finally, she avoided Everyone, pushed Mr. Freeman down from the attic, creating the appearance of an accidental death."

This kind of speculation was a little too scary, more like a plot from a palace political novel. Shade turned his head to look at the priest with some surprise:

"Do you have any evidence?"

"No, I'm just guessing based on the darkest side of people's hearts... just think that I raised a possibility."

But it was a real possibility because they really didn't find anything suspicious in the house.

In the box in the corner of the attic are the paintings of the late Mr. Freeman. It is impossible for an artist to sell every painting, not to mention that the drawings used for practice are not valuable at all to young painters.

The drawings in the box are regarded as Mr. Freeman's relics, but I don't know why they were not taken away by Mrs. Freeman.

The paintings themselves are ordinary objects, with the specific time they were painted written on the back of each painting. The earliest one was completed six months ago, and the most recent one was completed in the last week or two, which is the time when Mr. Freeman claimed there were problems at home.

In this world, although the profession of artist is not as dangerous as that of folklorists, it is still more dangerous than that of ignorant ordinary people. Mental problems will greatly affect the artist's creative style. Mr. Freeman originally tended to use strong colors to depict scenes under the sun, but the three oil paintings he has made recently are almost all cold-toned paintings, and in the painting There is something strange.

"Priest, look at this."

Schad pointed to one, a work by Mr. Freeman a week before his death. The picture is of the Freeman family's garden, and the house is painted from an upward perspective. He almost painted his house into a haunted house, and in the second-floor window, there was clearly a very blurry person standing.

"Is this something strange he saw, or is it a family member who happened to be at the window?"

The priest was also very puzzled.

In another painting before Mr. Freeman's death, he painted the living room of his home. At that time, wood carving equipment already appeared in the picture, and next to it was a small wood carving of a priest given to him by Priest Augustus. It seemed that Mr. Freeman wanted to use it as a reference for carving.

"So, why is he fascinated by wood carvings?"

The oil painting Mr. Freeman made two weeks before his death shows some wooden boxes stacked in the corner. During this period, his mental problems were not serious, and the colors and composition methods he used were relatively normal.

Shade looked at the third oil painting and asked Priest August:

"Priest, look at these boxes. Are they the wooden boxes used by the Kingdom Post Office to transport goods?"

No one has sent anything other than letters to Shade, so Shade doesn't know much about it. But Priest Augustus knew:

"Yes, it's a box shipped by the post office. You see, he even drew the metal fixing corners used to prevent the wooden boxes from falling apart during transportation. This black fixing corner means that these are valuable items. The red above The label means it was shipped from Carson Lick at this time.”

"Has Mr. Freeman been exposed to anything strange in the past two weeks?"

Shade came up with a conjecture, and then pointed to the content on the oil painting:

"Like these things sent from afar."

Priest Augustus frowned and nodded:

"There is a possibility. When I go to return the key later, we can ask together. However, we still need to search carefully to see if there are any other problems with this house."

Just like that, the time came to eleven o'clock in the morning, and it was still foggy outside. Shade and the Reverend Augustus concluded their final search of the garden, left the garden, locked the fence, and planned to return the key to Mrs. Freeman by car.

There was nothing unusual about the entire house. Shade touched almost every inch of the wall with his hands, but he could still feel no trace of elements or spirits. The priest even suggested searching the corners of the garden to prevent anything from being buried in the ground, but in fact they were overthinking it.

After wasting two hours and getting nothing, both of them were a little frustrated. But after all, I came out to try my luck for 15 credits, and it was expected in advance that I would not gain anything.

So they first had lunch together at a restaurant in a nearby neighborhood, where they talked about the truth about the painter's death and joked about how it could provide inspiration to Dorothy. After eating, the two took a carriage to the apartment where Mrs. Freeman and the children temporarily rented.

The apartment is also in the East District of Tobesk, and you can reach your destination in 20 minutes on foot. This is an ordinary street in the city, with shops and apartments for rent along the street. At noon on Thursday, it was very busy with people coming and going, and this place was only three streets away from Dr. Schneider's psychological clinic.