Steampunk: Sixth Era Epic

Although surprised by Her Highness the Princess's proactive cooperation, Shard still carried the cat to Princess Angelina Cavendish, bending down to place the cat, which was clutched by the back of its neck, before her hands.

Mia had no habit of biting, so she did not attempt to bite the beautiful hand stretched out in front of her. Adhering to the principle of sniffing anything to determine if it was food, she indeed made a light sniffing action. Now the cat slightly curled its body, and combined with its impressive appearance, the sight was quite attractive.

The young princess, just sixteen years old, actually reached out her uninjured hand to touch it, but was directly rejected by the cat's paws. Rather than angering Angelina, this made her and the surrounding girls laugh.

"Very good, it seems Her Highness has no issues, so onto the next one,"

Shard was quite satisfied with Mia's behavior.

With the princess having taken the first attempt to be sniffed by the cat, other noble ladies also laughed and let Shard bring the cat to sniff their hands. Shard always emphasized that his cat would absolutely, absolutely not miss anyone with a special scent on their hands; however, in reality, Shard didn't care what Mia would smell but rather closely observed each person's expressions.

When about two-thirds of the hand-sniffing procedure was completed, Shard finally noticed a girl, who had been sitting quietly on the sofa without speaking, wearing a blue long dress adorned with lace, discreetly rubbing her hands on her skirt.

"Perhaps it's just a coincidence, but..."

When it was her turn, Shard, carrying the cat, came before her and bent down to place the cat:

"Miss, please stretch out your hand."

The girl with chestnut-colored hair clearly did not want to stretch out her hand, but now that everyone was watching her, she hesitantly stretched out both hands, half of her palms hidden inside the beautifully patterned sleeves.

Shard lowered Mia's height, but she was already fed up with the action of sniffing hands.

"Meow~"

The cat actually meowed... because Shard's left hand had quietly tapped its tail.

"Oh?"

The detective furrowed his brows, as if he had encountered some difficult trouble. The ladies watching also caught his exclamation.

Shard carefully looked at the girl before him, scrutinizing her attire with an inquiring gaze. The girl in the gauze dress timidly looked at him, then cautiously asked:

"Detective, why have you suddenly stopped?"

"This..."

Shard made a troubled face because he truly did not know if he had found the right person.

But he knew someone knew the answer, so his eyes shifted toward President Stan, who had walked back. The middle-aged man, slightly thin with a high nose and deeply set eyes, stood beside looking quite surprised at Shard, his face bearing a faint smile.

Shard knew he had found the right person.

"Miss, what have you had on your hands?"

He asked softly, lifting the cat back onto his shoulder and then gently stroking its little head. The girl's face in front of him flashed a momentary look of panic. She hadn't undergone any special training, so all her emotions were displayed on her face.

So Shard very carefully said nothing but looked toward Princess Angelina Cavendish. The sixteen-year-old princess looked sternly at the girl before Shard, whose lips twitched:

"Angelina..."

She lowered her head.

Now, the girls who had been laughing and watching Shard carry the cat to sniff everyone's hands also fell silent, the previously lively atmosphere suddenly quieted down.

Shard glanced at President Stan again, and seeing that he remained silent, knew he had truly found the right person. He then hugged the cat in his arms to stroke it, as a thank you for its little help, before finally bowing slightly to Princess Angelina Cavendish:

"Then Your Highness, I believe this investigative assignment is concluded."

"Rejed's Hamilton, you did very well,"

The red-haired girl said softly, her expression now resembling Lecia more.

As the princess stood up to leave, two maids, one on each side, followed the girl "discovered" by the cat, with the princess's other friends closing their mouths and following behind.

"Your compensation for the investigation will follow shortly,"

she said and then walked out the door. Shard looked toward President Stan who also stood by, the middle-aged man making a silencing gesture and following the crowd together with Shard.

The group returned from the second floor to the first, then from the hall on the first floor to the outside. The time was approaching dusk, and the sky was gradually darkening. Three carriages drove up in the distance, stopping consecutively in front of the Prophet's Society, the girls getting into the carriages one by one, then heading in the direction of Yordle Palace.

Whether they were going to Yordle Palace and what would happen to the caught girl was no longer of Shard's concern.

He stood with President Stan outside the Prophet's Society, watching the convoy depart.

The Prophet asked Shard softly,

"Does it feel a bit inexplicable?"

"Indeed, even if one wanted to hurt another, such a minor method shouldn't be used. If it were an accident, why not apologize immediately?"

Shard could never understand this point.

"This matter is complicated... Although the Society is close to Yordel Palace, we shouldn't discuss too much about what happens there."

President Stan sighed softly,

"Politics, it's always the most troublesome affair."

The sunset glowed through the mist, tinting the sky above Tobesk red. The two men stood together on the bustling Silver Cross Avenue, in front of the busy entrance to the Prophet's Society.

Carriages passed before them, their wheels rhythmically crunching over the road, and the metal pipes clinging to the walls reflected the remaining sunlight, making the streets particularly bright. Together, they looked towards the fiery sunset over Yordel Palace, and beyond the hazy mist, the Steam Age streetscape of Northern Pearl, Tobesk City.

The setting sun made the cat fur on Mia's shoulder seem aglow; the cat yawned, unsure if it was hungry or sleepy, but it suddenly took an interest in a bird flying overhead.

The bird swooped over Silver Cross Avenue, over the densely-packed urban skyline. It flew over the billowing black smoke from the chimneys, over the heads of barefooted workers carrying sacks, over the heads of well-dressed gentlemen, flying over the thousands of homes in Tobesk.

August was about to reach its mid-point; the hottest days of the year were coming to an end, and autumn was on the way.

(Iluna is praying...)

When Shard came back to the Society and Luviya saw him in the Divination Room on the second floor, he was facing the window, counting a stack of one-shilling banknotes by the last rays of the sun, with Mia squatting beside him, intently watching his hands skillfully count the banknotes.

Luviya even saw an afterimage of Shard's hands; he was really skilled at counting banknotes.

"What are you doing? If you want to show off your wealth, you should at least be counting one Gold Pound banknotes," said the purple-eyed Diviner curiously, turning on the gas lamp on the wall, placing her handbag on the table, and then pulling up a chair to sit opposite Shard. Neither Shard nor the cat looked up at her, both focused intently on the banknotes.

"Wait a moment... Okay, good afternoon, Luviya, you're still looking gorgeous. This is from President Stan, for the investigative commission. These are tens, two hundred in total, the Society is indeed generous. But to think it's all in small change, I've been counting it for quite a while."

Shard smiled, tucking the money into an envelope, covering it with a handkerchief and tossing it into his front pocket. Mia looked up happily beside him; the cat understood the meaning of "money."

"The Society's Roder Card business attracts a lot of small change. So whenever there's a chance, the cashiers prefer to spend those hard-to-keep small coins."

Luviya understood this quite well, seeing Shard store his money securely. She didn't ask about what had happened before but anxiously said,

"I have already heard that the incident in Coldwater Port was completely resolved yesterday morning, but you mentioned Daknis... "

"He got away,"

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Shard replied deftly, the purple-eyed girl showing an 'as expected' expression:

"Look, Shard, the first candidate for The Chosen One, still has some skills."

"I used Wordplay, sent a Female Sorcerer from the Twelve Rings to catch him, but Daknis still managed to escape. The only thing that genuinely hurt him was the Sunlight Gun I threw using Iluna's Alchemical Item. I think he will probably tend to his injuries while he's on his way to Tobesk."

Avoiding the details related to Hevy Aphrola's identity and the relationship between Dorothy and Lecia, Shard briefly described his experiences in Coldwater Port. He even mentioned the Level 0 Relic "Desire" he had encountered and showed Luviya the "Greater Sin Chain" extracted from that piece of flesh.

As expected, Luviya was quite worried about Shard. She had never heard of anyone daring to eat part of a Level 0 Relic. She grabbed Shard's hand to examine him, but just like Shard's own feeling, except for an increase in his desires, all he had received were benefits.

"A gift bestowed by Fate..."

"...has already marked its price in the shadows."

Shard caught Luviya's words, she used the language of the Fifth Era, which Shard happened to have learned a bit from textbooks:

"It was the Blood Spirit School that set the price, it was that 'Puppeteer's Notes' that guided me to the damp chapel's secret room, and helped me gain power."

"But why do I feel that, even without that Relic, you could still have gained power?"

Luviya was somewhat distressed:

"What's happened to you is definitely not normal, think about it, Shard, in the two months we've known you, how many incidents have you experienced?"

"But aren't all the incidents I've experienced related to the Chosen Ones? In Tobesk it was because of Iluna, in Coldwater Port it was because of Ivan Daknis, it's not my bad luck."

Shard seemed quite relaxed about it.