Part 1. The Joker Chapter 103 – The Man from the Heart
”The family lives at number 19 in the Howells neighborhood?”
While memorizing the information, Klein sharply grasped a piece of information.
”Well, Welch’s residence is in the Howells neighborhood, the Divination Club is in the Howells neighborhood, and this fabric merchant called Cyrus Arepis is also in the Howells neighborhood ……So it seems like it wouldn’t be strange for Welch to know Linus Vansant, and even if he was through Cyrus Arepis’ acquaintance ……”
Holland, Klein felt the clues connect, and his thoughts became clear at once.
He was originally full of doubts as to why Welch would know Hyannis Vansant, since the banker’s son was not an occult-loving man, and money was more useful to him than divination, and now Klein felt that he could tentatively deduce the process of the acquaintance between the two parties:
”According to various magazine accounts, the middle and wealthy classes were happy to visit their neighbors at the same level in order to form a social circle that would help them, and Welch, also in the Howells neighborhood, and Cyrus, the fabric merchant, had every incentive to have the opportunity to become friends ……”
”It’s not particularly hard to understand how Cyrus knew Linus Vansant, a frequent visitor to the Howells Neighborhood Divination Club, and how perhaps a chance encounter, or perhaps a favor, could lead to familiarity between people who had been present in the same area for a long time ……”
”Wanting to sell the ancient books in his possession, Haynas Vansant approached Welch, a history undergraduate, through an introduction from Cyrus ……”
”The images of the suspected evil god ‘The True Creator’ appearing in Haynas’ dreams, and his own mastery of the correct incantation format, all of which indicate that he has gone deep into the field of the occult, and that he cannot rule out the possibility of being a member of a hidden organization… …”
”Nor do we rule out the possibility that he joined the hidden organization because he was guided by Cyrus.”
……
Between the surges of thoughts, Klein was almost certain that the information left behind by the other party had no small amount of credibility even without using the means of divination:
”Even if it’s not named Cyrus Arepis, isn’t a fabric merchant, and doesn’t live in No. 19, he definitely belongs to the Howells neighborhood, or the nearby area!”
Klein pondered as he revisited the other man’s loan record:
”The last visit to the Devereux Library was last Saturday, the day before Selena’s birthday dinner, and the day before the death of Heinas Vansant, and by now, several days have passed, and he still hasn’t returned the periodicals and magazines he borrowed.”
”According to the previous records, when only two journals are borrowed, he usually comes back every other day.”
”Does this mean that Cyrus was too frightened to come back to the Devereux Library when he learned of Hayners’ death?”
”Well, he borrowed a lot of unrelated history books and periodicals at first, before gradually clarifying his goals and showing massive overlap with the ones I’ve borrowed ……”
”This suggests that he had no one to guide him, no senior associate professor of history at the university to ask for guidance, and was left to figure it all out on his own.”
”What would a frightened target normally do? Two choices, one, with the information basically complete, he would head straight for the main peak of the Honchos Mountains, and two, when the main conditions are still lacking, he would hide out for a while, see what the wind is doing, and will reappear after confirming that the death of Hainas doesn’t involve himself.”
Thinking of this, Klein closed the lending record and pushed it back to a few librarians and took out the portrait, asking them if they had seen the target, unfortunately, there were quite a few borrowers coming here every day, and the administrators were hard pressed to make an impression on someone with few distinctive features.
”Yes, please.” Klein put away his ID and badge.
He didn’t intend to check it out single-handedly by himself, it was not only dangerous but also cumbersome, he planned to go to Zotran Street once more and leave the next thing to the captain and his teammates, while he himself went home to make tomato oxtail soup for his brother and sister, and in the meantime, he divined the target’s condition and whereabouts with the help of that mysterious space above the gray mist.
”Officer, there’s nothing else, is there?” One of the administrators asked pleadingly with a sigh of relief.
Klein nodded slightly and said:
”No more, I will come back if new clues appear.”
He gripped his black silver-encrusted cane in his left hand and walked briskly toward the door.
Just then, he saw a man in a black double-breasted tuxedo and let his collar stand up high enter with his head bowed.
The moment the two sides brushed, Klein caught a glimpse of the other man’s thick, straggly eyebrows and of a pair of gray-blue eyes!
These were the parts that the high collar could not conceal!
Cyrus? Cyrus Arepis? Such a coincidence? Klein froze, not expecting to meet his target directly!
What kind of luck is this called!
This was too much of a coincidence, wasn’t it?
He measured himself and felt the soreness of his muscles, so he pretended nothing had happened and continued walking towards the door.
Well, one must follow the will of the heart and be steady!
As long as Cyrus hadn’t left Tingen, this miss was irrelevant!
At this time, the man in the black double-breasted tuxedo walked up to the reception desk and handed the periodical held in his hand to one of the administrators.
”Return it.” He lowered his voice and said vaguely.
That librarian casually took the journal, glanced at it, and was suddenly stunned.
He subconsciously looked up across the room, and his body began to tremble uncontrollably.
”Is there a problem?” The man who held his collar up high asked in a deep voice.
His words were like the spark that ignited a barrel of dynamite, causing that administrator to instantly lose control and run to the side while shouting at the top of his lungs:
”Officer!”
”That criminal is here!”
…… At this moment, Klein, who hadn’t had time to go out, had only one sentence of “Holy shit” echoing wildly in his heart.
He instinctively put his right hand into his armpit and took out the revolver.
The man first froze, then turned around and stomped to run.
But instead of running for the door, he fled toward the side bulbous window, as if to smash through the glass and jump outside.
Klein, who was panicking, turned around and saw this scene, and his heart suddenly settled down.
For he realized that although he was afraid of his target, the target was even more afraid of himself!
”In such a hasty encounter, the other party will definitely not be able to judge my strength and figure out what exactly I’m good at, so the already weak-minded person will definitely subconsciously avoid a frontal clash and seek other ways to escape!” With a certainty in his heart, Klein lifted his revolver and snapped the trigger.
Right at this time, the man in the black double-breasted dress rolled violently, trying to avoid the bullet.
Immediately afterward, he pressed his right hand, and his entire body rose up in the air, pouncing on the glass of the convex belly window.
Poof! Klein’s first shot was a blank.
However, this was something he had anticipated, and he took advantage of Cyrus’ difficulty in dodging in mid-air and pulled the trigger again towards the torso area that was most convenient for shooting.
Bang!
The silver-colored Demon Hunter bullet pierced through the air and steadily lodged itself into Cyrus’ back.
Clang! The glass shattered and Cyrus crashed out, leaving drops of crimson blood and pieces of crystal on the windowsill.
Seeing that his opponent was injured, Klein, no longer cowed, stomped over and, with the help of a chair, jumped onto the windowsill and leapt outside.
It belonged to the back of the first floor of the Devereux Library, where rows of sturdy trees separated a lush green lawn.
Cyrus, who had been shot, was running to the side, trying to enter the alley between the two buildings, and Klein had not yet practiced hitting while running, and did not dare to shoot blindly, but could only hold his staff in one hand and his gun in the other, and followed the back of the man in the black gown in great haste.
Stomp!
He followed the blood drops on the ground, trying to shorten the distance between the two.
Seeing the corner in sight, seeing the speed of the injured Cyrus getting slower and slower, Klein, who was about to seize the opportunity, suddenly had a palpitation in his heart, only to feel that the one in front of him did not seem to be a human being, but a vicious wolf, a tiger, harboring a terrible danger.
This is his instinct as a soothsayer, this is the spiritual warning to him!
Klein immediately slowed down his pace, and out of the corner of his eye, he swept the blood on the ground:
Compared to the beginning, the blood that Cyrus was now dripping had turned black!
Just then, a gust of wind hit his face, and Kline’s eyes reflected Cyrus’ face.
There were thick, straggly eyebrows, there were gray-blue eyes, there was one raised sarcoma after another, there were cracked corners of the mouth, and there were white teeth.
Cyrus actually launched a counterattack at this moment!
It made the face in Klein’s eyes become clearer and clearer, making it seem as if he could smell some kind of foul odor!
Snap! Cyrus lunged out a distance of seven or eight meters, clearly exceeding the realm of a normal human being, but due to Klein stopping his pursuit in time, the two sides were still separated by almost ten meters before.
With a distance of less than two meters, the mouth dangling with sticky saliva and the dense sarcoma that was disgusting to the extreme constituted a clear and frightening picture that made Klein’s spirit highly tense.
Without even thinking about it, he took advantage of the brief stiffness of the opponent’s lunge and raised his right hand, snapping and snapping, letting the bullets pour into the target’s head.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
The very close range shot allowed one silver hunting bullet after another to burrow into Cyrus’s head, sending blood spattering and blurring his opponent’s face, and causing him to stagger back.
Shooting all the bullets inside his revolver in one breath, Klein subconsciously tried to back up and confirm the outcome of the battle.
But at this time, Cyrus, who was struggling to stand up straight, gave him a great fright, causing him to violently swing out the cane held in his left palm.
Snap! The hard, black, silver-encrusted cane smacked Cyrus’ neck, drawing out crimson marks.
Snap!
Klein instinctively whipped his opponent until Cyrus staggered to the ground.
Whew! Whew! Whew! Klein was panting heavily as he pounded the ground with his cane, keeping a dead eye on his target for fear that his opponent would suddenly swindle.
At this point, Cyrus’s head was almost a broken ripe watermelon, the remnants of the dense sarcoma began to subside, while the body returned to calm after a few twitches.
Instead of rushing to examine the body, Klein dropped his cane, pulled out the demon hunting bullets he had with him, and shoved them into the revolver one by one.
Only after doing so did he stabilize his spirit and, fighting back nausea, half-squatted down and fumbled with the pockets of Cyrus’ black double-breasted gown.