"That gift was actually from Mr. Black Cat. Before he left Nolan for the winter, I helped him with a huge problem... It's a book that details a very interesting ability. The puzzle is solved by decoding the letters based on the lunar phases—specifically, when the blue moon is full and the red moon is half-waned. I'm sure you understand that kind of cipher, Candle Mr. I don't have the book with right now; Mr. Black Cat said he lent it to an old friend of his, but you can definitely retrieve it with the borrowing slip. You might know his friend, actually. His na is MrBirchwood. I'll mail the slip to your black market alias address when I get back. You can just go and pick it up."
This was Mr. White Cat's way of thanking Jenkins for his efforts tonight, and the gift was certainly a pleasant surprise. But Jenkins was far more concerned with the evening's events and how the situation had escalated to this point.
In truth, neither Mr. Hood nor Mr. White Cat bore any responsibility for what had happened. They were rely in the wrong place at the wrong ti, unfortunately caught in the ritual that forcibly connected them to the Mysterious Realm. The disastrous result was that one of them was gravely injured and the other went missing.
"Those aberrations are getting far too bold," Jenkins remarked. "How could they have the confidence to open a gateway to the outside world right in the middle of a human city?"
"It's likely because of Nolan's current state," Mr. Hood explained. "Most Enchanters in the material world have heard of Nolan's... reputation. They know this city is overflowing with 'miracles.' Just as that ancient titan wants to use the miracles at the end of the Epoch to break free from the gods' seals, it's not surprising that soone else would want to use that sa power to open a door."
"Soone else?"
Jenkins picked up on the word imdiately. Mr. Hood had used a pronoun that specifically referred to a human.
"Yes," Mr. Hood confird. "Those aberrations are physically very different from humans. Without human assistance, those malevolent creatures could never have accomplished what they did tonight. So ti ago, Miss Bailing told she had seen ghouls at a burnt-out camp outside the city, which made suspect they had an inside man among the humans. Tonight, when Mr. White Cat and I were lying in ambush near the bank construction site, we saw three n arrive first to scout the area for any traps. They were undoubtedly collaborators."
"Do you know who they were?" Jenkins asked at once, a suspicion forming in his mind that the Tree House organization was once again plotting sothing in the shadows. But that didn't seem right. Based on the information from the interrogation of the man who planned the slate robbery, the Tree House should have already withdrawn all its personnel from Nolan.
"I recognize one of them. I saw him once at a party..."
Mr. White Cat spoke up, then hesitated for a few seconds before continuing.
"I believe he was one of the guards for the ambassador of the Ancient Ao Principality... if I'm not mistaken."
As human civilization progressed, certain old systems were gradually changing. After the fall of the Ancient Sicari Empire, the primary human nations in the material world were the three great kingdoms of today. But in the lands overseas and in the gaps between these major powers, nurous smaller countries still existed.
So of these nations maintained complete independence and also called themselves kingdoms, though their status was incomparable to the three great powers. Others had sworn fealty to one of the three kingdoms, their rulers granted noble titles by the Stuart royal family of Ruen, the Middleton royal family of Bel Diran, or the Alecio royal family of Turin, and their small states were accepted as principalities of the respective kingdoms.
In the current era, most of these principalities had been absorbed into the three kingdoms, becoming counties or large cities. However, a few still retained their status as principalities.
Whether small kingdoms or principalities, they were inevitably used as buffers and pawns in the territorial disputes between the three great kingdoms, yet they all maintained a degree of autonomy. Today, the regions that still held the title of principality were, in na, nearly as independent as the small kingdoms. As such, they dispatched envoys to important cities. In a tropolis as crucial as Nolan, while they couldn't establish a formal embassy on the scale of one in a royal capital, they had ambassadors who resided there year-round. These individuals were typically among the most active figures in the city's high society.
"The Ancient Ao Principality?"
Mr. Hood's grasp of geography was clearly lacking; he racked his brain for a long ti but couldn't place the country.
"Isn't that the country whose duke's son died five years ago when his yacht capsized off the coast of Nolan?" Jenkins asked after a mont's thought. The incident was etched vividly in the original Jenkins's mory because Robert Williams, who was still running a small shop in the Dock Area at the ti, had received a ring a sailor had found washed up from the sea.
Because of the ring's dubious origins, Robert had bought it for a very low price and then sold it for a substantial profit. A portion of the money he later lost in his failed investnt in undersea mining had co from that very ring, which could also serve as a private seal.
"That's the one," Mr. White Cat confird. "There seed to be so diplomatic friction at the ti, but the newspapers never reported on what happened next... In any case, that's the country. It's perfectly normal that Mr. Hood hasn't heard of it. Its entire population is smaller than Nolan's."
The comparison was hardly fair, of course, as the Nolan region was one of the most densely populated areas in the entire world.
"This is very valuable information," Mr. Hood mused. "But what is the Ancient Ao Principality trying to accomplish this ti? I simply can't figure it out..." He then looked up as the man sitting across from him, sipping tea, set his cup down.
"If you can't figure it out," Jenkins said with great earnestness, "why don't we go and ask the ambassador himself what he wants?"
"Is that really necessary?" Mr. White Cat asked hesitantly. "It's almost dawn. If we report this to the Church or City Hall, the ambassador and his entire family won't be able to escape. Do we really need to take that risk?"
"Of course we do," Jenkins argued. "This matter is likely not over. It's hard to say if they have a backup plan after their first one failed. If we report this to the Church, the current city-wide lockdown will be lifted, which could easily tip them off. Besides, it will take the Church ti to verify the source of the information. On the other hand, if we act ourselves, we could probably be eting with the ambassador in about fifteen minutes."
His words had undoubtedly convinced them, but there was one problem: none of them knew where the ambassador of the Ancient Ao Principality lived. Although Mr. White Cat had seen the man, Corey Wilson, and his guards, it had only been at a party.
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