"I'm here for you!"
Charlotte's voice was filled with excitement and joy.
Her usually sharp spiritual intuition clearly felt that Ms. Cecil was lying.
Yet, she subconsciously ignored all of it.
In its place was a kind of blind trust that a young, inexperienced girl had for her idol.
Hearing this, Elias couldn't help but curl his lip.
A strong sense of speechlessness welled up in his heart.
"I'm glad to see you too!"
Ms. Cecil's voice drifted over.
Her tone was perfectly measured—gentle and kind.
"However, I still have some very urgent work to handle right now."
Ms. Cecil continued.
"Would you mind following my colleague here to my room and waiting for me for a bit?"
As she spoke, Ms. Cecil gave a slight nod to the young colleague standing behind her.
Charlotte didn't hesitate for a moment.
She was unexpectedly compliant, nodding vigorously with a crisp, "Okay!"
Hearing this, Elias's heart, which had been lodged in his throat, finally settled a little.
At least from her current actions, Ms. Cecil really didn't seem to want to involve an ordinary person like Charlotte in this supernatural vortex.
Thinking about it, she was an investigator for the Seventh Agency after all, so she should have some level of professional standards.
However, while he felt a sense of relief, a different kind of imbalance began to spread in Elias's heart.
Charlotte's attitude toward Ms. Cecil and her attitude toward him were like night and day!
He was her actual brother!
A blood-related, genuine biological brother!
And the result?
Charlotte treated him like a thief.
She would grill him on anything suspicious and create conditions to be suspicious of things that weren't.
She even dared to stalk him!
But what about Ms. Cecil?
The woman gave a casual sentence without even a proper reason, and she just followed obediently?
Where was that innate spiritual intuition of yours?
Was it broken?
Life is hard, Elias thought, shaking his head.
This sister was raised for nothing.
But complaints aside, Elias's goal was now very clear.
He had to stop this girl from seeking death due to her damn curiosity.
As long as he could confirm that Charlotte was safely settled in the hotel room, he could free his hands.
While the elite team of the Seventh Agency was investigating Mester's Treatment Room, he could quietly check the situation inside.
As long as he could confirm the threat in Mester's Treatment Room was gone, this trip wouldn't be in vain.
If there was a chance to loot some gold coins along the way, that would be even more perfect.
A man had to seek some benefits for himself.
However, the current situation wasn't all good news.
Elias's brow furrowed slightly.
According to what Finn had said earlier, Ms. Cecil had split her forces.
So the question was, where were they sent?
Elias's gaze pierced through the glass, coldly scrutinizing the building across the street.
Mester's Treatment Room.
It was an extremely ordinary two-story building.
For a place with such a small footprint and limited internal space, it was impossible to deploy too many personnel.
The terrain wouldn't allow it, and too many people would lead to friendly fire.
But if he carefully calculated the display today...
Just at the hotel entrance, including that Finn who just ran out, he had already seen no less than three fully armed investigators.
And don't forget, there were already investigators who had gone into the treatment room to scout ahead of time.
Plus Cecil herself, who was sitting outside in command.
This was an extremely luxurious tactical squad configuration.
It seemed like the Hope County branch of the Seventh Agency was really going all out this time.
The more Elias thought about it, the more he felt something was off.
He could tell by comparison.
Even Branch Manager Guardian, a genuine Scale Four powerhouse, didn't mobilize so many people for field missions.
But what about Ms. Cecil?
She was only a Scale Three.
Why could she mobilize such a massive tactical force?
Combining the fragments of information Charlotte had shared with him before, Elias quickly pieced together a complete logic chain in his mind.
This Ms. Cecil came from Landon.
Landon, the center of politics and power in the Kingdom of Velen.
From this, he could infer that the power behind her was staggeringly large.
It was possible she was a special envoy directly dropped in from the Seventh Agency headquarters in Landon.
What level of matter could alarm someone from the Seventh Agency headquarters to travel all this way to get involved?
While Elias was hiding in the shadows, his mind racing with deductions, Charlotte's voice suddenly came through the link charm.
"But, Ms. Cecil..."
Charlotte's voice sounded a bit hesitant.
"My brother came here with me just now."
"I don't know where he went."
"Maybe... he went to the bathroom!"
Elias felt his scalp go numb.
His eyes widened, and he nearly spat out a mouthful of blood onto the plants in front of him.
?
You think of your dear old brother now?!
When you were rushing out just now, why didn't you think of me?
Why did you have to mention me in front of her!
"Oh? Really?"
Ms. Cecil's voice came through the charm.
Her tone was extremely strange.
The end of her sentence trailed up slightly with an indescribable playfulness.
Simple-minded Charlotte might not have heard the deeper meaning behind those three words, but how could Elias miss it?
She was thinking.
She was suspicious.
"It's fine."
Cecil's voice quickly returned to its gentle tone.
"If I see him in a bit, I'll definitely tell him to go find you immediately."
"Okay!"
Charlotte gave a compliant response.
Then, she turned and followed Ms. Cecil's young subordinate, pushing back through the doors of the White Bank Hotel and heading straight for the stairs in the lobby.
Watching Charlotte and the investigator disappear around the corner of the stairs, Elias took a deep breath, suppressing the urge to strangle his own sister.
Who pits their own brother like this?!
He quickly followed after them.
Originally, his plan for today was perfect.
As long as he didn't give Ms. Cecil any chance to confirm he was a transcendent, everything would be fine.
Recalling their brief meeting at the train station square, Elias was self-aware enough to guess that Ms. Cecil, with her sharp professional intuition, definitely harbored a trace of suspicion toward him.
But suspicion was just suspicion; she had no physical evidence.
As long as he wasn't caught in the act and didn't walk into her line of fire, she would have to keep that suspicion to herself.
But now, this was great.
Charlotte had to go and stir things up by mentioning the name "Elias" to Cecil at such a sensitive time and sensitive crime scene.
His suspicion level was instantly maxed out!
However, now was clearly not the time to dwell on these messy matters.
Elias stepped onto the stairs covered in thick wool carpet, silently arriving at the third-floor corridor.
He hid in the shadows of the stairwell, waiting patiently.
After about a few minutes, the young investigator pushed open a door, politely withdrew, and turned back toward the stairs.
Once the investigator had completely left the corridor and the sound of footsteps faded into the lobby below, Elias quickly approached the door.
He knocked gently.
"Who is it?"
Charlotte's alert voice came from inside.
"It's me."
Elias identified himself.
With a click, the brass lock turned.
Charlotte opened the door, poking half of her head out, her large eyes full of suspicion.
"Al, where did you just go?"
"The bathroom."
Elias didn't even blink as he smoothly used the excuse Charlotte had found for him earlier.
"How did you know I was here?"
Charlotte wasn't that easy to fool, her brow furrowing slightly.
"Duh."
Elias rolled his eyes, putting on a righteous parental posture.
"I just came out of the washroom and saw you going upstairs with a strange guy."
"Didn't I have to hurry up and see what was going on?"
Hearing this, Charlotte suddenly felt like she was being treated as an improper girl.
Her face instantly flushed red, and she stomped her foot in frustration.
"What are you talking about! That was Ms. Cecil's colleague!"
Taking advantage of Charlotte's outburst, Elias naturally stepped into the spacious hotel room.
He casually shut the door tight and locked it.
The decor inside the room was very refined, but in Elias's eyes, none of that mattered.
In the depths of his pupils, a flicker of faint blue light passed.
Spirit Vision activated.
At the same time, he silently communicated with Edmond in his mind.
"Old Ed, sweep the room."
Under the dual probe of Elias's own Spirit Vision and Old Ed's Scale Two perception spell, the spiritual flow of the entire room was laid bare.
A few seconds later, the check was complete.
There were no hidden arrays, monitoring rituals, or residual spirituality in the room.
Cecil was clearly an extremely confident person who didn't think anyone would dare to mess with her room.
It was safe.
Elias turned around, looking at Charlotte who was still sulking.
"Alright, alright, I misunderstood you."
Elias put on a look of admitting his mistake.
Charlotte gave a cold huff and turned toward the sofa in the center of the room.
The moment Charlotte turned her back, Elias pulled a small paper packet from his coat.
Inside was that packet of dreamlily powder.
The spirituality within his body surged, silently injecting into the paper packet through his fingertips.
He gave his wrist a sharp flick.
The originally calm powder, catalyzed by spirituality, instantly transformed into a cloud of tiny dust nearly imperceptible to the naked eye.
Like an early winter frost, it silently filled the air around Charlotte.
"Clack."
Charlotte, who was about to sit down, suddenly stiffened.
Her bright eyes instantly lost their focus.
The power of dreamlily powder was absolutely overwhelming for an ordinary person.
Charlotte's body went limp.
Elias was quick, stepping forward in a flash to steadily catch his sister's soft body.
He gently picked Charlotte up and carefully placed her on the soft bed in the room.
After finishing this, Elias straightened up and let out a long sigh of relief.
The world was finally quiet.
Next, it was time for the adults to work.
He pulled a pitch-black mask from his inner pocket and deftly pulled it over his head, leaving only a pair of cold eyes exposed.
He turned to head toward the window to check the battle at the treatment room opposite.
Just then, Old Ed's disdainful voice rang out in Elias's mind.
"You beast!"
"You even laid a hand on your own sister!"
Rate on N.U.
