The thief's movements were swift. Angel had just reached the ground floor, hiding in shadows beside the stairs, when the door opened soundlessly.
A small figure squeezed through the gap, gently closing the door behind. The parlor was pitch black—only a sliver of crimson moonlight entered through the street-facing bay window, blocked mostly by curtains and illuminating only a tiny area near the window.
But with Angel's dark vision, this young thief—seemingly not yet an adult—moved nimbly through the pitch-black parlor to the study door, pushed open the half-closed door, and slipped inside.
Angel didn't disturb him, patiently waiting in the parlor darkness.
Though young, this thief displayed skilled technique and clear purpose—definitely not here for simple theft, but something more important.
She doubted that someone who'd been in Backlund only two days, contacting no one but her landlady and maid, would attract such attention. Only one possibility remained:
The intruder sought something belonging to the previous tenant.
After renting the house, Angel had thoroughly inspected every room, even using spirit vision, finding no hidden doors or storage compartments. But tonight's intrusion suggested she'd missed something.
She decided to let this gentleman thief help her out.
About five minutes later, the study door reopened. The small-statured thief emerged with a document folder tucked under his arm—clearly his objective. Having obtained it, he showed no hesitation and headed straight for the front door.
"Darkness."
Angel's Hermes word froze the thief. The next second, he kicked off and lunged toward the exit.
But the "Sleep Charm" she'd thrown at his feet had already activated, igniting with dark red flames and a soft explosion—like a paper bag being popped.
Bang—
The running thief stumbled forward as if tripped, his head hitting the floor. He collapsed motionless.
Standing at a safe distance, Angel felt mild dizziness, but having thrown the charm deliberately and being a Sequence 7 Beyonder with mental preparation, the sleep effect on her was minimal.
Seeing the charm take effect, she didn't immediately check on the unconscious thief but went to the street-facing window, lifting a corner of the curtain to look outside.
This purposeful thief might have accomplices waiting.
After several minutes' observation, Red Rose Street bathed in crimson moonlight showed no passersby, and the more distant Tussock riverside remained quiet. Only then did Angel relax and return to the thief's side.
A gray-haired young man—probably not yet eighteen—wearing an old jacket and faded trousers, still clutching the document folder tightly.
After a brief search turning up only a few pence, a lockpick set, and a chipped knife, Angel found nothing else. This thief's purpose was indeed simple—just this document.
Settling onto the sofa, she opened the unmarked leather folder and extracted a thick stack of papers.
After flipping through just a few pages, Angel's head felt like mush.
Complex formulas and technical terminology filled every page. Though written in Luen and mostly familiar individually, combined they made no sense.
Even diagrams accompanying some documents only vaguely suggested a complicated machine with numerous functions.
If Melissa were here, she might understand this—she's so interested in such machinery...
Sighing inwardly, Angel stuffed the documents back in the folder, set it on the nearby coffee table, and withdrew her still-warm magic mirror, kneeling beside the sleeping thief.
Since I can't understand the documents, I'll ask someone who can...
"Magic mirror, magic mirror, tell me—why has this person come?"
Caressing the smooth mirror surface, Angel silently repeated the divination phrase three times, absurdity welling up inside her.
Compared to mysterious dream divination or elegant pendulum divination, mirror divination felt like a children's fairy tale game.
But the most advanced divination often requires the simplest methods. After finishing the incantation, she channeled spirituality and lightly swept across the mirror surface. The formerly solid surface rippled like water, then grew hazy, billowing with mist.
The mist dispersed, revealing a scene in the mirror. A burly man was conversing with the thief, Angel clearly hearing their dialogue.
"Quirk has confessed everything. That manuscript is in his former rental house—in a hidden compartment behind the study bookshelf. Tonight you'll steal it. Remember, Gory, no complications, or I'll break your legs."
The burly man with a cross-shaped scar over his right eye and spiky dark hair spoke sternly.
"Yes, boss."
The gray-haired youth called Gory nodded and replied curtly.
The image faded, the vanity mirror returning to normal.
Angel glanced at the folder on the coffee table. Apparently this document—hidden in the study of 47 Red Rose Street just half an hour ago—was what this "boss" had ordered thief Gory to steal. And the person who'd hidden it, as she'd suspected, was the previous tenant, the Feysac man called Quirk.
To ensure accuracy, Angel picked up the document and performed another divination with the magic mirror.
"Magic mirror, magic mirror, tell me—this document's origin."
In the mirror, the folder passed between several unfamiliar men and women before finally being placed behind a bookshelf by a casually dressed middle-aged man.
"The divination result is quite vague... is it due to insufficient information?"
Angel recalled Klein's frequent emphasis on "obtaining sufficient information" for divination.
But the man who'd finally hidden the document behind the bookshelf should be that Feysac man, currently in this "boss's" hands, fate unknown.
But this hardly concerned Angel. If this thief Gory hadn't made such noise breaking in, and if Angel weren't a Beyonder with heightened vigilance, he'd have likely succeeded and disappeared by now...
Now that she'd intercepted him, she'd inadvertently become involved in this mysterious document dispute.
Looking at Gory prostrate on the floor, Angel formed a plan.
"Ugh..."
Gory clutched his forehead—swollen from hitting the floor—and slowly rose.
His eyes cleared, his body shuddered, and he remembered he was still inside Quirk's former residence, still mid-theft.
The manuscript—where is it?
His hands frantically searched the darkness, touching the document folder beside him. He immediately pulled it close and grabbed it.
"Good, it's still here... What just happened? I think I heard a strange whisper, then felt drowsy and fell asleep?"
Gory checked the folder's thickness, finding it unchanged from when he'd found it. Relieved, he looked up and scanned the parlor, but in the faint moonlight filtering through curtains, the room appeared normal.
Intelligence indicated the new tenant was a young woman who should be asleep. His task was simply retrieving the manuscript—no need to concern himself with her...
So what caused his blackout? Had he tripped and knocked himself unconscious on the floor?
Instinctively rejecting this absurd possibility, Gory shook his head, secured the folder under his arm, quietly opened the door, stepped onto the street, and quickly left Red Rose Street.