"Please... I beg you..."
After uttering his final words, the man named Sodod died right before Dorothy’s eyes. Watching this scene unfold, Dorothy, still hidden under the bed, confirmed through the Corpse Marionette Ring that the man was truly dead. Her expression turned serious.
Crawling out from under the bed, Dorothy wasted no time. She immediately took out the Cursed Box, opened it, and placed it on the floor. Using the Corpse Marionette Ring, she lifted Sodod’s body and had it, along with Edrick, jump back into the box. After securing the box, the compartment was once again empty except for Dorothy.
Knowing that Sodod might be pursued, Dorothy had to hide the body to avoid any trouble. Fortunately, Sodod had roughly bandaged his wounds before coming to her, so he hadn’t left a trail of blood.
After securing the body, Dorothy sat back on the sofa, her expression serious as she began to ponder. In her mind, she replayed the words Sodod had spoken earlier.
“This man named Sodod claimed to be a captain of the Ulster’s Serenity Bureau. He boarded this train to deliver something to the central bureau in Tivian, but was recently robbed by a suspected Black-rank Shadow Beyonder.”
“This guy might be a Lantern. During his fight with the Shadow, he probably tried to use his ability to search for the enemy’s location, but instead ended up detecting me. The one who drained all the Shadow spirituality from my ring was likely him...”
“He knew of my existence, so in his final moments, he came to me for help. To him, I was an unknown Beyonder, while the other Shadow Beyonder was clearly his enemy, trying to steal what he was escorting and kill him. So, he took a chance and sought my help, tempting me with the reward from the central bureau...”
“So... should I take this on?”
Sitting on the sofa, Dorothy pondered this. Opposing a Black Earth rank Shadow was a risky endeavor, and this matter had nothing to do with her. She could easily walk away. “No matter what, the Serenity Bureau is an official organization. Those who openly oppose them are likely dangerous societies or cults like the Crimson Eucharist. Honestly, I have no qualms about taking action against such organizations. They are my primary source of mystical resources.”
“Moreover, the opponent is a Shadow. Recently, I’ve been running low on Shadow. I used up all my spiritual storage items during the fight with the two Bonesmiths, and I’ve also used up a lot of my accumulated Shadow. Now, even the Shadow stored in my ring is gone. I really need to replenish my Shadow reserves.”
Dorothy thought this way. Currently, she was indeed very short on Shadow, with only 1 point left. After exhausting her Shadow storage items during the school battle, Dorothy had initially planned to buy some Shadow storage items from Aldrich. However, Aldrich, in order to recover his strength, decided to venture into some dangerous places and needed to keep all his storage items for combat readiness, so he temporarily stopped selling them. Instead, he recommended Dorothy to purchase items from the White Craftsmen’s Guild branch in Tivian.
Therefore, Dorothy currently had only 1 point of Shadow left, both in accumulation and storage. For someone like her, who preferred to stay hidden in the shadows, this was quite unfavorable. So, she had a genuine need to acquire more Shadow. If she could eliminate this Shadow Beyonder, she might gain some resources and possibly receive a reward from the Serenity Bureau.
“If handled properly, I might be able to deal with that Shadow safely.”
With this in mind, Dorothy decided to intervene in this matter and confront the Shadow Beyonder.
“First... I need to find him. That guy has already gotten what he wanted, and he might be planning to disembark soon. My opportunity lies before the next train stop...”
Thinking this, Dorothy left her compartment and headed toward the front of the train. After passing through a carriage, she found the train attendant’s duty room behind the conductor’s cabin and approached the attendant on duty.
"Mr. Attendant, where are we now? How long until we reach Tivian?" Dorothy asked the attendant politely, and he responded courteously.
"Miss, we are currently at the border of Black Forest County. If everything goes smoothly, we should arrive in Tivian tomorrow afternoon."
"And when will the train stop next? Will it stop for a long time like before? I find stopping so boring, I prefer when the train is moving~" Dorothy tried to sound as innocent and naive as possible as she continued to ask. The attendant thought for a moment before answering.
"Well... the next stop should be at Firwood Town. The train just passed the Moon Tree River Bridge, and according to past schedules, we should arrive there in about ten minutes. But don’t worry, miss. We’ll only be handling garbage and restocking food there. We won’t be refilling water or coal or doing mechanical inspections, so the train will start moving again quickly."
"Ten minutes... Thank you!"
After bidding farewell to the attendant, Dorothy walked back to her carriage. As she walked through the corridor, her expression immediately shifted from an innocent smile to one of seriousness and gravity.
“Ten minutes... It’s almost impossible to find and deal with that guy in the entire train within just ten minutes. If what Sodod said is true, and that guy has the ability to move through walls, then once the train stops, he can immediately disembark by passing through the walls. Any part of the train could be his exit point, making it impossible to stop him. To catch him, I must prevent the train from stopping... But how can I do that?”
Dorothy pondered deeply, and then she came up with an idea.
With a plan in mind, Dorothy quickly walked through the train corridor. After passing through another section, she arrived at a carriage where faint traces of white smoke still lingered. In this carriage, she saw a compartment with its door wide open.
Hurrying to the compartment, Dorothy carefully inspected the interior and found traces of blood on the floor.
“This is it. This is where Sodod clashed with the other Beyonder.”
Thinking this, Dorothy looked around. After surveying the area, she murmured to herself.
"It seems I need to set up a little something..."
...
In the darkness, the roaring train continued to speed along the tracks.
In the train attendant’s duty room near the front of the first-class carriages, several attendants were idly playing cards and chatting.
"Hey... what happened in Carriage Three earlier? There was so much smoke."
"Who knows? We thought it was a fire, but when we got there, there wasn’t any flame, just smoke. I opened the windows to let it disperse, and that was it."
"Hey... let me tell you, I just saw a little lady at the counter. She was so cute..."
...
As the attendants chatted and played cards, a sharp, clear scream suddenly came from the direction of the first-class carriages.
"Ahhh!!!"
Hearing the scream, the attendants froze, exchanging glances.
"What happened now?"
"Don’t know. Let’s go check."
Quickly putting down their cards, the attendants hurriedly put on their hats and rushed out of the duty room, heading toward the source of the scream. Soon, they arrived at Carriage Three.
Inside the carriage, they saw that several compartment doors were open, and passengers had gathered around one compartment.
Realizing something was wrong, the attendants quickly made their way to the crowded compartment. They saw that the faces of the onlookers were filled with panic. Among the crowd, a noblewoman sat on the floor, trembling as she pointed a shaky finger toward the open door of the compartment.
"De... dead... dead body!!!"
The noblewoman stammered in terror. The attendants’ hearts sank, and they quickly pushed through the crowd to look inside the compartment.
There, they saw a man in his thirties, wearing a dark blue shirt and gray pants, lying on the floor with his hands clutching his stomach. A large pool of blood had formed beneath him, and his lifeless face was frozen in a wide-eyed stare, a horrifying sight.
Seeing this, all the attendants were stunned. They looked at each other, unsure of what to do.
"He... he’s dead? What... what happened!?"
One of the attendants exclaimed in shock, but a voice from the crowd responded.
"A murder..."
Hearing this, the attendants and many passengers turned to look. They saw a tall, thin man in a trench coat and a top hat, with deep-set eyes and a hooked nose.
Facing the many eyes on him, Edrick spoke solemnly.
"Ladies and gentlemen, unfortunately, it seems we have witnessed a despicable murder tonight."