"Dimodo?"
"They're still in the restaurant."
Then, pointing to where the moldy head had been purified, he asked hurriedly: "What was that?"
Klein, maintaining the persona of Gehrman Sparrow, didn't reply. He glanced at Danitz and walked past
"Flaming" Danitz, carrying the lantern, felt relieved to have finally completed a goal. He straightened his back, looked at Urdi and the others, and snickered: "You don't need to know what it was. Just remember it's a monster that can hurt you."
If not for Gehrman Sparrow being a few meters away, he would have even proclaimed: Only I, the great "Flaming" Danitz, can protect you!
Cleves, Cecil, and Tige exchanged glances, stepped forward, and comforted their employer: "Ask when we get back to the White Agate."
To be honest, the three bodyguards had all been adventurers for a time, but their knowledge of monsters was still limited to folk tales and drunken stories from peers, so they couldn't help feeling they were dreaming.
But for them, having seen creatures like fishmen, other things were not so hard to accept, just uglier, weirder, and more peculiar.
With that thought, they calmed down a bit, and the guns in their hands seemed to regain their power.
Yet the pure light that fell from the sky was still beyond their understanding. They felt their long-formed worldview, philosophy, and values shaken, so they had to temporarily put it aside and suppress all emotions deep in their hearts.
Klein stopped at the entrance of the Green Lemon Restaurant, raised his right hand, and knocked.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
After three rhythmic knocks, there was no answer from inside—complete silence.
If not for the bright candlelight shining through the windows and door cracks, Klein would have thought it was an abandoned house.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
He knocked three more times.
Inside the restaurant, silence persisted, as if everyone were following the custom of not responding to knocks in foggy weather.
Klein lowered his right hand and patted the hem of his double-breasted frock coat.
Suddenly, he leaned back, raised his knee, and kicked his right foot forward.
With a crash, the restaurant door burst open, and the nails holding the copper lock popped out.
Fox, the boss in his tailcoat with a plump, almost round face, was still standing in his original spot. The ladies and gentlemen who had chosen to stay opened their doors again and stood silently on the boundary, watching.
"What... do you want?" Fox asked without anger, in the same tone as before, but now he held a revolver.
Klein, his spiritual vision active, turned his head, looked around, and found no trace of evil on the people present.
His gaze fell on the restaurant owner. He stared into the other's eyes and asked: "Where is Dimodo's family?"
Fox met the deep brown eyes that were suppressing emotions, as if brewing a storm, for two seconds, then turned his head unnaturally and said: "One more table, outsiders, upstairs."
"Tell them to come down," Klein ordered coldly.
Fox was silent for several seconds until the other quickly drew his gun and aimed at his head.
He took a breath and sent a waiter to the second floor, and the Dimodo family came downstairs with a clatter.
"What happened?" Dimodo was a man under thirty, on vacation with his newlywed wife.
Klein lowered his gun and said flatly: "Something's happened in Bansi Harbor.
"Will you come back to the ship with me, or stay here?"
"Something happened?" Dimodo repeated the word while seeing Urdi Branch nodding heavily at him from outside.
He knew Urdi was a wealthy import-export merchant with three bodyguards. He believed that if something really happened, it would be safer to stay with him, so the answer was obvious.
As for the unique customs of Bansi Harbor, they were just customs! He took his new wife's hand, walked toward the door, and said with a polite smile: "All our things are on the ship, so of course we'll go with you."
"Thank you." He and his wife thanked in unison, passed Klein, and joined the Branch family outside.
Klein holstered his revolver, bowed slightly to boss Fox, and said: "Sorry for the disturbance."
With that, he turned and, in the light spilling from the restaurant, walked toward Cleves and the others.
With a bang, the Green Lemon Restaurant's door closed again, swaying slightly in the wind.
Klein had actually sensed some abnormal, subtle atmosphere, but since his spiritual vision yielded nothing, he didn't want to dwell on it, lest he trigger the enormous danger lurking in Bansi Harbor.
He returned to Danitz' side and counted the people by the light of the lantern.
Donna's family of four, three bodyguards, the Dimodo couple, and a few servants—all accounted for... Klein swapped his revolver and cane, raised his right hand holding the gun, reached into his double-breasted frock coat, and stroked the "
A dark golden light flashed, and an invisible force rapidly spread outward like a wave, washing over everyone present.
At that moment, Donna's family felt as if they had arrived in the south, basking in warm sunlight, dispelling the chill inside them.
They were no longer so tense and worried, as if they had regained their courage. The residual black and the extremely faint sense of evil from the specially cured meat at Damir Harbor quickly dissolved.
"Sun Aura" – an ability that boosts the courage of allies within a twenty-meter radius and purifies any evil power within them!
This spell-like ability, activated through the brooch, was under Klein's spiritual and mental control, allowing him to bypass those he didn't wish to help.
"First to the telegraph office," Klein repeated. Cane in left hand, gun in right, he oriented himself and stepped forward.
Danitz, as instructed, walked diagonally beside him, while Cleves, Cecil, and Tige professionally took over the other directions of vigilance.
A group of more than fifteen people—if attacked, it would be easy to get overwhelmed, and here only "Flaming" could be considered a true ally... What to do? Klein recalled the characteristics of the monster they'd encountered earlier and suddenly holstered the revolver and transferred the cane to his right hand.