Steampunk: Sixth Era Epic-Chapter 357 The Fear Before Death

Shard fiddled with the ugly little wooden carving in his hand, while the priest suddenly stopped in his tracks, signaling Shard to look to the side:

"We've arrived."

Number 12 Hangton Garden Street was the original residence of the Freeman family, but now they had moved out. The priest, relying on his strong personal charm, had actually borrowed the keys to the house, which had not yet found a buyer.

The family seemed to have left in a hurry, with moving rubbish scattered around in the overgrown garden due to lack of maintenance. But they hadn't moved away too long ago, so the place only looked slightly disordered.

The priest was holding a bunch of keys, unlocking the iron lock that was entwined around the fence. After walking a dozen steps along the path, they were in front of the house door. During this time, neither Shard nor Priest Augustus felt anything unusual.

"From the information we have at the moment, it appears that no one in the family, other than Mr. Freeman, has encountered any mishaps. Mr. Freeman's death also occurred over a very long period, so I think the danger here won't be particularly great,"

said the priest, holding the keys and speaking to Shard, who was surveying the garden:

"But don't let your guard down either. Whether it's an evil spirit or a relic, they both have the ability to kill us directly, so be cautious later on."

"I understand, Priest."

The old man nodded, bowed his head, and whispered a prayer to "Mr. Dawn" with closed eyes. Then he grasped the Holy Emblem hanging on his chest, ensuring that this divine item, which possessed exorcism capabilities, was alright before using the largest of the keys on the ring to open the house's main door.

Upon entering, there was no strange smell, but because the house had been closed for a while, upon suddenly opening the door, they could see tiny dust particles floating in the air under the sunlight.

Shard casually closed the door behind them, then reached out to touch the wall and turned on the gas lamp in the entrance hall.

Priest Augustus was holding his Holy Emblem, rotating it evenly around and murmuring incantations. Consequently, Shard also used the Arcane Techniques, "Echo of the Past" and "Echo of Blood," to survey the surroundings. The former only let him hear the voices of neighbors passing outside on the street, and with the latter, he didn't see any overly obvious blood traces.

"It's probably not an evil spirit, but there's definitely something sinister here,"

the Old Cleric frowned tightly:

"If it really is a relic, then we might be in trouble. Here's what we'll do: I'll take you to see the place where Mr. Freeman died first. He fell from the attic's trapdoor and then rolled down the stairs connecting the third and second floors, unfortunately breaking his neck."

Even though it was daytime and the place seemed safe, the two of them had no intention of acting separately and searching on their own. In such a dangerous location, it was safest to stay together.

Inside, the house was almost completely emptied out. Only the odd bits left scattered on the floor and the dust marks on the walls from where picture frames had been hung for years indicated that this had once been a warm home.

There were no difficulties encountered while going upstairs, and at the turn of the staircase leading up from the second floor, Shard's eyes finally caught sight of a clear, blood-red glow. Patches of blood were spread on the ground, likely where Mr. Freeman had bled out after being immobile due to a blow.

The Old Cleric crouched down, the edge of his Ring of Fate just visible behind him. As the Necromancy Spirit Rune emitted Spiritual Light, the priest touched the floor with his hand, which was giving off a faint gray glow, while Shard kept up the use of his sorcery, looking upwards.

Strangely, the clear blood traces didn't just remain on the landing at the staircase turn but were also present on the stairs and had spread from an even higher place. Although not much, it indicated that Mr. Freeman had already been injured before he rolled down the stairs.

"Was it an injury from falling to the third floor from the attic, or was he wounded while still in the attic?"

Shard pondered silently as Priest Augustus also stood up:

"I felt the fear of the soul, he endured great fear before death. It's not the fear of dying; it's a completely different feeling."

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Shard queried. If there was a body, he could directly use "Soul Echo."

"According to the wishes of his family, he was cremated and then buried in the public cemetery in Tobesk,"

the Priest replied, looking up together with Shard. Even if it weren't for cremation, given the current weather, it's doubtful the body would have been sufficient for Shard's Necromancy.

"Let's continue upstairs; I saw some blood traces."

Shard suggested.

So they went to the third floor, and indeed, the blood traces extended down from the trapdoor leading to the attic. Shard found the small mechanism to open the trapdoor by the window and, amid the sound of gears turning inside the wall, a square hole appeared in the ceiling, and an iron ladder was lowered.

They still couldn't sense any traces of the elements, so Shard led the way, with the Priest following him up the ladder into the attic.

The attic had been emptied as well, only leaving some cardboard boxes along the walls. The blood originated from the right side of the attic, but now it had been cleaned up so thoroughly that seeing the blood traces was of no use.

"I've had my suspicions," said Shard as he squatted down to inspect the cardboard boxes.

Out of the blue, Priest Augustus mentioned, "I once suspected that it was Mrs. Freeman who was playing tricks. She would create noises at home to scare Mr. Freeman. Then, she might have used drugs to affect Mr. Freeman's mental state. Finally, avoiding everyone's attention, she pushed Mr. Freeman from the attic to stage an accidental death."

This conjecture was quite terrifying—as if it were taken from a courtly political novel. Taken aback, Shard turned to look at the priest and asked, "Do you have any evidence?"

"None, it's merely a prediction based on the darkest possibilities of human nature... consider it just a possibility I've put forth," the Priest replied.

But this possibility indeed existed, as they really hadn't found anything suspicious in the house.

The boxes in the corner of the attic contained the artworks of the late Mr. Freeman. Not every piece an artist paints can be sold, let alone practice sketches, which are practically worthless for a small-time painter.

The sketches in the box were Mr. Freeman's relics, although it's uncertain why Mrs. Freeman didn't take them away.

The paintings themselves were ordinary items, with the specific time of creation written on the back of each one. The oldest was a piece from six months ago, while the most recent ones were completed in the past week or two—that is, during the time Mr. Freeman claimed there were problems in his house.

In this world, the profession of an artist was not as dangerous as that of a folklorist but was still riskier than that of an uninformed commoner. Mental problems greatly could affect a painter's artistic style. Mr. Freeman had originally preferred using vivid colors to depict sunlight-filled scenery, but his three most recent oil paintings painted during the last period were almost entirely in cool tones and contained some strange elements.

"Priest, look at this," said Shard, pointing to one of the paintings.

This was a work Mr. Freeman completed a week before his death. The scene depicted the Freeman's garden, drawn from an upward perspective showing his own house. He had almost portrayed his own home as a haunted house, and in a second-floor window, there was a very blurred figure standing.

"Is this the strange thing he saw, or just a family member who happened to be at the window?"

The priest was equally puzzled.

In another painting made before Mr. Freeman's death, he had depicted his house's living room. In that painting, wooden carving tools had already appeared, along with a small wooden figure of a priest given to him by Priest Augustus. It seemed that Mr. Freeman intended to use it as a reference for carving.

"So why was he obsessed with wood carving after all?"

In the oil painting from two weeks before Mr. Freeman's death, some wooden crates were stacked in a corner. At this time, his mental state wasn't too severe, and the colors and composition he used were relatively normal.

Looking at this third oil painting, Shard asked Priest Augustus:

"Priest, do you see these boxes, could they be the cargo crates used by the Kingdom Post Office?"

Since Shard hadn't received anything other than letters, he wasn't very familiar with these things. But Priest Augustus recognized them:

"Yes, they are indeed the crates used by the post office for shipping goods. Look, he even painted the black metal brackets that prevent the wooden crates from falling apart during transport. The black brackets mean that the contents are valuable. The red label indicates they were shipped from Carsonrick."

"Did Mr. Freeman come into contact with anything strange in his last two weeks?" Shard speculated, pointing to the contents of the painting:

"Like these items shipped from afar."

Frowning, Priest Augustus nodded in agreement:

"Possibly, when I return the keys later, we can ask together. However, we must carefully search the house to determine if there are any other issues."

By then, it was eleven in the morning, with a misty fog outside. Shard and Priest Augustus finished their last search of the garden, locked the gate, and planned to take a carriage to return the keys to Mrs. Freeman.

The house showed nothing out of the ordinary. Shard had almost touched every inch of the wall with his hands, but could never feel the trace of elements or spirits. Even the priest suggested searching the garden corners to make sure nothing was buried there, but it turned out they were overthinking it.

Two hours wasted without finding anything left them both somewhat dejected. After all, they were just trying their luck for the 15 credits; not finding anything was something they had anticipated.

So they had lunch together at a restaurant in a nearby block, talking about the real cause of the painter's death and jokingly suggesting they could give Dorothy inspiration for her writing. After the meal, they took a carriage to the apartment where Mrs. Freeman and her children were temporarily staying.

The apartment was also in Tobesk Eastern District, a twenty-minute walk to their destination. It was an ordinary street in the city, lined with shops and apartments for rent. The crowds on a Thursday noon made for a bustling scene, and Dr. Schneider's psychological clinic was just three streets away.