Chapter 23: Lanevus's Child
Alice is very confused now.
She was walking on the way to the fortune-telling club, when the horse of a public carriage on the roadside suddenly went crazy for some reason. Even though the driver tried his best to control it, the carriage rushed straight towards Alice.
Alice was so scared that she froze in place. She felt that she should do something, but her body was so scared that she couldn't move, so she could only watch the carriage rushing towards her. Then she tripped on a pole hit by scattered passers-by and fell in front of Alice.
Alice could even feel the gust of wind when the carriage rushed towards her. She was so scared that she was stunned and welcomed the apology of the coachman. She refused the compensation in a restless mood and left here.
But why... this thrilling scene made her feel inexplicably familiar? It was as if she had experienced this coincidence countless times before - she brushed past death because of strange accidents, but was unscathed.
When Alice entered the Divination Club with this confusion, three people passed by Alice. Alice felt that her inspiration seemed to be touched. She subconsciously looked in the direction they left, but the backs of the three people had disappeared at the corner of the stairs. She only had time to see half of the lotus leaf hat.
"Alice?" Klein noticed Alice's arrival in surprise, and he was the first to speak out to remind her.
Alice, who didn't notice anything wrong, quickly closed her eyes and walked to the place where the voice came from and sat down: "I didn't expect to meet you here."
This sentence that should have been said by Klein made him silent-after all, it was normal for him to appear here to summarize the rules of the role of the fortune teller!
"You seem to be very famous here, Mr. Fortune Teller." Alice relied on the fact that she couldn't see Klein's expression, and started chatting with Klein with the mentality that as long as I wasn't embarrassed, it was others who were embarrassed.
Klein, who had a certain understanding of Alice's personality, decided to take the initiative in the topic: "You know? I just heard about a hateful fraudster."
"How hateful is he?" Alice asked curiously.
"He took away more than 10,000 pounds!" Klein's tone contained inexplicable grief and indignation.
"...What's his name?" This amount made Alice feel a little emotional.
"Lanevers, his name is Lanevers," Klein replied, "Just now, two of his victims came to me for divination. They have already called the police, and the police also take it very seriously. They are willing to take out a part of the money they recovered as a reward. If you provide effective clues, you can get 10 pounds. If you can help the police catch Lanevers, you can get 100 pounds in cash!" Alice was amazed at the generosity of these two people for a moment, and then she asked, "But didn't he defraud 10,000 pounds?" Klein's thoughts were disrupted for a moment. He recalled the logic of the conversation before and after, and then confirmed what Alice meant: "The victims are not just these two people." Alice nodded thoughtfully, and then asked, "Didn't you try to divine Lanevers's location?" "I would like to try," Klein did not hide his desire for the bounty, "but there is no information, even the name is likely to be fake, and there is no handbag... uh, it can't be said that there is nothing." "Huh? What do you mean?" Alice asked. "Lanevers' girlfriend is pregnant with his child..." Klein answered hesitantly.
Alice remembered the inspiration she had just been inspired by and the trio she had missed for some reason. Her smile suddenly disappeared. She asked, "Did Lanevers' girlfriend just leave before I came?"
Klein was slightly startled. He did not understand the intention of Alice's question, but was infected by Alice's sudden serious attitude. He replied, "Yes, the two victims came with Lanevers' girlfriend and left just before you left. You should have run into them."
So Alice said to Klein, "We need a place to talk conveniently."
Klein received this hint, and that night, they met above the gray fog.
"What do you want to say?" Klein asked impatiently.
So Alice frowned and spoke:
"I encountered a car accident this afternoon... " "The car accident did not cause any consequences in the end. It just delayed time, causing me to pass by the people you mentioned at the door.
"And when we passed by, there was a girl wearing a lotus leaf hat among them... should she be Lanevus' girlfriend? She inspired me."
Klein didn't say anything. He suddenly remembered the clairvoyance that he hadn't been able to remember after being interrupted. He suddenly realized that there must be something wrong with that Megose.
"Klein?" Alice looked at Klein who had been silent for a long time and asked in confusion.
"... In the afternoon, I wanted to open my clairvoyance on her, but I forgot." Klein said softly.
"..." Alice pursed her lips, and after a while she hesitated and spoke, "Maybe, I mean maybe, if we see her, there will be danger?"
"But what kind of danger is it that even a glance at her..." Klein didn't finish his words, because he suddenly realized what he couldn't see - gods, or mythical creatures.
"That child...?" They looked at each other and didn't say anything.
...
The next morning, they came to Dunn's office together, which was very rare.
Under Dunn's gaze, Klein couldn't wait to speak:
"Captain, I met the victims of the Lanevus fraud case at the Divination Club yesterday. They wanted me to divine Lanevus's whereabouts. I told them that they must have Lanevus's personal belongings. Then they suggested that they could use Lanevus's child to divine.
"They brought Megosaurus, the mother of Lanevus's child. Megosaurus's behavior was very strange. I wanted to try to see her, but..."
"But he forgot." Alice took over Klein's words, "Yesterday afternoon I wanted to go to the Divination Club, but I had a car accident on the road. When I arrived, I just passed by Miss Megosaurus, and she touched my inspiration."
After a pause, Alice added: "I didn't see Megosaurus either."
"Do you suspect that there is something wrong with that child? "Dunne clarified Alice and Klein's thoughts.
"The spirit warned Klein not to look at the child, and fate helped me avoid the possibility of seeing the child... Captain, what kind of child is it that cannot be looked at directly?" Alice threw the question to Dunne.
"Which district did this happen? What is the belief of Megose's family?" Dunne began to ask as usual.
"The location of Lanevus's steel company is in the South District, and as for Miss Megose... her family believes in the God of Steam and Machinery." This was Klein's answer.
So Dunne signaled them to go back first. He needed to negotiate with the Punisher and the Heart of the Machine. Klein and Alice could only obey - after all, even if they wanted to secretly take a look at Megose, they had to go secretly.