Chapter 270 Golden Iris

The light coming through the window gradually dimmed, and the ghost left.

Ning Zhe held a lantern to illuminate the outer wall of the bell tower. The old eaves were dilapidated and muddy water was dripping down. However, the falling water drops disappeared silently after leaving the range of the light and did not fall to the ground.

Starting from the terrace, Ning Zhe took Bai Zhi's hand and walked slowly across the dilapidated roof. Their backs were pressed against the outer wall of the bell tower. They passed one window after another overhead. When they reached the fourth window, Ning Zhe stopped.

"Why did it stop?" Bai Zhi looked up at the window above her head. There was a golden iris carved on the walnut-colored wooden window frame. She asked softly, "Is this the place?"

"It's right here." Ning Zhe slowly stood up, holding onto the window sill with his hand, and said, "The golden iris is the family emblem of the Flimmisret family. The window behind is the castle owner's private library."

Vanessa Castle was originally designed as a war fortress, which was to serve as a strategic stronghold between the Apennine Peninsula and the European continent, and to guard against political assassinations by other nobles. In the earlier Middle Ages, the Frimmisret family was also responsible for suppressing the rebellious serfs on the Apennine Peninsula for the royal family.

Because of this background, the castle designed by Grand Duke Vanessa paid great attention to security. The bedroom of the city lord himself is hidden deep in the rock wall. There is no window connected to the outside world, and not even a door that leads directly inside. The only entrance is hidden somewhere in the library. It is a nesting doll-like structure with another secret room hidden inside a secret room.

——Ning Zhe only found out about this later.

And now, he also knew what Gazza was looking for in the library at that time.

"When he separated from me, Gazza's plan was to first send me up to the second floor through the shaft, and then find another way to the second floor and find a way to get into the city lord's bedroom to find the developer's blueprints for Vanessa Castle."

If you want to enter the city lord's bedroom, you must pass through the library.

"So at that time, Gaiza was looking for the secret door leading to the city lord's bedroom in the library. However, before he found it, I took control of his body away."

Ning Zhe, who had accidentally entered Geza's body at the time, had no idea of the situation, nor did he know what he was looking for in the library. He died inexplicably at the hands of a ghost wandering around with candles lit. He fell to the ground and turned into a box, losing his life in vain.

Fortunately, after many twists and turns, he returned to the library, but last time he was inside the window, this time he was outside the window.

Ning Zhe calculated the time. It took him only about half an hour to 40 minutes to go up from the shaft to the second floor, set fire to the banquet hall, and then walk along the outer wall from the eaves to here.

Gaiza couldn't use the shaft mechanism to go upstairs alone. He had to go through the corridor or find another longer way. No matter which way he went, he couldn't reach the library before Ningzhe who took the shortcut. Not to mention that after Ningzhe set fire to the banquet hall, the "things" wandering in the corridor on the second floor had been alarmed. Going upstairs now would be more dangerous than when Baizhi came up.

"Okay... then let's wait here for Gaiza to climb up to the second floor and enter the library..." Ning Zhe slowly stuck his head out from the window sill and carefully observed the situation in the library.

The next moment, his pupils suddenly contracted and his heart skipped a beat.

"What's wrong?" Bai Zhi noticed his mood swings and was a little worried: "What did you find?"

Bai Zhi stood on the eaves with an oil lamp in her hand, tiptoed, and sneakily poked half of her head out to look into the window with Ning Zhe beside her. Ning Zhe put his index finger in front of her lips and whispered, "Shh..."

Don't make a sound.

Bai Zhi shut her mouth obediently and looked in the direction of Ning Zhe's gaze. She saw a middle-aged man of medium build standing in front of the door of the library, carefully turning the metal handle on the door.

The man had short wine-red hair, a characteristic of Celtic people. A candle flickered between the bookshelves behind him. A shrunken corpse with only the upper body holding a candlestick was crawling slowly in front of the bookshelves. The orange candlelight emitted a rotten wood smell. Click...

The door opened, but not by the man.

The heavy door in front of the red-haired man quietly became damp, and the four copper-clad corners were covered with rust. A skinny ghost hand slowly stretched out through the crack in the door, and along with it, the life-threatening light also leaked into the room.

The door of the library was slowly pushed open by the ghost outside. The red-haired man let go of his hand, quietly retreated along the movement of the door panel, and hid himself in the small triangular space formed by the door and the corner of the wall.

The dead body holding the brass oil lamp was only half of its body, and the cross-section of the torso was rotten and rotten, bringing with it the stench of a corpse.

Ning Zhe looked at the ghost standing at the door of the library, and his index finger, which was raised in front of Bai Zhi's lips, stopped in place. He knew who the red-haired man hiding behind the door was.

That's Gezza.

Or rather, that is...

"…That's me." Ning Zhe muttered to himself silently, watching himself who was about to die.

What happened? Why did Gazza arrive at the library earlier than me who took a shortcut? He came downstairs later than me and took an extra detour, but why, why did they both arrive at the library at almost the same time?

tick-

A drop of rain fell from the eaves.

Ning Zhe silently watched the ghost holding the oil lamp slowly climb up the door panel until he reached the top of the gate. Bai Zhi blinked, looked at him curiously, and asked in a low voice: "What's wrong? Did you notice anything?"

"Time." Ning Zhe whispered, "The flow of time on the second floor of the clock tower is different from that on the first floor."

When Ning Zhe was active in the castle as Cynthia, he felt that a little more than four hours had passed. After Cynthia's death, he woke up on Van Dyke's airship and asked Xia Yubing, and found out that he had slept for about three to four hours.

When Ning Zhe was in the library as Gaiza, he was drawing a simple map, looking around for what the owner of this body was looking for, and busy avoiding ghosts wandering around with candles... He felt that he had been in the library for about 20 minutes to half an hour, but after waking up, he found that only less than 3 minutes had passed in the real world and Xia Yubing had just taken off his pants.

The reason for these two time dislocations is the objective condition that the speed of time flow in different areas of the castle is different.

"In Fort Vanessa, the higher you go, the lower the temperature gets."

"Similarly, the higher the altitude, the lower the relative flow rate of regional time will be."

Temperature, altitude, and the speed of time flow seem to be three conditions of existence that are positively proportional to each other.

This also explains why I, who set out first and took a shortcut, still arrived at the library almost at the same time as Gazza, because after he went up to the second floor, the relative time between me and Gazza had slowed down.

(End of this chapter)

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