Published at 8th of October 2024 3:06 am

Chapter 1070: Living to the Fourth Stage

This chapter is updated by JustRead.pl

Amid the pounding heartbeat that seemed to reverberate in her ears, Bohemia pressed herself tightly against the wall, silently deciding that the moment that person revealed their head, she would immediately deliver a punch to their nose. As she anxiously waited behind the door, she suddenly heard the footsteps stop inside the room.

Shortly after, the door clicked shut with a ‘ka-chunk.’

A false alarm. Along with the sound of the closing door, Bohemia’s heart dropped back into her chest, and she let out a long exhale as if most of her strength had been drained.

“Lucky break, he didn’t come out,” the Descartes Spirit commented with a click of its virtual tongue.

Bohemia shot it a withering look.

A series of swaying lights emerged under the door, probably from the person using a flashlight. Since she had already taken everything out, Bohemia wasn’t concerned about the intruder rummaging. She took the opportunity to inch her way into the Sandwich Secretary’s office and slipped inside.

Having moved back and forth between the two rooms throughout the night, she felt completely drained. Since entering the game, her energy levels had dropped to that of an ordinary person.

By the dim moonlight, she glanced at the clock that had fallen to the ground. It was at least three hours until dawn. Bohemia quietly secured the doors and windows, sitting behind the door with her ears trained on any sounds coming from across the hallway. She couldn’t leave the building, so she had to wait for the other party to leave first.

“I think the key issue is why that person knew your safe code,” the Descartes Spirit finally broke the silence.

“It’s definitely Sandwich Secretary; he somehow saw it and told someone else,” Bohemia replied.

“That’s unlikely. You had your back to him and were stuffing me into the safe. I happened to be facing Sandwich Secretary at that moment.”

“Why do you even differentiate between facing and not facing? Aren’t you just a mass?”

“The point is, he had his back to you all along, and there was nothing to cast a shadow behind him, so he definitely couldn’t see the code,” the Descartes Spirit emphasized.

“Stop being mad,” Bohemia muttered. “I initially thought the code was Sandy Winters’ birthday, as 1127 looks like a date. However, her passport doesn’t have this birthday.”

Tonight, two unidentified individuals came in to investigate—one targeted her, and the other targeted Sandwich Secretary. Looking at the numerous bank accounts filled with money, it appeared that her role as a public servant wasn’t entirely clean. However, she wondered why they would also investigate Sandwich Secretary.

“Try reasoning it out. As far as we know, Sandwich Secretary has only been involved in one shady affair, cooperating with Detective Gell to provide him an opportunity to kill the criminal, Hersin. If someone’s investigating, it’s definitely regarding that case. After all, there’s hardly anything else of interest on him; they can’t possibly want to figure out why his choice of partner is so low,” the Descartes Spirit thought carefully for a moment and added, “This isn’t real life; it’s a game. We should mainly consider the information the game provides.”

Bohemia didn’t catch the underlying meaning behind the particular sentence it had intentionally sandwiched in.

Now, she was deeply immersed in thought, pondering the mess of documents scattered on the floor. For a while, she remained silent. After some time, she whispered, “Isn’t that a bit too quick?”

“Huh? Too quick for what?” The Descartes Spirit suddenly perked up. “Do you have an idea?”

Bohemia, however, fell silent again. It seemed that this time, she had grasped a crucial clue. She delved deeper into her thoughts, feeling that the fog was beginning to lift, and the key points were becoming clearer one by one.

“Why aren’t you saying anything? What have you figured out?” The Descartes Spirit was floating around her, quite agitated. “Do you know who’s on the other side?”

“Why don’t you go and take a look for yourself?”

“What’s the point in thinking about it? Discovering the answer but losing the most wonderful thinking process is like being full but not tasting the deliciousness of food. Hey, are you going to speak?” The Descartes Spirit snorted impatiently.

However, at this crucial moment, Bohemia fell silent. The Pocket Dimension received no response to its queries. Glancing at her, the Descartes Spirit realized that she was deep in thought and her face suddenly became grim, exclaiming, “damn it!”

“What’s wrong?” asked the Descartes Spirit.

“Quick, help me tidy up the mess on the floor. Oh, right, you’re no use. I’ll do it myself!” Bohemia said, hurrying to gather the scattered files while putting the chair and the clock back in their places. The Descartes Spirit couldn’t grasp the situation and floated in the air, watching her with a dumbfounded expression.

Almost as soon as she finished tidying up, the door to the warden’s office across the hallway opened. Bohemia wasn’t going to make the same mistake again. Without waiting for the sound of approaching footsteps in the hallway, she immediately dashed to the window. Under the moonlight outside, a tall structure used for climbing was erected, the very same ladder that the man who came to investigate the Sandwich Secretary had left behind after being hit by her.

As the footsteps reached the door of the Sandwich Secretary’s office, she hastily stuffed the files into her clothes, opened the window, climbed the ladder, and pulled it up. Of course, this didn’t stop the mosaic-like Descartes Spirit. It blurredly slipped through the crack in the window and caught up with Bohemia, who had climbed a considerable distance down the ladder. It complained, “I can’t believe you climbed so fast, just like a mouse.”

Bohemia was afraid that the sound of her closing the window might have been heard by the person outside. She had no time to pay attention to the companion right now. She moved quickly, almost as if she had turned into a shadow. Once she landed on the ground, she immediately pressed herself against a protruding wall.

“Is that person looking out the window?” she asked in a hushed tone. “Can you see who it is?”

The Descartes Spirit floated in mid-air, unable to resist its curiosity, and took a peek into the window on the second floor. “It’s Old Shoes! It’s Old Shoes! Oh my, it’s really him! Actually, I had been vaguely suspecting this old fellow from the start…”

“Indeed, it’s him. Cut to the chase,” Bohemia wasn’t surprised, her breathing returning to normal. She adjusted the files slipping down from her clothes and asked, “Has he left now?”

“Wait, there’s still a flashlight inside the window…”

“I need to get inside quickly,” Bohemia looked around, bit her lip, and rushed past the corner towards the first-floor door. “The rule is to spend the night inside the building without being noticed. If I stay outside for too long, the game might consider me invalid, and that would be unjust!”

Luckily, her decisive action saved her. Just as she dashed into the first floor, the Pocket Dimension host’s warning sound had just started to echo. Coincidentally, right after the warning, Old Shoes’ footsteps descended the stairs with a clattering. Perhaps he assumed no one was inside, so he didn’t exercise the same caution as before, and every step resonated clearly downstairs.

“Conference room!” the Descartes Spirit called out, and both of them promptly slipped into the conference room.

Bohemia stood behind the half-closed door of the conference room, listening to Old Shoes’ footsteps gradually recede until they were inaudible. Once she felt he had gone far enough, she finally breathed a sigh of relief. The hide-and-seek game had finally come to an end. All she had to do now was wait for daybreak. Since no one knew she was there, even if someone wanted to harm her, they wouldn’t come to this location. She should be safe for the time being.

“Now you can tell me,” the Descartes Spirit urged. “What did you discover just now?”

Bohemia pulled out the files and spread them out on a chair, feeling like all her energy had been drained.

“Sandy Winters is not entirely clean, and she has close ties to the inmates. It’s possible that my character is a vital link in the prison’s internal and external communications. The investigators from the Bureau came for this matter, and with the person who entered my office earlier carrying a gun, it’s not hard to guess that it was Old Shoes.”

“But how does he have the safe code, and why does he have keys?”

“The code, I’m not sure yet… but the keys, that’s easy,” Bohemia snorted. “Did you forget? When Old Shoes was talking to the secretary on the phone, the Sandwich Secretary revealed everything. He said, ‘Stay in the adjacent room for the night, and I’ll give you the keys.'”

“Wait, was he referring to the keys to those rooms in the medical department?”

“Of course, that’s how we’d assume it,” Bohemia’s expression wasn’t great. “Because that blasted secretary wanted me to believe that he’d sent over the keys and only the keys from the medical department… But the fact is, right under my nose, he also sent the backup keys for the entire office building. Old Shoes got the office keys and could secretly investigate my office at night.”

“Why would he give him the keys?”

“He was probably in covert contact with Old Shoes for a while. Maybe he’s Old Shoes’ informant used to monitor me… Detective Gell’s death came as a sudden surprise; they probably both hadn’t anticipated it. I’d say that regarding Detective Gell’s death, Sandwich Secretary was also keeping it from Old Shoes… He’s truly a double-dealer! But Old Shoes seems quite clever; he immediately seized the opportunity and targeted my office. The person who rifled through my trash can in the afternoon was most likely him!”

The Descartes Spirit pondered for a moment and asked, “How do you know they were secretly in contact with each other?”

“It’s still because of the keys.”

Bohemia gestured towards the entrance of the conference room with her lips, “Do you remember what Sandwich Secretary said about how he quietly locked Old Shoes in the conference room? He claimed he had put the key in early, twisted the lock cylinder, and then, when he closed the door, he casually locked it. It sounds reasonable on the surface, but the more I thought about it, the more something seemed off… It wasn’t until I thought about another set of keys just now that it suddenly struck me.”

“How’s that?”

“Following his method, sure, nobody inside the room would notice when he locked the door, but he had to withdraw the key eventually! After the door was closed, the sound of withdrawing the key would be perfectly audible inside the room. Especially when it’s a seasoned old detective…”

Bohemia reached this point but suddenly felt uncomfortable in her chest and throat. She coughed hard a couple of times, then continued, “So it’s clear that he definitely lied to me—”

A severe fit of coughing interrupted her unfinished sentence. Bohemia bent over, spitting out a large mouthful of blood that splattered on the floor.

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