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[Translator – Seraph]
[Proofreader – Draxx]
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Chapter 38
Whenever I completed a quest in a parallel world, I would return to reality.
Like an actor stepping off stage after the final curtain call.
That was the pattern my ability, ‘Transcendent's Connector’, had always followed.
But this time
When my vision returned from darkness, I was still standing at the crime scene.
"What the?! She's gone!"
"Where did she go?"
The murmuring journalists, Ashley Cooper's exploded corpse, and Vanessa’s absence.
And then...
"Well done."
Arthur Conan Doyle.
He clapped me on the shoulder.
"But in the end, the suspect we were after got away."
He gazed at the empty spot where Vanessa had stood, eyes sharp like a detective faced with an unsolved puzzle.
The request I had made to Conan was not to capture Jack the Ripper.
It was to capture a suspect of Crime Pub.
Vanessa Walker.
Of course, Vanessa's image had already been captured by the journalists’ cameras.
By sunrise, her identity would be front-page news across London.
With the title ‘Jack the Ripper’.
For the average citizen, that would be the end of it.
But for Conan Doyle, it was far from over.
Because to him a mystery left unresolved was no ending at all.
Vanessa hadn't simply vanished; she had evaporated.
And to Doyle, that was an enigma.
His curiosity, burning like an unsolved riddle, tethered me to this world longer than expected.
==
[Arthur Conan Doyle]
Capture the Crime Pub suspect.
Reward: Conan’s Eternal Fountain Pen
==
To this cold, calculating perfectionist this was still a failure.
The 19th-century London stage was not yet ready to close its curtains.
***
Solving Conan’s mystery was easy.
I just had to tell him the truth about my ability
And his curiosity would be satisfied.
But I didn’t.
Because this might be my only chance to enjoy 19th-century London.
I had been too busy completing quests to appreciate it before.
And more than that
There was still an unfinished story left untold.
Walking along a London bridge, I explained to Vanessa what had happened to her.
"You’ve been ‘summoned’."
Vanessa listened carefully.
Then, with a soft smile
"Ah, so that’s how it is."
Her expression gave nothing away but that was typical for Vanessa.
She always smiled like that.
Which made me curious.
"Why did you step forward?"
When the journalists were taking pictures of Ashley Cooper’s corpse, I had never imagined she would reveal herself.
By showing her face, the British government would brand her as the ultimate scapegoat for their sins.
And that’s exactly what happened.
London was buzzing with the revelation of Jack the Ripper’s true identity.
Vanessa’s face plastered across every newspaper front page.
Ashley Cooper was officially recorded as the first male victim of the Plum Blossom Poison.
By stepping into the light, Vanessa could no longer live in London.
But she didn’t seem the least bit bothered.
Instead, she tilted her head and asked me this:
"Didn’t you tell me to come out?"
"Me?"
"Yes."
I was speechless.
Sure, my gaze might have said otherwise, but still
"So you just jumped in without a plan?"
"I told you, didn't I? That I'd repay my debt."
"……."
Vanessa had always said that.
Every time I handed out bread and food to the children.
"I’ll definitely repay you."
If Vanessa hadn’t stepped forward back then, I would have become the prime suspect in the Ripper case.
The British government needed someone to take the fall.
If the world learned that Ashley Cooper was the real Jack the Ripper, even the royal family could be implicated.
They would never let that happen.
Of course, I didn’t care.
As soon as I completed my quest, I would return to the modern world.
But Vanessa didn’t know that.
All she saw was the danger I was in
So she shielded me.
All because I gave out some bread.
"You risked your life… just for that?"
"Yes."
Unbelievable.
I shook my head in sheer exasperation
And Vanessa simply smiled.
Her golden eyes curled into a mischievous arc, catching the evening light.
Under the London sunset, her fox-like gaze glowed.
"To you, it might be just some bread but to me, it was everything."
We wandered the streets of 19th-century London, talking about anything and everything.
Crossing the bridge with Big Ben in sight, strolling along the Thames
For the first time, I took my time to soak in this world.
[CONAN DOES IT AGAIN!]
[JACK THE RIPPER EAST END TAILOR?!]
The streets buzzed with the latest headlines.
People walked by, holding newspapers with Vanessa’s face on the front page.
"She looks normal, but how terrifying!"
"I know, right?"
Yet even as the woman herself walked right past them
No one recognized her.
I stared at Vanessa in disbelief.
She was a ghost.
Her ability to distort perception was beyond anything I had imagined.
No wonder the police could never catch her.
"At first, I thought you were the one killing those prostitutes."
We crossed Tower Bridge, and I spoke of my initial suspicions.
"I figured… you wanted them to die as humans, before they turned into monsters."
Vanessa's golden eyes widened.
"Me? Do something like that?"
She looked genuinely surprised.
That was unexpected.
Because I knew she didn’t want those women to become monsters.
Yet
"That was their choice."
"But they didn’t know the poison would turn them."
"Even if they did, nothing would’ve changed."
She leaned against the bridge railing, gazing at the dark Thames below.
"People in the East End will do anything to escape starvation even if it means dying as a monster later."
"Even knowing their fate?"
"Because the ‘present’ is what matters."
Not the future.
That was the way of the East End.
"So, I had no reason to interfere."
She turned to me with a gentle smile.
Most people if they saw someone on the path to becoming a monster
Would choose to end them mercifully before it happened.
To let them die as humans.
But Vanessa saw even that ‘downward spiral’ as a valid choice.
Maybe it was just…
The difference in the worlds we came from.
Just like how a single loaf of bread meant nothing to me but to Vanessa it had been salvation.
***
Vanessa made one last stop at the church to say goodbye to the children.
"Vanessa, are you really never coming back?"
"That's right, Ciel. Your big sister is going to make it big, and she won’t be coming back to a tiny church like this."
"Hngh, Vanessa, you're so mean!"
"If you don't like it, then succeed on your own."
Vanessa comforted the tearful children.
Her words may have seemed harsh, but this was simply her way of saying farewell.
"This bread really is the best."
"……."
Vanessa took a bite of the milk bread, savoring it.
I could tell that was her way of saying it was time to leave.
After all, there was no place left for Vanessa in London.
And yet
"I can’t just leave like this. It wouldn’t sit right with me."
"?"
"Let’s leave them with a parting gift."
She flashed me a mischievous smile.
***
"Prime Minister, explain yourself!"
"Is it true that Plum Blossom Poison is linked to the anomalies?"
A press conference was in full swing at the British government offices.
The Ashley Cooper Incident had brought Plum Blossom Poison into the spotlight.
Most London citizens had no idea that Plum Blossom Poison was responsible for creating anomalies.
But with Ashley Cooper’s death, that secret had been exposed.
The Prime Minister tried to spin the situation as a natural disaster, a consequence of unchecked prostitution among the poor.
"Making this public would have only fueled fear among the citizens, so we had no choice but to keep it under wraps."
It was a convenient excuse.
Given the unsanitary conditions, it wasn’t unthinkable for anomalies to appear naturally.
"However, now that the truth is out, the government will actively..."
Just as the Prime Minister continued his speech
Whoosh!
A flurry of papers scattered through the air.
"What is this?"
"Wait, this is?!"
"No way!"
Reporters instinctively picked up the papers and began reading. Their eyes widened in shock.
[Plum Blossom Poison: A Government-Orchestrated Man-Made Disaster.]
[Ashley Cooper led the research on Plum Blossom Poison.]
The documents Vanessa had collected the hidden truths of the Plum Blossom Poison incident had been exposed.
She had gathered this information by infiltrating even the gangs that cooperated with the government.
The conference room exploded into chaos.
"My God… Plum Blossom Poison was artificially created?!"
"Prime Minister! How do you explain this?!"
"Ugh… That is…!"
The Prime Minister's face turned ashen.
And then
"T-That’s Jack the Ripper!"
"Up there! Get them!"
The police spotted Vanessa scattering the documents from the second floor and rushed toward her.
And just like that Vanessa vanished into thin air as if she had been dismissed from existence.
***
Late at night.
With everything in London settled, I went to see Conan.
When I arrived, he was writing Sherlock Holmes.
Just like the first time we met.
But this time, his words were different.
"It seems you've finished your business."
It was as if he had been expecting me.
"Now then, tell me who you are?"
He had known everything from the start.
I was the final piece of the puzzle he had yet to solve.
So, I told him the whole truth.
That I was Awakened from another world.
That Vanessa had been exiled for distorting history.
"So parallel worlds really do exist."
It was an absurd story yet Conan believed me completely.
It was the confidence of a man who had never been wrong.
"Please don’t include this in Sherlock Holmes. If you do, even you might be erased from this world."
"Then take my fountain pen. Otherwise, I won’t be able to resist writing about it."
Conan practically shoved the pen into my hands, as if daring me to take it before he spilled the secret.
Quest completed: Arthur Conan Doyle’s Request. You have received Conan’s Fountain Pen as a reward.
***
At some point, I had returned to the General Store.
In my hand was Conan’s fountain pen.
==
[Conan’s Fountain Pen]
[Rank: Legendary]
[Attribute: Deduction]
A fountain pen belonging to the legendary British detective novelist, Arthur Conan Doyle. When a mystery is presented, it writes down a clue on its own.
==
"Why did Ashley Cooper kill the prostitutes?"
The moment I thought of the question
Scritch, scratch
The pen began to move on its own.
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[Translator – Seraph]
[Proofreader – Draxx]
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