Lord of Mysteries

Chapter 5 Ceremony (Third update, please vote!)

Free? Free things are the most expensive! Zhou Mingrui muttered silently, planning to firmly refuse any additional services offered later.

If you're so capable, then try to figure out that I'm a time traveler!

Thinking of this, Zhou Mingrui followed behind the woman with her face painted red and yellow, and bent down to enter the low tent.

The tent was very dark, with only a little light seeping in, vaguely illuminating a table covered with playing cards.

The woman in the pointed hat was completely unaffected. Her long black dress billowed as if floating on water as she walked around the table, sat down opposite her, and lit the candles.

The dim light swayed gently, casting a hazy glow inside the tent, instantly adding a touch of mystery.

Zhou Mingrui sat down calmly, his gaze sweeping over the tarot cards on the table. He noticed familiar major cards such as "The Magician," "The Emperor," "The Hanged Man," and "Temperance."

"Could Comrade Russell really be a 'senior'... I wonder if he's a fellow countryman of my great foodie empire..." Zhou Mingrui's lips twitched slightly, and he was momentarily dazed.

Before he could even finish looking at the cards on the table, the woman, who claimed to be "very accurate in divination," had already gathered all the tarot cards together, piled them up, and pushed them in front of him.

"You shuffle and cut the cards," the circus fortune teller said in a low, hoarse voice.

"Should I wash it?" Zhou Mingrui asked instinctively.

The fortune teller's face flushed with a faint smile as he said:

"Of course, only one can predict one's own destiny; I am merely an interpreter."

Zhou Mingrui immediately became wary and asked in return:

"Is the interpretation free of charge?"

As a keyboard folklorist, I've seen similar tricks all the time!

The fortune teller was clearly taken aback for a moment before finally saying in a low voice:

"It's free."

Zhou Mingrui felt relieved, stuffed the revolver a little more into his pocket, and then calmly stretched out his palms, skillfully shuffling and cutting the cards.

"Alright." He placed the shuffled tarot cards in the center of the table.

The fortune teller clasped his hands together, examined the cards intently for a while, and then suddenly spoke:

"Excuse me, I forgot to ask, what kind of divination do you want?"

Back when he was pursuing his unsuccessful first love, Zhou Mingrui had also studied tarot cards, and said without hesitation:

"Past, present, and future."

This is a divination spread in Tarot, with three cards arranged in a row, symbolizing the past, present, and future respectively.

The fortune teller nodded first, then smiled and said:

"Then please shuffle the cards again, and figure out what you want to ask so that you can shuffle cards that truly have symbolic meaning."

"You were just messing with me... Why are you being so stingy? It's just that I kept emphasizing that it's free..." Zhou Mingrui's facial muscles twitched. He took a deep breath, took back the tarot cards, and reshuffled and cut the deck.

"Is everything alright this time?" He placed the cut cards on the table.

"That's all." The fortune teller stretched out his finger, picked up a card from the top, and placed it on Zhou Mingrui's left. His voice grew increasingly low and hoarse. "This card symbolizes the past."

"This one symbolizes the present." The fortune teller placed the second card directly in front of Zhou Mingrui.

She then picked up the third card and placed it to Zhou Mingrui's right:

"This symbolizes the future."

"Alright, which card would you like to see first?" After doing all this, the fortune teller raised his head and looked deeply into Zhou Mingrui's eyes with his gray-blue eyes.

"Let's look at 'now' first," Zhou Mingrui said after a moment's thought.

The fortune teller nodded slowly and turned over the card that was in front of him.

The card depicts a young man dressed in gorgeous clothes, wearing a dazzling headdress, carrying a cane on his shoulder with luggage hanging from the top, and being pulled by a small dog behind him. The card number is "0".

"The Fool," the fortune teller whispered, his grey-blue eyes fixed on Zhou Mingrui.

The Fool? Tarot card number zero? The Beginning? Containing all possible beginnings? Zhou Mingrui wasn't even a beginner tarot enthusiast; he could only offer a rudimentary interpretation based on his impressions.

Just as the fortune teller was about to speak, the tent flap was suddenly flung open, letting in strong sunlight that made Zhou Mingrui, who was facing away, instinctively squint.

"Why are you impersonating me again! Fortune telling is my job!" a woman's voice hissed angrily. "Go back! Remember, you're just an animal tamer!"

Animal trainer? Zhou Mingrui adjusted to the light and saw a woman at the door wearing a pointed hat, a black dress, and red and yellow paint, only taller and thinner.

The woman sitting in front of him quickly stood up and said dejectedly:

"Don't mind me, I just like it. I have to say, sometimes my divination and interpretations are quite accurate, really..."

As she spoke, she lifted her skirt, walked around the table from the side, and quickly left the tent.

"Sir, would you like me to interpret this for you?" The real diviner looked at Zhou Mingrui and asked with a smile.

Zhou Mingrui moved the corners of his mouth and asked sincerely:

Is it free?

"...No," the real diviner replied.

"Never mind then." Zhou Mingrui put his hands back in his pockets, pressed his revolver and banknotes, and bent down to walk out of the tent.

Seriously, they actually hired an animal trainer to do a tarot reading!

A clown who doesn't want to be a fortune teller isn't a good clown.

Zhou Mingrui quickly put the matter out of his mind and bought a pound of not-so-good lamb for 7 pence at the "Lettuce and Meat" market. He also bought tender peas, cabbage, onions, potatoes, and other items. Adding the bread he had bought earlier, he spent a total of 25 copper pence, which is 2 sous and 1 penny.

"Money really doesn't last long, poor Benson..." Zhou Mingrui not only lost the two banknotes he had brought with him, but also the penny that was originally in his pocket.

He casually remarked this, then stopped thinking about it and hurriedly returned home.

With the staple food ready, the lucky charm ceremony can begin!

…………

After the tenants on the second floor left, Zhou Mingrui did not rush to perform the ritual. Instead, he first translated the words "Fusheng Xuanhuang Xianzun" into Old Fusak and Rune, intending to try again in the local language the next day if the original incantation failed!

After all, we have to consider the differences between the two worlds and the issue of adapting to local customs.

As for translating it into Hermes, the ancient language used for prayers and sacrifices, Zhou Mingrui found it difficult to complete due to insufficient vocabulary.

After doing all this, he took out four rye breads from the paper bag, placing one in the corner where the coal stove used to be, one on the inside bottom of the dressing mirror, one on the top of the cabinet where two walls meet, and one on the right side of the desk where miscellaneous items were piled up.

Taking a deep breath, Zhou Mingrui went to the center of the room, calmed himself down for a few minutes, and then solemnly began to walk in a counter-clockwise square.

As he took the first step, he murmured:

"Fusheng Xuanhuang Immortal Lord."

The second step was for him to sincerely recite in his mind:

"Fusheng Xuanhuang Tianjun."

Third step, Zhou Mingrui held his breath and whispered:

"The God of Fortune and Prosperity Xuanhuang."

Fourthly, he exhaled the stale air and silently recited:

"Fusheng Xuanhuang Tianzun."

After finishing his walk and returning to his position, Zhou Mingrui closed his eyes and waited for the result, his heart filled with anticipation, unease, hope, and fear.

Can we go back?

Will it be effective?

Could something unexpected happen?

The darkness before him was tinged with the deep red of the light, and Zhou Mingrui's mind was filled with a surging, unsettling thought.

Just then, he suddenly felt that the air around him seemed to have stopped flowing, becoming viscous and eerie.

Immediately afterwards, he heard whispers that were sometimes dense, sometimes sharp, sometimes illusory, sometimes alluring, sometimes frenzied, and sometimes insane.

Even though he couldn't understand what the murmurs were saying, Zhou Mingrui couldn't help but listen and try to understand.

His head throbbed again, the pain so intense it felt like a steel rod had been plunged into it.

Zhou Mingrui felt as if his head was about to explode, and his thoughts were filled with a hallucinatory quality.

He knew something was wrong and tried his best to open his eyes, but he couldn't complete this simple action no matter what he did.

His entire body tensed up, as if he might snap at any moment. A self-deprecating thought inexplicably popped into Zhou Mingrui's head:

"If you don't court death, you won't die..."

He could no longer bear it. Just as the string in his mind was about to snap, the cacophony of voices and whispers subsided, and the surroundings became very quiet, the atmosphere rather ethereal.

Not only the atmosphere, but Zhou Mingrui also felt his body was floating.

He tried to open his eyes again, and this time it was very easy.

The pervasive gray fog entered his eyes, hazy, indistinct, and boundless.

"What's going on here?" Zhou Mingrui looked around in astonishment, then looked down and found himself floating on the edge of an endless gray fog.

The gray fog flowed like water, dotted with deep red "stars," some large, some small, some hidden deep within, and some floating on the surface.

Looking at this holographic scene, Zhou Mingrui stretched out his right hand, half confused and half exploratory, trying to touch a deep red "star" floating on the surface on the right, in order to find a way to leave.

As soon as his fingers touched the surface of the star, water ripples suddenly surged from his body, causing "Crimson" to erupt like a dreamlike firework.

Zhou Mingrui was startled and hurriedly withdrew his right hand, accidentally touching another "deep red" one.

And so, the "stars" shone brightly.

As a result, Zhou Mingrui felt his mind go blank and his spirits scatter.

…………

Inside a luxurious villa in the Queens district of Backlund, the capital of the Kingdom of Rune.

Audrey Hall sat at her dressing table, stroking the antique, cracked bronze mirror on the table.

"Mirror, mirror on the wall, wake up..."

"In the name of the Hall family, I command you to awaken!"

……

She tried different explanations, but the mirror remained unresponsive.

After more than ten minutes, she finally gave up, pursing her lips in grievance and muttering softly:

"Dad was lying to me all along. He always told me that this mirror was a treasure of the Black Emperor of the ancient Solomon Empire, an extraordinary item..."

Before she could finish speaking, the bronze mirror on the table suddenly emitted a deep red light, enveloping her instantly.

…………

On the Sea of ​​Sunia, a clearly outdated three-masted sailing ship is navigating a storm.

Alger Wilson stood on the deck, his body rising and falling with the swaying, effortlessly maintaining his balance.

He wore a long robe embroidered with lightning patterns and held a strangely shaped glass bottle in his hand, inside which bubbles would sometimes roll, frost would sometimes gather into snow, and wind would sometimes leave traces.

"We still need Ghost Shark's blood..." Alger murmured.

Just then, a deep red burst erupted between the glass bottle and his palm, instantly engulfing the surroundings.

…………

Above a gray mist, Audrey Hall regained her vision and looked around in fear and confusion, noticing that the man diagonally opposite her, whose head was blurred and whose figure was indistinct, was doing the same thing.

Immediately afterward, they noticed a mysterious figure shrouded in gray-white mist standing not far away.

Zhou Mingrui, the "mysterious man," was equally dumbfounded.

"Sir, where is this?"

"What do you want to do?"

Audrey and Alger were taken aback and fell silent for a moment, then spoke at the same time.

PS: Chapter 1/7 added, please vote with your recommendation votes!

(End of this chapter)