"I have received your prayer."
...
Listening to the layered responses echoing in his ears, Snow faintly detected a hint of impatience and irritation. Although he clearly understood this should be an illusion, he could still empathize with Klein's current mood.
"If this continues, I'm afraid I'll become the most annoying believer to Mr. Fool." Snow grimaced, ending today's prayer session, and returned to the dining table, softly saying in Ancient Hermes:
"Thank The Fool for granting me breakfast."
"Meow?" Lily nimbly jumped onto the dining table, letting out a humanized meow. Snow rolled his eyes and said:
"You come running as soon as you hear 'breakfast'? Although you're both cats, you're still far from being like Klein the Cat!"
Despite his words, he still mashed up boiled chicken breast mixed with eggs to make cat food and handed it to the little one.
After finishing breakfast, the little one immediately jumped into the cat bed beside the bed. Although she appeared to be napping, in reality, she was meditating.
Yes, meditating.
To engrave this skill into Lily's instincts, Snow paid the price of being a cat for three hours every day.
That's right, his possession of Lily wasn't just for going out for walks and flirting with witches, but also to imprint "conditioned reflexes" on Lily.
Pavlov's Dog, this Sequence 8, was quite interesting. Like most Sequence 8s, it didn't have any earth-shattering abilities sufficient to influence the tide of battle. Apart from physical enhancement, its core ability was only one thing: "conditioned reflex."
This sequence could allow oneself to rapidly form conditioned reflexes, thereby accelerating the mastery of skills that required so-called "muscle memory" like shooting and combat.
At the same time, it could also apply this ability to animals, just as he had done before—projecting part of his consciousness into an animal's body, then controlling the animal to train. After repeating a certain number of times, the animal would spontaneously develop conditioned reflexes and learn this ability.
However, due to the existence of "The One-Foot Staff," Snow could maintain this ability for extended periods, which allowed him to luxuriously borrow Lily's body to go out.
Actually, he felt that the first thing Lily should have learned was how to speak.
Unfortunately, even though two days had passed since drinking the Assassin potion, Lily still showed no intention of speaking—
Snow even suspected that this little one was putting on an act.
Of course, this was just a joke. Through pre-borrowing Pavlov's Dog's abilities, he had already engraved loyalty to himself into Lily's instincts. Otherwise, he wouldn't have been able to feed her the Assassin potion. As for why she hadn't learned to speak yet, Snow felt it was more likely because language and conditioned reflexes didn't have too direct a connection.
After typing on the typewriter for a while longer, Snow organized his manuscripts. He hadn't accomplished much else in this half month, but he had written four-fifths of "Phantom Blood." Once he returned to Backlund, he would immediately submit this book—as a famous veterinarian in Backlund, Snow's network naturally included editors.
But compared to considering these matters, he had more important things to do today.
Looking back at the clock that had already pointed to eleven o'clock, Snow put on the double-breasted high-collared frock coat he hadn't worn in half a month, donned a half-high silk top hat, picked up the silver-mounted yew wood cane, packed his manuscripts into a briefcase, let Lily perch on his shoulder, and with this extraordinarily eye-catching outfit, stepped out of the hotel room.
Regarding this guest who had stayed for half a month, the hotel staff had heard some rumors. Seeing him leave his room, quite a few people showed expressions of surprise.
However, how a guest chose to stay was the guest's business, and no one approached him out of curiosity to strike up a conversation.
Walking through several streets, Snow saw a location he had only seen in dreams before. This wasn't a metaphor—he had truly been brought here by Dunn in a dream. Yes, this was the Police Station located on Zouteland Street.
"Sir, may I ask what brings you here?" Whether it was because Snow's appearance was too outstanding or because his aura was sufficiently upright, the police lady who received him was very polite.
Without doubt, she must be a believer of the Evernight Goddess.
"My name is Snow von Penredax, and I'm looking for Mr. Dunn. Um, I believe he should be a Senior Inspector." Snow showed a polite smile, and that sunny, handsome smile immediately made the rather sweet-looking police lady blush—
"Mr. Dunn? Um, let me help you inquire about that."
The police lady obviously wasn't familiar with this name, but she still nodded and left with small steps.
However, this lady never returned. Instead, when Snow was boredly starting to play with his cat, Mr. Dunn with his deep gray eyes appeared before him.
Dunn didn't waste words but directly led him to an office, then went straight to the point: "Mr. Penredax, what brings you to see me?"
"I just wanted to confirm whether that was really a dream or not." As soon as Snow spoke, Dunn immediately became alert, because his not-so-good memory finally recalled that when he had originally questioned this man, it should have been in a dream!
This wasn't really Dunn's fault for being careless. Honestly, if the other party hadn't come looking for him, he would have almost forgotten that he had once questioned such a person!
But would an ordinary person really come looking for someone because of a dream?
"Mr. Dunn, perhaps for you, that was just an inquiry, but I have been troubled these past days. That dream was so clear, and when I woke up, I also found traces that someone had been in my room. You should understand that I'm currently in a state of avoiding disaster. This situation has made me unable to eat or sleep peacefully. I struggled with this for a full week before finally making up my mind..."
Listening to Snow's rambling words, Dunn also roughly understood the situation, decided mentally to criticize Leonard when he returned, then nodded and said:
"Rest assured, I had no intention of harming you..." Dunn comforted Snow, trying to calm his emotions. Snow turned his head, took a deep breath from Lily, and finally relaxed, sighing:
"Mr. Dunn, I had previously heard some information about Beyonders in Backlund's circles, though at the time I thought it was just a story. However, your appearance has confirmed the existence of Beyonders for me, so I wanted to inquire whether I could become a Beyonder myself?"
"Mr. Penredax, this is not something you should know about." Dunn showed a serious expression, his deep eyes carrying a dignity that seemed capable of drawing one's soul into them—
"The domain of Beyonders is extremely dangerous. I don't recommend you join this circle. However, if you've truly made up your mind, you can join one of the three major churches and obtain qualifications in this area after passing certain assessments."
"I understand. Thank you for informing me." Snow removed his half-high silk top hat, placed his hand on his chest, and bowed. Then, just as Dunn was considering whether he should pay special attention to him, he suddenly heard him say: "By the way, Mr. Dunn, I've been cooped up in the hotel for half a month and would like to find a Fortune teller to help me with divination. Do you have any reliable recommendations?"
(End of Chapter)