One minute.
Two minutes.
Five minutes...
Time slipped past as she waited, but no response came from the man. Bernadette pressed her lips together, mildly disappointed. "Of course — trying to relay a message across two worlds was always going to be too much to ask."
Then an idea struck her: What if... I prayed to him directly inside the mysterious room? Especially if he were also on the other side of the door at the time — in that moment, both of them would technically be in the same 'world', wouldn't they?
Bernadette entered the Land of Chaos immediately, stood in the sitting room, and recited Vincent's three-segment Honorific Name aloud.
Then she stood quietly before the closed door, waiting for a miracle.
...
The World of Lord of the Mysteries.
After returning to reality, Vincent had been pacing back and forth in the room, hoping Bernadette would read his message soon and pray to him quickly.
He'd waited an hour, perhaps two, slipping into the Land of Chaos multiple times — but never any response from Bernadette.
The night deepened. One by one the lights outside the window went dark, the city dimming all at once, until only the full moon blazed stubbornly at the edge of the sky, pouring out its crimson glow without reserve.
"Tonight... is a full moon?"
For a certain prolific author, tonight was going to be a rough one.
He offered a brief, genuine moment of sympathy — and then entered the Land of Chaos once more, walking out to the chaotic expanse of the Thirty-Third Heaven's realm. The ancient Scale floated as it always had — no different from any of the previous times he'd come.
He shook his head and sat down on the stump of a collapsed stone pillar, gazing out at the swirling disorder around him, waiting for a response that might not come.
His spirituality drained steadily.
His mind grew gradually weary.
After a long while, Vincent sighed. "Either she hasn't seen my message yet — or the idea of praying across two worlds was just never going to work."
Not being able to connect through prayer didn't really matter that much in the end. Now that they had pen and paper, communication was already far more convenient than before.
"Back to sleep."
He yawned, just about to return to reality — when a pale golden radiance began to seep out from the Scale, spreading outward until it formed a palm-sized glowing screen. A figure flickered within it.
Vincent's tiredness vanished at once. "Is that Bernadette?"
He channelled his spirituality into the radiance immediately, and the flickering silhouette sharpened rapidly — and there she was. Someone he saw every single day, and yet someone he was, in any real sense, meeting for the very first time.
It really was her!
She actually managed to reach me from the Harry Potter world through prayer — wait. Hang on. Why does the space around her look so much like... the sitting room?
Not like. It was the sitting room of the Land of Chaos.
She had prayed to him from inside the Land of Chaos.
Vincent understood immediately and gave himself a light smack on the forehead. "Of course — I can't believe I didn't think of that!"
He channelled more spirituality and established the connection, smiling as he said: "You are a genius — how did you even think of that?"
On Bernadette's side, after several minutes of waiting, a veil of golden radiance suddenly bloomed in front of her. Within the mist, a blurred and indistinct figure could be seen, its voice faint but resonant with an unmistakable, unworldly gravity: "You are a genius — how did you even think of that?"
She stared steadily at the deep, mysterious silhouette within the mist. "Is it really you? Vincent?"
"It is."
A question, an answer — and then both of them fell silent at once.
They had exchanged pages upon pages of messages every exchange cycle. They had been more eager than anyone to establish this connection. And yet now that they were here, face to face, free to say anything at all — neither knew where to start.
Because this was, in a strict sense, their first meeting. Their first proper acquaintance. And yet they already knew each other too well — each aware of the other's preferences, habits, little gestures, and personality. The most familiar kind of strangers.
"Are you... doing all right? These past few days?"
After a long while, Vincent was the first to speak quietly — though his voice, passing through the radiance, still carried that same uncanny, awe-inspiring quality.
"Well enough."
Bernadette had settled back into complete calm by now. "Those children are quite interesting. Being around them... it's like I've recovered some memories from long ago."
She paused, then asked: "What about you? Besides becoming an 'evil god' this exchange, what other surprises have you left behind for me?"
Vincent blinked, then understood what she meant. He cleared his throat. "Nothing else, really — just the usual roleplay and all that. As I said in my message, I've advanced to Sequence 8 now."
"Oh — there is one more thing, actually. Something that just happened tonight." He added: "On my way back to the restaurant, I was picked up by an Aurora Order Rose Bishop."
"I'd been shadow-jumping my way home, and he apparently mistook me for a fellow Aurora Order member. He came over to ask me about Mr. A's whereabouts."
"I was going to lead him to Stephen to have him dealt with quietly — but I said something wrong, raised his suspicions... and then I killed him."
Bernadette's eyes narrowed faintly. "Sequence 8 taking down a Sequence 6. You're rather impressive."
"Ah — that's entirely thanks to you. Your abilities. Your Scrolls. And your near-demigod's physical strength."
She gave a small nod. "I ran into something the other day as well..." She described the incident with the blood-tinged magical scent in the night.
"A magically-charged scent of blood?"
Right — that must be Quirrell going into the Forbidden Forest to hunt unicorns and drink their blood.
"Once this exchange ends, I'll go and take a look."
"All right."
A silence settled between them again.
"Those Roselle journals..."
In the end, it was Bernadette who brought it up first: "You've been able to read them, haven't you?"
"Yes."
"Then is there anything you want to say to me?"
"Well..."
Vincent thought for a moment, then answered in a half-honest, half-evasive way: "I was genuinely surprised at first — I thought maybe Chinese existed in your world as well. It was only later, after I'd looked into it, that I realised it had been... invented, so to speak, by Emperor Roselle. Your father."
Bernadette gave a small nod. "So..."
"You believe your father also came from my world."
"What other explanation is there?"
Vincent felt a pang internally. That was the logical conclusion — and he couldn't fault the reasoning. But it was wrong. How could he explain it? Should he just come clean?
Come clean about what, exactly? That I know your father was native to the LOTM world — just a 'pre-historical' figure, placed into the timeline by the Lord of Mysteries, which created the appearance of a transmigration?
How do I know? Oh, because your world is actually a novel, or alternatively — I'm something of a prophet.
There was no clean way to explain any of this. Perhaps in the future, under the guise of insights from the Land of Chaos, he could drop the occasional hint?
"Do you think Father's situation could be the same as ours? You came into contact with his wishing compass and entered the Land of Chaos — that can't just be a coincidence, can it?"
Honestly — I wish I knew too.
"Those questions," Vincent said, "may only be answerable if we find your father." He paused. "You've been studying Chinese — Roselle's script — these past few days, haven't you?"
"Yes. Madam Pince lent me a few books, but the progress is much slower than my English."
Vincent smiled slightly. "If you're ever stuck, I can still help you translate. Now that we can talk in real time, that should be easy enough."
"Mm."
Bernadette thought of something. "By the way — what's your read on the Fool? He can read Chinese too, after all."
"My thinking is: act as though I know nothing. Even if He also happens to be from my world, He's now a figure of near-divine status. Who knows how He might react if He learned the truth about me?"
"That's what I thought as well."
After all — Father had still been pining for his homeland well into his final years. Who was to say a near-divine being wouldn't harbour similar feelings? And if He found out that others could move freely between the two worlds — would He really feel nothing at all?
To be continued…
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