Chapter 1 Agatha's Visit

With nervousness and curiosity, Agatha surreptitiously sized up the place.

It looked like an ordinary residence. Most of the furniture was a bit old, but it was kept clean. The air in the rooms was fresh, perhaps from a recent airing. The sound of boiling water came from the kitchen, like a samovar in action.

This didn't feel like a "Landing Point." It was just a normal house.

Of course, Agatha knew from the start that it had been an ordinary house—until a few days ago, it was listed as a rental property in the citizen assistance center's registry. She had just thought... since an indescribable visitor had chosen this place as their temporary residence, shouldn't there be something special about it?

But she found nothing.

"Tea? Or would you like some coffee?" Duncan came up beside Agatha and asked casually.

Agatha suddenly woke up, looking at Duncan across from her in surprise. After a moment, she realized what he meant and quickly waved her hands. "No… thank you, I'm not thirsty."

"Don't be so formal, make yourself at home," Duncan said with a smile, sitting down on the sofa opposite Agatha, his attitude very easygoing. "Let me think... if I'm not mistaken, you must be the gatekeeper of this city-state? It's unlikely that an ordinary guard would come calling at this hour."

"Gatekeeper Agatha," Agatha replied immediately, trying to appear calm. "You knew I was coming?"

"You were bound to come, or some other church higher-up," Duncan said casually. "Annie will tell the gravedigger about my situation, and the gravedigger will report it to the church. I just need to wait here, and I'll meet with the church leadership of this city-state."

Agatha adjusted her posture slightly, gazing at the burly figure before her with a more solemn demeanor. "I want to know... your true purpose. Who exactly are you, and why have you come to Frost?"

"Haven't I said?" Duncan raised his eyebrows. "To solve the problem here—I thought I made that clear enough in the tip-off letter."

Agatha opened her mouth, obviously finding it hard to accept such a simple answer. After a few seconds, she hesitantly asked, "Really... is that all?"

"If you need a darker reason and a more complex conspiracy to find this reasonable enough, I can make one up on the spot," Duncan said casually. "Which style do you prefer? Doomsday or conquering the realm?"

Agatha visibly tensed up.

"Ahem, you scared her," Vanna suddenly coughed twice behind Duncan. "This gatekeeper lady will take it seriously."

"Really?" Duncan turned his head slightly, puzzled. "I thought the joke was obvious…"

"In my experience, yes," Vanna sighed helplessly. "People in this line of work are always on edge. You can't joke around."

Duncan didn't know what to say for a moment. Agatha looked at the extremely tall woman with confusion. For some reason, ever since she had entered the house, she had felt the woman's gaze falling on her, as if… observing something with interest.

But that wasn't important. What was important was that she had confirmed that the superior being before her was just joking—a nasty, frightening joke.

"Please forgive my sensitivity," Agatha said sincerely. "The anomalies in the city-state have become more serious recently. Everyone is on edge. I even suspected…"

She hesitated to finish the sentence, but Duncan smoothly picked up where she left off: "You suspected me? Don't worry, that's perfectly reasonable. After all, my arrival was perfectly timed, and I got involved with the Annihilation cultists and the 'fakes' as soon as I got here."

Agatha didn't say anything, but she looked a little embarrassed.

"I want to know what progress your investigation has made," Duncan said, ignoring her reaction, "Do you have any leads?"

Agatha hesitated, unsure
whether or not she should reveal too much of Frost's internal intelligence to this enigmatic "visitor," but after a moment, she began to speak cautiously: "After receiving your warning, we did catch some Annihilation cultists, but we obtained almost no useful information—those heretics deeply symbiotically linked to the abyssal demons have extremely resilient minds and often choose to self-destruct at the last moment. The few who were captured alive are all peripheral figures who don't know the full scope of the plan…

"Until now, we can only confirm that the frequent occurrences of the duplicate phenomenon in the city are indeed the work of those heretics, and that they have indeed built a hidden and vast nest within Frost City, but as for the specific location of this nest... we still have no clue."

At this point, Agatha paused and continued, "As for Dagger Island, which you mentioned in the letter… even more unsettling is that it has disappeared." "I know," Duncan said calmly.

"You already knew?" Agatha said with some surprise. "This news should still be under seal…"

Duncan said in a calm tone: "I have my own intelligence channels in the mortal world. Even without leaving the city-state, I know some of what is happening on the outer seas."

The intelligence channel was of course Tyrian—after all, Dagger Island disappeared right in front of the Sea Mist Fleet, and Tyrian would naturally report the situation to the *Lost Country* as soon as possible.

But even though he knew this shocking news immediately, Duncan could only be shocked—he couldn't figure out how such a large island could disappear out of thin air.

From the situation conveyed by Tyrian, the island's disappearance process was not a sinking, but more like a direct melting into the sea, and a series of large explosions had occurred before its disappearance, very much like the people on the island had activated something—but other than that, there was no more intelligence.

Intelligence was scarce, the way it disappeared was too bizarre, and after it disappeared, no clues or traces remained. Dagger Island had gone from one mystery to another bigger mystery. No one knew what had happened there, let alone where the island had gone.

"Do you know where Dagger Island has gone?" Agatha's voice interrupted Duncan's thoughts. The city-state's gatekeeper looked up, her eyes sincerely looking over. "Do you know what happened to it?"

Duncan thought for a moment, feeling that directly admitting that he had been pondering all night without figuring it out might affect his image a bit, so he pondered for a moment, then reached out and pointed to the ground.

"Below?" Agatha was stunned. "You mean, Dagger Island did sink into the sea… but the eyewitness reports at the time said that there was no vortex phenomenon generated by the island sinking on the sea surface…"

How could Duncan know how to answer—he was also curious as to how such a large island could disappear out of thin air!

He just kept his hand outstretched, pointing at the ground.

"You're not talking about Dagger Island… the clues are under our feet?" Agatha seemed to realize something, and almost instantly, she recalled her most recent conversation with Bishop Ivan, and the "Second Waterway" deep underground!

The city hall and the church had searched the entire city-state. The strict curfew and repeated large-scale investigations should theoretically be enough to catch a large number of lurking cultists, but only a few peripheral figures of the Annihilation cultists had been caught. The First Waterway, subways, utility tunnels, and other places where people could hide had all been searched, with no clues…

The city-state was so big. If there were no traces of those heretics in the places mentioned above, then only the Second Waterway remained as a possibility.

Those collapsed areas, those caves shrouded in darkness, those polluted shafts and pipes… They might indeed not be suitable for survival, but what if those Annihilation cultists really did survive in those places?

Of course, searching the "Second Waterway" was already in the plan, but she had always been hesitant to confirm whether this costly search operation was meaningful, and now, she had finally found the strongest support for this operation—a friendly god-like being clearly indicated that they should look down below.

"I see—I understand, our direction is right," Agatha suddenly stood up, her tone filled with realization and joy. She looked at Duncan across from her, her attitude suddenly becoming exceptionally sincere and respectful, and she bowed deeply.

"I understand—thank you very much for your reminder!"

Duncan kept his gesture of pointing at the ground, looking a little dazed at the bandaged woman who had suddenly become excited.

What did she understand?

"We will immediately carry out the next search. This time, we will definitely uproot those heretics' nest," Agatha said confidently, not noticing Duncan's daze, and was about to say goodbye. "Then I won't take up your time—forgive my disturbance, I must be leaving."

"Uh… okay," Duncan stood up half a beat late, subconsciously saying, "Then take care…"

Agatha thanked him and turned to walk towards the door, but then seemed to remember something and suddenly stopped.

Alice, who was about to get up to see her off, almost bumped into her.

Agatha's gaze swept over Alice, but this time she did not pay too much attention to the blonde woman without a heartbeat or breath—it was normal for a god-like being to have some strange followers, nothing to be surprised about.

She turned her head to Duncan.

"Please rest assured, I will instruct the church's guardians that no one will disturb you," Agatha said very seriously. "I hope you have a pleasant stay in Frost—if there are any new developments, I will come personally."

"Ah, that would be great," Duncan smiled, satisfied with this. "I really don't want to be disturbed."

Agatha nodded, then turned again to walk towards the door, but after only two steps, she seemed to suddenly remember something and stopped.

"There's one more thing I almost forgot." The gatekeeper pressed her forehead somewhat awkwardly, looking at Duncan and saying.

Duncan said with confusion, "Oh?"

Agatha hesitated, and finally asked the question that had been bothering her and many others for a long time: "Regarding the 'secret number' that you left at the end of your last 'tip-off letter'… what exactly does that mean? Please forgive our limited knowledge, we have been trying to decipher it for a long time, but we still cannot understand the riddle you left behind."

Duncan: "…Huh?"