Countess Lyxter
The hotel manager, dressed in a neat suit, led the two into the hotel at the campsite.
The hotel was brightly lit, with smooth tiled decorations reflecting the light of the magnificent chandeliers on the ceiling, and candles placed everywhere casting a soft glow, highlighting a hazy beauty.
As Loren and Hermione entered, the dazzling lights shone into their eyes, almost blinding them.
It looked very strange to have so many candles lit in a modern hotel. The main light in the center of the ceiling was still an electric light, emitting light normally, and there was no indication that there was a power shortage.
Loren squinted slightly for a moment to adjust his eyes, then asked, "Why are there so many candles?"
"The hotel is hosting a candlelight Yule Ball tonight. You are welcome to join us if you are interested," the hotel manager replied.
Hermione looked around and, not seeing anyone else, asked in confusion, "Where are the guests at the Yule Ball?"
The hotel manager paused, then replied, "Some guests are outdoors, and some are in their rooms. The Yule Ball hasn't officially started yet, so it's rather quiet."
Loren and his companion were led to a room on the side of the hall, where a table was set with hot food prepared for the Yule Ball.
On the snow-white tablecloth, plates of various cheeses, cookies, fried chicken nuggets, and cocktail meatballs were arranged in a small mountain shape.
There are also empty wine glasses stacked into a small mountain according to the Fibonacci sequence. It seems that the wine will be poured from the top glass when the banquet begins, and the overflowing wine will flow into the next row of glasses.
"Wait a mininute."
The hotel manager, dressed in a suit, smiled politely and said, "I'll go find you a food container so you can carry it with you. If you're hungry, feel free to help yourself to the food here; all the food is provided free of charge by our hotel."
After speaking, he bowed slightly and left the room.
Hermione was a little uneasy. She whispered, "Loren, I feel like this hotel is strange. This person's way of speaking is also abnormal, like, like..."
Loren added, "Like an emotionless puppet."
Bright lights, an empty hotel, and it's so quiet, unnaturally quiet.
Loren also had a vague sense of unease. He looked around with his crystal-blue eyes, but did not detect any Magic Power fluctuations.
From the moment he entered the hotel, that strange feeling lingered in his mind. Although he didn't know the source of this feeling, he didn't want to take any risks and said to Hermione, "Let's not wait any longer, let's just go."
Just as the two were about to leave, the hotel manager from before entered with another woman in a suit.
The hotel manager, dressed in a suit, maintained a polite and courteous demeanor throughout. He introduced, "This is the manager in charge here, Earl Lee Kester. The kitchen is out of takeout containers, and she's here to apologize to you."
"Earl? That sounds like a title from many years ago," Hermione asked, but quickly realized it was impolite and stopped.
Earl Lee Kester's face was illuminated by the light, making her appear quite old. She had clear neck wrinkles and wrinkles around her eyes, but her back remained straight, giving her a spirited look.
With a sincere smile, she said, "I'm so sorry, this was our oversight. To compensate you for your loss, I sincerely invite you to tonight's Yule Ball, and all your future expenses at the hotel will be waived. Our hotel will take this matter seriously, and we apologize for the unpleasant experience it caused you."
His voice was a little hoarse, sounding like he had a cold.
Both of them gave Loren a very bad feeling, just like a brightly lit hotel where you couldn't see a single person, which made him uneasy.
Loren shook his head and refused, "We don't plan to attend the Yule Ball, so we'll head back now."
He pulled Hermione and tried to leave the room.
The female hotel manager reached out to stop them. She knelt down on one knee, her head level with Loren Hermione's, her eyes reflecting their images. In a flat, emotionless voice, she said, "The ball has already started. Don't you want to take a look?"
Her eyes widened slightly, her pupils contracted into black dots, and the black in her eyes gradually seeped into the whites of her eyes until her entire eyeballs turned black.
Loren and Hermione stared into those eyes, their gazes gradually unfocusing, mechanically repeating, "The Yule Ball has begun, look."
The room door suddenly opened, and the hall outside was already crowded with people dressed in exquisite dresses and skirts, swaying to soothing music under the lights.
The lights and shadows filled their minds, slowing their thinking as if they were drunk, their only thought being to watch the Yule Ball.
Loren kept walking forward, vaguely realizing that he had forgotten something. There was a voice in his heart repeating something, but he couldn't hear it clearly.
The hotel lobby had been transformed into Castle hall, with enormous candelabra hanging from the dome, casting a soft glow that illuminated the entire Yule Ball. The walls were adorned with magnificent tapestries, painted with vibrant colors.
The snow-white hotel walls have been transformed into gray Castle stone walls, and the candlesticks hanging diagonally on the wall are gently swaying with candlelight.
In the center of the dance floor, a gorgeously dressed musician played soft music, the melodious tunes echoing throughout the room. The ladies' gowns flowed gracefully, delicate silk adorned with lace and pearl embellishments, loose sleeves, and an overall relaxed cut, rich in detail, and ornately decorated, with colorful ribbons fluttering to the music.
Loren and Hermione moved through the bell-shaped trains, floor-length gowns, and voluminous skirts, but no one at the Yule Ball noticed them. For Loren and Hermione, the Yule Ball was merely a tangible image, and those within that image were unaware of the audience.
Loren was in a daze, half-asleep, only remembering to look at the Yule Ball Yule Ball, but his subconscious was pointing in the opposite direction.
A strong sense of panic gripped him, as if something terrifying was about to happen, but he couldn't remember anything. The two mechanically moved to a corner of the room, taking in the entire scene of the Yule Ball.
Bang bang bang!
A rapid and forceful pounding on the door interrupted the musician's performance, plunging the entire ballroom into an eerie silence.
Bang bang bang!
The knocking sounded again, echoing in the ballroom and above the people.
The crowded people parted to make way from the gate to the center of the dance floor, where Earl Lee Kester and a housekeeper stood.
They couldn't see the two people in the corner either.
At this moment, Earl Lee Kester had the face of her youth, with delicate, fair skin and plump cheeks. The young girl walked to the door with proper bearing, and the housekeeper reached out to open the door.
A man in a gorgeous coat appeared outside the door. He was tall and slender, elegant and confident, with delicate and well-defined features, eyebrows like black feathers, and deep eyes.
He was raising his hand, ready to knock on the door again.
The girl smiled gently, "Gentleman, may I ask what brings you to my door and interrupt my 18th birthday Yule Ball?"
The man first looked surprised, then laughed, "Beautiful lady, happy birthday. I knocked on the door to show you the sights of the world at 18. If you can, could you also give me a glass of water as a hunter passing by?"
Laughter erupted from the crowd at the Yule Ball.
Earl Lee Kester also covered her mouth and laughed, and it took her a while to stop and invite the gentleman to her birthday Yule Ball.
The man was handsome and elegant, and the woman was beautiful and charming. Under the envious gazes of the crowd, they danced one song after another, their skirts fluttering and twirling with their movements, the pearl ornaments on them sparkling.
Loren and Hermione sat hand in hand in a corner, unseen and untouchable by anyone. They witnessed the Yule Ball, but not in this time and space.
After the Yule Ball, the girl persuaded the man to stay at the Castle for a while.
During the day they go out riding horses and hunting, chasing the wind and sunlight, and frolicking in the fields. At night they dance by candlelight.
Four days passed in this way, and the two fell completely in love, unable to extricate themselves. But the man insisted on leaving, no matter what. The woman cried all night, but still couldn't persuade him to stay.
Five days later, the man and woman said goodbye at the door.
Loren and Hermione remained seated in the corner, mechanically watching the scene unfold.
Looking at the girl's red and swollen eyes, the man felt a pang of heartache. He reached out and stroked her cheek, which was no longer as full as when they first met. "Perhaps one day I will come to find you. I hope you will still be beautiful and charming then."
Tears streamed down the girl's face. After a passionate kiss, the man walked away without looking back.
The gates closed, Castle was plunged into darkness once more.
The man was gone, and the young girl suffered greatly from longing. The housekeeper, who had grown up with her, couldn't bear to see the girl suffer, so she took her out for a while. They went on this trip for an unknown period of time, but they still found nothing; they couldn't find any trace of the man.
Earl Lee Kester gradually succumbed to her grief, her young body wasting away in depression, aging, and her complexion growing paler.
The housekeeper sought medical help everywhere, but to no avail.
On a stormy night, thunder roared outside the window, deafeningly loud, and torrential rain lashed against the Castle. The Earl tossed and turned all night, unable to sleep.
She had become so thin that she was just a skeleton, her wrinkled skin clinging to her bones, and everyone could see that she was about to die.
The housekeeper lit a candle in a room on the Second Floor, and the candlelight cast her shadow on the glass window, making her look long and furtive.
She summoned the youngest maid in the Castle, had her wipe the candlesticks, and then, hiding behind the maid, killed her with a dagger that had pierced her body.
The instant the blood splattered, a crystalline blue light enveloped Loren's entire eyeball, and the entire scene before him rapidly shrank, shrinking until it became a single point.
He finally saw clearly what was before him: a small, exquisite mirror shimmering with a blood-red Magic Power light. It had an oval surface and a handle at the bottom, the tip of which was inlaid with a ruby.
The Yule Ball, the young girl, and the murder scene I just witnessed are all reflections of this mirror.
It did not cause any harm to the two people, so it should not have been done with malicious intent.
But Loren was very unhappy about being brought into the illusion so quietly. He pointed his wand directly at the mirror and chanted, "[Sectumsempra]".
An invisible blade sliced through, failing to cut the mirror, but countless cracks extended from a point in the center of the mirror, indicating that the mirror was on the verge of shattering.
Loren was about to try again to break the illusion when the mirror image enveloped him once more. When he opened his eyes again, he was sitting back in the corner of the Castle.
He gripped his wand tightly and muttered, "To deal with something like this, you should Fiendfyre with Fiendfyre."
The story in the Castle continued. The housekeeper poured the maid's blood into a goblet and gave it to the Earl to drink. She also used the blood to wipe the Earl's body. The storm covered up all the traces.
And so Earl Lee Kester recovered from her illness, regaining her youth, beauty, and radiance. But she also became addicted to the taste of blood, and every month thereafter, the housekeeper would kill a young girl for her, drinking her blood and bathing in it.
The Castle was brightly lit again, and Yule Ball even grander than before were held repeatedly. Earl Lee Kester hoped to recreate the scene of that night 'Yule Ball and find that handsome gentleman again.
Bang bang bang!
The moment the knocking on the Castle sounded again, the sound of the mirror shattering rang out, and the entire scene before them shattered into countless fragments and disappeared.
Loren and Hermione reappeared in the forest, their feet stepping on a small dirt embankment covered with fallen leaves.
"Is it over?" Loren surveyed the surroundings; this time it was truly just an ordinary forest.
Hermione looked bewildered. "Weren't we just gathering firewood? Why does it seem like we've stopped here?"
That sounded strange. Loren looked into Hermione's eyes and asked, "Don't you remember what just happened?"
"What happened just now? What happened?" Hermione asked.
Loren stood there, stunned.
Does Hermione not remember what just happened, or was the Hermione from before part of an illusion?
He was more inclined to believe that he was the only one who had entered the illusion, and that Hermione had only been momentarily distracted there.
Hermione noticed Loren's strange expression. She thought for a moment but couldn't figure out why, then asked, "Did something happen just now?"
Loren didn't intend to explain the illusion to Hermione, lest she worry.
He smiled and said, "Didn't we just say we'd collected enough firewood? Why can't we stop?"
"I clearly said to prepare more, and this isn't enough!" Hermione slapped his hand away, thinking he was trying to slack off, and ignored him to continue gathering firewood.
Loren followed behind Hermione, and only then did he begin to process what had just happened.
From the moment they crossed that small embankment, they, or perhaps only he, stepped into an illusion.
But the illusion doesn't directly transform into Castle. Instead, it mirrors a hotel, with the image of a hotel manager in a suit leading him into a room inside. From there, he enters the Castle, and finally, he sees the complete mirror image from a corner of the Castle.
First of all, this style of linking one thing to another and reflecting images is the same as when he interpreted the Book of Abraham on a bright Mars night, both of which are deeply connected with mirrors.
Could there be a connection between the two? Could this be a system of magic, or Alchemy? Loren planned to go back and research information about this mirror illusion.
Secondly, the content is mirrored, telling the story of a Earl named Lee Kester who maintains her youth with blood. She and her housekeeper must be witches, and this behavior could be the Dark Arts of Pure-blood Families, or it could be Vampire.