Oh, fate!

No, no!

Where had the notebook gone?

Lorne frantically rummaged through his satchel. If he hadn't still been out on the street, he would have dumped everything out at once.

Oh, fate! Why are you doing this to me?

"I can't panic. I need to stay calm."

"I should go to the police."

"Wait... I'm a transmigrator!" Lorne grew a little agitated. As far as he understood it, transmigrators and the authorities were enemies.

Even if the police couldn't necessarily tell he was a transmigrator, he was also a Beyonder. If they discovered that, he would be in trouble all the same.

Besides, that Notebook definitely had something to do with the supernatural. If the police noticed anything suspicious, his being a Beyonder would leave him with no way to explain himself.

Could that fortune-teller have pretended to sleep to distract me, then stolen my Notebook with some unknown ability?

After all, Sequence 7 of the Seer Pathway is called Magician. It would make perfect sense for one to know some sleight of hand.

"That doesn't add up either. When I left, I deliberately reached into my satchel to check, and I did feel the Notebook."

Wait!

Seer... Clown... Magician...

That circus seemed to have all of them.

Lorne felt as though he had uncovered some sort of secret.

"Could everyone in that circus be a Beyonder?"

"And all of them from the Seer Pathway, too."

"So was this a group operation?" Lorne lowered his head, his expression turning grim.

"No, that's just speculation. By that logic, every circus would be suspicious."

"It shouldn't be that much of a coincidence."

"For now, I'll retrace my entire route."

An hour and a half later, Lorne sat dejectedly by the roadside. He had searched his entire route and even gone back to the circus, but he had still found nothing.

The circus employees had looked perfectly normal, too. None of them had shown any signs of guilt.

Now his trail had gone cold. The only thing he could be certain of was that the Notebook had inexplicably vanished after he left the circus.

Yet the satchel at his waist was intact, without any holes or other damage. The notebook definitely hadn't simply fallen out.

"Was it a pickpocket? With all those people around the circus, it wouldn't be surprising if a few thieves were mixed in."

"Good thing I kept all my money in my inside pocket. Otherwise, I might not even have the fare to get back." The thought gave him an odd sense of relief.

He rose dispiritedly, planning to return to the Azure Hotel and see whether divination could help him locate the Notebook.

Lorne took a few coins from inside his coat and set off to find a public carriage, but after barely two steps, he suddenly realized something was wrong.

"A Monster's spiritual intuition is extremely sensitive. There's no way a thief could take something out of my bag without me sensing anything!"

The more Lorne thought about it, the more inconsistencies he noticed.

"I'm usually so cautious. Why would I go to a crowded circus while carrying something this precious?"

"Even if I wanted to relax, even if I'd never seen a circus before, I still shouldn't have done that!"

"Wouldn't lazing around in bed at the hotel have been just as nice?"

"But I didn't. Had I lost my mind?" For a moment, Lorne began to doubt himself.

"No, this definitely wasn't just carelessness on my part." Lorne shook his head, rejecting the idea. He hadn't become that foolish.

"Whatever the reason, everything that happened today was far too coincidental, far too unreasonable."

Somewhere in Tingen City, a hack writer suddenly felt a chill down his back.

After searching the streets without finding anything, Lorne had no choice but to return to the Azure Hotel.

"Meow~" Lucky, who was lying on the bed, greeted his return with a cheerful cry.

But she seemed to sense the negative emotions practically spilling out of him and obediently fell silent, closing her eyes to go back to sleep.

Lorne went to the desk, removed the Pendulum from his wrist, and prepared to perform a divination.

He had no other choice. He had searched everywhere he could; divination was his only remaining option.

"My Notebook is still in this city."

The Pendulum turned slightly clockwise, indicating yes.

Lorne wasn't surprised by the result.

"Someone stole that notebook."

This time, the Pendulum showed little reaction. It merely twitched slightly, then went still.

Lorne knew this probably meant he had too little information to divine an answer.

In other words, the divination had failed.

"Could it really have been an accident?"

Early the next morning.

The morning mist, laden with coal dust, formed a gray veil in the alley. Old Tom's square-toed leather boots crushed shards of glass lodged between the paving stones.

As an antiques dealer with a little money to his name, he would never have walked through this filthy alley if he hadn't been rushing to a business meeting.

He pulled his heavy wool coat tighter and quickened his pace.

"Once I turn this corner, I'll be clear of that sour stink from the docks."

His boot suddenly slipped, and he staggered, catching himself against the damp brick wall.

"What!" The sudden mishap startled him.

Blood-dark red, sticky fluid-flowed from the foot of the wall to the middle of the lane. A grotesque corpse lay in the center of the alley.

But he wasn't particularly frightened. After so many years traveling far and wide, he had seen plenty.

He raised his silver-plated cane and prodded between the corpse's ribs with its tip, studying the body as he did.

"Ragged sackcloth clothes, a copper ring on a severed finger. Just another little pickpocket from the docks who didn't live to see twenty. What rotten luck!"

The death of such an insignificant figure was commonplace in this era, and Old Tom had no intention of inviting trouble by reporting it to the police.

He wiped the tip of his cane against the brick wall and was about to leave when he noticed something beside the corpse. His nostrils quivered like an old dog scenting carrion, and he stopped to take a closer look.

It was a book with a black cover that looked very old. His instincts as an antiques dealer brought him to a halt.

He instinctively swallowed, his Adam's apple bobbing.

Parchment? No, this tanning technique... This must be from the Fourth Epoch. It's at least several hundred years old. Damn it, where did this brat get...

A scraping sound came from the alley.

Old Tom snatched up the book and stuffed it inside his coat even more deftly than he had stolen a widow's silverware in his youth.

As he rose, he noticed something strange beneath his foot and suddenly realized he was standing on the corpse's severed neck.

Amid the rasp of his boot sole scraping repeatedly against the brick wall, Old Tom hurried out of the alley without looking back.

"Young Master Welch, what do you think? This is a genuine Ancient Book, passed down from the Fourth Epoch."

"I went to a great deal of trouble to get it." His face alight with excitement, Old Tom introduced the Ancient Book he had just picked up to the young man before him.

He even invented a story about a treasure to go with it, leaving his listener utterly spellbound.

When the young man named Welch readily paid him, Old Tom smiled so broadly that the wrinkles on his face seemed about to split.

"A wise choice. You certainly won't be disappointed."

"What do I need to do to find my notebook?" Lorne asked the Wish-Granting Box in front of him.

A few seconds later, a slip of paper appeared out of thin air inside the box. It read:

"Go to Iron Cross Street in Tingen City in ten days."