In the office, Isaac finished reading the letter in his hand, his gaze lingering on the last line, "No need to reply," and remained silent for a long time, unsure of what to say.
The letter was something Carlo had just pulled out of his desk drawer. He tossed out a comment, "This letter, written by Lessing himself, should give you an idea of his situation rather than me giving you a long explanation," and let Isaac read it himself.
The image of Edward in the letter overlaps with that of his adoptive father in his memory, yet they are somewhat different.
Edward, whom he knew, was a gentle old man, a learned historian, but somewhat reclusive. He rarely confided in Isaac, let alone interacted with other professors. He spent most of his time alone in his study reading ancient books and studying antiques.
In this letter, Edward lowered his guard and recounted his years of confusion and reflection.
Various questions swirled in Isaac's mind: Lessing's past, the changes in Vista, order, the gods...
But in the end, somehow, perhaps knowing that asking the others at this moment would not yield answers, he chose the most insignificant question, "Was this house, 122 Red Maple Street, originally his residence?"
Carlo was looking at another stack of letters, homework submitted by the orphanage children. "He was indeed living here when he wrote those letters, but not in this house now."
"What happened?"
"Oh, you're not from Vista, so you probably haven't heard of it." Carlo wrote "Your handwriting is terrible" on a page of letter paper. "This area used to be the old town, with mostly wooden houses. There was a huge fire more than ten years ago that burned down most of the street, including the house where Lessing used to live."
"This building is a reconstruction on the original site. The city hall built a batch of similar-sized townhouses, retaining the original house numbers."
Isaac couldn't help but feel a little regretful. If he could have lived in the house where Edward actually lived, touched the tables and chairs he used, walked up the stairs he climbed, and seen what the street scenes he saw every day were like, perhaps he could have gotten closer to the old man's heart.
But a fire erased those traces, and now all that remains is imagination. Isaac couldn't quite describe how he felt.
"However, since the old house has already burned down, the key Lessing left me is useless." Carlo poured a key out of the envelope, weighed it in his hand, and said, "Keep it as a keepsake."
The key traced an arc, and Isaac reached out and caught it.
A brass key, its teeth worn smooth and rounded, its surface dull and oxidized, clearly had been used frequently in the past, until it was completely shelved at some point.
Isaac examined the keys for a moment, then put them in his pocket. "Thank you."
"I've finished reading the letter, can you return it to me now?"
Isaac handed the letter back to Carlo, Carlo stuffed it into an envelope, opened a drawer containing a row of letters, counted Carlo, and put them back in their original place.
"Boss, you've packed this letter quite neatly."
"You sound surprised," Carlo said, closing the drawer. "What do you think I'll do?"
"You look at it and then just leave it aside?"
Isaac thought that, given Carlo's usual style, these letters would have been casually stuffed into some corner or simply buried under a pile of documents.
But the row of letters in the drawer, arranged chronologically, looked like they had been carefully preserved.
"With more acquaintances and a longer lifespan, it's inevitable to forget who's who, when, where, and what was said," Carlo said. "These letters can serve as a reference; looking through them will help you remember what topics were discussed at what times."
"I see... By the way, boss, you've lived for a very long time."
"Of course, I'm a true veteran. Lessing is just a little thing in front of me."
Carlo looked to be in his early twenties, no more than thirty, which reminded Isaac of the "immortality" pursued by the Ghoul Cult, leading him to speculate, "What kind of method did he use to achieve eternal life?"
"It's also part of my secret, and no one else can copy it anyway."
"Could it be that they're using a dice roll to determine 'how many more years you'll live'...?"
"Hehe, it's theoretically possible, but testing this kind of thing is extremely difficult. Failure might even result in a direct reduction in lifespan."
Isaac didn't press Carlo about why he was called an old codger, while Carlo put down the children's homework. "Once you've dealt with that idiot and finished your own business, you can finally look at the ring."
He took out the ring, placed it on the table, and spun it. The dark silver ring spun and fell down, gleaming under the light, the engraved patterns on its surface winding and coiling like veins.
Isaac examined the object that had triggered the series of events. "Boss, you knew the origin of this ring from the beginning?"
After all, it was Carlo told him on the black market that this thing was a "good thing," although in retrospect, it turned out to be quite sinister.
"How could I possibly know what this ring is for just by looking at it?" Carlo leaned back. "I knew it was a good thing because I saw the power it emitted with my Spirit Vision. That power wasn't particularly strong, but the texture... it felt like a fragment peeled off from some much larger source."
Isaac nodded. "The person who gave this ring to Baker said its effect was to draw life force from the remnants of corpses to supply the living, but the truth should be more than that."
"That's right. If it only draws life force from corpses to maintain the wearer's youth, then Baker's mother-in-law wouldn't have died suddenly after wearing it."
Isaac followed this line of thought, "Could it be that there was some residual life force in the ring, and after Baker's mother-in-law wore it, that accumulated life force was used by her first, which is why she was in such good spirits for those two days?"
"But once the life force stored inside is depleted, the ring will directly draw life force from the wearer to replenish it and maintain its own power."
Carlo picked up the ring and twirled it between his fingers. "That sounds a lot like an oil lamp. When the oil runs out and there's no new fuel to replenish it, it burns the wick. When that runs out too, the person is gone."
"Could Baker's sudden death have also been caused by this ring?" Isaac asked. "Did he wear the ring after he got it?"
"It's hard to say. At least based on Morris's Spirit Mediumship memories, he never wore this thing. Moreover, he suddenly died after selling the ring. Although the timing was coincidental, the ring wasn't on him at the time. Whether his death was directly related to the ring's power remains to be investigated."