Contractbound 66 A Hard Day's Work

Valentine was standing in front of a double door at the corner of the big courtyard. He thick wooded door was carved with abstract ornaments that, when he looked carefully at them, resembled babies with bat wings and horns carrying something to a person who was lying down on the ground. He didn't know what it represented, but he etched the carving in his memory nonetheless; it might be an important piece of information.

He was about to touch the door handle when his hand couldn't move farther. Something invisible was preventing him from doing so. On the doors, there was a glowing red marking, but it was a different one from the usual blood seal that he had seen in the mansion. This marking had a complicated pattern that resembled a gate of some sort with two inverted crosses at the bottom. It was the sigil of the Deity of Fire Divination!

Valentine slit his palm and splattered his blood on the doors to try to break the seal. However, it stopped midair and got splashed back to the s.p.a.ce in front of it. None of the blood hit Valentine because he had expected the result and moved aside in time.

"I guess it's time to switch," he said shortly.

He then sat down next to the door with his back against the wall. He concentrated on his breathing to help him fall asleep faster. With his much field experience, falling asleep anywhere was not a problem at all, and only within seconds, his consciousness had faded. Graham woke up not long after.

He observed the red marking on the double door and it was indeed the seal of his first Deity. It probably meant that only the blood of His Contractbounds could undo the seal on the double door. He took a step closer and slit his wrist while forming a cup with his left hand to contain the crimson liquid.

There was now quite some blood on his left hand, so he made a quick slapping motion with it and jerked midair to let the blood get all over the seal's invisible barrier. He waited for the blood to slowly form a pattern following the seal, but what he expected didn't happen.

"Urgh!" he groaned.

His blood got splattered back at him, and he wasn't fast enough to dodge in time. He now had blood on his face and some on his coat.

"Not my coat! This will be difficult to remove..." he regretted.

He took a piece of already b.l.o.o.d.y cloth from his briefcase and rubbed the stain on his coat diligently to prevent it from spreading. He had to do it very quickly because he wasn't actually in a safe place.

"So, blood doesn't work. What about divination?" he finally said after wiping his face clean.

Graham took out his black lighter from the right outer pocket of his coat and lit a flame. It burned calmly, while occasionally danced in its place. He stared at the bright flame and concentrated while repeating a question in his mind.

'How do I break this seal with the Deity of Fire Divination sigil?'

He waited patiently for an image to appear from the flame. It was still burning calmly and the surrounding area didn't become darker than usual like what always happened. It seemed his divination had failed.

"No result?" he asked in confusion.

Graham went into deep thought about what had just happened. When his divination was interfered with or if he wasn't powerful enough to divine it, it would usually show abnormality like a violent blaze. Since nothing happened in the first place, that meant what he had tried to divine didn't exist or he simply didn't have enough information to go with it. He was clearly standing in front of the sealed door, so the latter could be crossed out.

"I am confident I have enough information to divine about this seal, but it failed just like that. Maybe it's because the question of how to break this seal doesn't exist from the very beginning," he paused; his eyes were glimmering with revelation. "Which leaves me with two options: the seal doesn't exist or I already know how to undo it. The former is clearly not the case since it stopped us from interacting with the door."

With that revelation, he concentrated on the still burning flame from his lighter and repeated something in his mind.

'I order you to break this seal and open the door.'

Instead of a question, he uttered a command through his divination. An image then gradually appeared in the flames. There, he could see the exact same double door with a complicated red marking on them. The seal in his divination came undone and the doors were both pushed open by an invisible force. In front of him, the same thing was also happening. The double door was now unsealed and open.

It was a big, dusty room in front of him with a lot of shelves that had empty gla.s.s vials on them. On the floor in the middle of the room, there were candlesticks arranged into a formation, but the pattern was not familiar to him. Most of the candles had burned midway, which meant whatever they were intended for had been carried out. The room had no windows, so it was somewhat difficult for him to see inside, especially with the thick clouds blocking the sun.

Graham took a step into the room with his lighter still emitting fire in his right hand, while his left was carrying his briefcase. He scanned the empty gla.s.s vials on the shelves and took some that were still in good condition, stuffing them neatly inside his briefcase. Most of them were broken, so he ignored the containers and moved along. The candles on the floor were just normal colored candles, so he didn't take them either. His attention was attracted by something in the corner of the room, farthest from the door.

There was a thick ancient book lying on an end table that looked like it hadn't been opened in ages. A heavy layer of dust covered the whole thing, along with the table. The cover looked like it was made of leather, but there was no t.i.tle on it. The thick book was only the size of a normal textbook, unlike what he had expected. He approached the book and opened a page to check if it was what he had come for, and the first few sentences he read proved his belief. He had finally got the book containing important knowledge regarding the world of the supernatural. He didn't know the extent of the knowledge that the book had; for that, he needed to read all the contents first. For now, his goal was to escape from the mansion as soon as he could.

Graham picked up the book and was relieved to find that it wasn't enchanted to be unliftable. He put the book securely inside his briefcase and put on the strap around it. After that, he sat next to the table where the book was and leaned against the wall.

"Val, it's time to bail. You take over," he said, then his mouth started moving.

"I, in the name of the Deity of the Tongue, order myself to fall asleep immediately!"

Graham then felt the heavy drowsiness that he had expected and fell asleep not long after. Valentine woke up just some seconds later and got up from his position. He walked out of the room quickly while cleaning the dust off his coat. The plan was not to exit through the main entrance but through an unconventional mean, He would take a shortcut by climbing up the mansion and going over the roof. It was the shortest and safest route he could think of, although more difficult. However, with his agility and nimbleness, it shouldn't be too difficult.

He avoided going back into the mansion in order to avoid meeting the black monster again, and more Leyaks. Although they were initially weak, they were getting stronger by time, and smarter too. However, they shouldn't be able to obstruct his escape if he climber over the wall because based on Valentine's observation, although technically they were floating above the grounds, they couldn't actually fly, at least for now. They couldn't go through walls either, at least for now.

Valentine went over to the unsheltered part of the courtyard and took out the blood-stained cloth from his briefcase. He tied it around the handle and around the belt loop near his back, freeing both of his hands, although it added some weight to his back. He climbed the pillar skillfully and reached out to the iron bars on the second-floor window. The barred windows, although previously had been an annoyance, now provided him with something to grip and step on. He carefully and nimbly made his way all the way up to the roof and stood there for a moment. He needed to plan his way down mindfully because the gable roof was slippery and didn't provide enough stable footing. It was definitely easier to climb up than to go down.

From his sport high up there, he could see the green area below and the withering forest outside it. There were Leyaks there as well and he was sure that they had also evolved. The journal page said that the seals would refresh after a day, so those Leyaks should get back to their weak state if he ever needed to come back to the mansion.

The outer wall of the mansion was basically unclimbable, unlike the inner one, where there were barred windows facing the courtyard placed near each other. On the wall outside, there were only very view windows. The shape of the outer part of the mansion also made it very difficult to climb, unlike the courtyard side which was basically a straight surface; that was why he hadn't climbed over the first time he arrived at the mansion.

"Now, how do we get down?" he pondered.

He scanned the wall below and saw a barred window somewhat far from the roof, but most likely still on the second floor, and it was the only one over there. The roof was hanging over farther than the bars, making dropping down difficult. However, with his skills, it should still be doable. From the barred window, he could then just drop down to the ground, which was probably still more or less eight meters above the ground.

Valentine moved over to the edge and crouched facing in, his hands were in position. He then let his body drop down while his hands grabbed tightly on the roof edge. He swung his body gently towards the wall and let go of the roof. The moment his hands stopped grabbing the roof edge, his body fell very quickly several meters towards the ground; however, he managed to reach out to the window bars and held on tightly, which stopped his fall. His hands were in pain from the sudden, violent contact with the hard iron bars.

He was almost midway to the ground below, so falling down the rest of the way shouldn't break any bones. He climbed down to the lowest part of the window bars and got into position, spotting the location he wanted to land on. He then let go of the bars and let his body drop down. Gravity quickly pulled his body down and Valentine got ready for a safe landing. He bent his body and knees so that he would land with both feet and his arm would act as a balance. The moment he felt contact with the ground, he used all the power from his legs to bounce his body back up, rolling backward to spread the impact of the fall. His briefcase bounced back, hitting his back hard, although it didn't hurt because of the soft material.

"That wasn't too bad," he said, satisfied with his own performance. "Remember, G, when we had to jump down from a much higher place? Even we broke our leg back then. But to be fair, we weren't a Contractbound at that moment."

He got up and untied the cloth from the briefcase on his back and quickly left the spot. He circled the mansion to find the way where he came from. The mansion felt much bigger from the outside, so it took him some time to find it because he had gone down from the opposite side.

Although he really wanted to read the ancient book that he had just found, he held back the urge because it was not safe to do so, even if the green area around the mansion had shown no danger so far. His priority right now would be to quickly make his way back to the town and to his hotel room, where he could let Graham safely a.n.a.lyze the content of the book.