So There's Nothing to Talk About

“Go!”

Lynch scooped up little Nara and shoved the couple from behind. As he pushed them toward the door, two orange glass bottles slipped from his hands.

The smoke and dust at the window cleared, revealing the night sky outside.

A young lady in fancy clothes with a black fan was walking gracefully through the air, followed by several black-clothed, humanoid entities.

“You failed to complete the task, outsider—ah!”

Amidst the piercing sonic assault of her scream, Lynch, with his back to the window, waved his fingers without looking back. At the same time, the glass bottles shattered against the window frame.

Boom!

Flames erupted, completely engulfing the young lady and the black-clothed figures who were stepping inside.

That'll teach you to talk too much.

“Move! What are you staring at?”

Lynch kicked the dazed couple to snap them out of it, then threw open the front door and charged out first.

“But... our home...”

“What damn home? We need to escape and figure out what's going on first! Or do you know what those monsters want to do to you? Follow me!”

Charging out of the apartment, he fired two shots at the lock of the apartment opposite theirs.

??

Who the hell came up with the idea that pistols could shoot open door locks? Screw you and your whole family.

Helpless, Lynch delivered a flying kick, forcing the door open, and charged inside amidst the terrified screams of the occupants. The revolver in his hand was the ultimate passport; the people inside didn't dare block his path.

“Just passing through, just passing through.”

Lynch carried the little girl, Nara, as he cut straight through the apartment. With monsters hot on their heels and Lynch holding their daughter, the couple instinctively followed him.

The four of them rushed to the far end of the opposite apartment. Smashing the window glass with his cane, Lynch scanned the area, grabbed the couple, and threw them down onto the awning below before jumping down himself.

“Ahhh!”

The little girl screamed in his arms, her terror oddly laced with a hint of excitement. This kid had potential.

As for her parents, they crashed through the awning before they could even scream. They were now rubbing their backsides in a daze as they scrambled to their feet.

“Move, don't stop! Those things might not have been killed by the explosion.”

This was the back of the building, and the long apartment block blocked their pursuers' line of sight. Lynch urged the couple into the alleyway behind them. By now, the husband, Luke, had finally cleared his head a bit and began to lead the way. After winding through several left and right turns, they quickly emerged onto a main road.

Looking back, there were temporarily no pursuers.

“What... what do we do now?”

The couple leaned on each other, completely out of breath. Little Nara sucked on her finger in silence, her innocent eyes staring up at the strange uncle holding her.

What are you looking at? Look at your dad. He's the one who caused all this.

“Find a carriage and head to the place you mentioned, as fast as possible.” Lynch scanned the street. He had no idea what time it was in this world, but there were still quite a few carriages around. “At the very least, I need to figure out what's going on before I can even begin to solve this.”

“Then let's take a hired carriage. I'll go call one.”

“Call one? Did you forget what happened to the last coachman? Do you know how to drive?”

In this post-transmigration world, men generally knew a bit about driving carriages, and Luke was no exception. Seeing Luke nod, Lynch sprinted toward a nearby hired carriage waiting for passengers. Before the smiling coachman could even react, Lynch very gentlemanly pointed a gun at his head and politely invited him down from the driver's seat.

“You've got the night off. Go ask the monastery for compensation. And remember, don't work the night shift in the future, or you might get robbed.”

Amid the coachman's friendly, hopping-mad farewell blessings, the carriage sped away, quickly leaving the Helms' apartment far behind. Only then did Lynch find the chance to toss the little girl back to her mother, Clara. He let out a sigh of relief, made a funny face at the little thing who was staring at him curiously, and began reloading his revolver, preparing for battle.

“Who... who on earth are you? What is actually going on? First there are monsters, and now people are flying!”

Amidst the clattering of hooves, Luke, who was driving the carriage, finally couldn't help but shout, his voice cracking with a sob. Clara, too, was trembling and weeping softly as she held her daughter. Tonight's events were clearly far too traumatic for a housewife.

“Heh, isn't this the novel and thrilling life you wanted?”

Lynch's tone was dripping with sarcasm. Having spent all this time constantly dealing with mystery, he harbored a deep-seated loathing for fools who didn't appreciate the blessing of a peaceful, mundane life. This was absolutely not envy or jealousy. Definitely not.

However, seeing Clara cry even louder and Luke whip the draft horse savagely—feeling like a true corporate slave who was putting in all the work only to take all the heat—Lynch decided to explain anyway. “You've come into contact with the truth of the world, and someone believes you must be eliminated. I don't know how they plan to handle you, but I doubt they just want to invite you out for a drink. So... what exactly do you know?”

“We can't really explain it either, we just suddenly understood some things,” Luke said without turning his head as he drove. “This world was originally fake. It's just a fantasy or some kind of dream...”

“The Dreamlands?”

“Yes, that must be it. We are just people in a dream. Just like the city, we are fake, we don't even exist. But some terrifying thing—I don't know what—messed with the boundary between falsehood and reality, locking the city and us into the crevice between the dream and reality. That way, it can look through this place and constantly spy on everything happening on the other side. There's a lot of information I don't really understand either; it just forced its way into my mind.”

I see. So that evil god did all this just to spy on people and have a laugh? Is she sick in the head?

Wait, no. Messing with the boundary between falsehood and reality? Damn it, she probably used the Gate of Falsehood and Reality to pull this off, which is why that thing has never appeared again since the Fourth Age. Because of this, William and his group coveted that mirror and tracked it all the way here. Hiss, the clue that led the Flaming Red Lips to the mirror might have even originated from this very place.

But if this is a dream, then it's not surprising whether people can fly or monsters exist. Even if there are flying monsters...

???

What is that?

The wind was picking up, carrying a faint, fishy stench.

In the night sky filled with the red fog, several black dots suddenly emerged. The dots expanded rapidly, turning into several dark silhouettes within seconds. Finally, they tore through the red fog, revealing their forms in midair.

They had the heads of birds, the compound eyes of insects, the wings of bats, the scales of fish, the hind hooves of horses, and the front claws of wolves. Their appearance was incredibly bizarre, as if various creatures had been wrongly stitched together.

Lynch had seen this thing just a few days ago in the Grand Museum of Rhine City, where Professor Green was studying its remains.

A mysterious heteromorph, a messenger and mount of the evil god, a bizarre entity that traveled between the Dreamlands and the mortal world.

Riders sat atop the heteromorphs—none other than the pursuers who had just been blown away. The monster girl in fancy clothes, with whom Lynch had crossed paths several times, flew at the very front. Her eyes lit up the moment she spotted Lynch. Her speed suddenly surged, and she drew closer by the second.

“You said I could refuse.” Shielding the mother and daughter behind him, Lynch aimed his gun at the girl in the air and fired three consecutive flame bullets. “Besides, I haven't even made my choice yet. If you want to watch a good show, you should at least give me a chance to figure everything out first.”

Bang! Bang! Bang! Three bursts of fire erupted in the air. The heteromorph spread its wings, banking sideways to slip through the flames.

Securing her body with tentacles, the bloated young lady in fancy clothes suddenly opened her mouth and spat a jet of black water, which shot like an arrow toward the carriage.

“Shit, Luke, dodge!”

Fortunately, the carriage swerved just in time, causing the black water to splash onto the ground, which immediately corroded a deep crater into the road.

“I didn't stop you from refusing, nor did I stop you from figuring everything out, outsider. I'm simply sending you on your way as well, hehehe.”

Taking advantage of the carriage's evasive maneuver, the girl closed the distance. She controlled the heteromorph to dive twice in rapid succession, nearly catching up to the carriage.

So there's nothing to talk about, then?

With a dark expression, Lynch gave a thumbs-up to the girl relentlessly pursuing them. Then, he reached into the inner lining of his coat and pulled out an ancient piece of parchment.

【Parchment of Max (3)】

One of Miss Valente's life-saving mystery relics.

Well then, goodbye.