Lord of The Mysterious Realms Chapter 1165

"I'm very happy about this too, Hathaway."

Lying on his side, Jenkins felt a certain hoarseness in his throat. It might have been an illusion, a symptom of his nerves, or perhaps a strange sense of dread brought on by the cat's claws kneading the back of his neck.

"Speaking of which," he began, "at a time , is there some sort of ritual I'm supposed to perform? Should I be making celebratory pancakes or something?"

"Oh, Jenkins, what are you talking about?"

Hathaway asked, puzzled for a moment before she burst into laughter again.

"See? I knew I'd be the first. Even with all the other girls around you, I knew I'd be the first. I wasn't wrong."

What happened last night was certainly a momentous event for Jenkins, but waking up this morning, he didn't feel that solemn sense of ceremony he'd expected. The absence of it left him with a strange feeling of disappointment.

After getting out of bed, they had breakfast together. He had intended to spend the day by Hathaway's side, but she shooed him away.

"We aren't married yet, you know. Sometimes your clumsiness is just too much. Go on, go do your own thing."

"Well, I suppose that officially makes you my kept man now,"

Hathaway had said as they kissed goodbye. Seeing the astonishment on Jenkins's face, she patiently adjusted his collar.

"Everything will work out, Jenkins. Before summer ends, this business of ours will have a perfect conclusion. Oh, and sir, please be a bit more serious. I'm waiting for you to ask me out again. Or must I be the one to do the asking?"

"Next time... yes, next time. Miss Hersha, when might you be free? I'm available anytime..."

All in all, the marvelous night had matured Jenkins considerably. On his way to Pops Antique Shop, he kept replaying the experience in his mind. The girl was as fiery as her red hair, and he could now definitively say that she didn't wear any of those metal contraptions under her clothes to enhance her figure. And her perfume smelled wonderful.

The door to the antique shop swung open. Pops looked up at the stern-faced Jenkins, then at the clearly infuriated cat.

"What has you in such deep thought so early in the morning? Man and nature? Or the eschatology of all things?"

Pops asked casually, his eyes returning to the newspaper.

"The propagation of all things."

Jenkins supplied the answer.

Pops froze. He stroked his chin, staring at Jenkins in disbelief as if questioning whether this was the real man standing before him. After wracking his brain for a reply and coming up empty, he decided to just drop the subject.

"I brought your things over from the church," he said instead. "You can take them home with you this evening. The business with the angel is over, so you should settle down and continue your studies. Don't go running around all the time, it's not good for you."

After his brief "house arrest," Jenkins was finally allowed to live at home again. This meant his personal belongings, including the Strayer Butterfly, were to be brought back.

Jenkins listened distractedly to Pops, his gaze drifting absently toward the counter. A small suitcase held his change of clothes, while his cane and a glass bottle were set beside it.

The cat, its face a mask of strange emotion, sauntered over to the glass bottle. Then, with a look of pure vengeance, it extended a paw and sent the bottle tumbling off the counter, where it landed on the floor with a crisp shattering sound.

His mind elsewhere, Jenkins's first instinct upon hearing something fall was to reach out and catch it. By a stroke of incredible coincidence, his hand made contact with the newly freed Strayer Butterfly. Thıs content belongs to NoveIＦire.net

The butterfly fluttered gracefully in the dry, indoor air. The cat, leaping down from above, and the man, reaching out from the side, touched its wings at the exact same moment—one from the left, one from the right.

There was no grand spectacle, no strange phenomenon. The man and the cat simply vanished into thin air, leaving a dumbfounded Pops holding his newspaper, staring at the spot where the butterfly continued to dance in the air.

Seeing the butterfly drift toward him, Pops shot up from his rocking chair by the fireplace, snatched his overcoat, and retreated to the doorway. He carefully cracked the door open, letting a gust of cold wind rush in, and quickly slipped outside.

He slammed the shop door shut and peered through the display window into the now-empty interior. The shards of glass before the counter glittered like fine works of art in the glow of the gas lamp, and the butterfly, now resting on Chocolate's cushion, was still gently fluttering its wings.

The thousand words welling up in Pops's heart finally coalesced into a single, heartfelt curse muttered in the purest Norland dialect. Locking the door, he turned and, without his umbrella or coat properly on, set off toward the church in the light morning rain.

Jenkins couldn't quite grasp what was happening. By the time he realized he had touched the Strayer Butterfly, it was already too late.

The disorienting spatial transfer began immediately. The vertigo and hallucinations instantly robbed him of his ability to think. The mysteries of space were something Jenkins still couldn't comprehend, and the bizarre sights during the transit were impossible for him to observe with any clarity.

All he could do was clutch his cat tightly. When he saw a massive claw emerge from the swirling kaleidoscope of colors, he brandished his sword and sliced the appendage in two.

The last time he'd touched the butterfly, he had been lucky enough to be transported to another location within the same city. This time, however, his luck had run out. When he came to his senses, he found himself falling into a pile of snow.

He pushed himself into a sitting position, brushing off the snow. Before him stretched a boundless snowfield, and in the distance, he could faintly make out towering, snow-capped mountains that seemed to scrape the sky.

"Wherever this is, it's definitely not Nolan. This isn't even the continent's west coast... Huh, what's this?"

He squeezed the soft cat in his arms to make sure it was alright, then looked up to see a wooden sign standing not far away. Forgetting to scold the cat for once again trying to attack the butterfly, Jenkins brushed the snow from his head and shoulders and walked over to read the words carved into the wood:

Although the three kingdoms used the same written language, their spoken languages differed, and regional habits led to slight variations in lettering. The person who had written on the sign clearly didn't use standard script; Jenkins almost failed to recognize the flowery, cursive letters.

"Hmm? What does this mean?"

The ground beneath his feet vanished. The combined weight of the man and his cat was enough to break through the cover of a hidden pit, which welcomed them with open arms.

The mouth of the pit had been covered with dead branches and straw to prevent anyone from missing it in the vast expanse of white. Someone had even thoughtfully erected a sign to prevent accidental falls. Unfortunately, the heavy snow had buried everything, and the wooden sign, meant as a warning, had ironically lured Jenkins right to it.