Lord of The Mysterious Realms Chapter 550

Entering through the opera house's back door, Jenkins found a straight corridor. After less than two minutes of walking, he could hear the low murmur of conversation up ahead.

Jenkins quickened his pace, candle in hand, and traced the sounds to a closed black wooden door. He took a step back, raising the candle to illuminate the doorplate. The universal script read:

"Yes," he thought. "This is the address Nelly gave me."

He nodded, then rapped his knuckles lightly on the door twice.

The voices inside fell silent. Jenkins had just counted to sixteen in his head when the door creaked open. Before him stood a man of medium height and slender build, also wearing a mask. Instead of a candle, he held an old-fashioned oil lamp.

The man nodded, ushering Jenkins inside. Jenkins raised his candle, the pale yellow light illuminating a small, backstage-like area. They passed through a curtain one after the other, emerging onto a spacious stage where five other masked individuals were already seated in a circle.

Jenkins spotted a stack of chairs to one side of the stage and moved to grab one, but the man who had led him in held up a hand to stop him.

"My apologies, sir. Before you can join us, we must confirm that you are genuinely troubled and have come here seeking help. I'm very sorry, but we have to prevent pesky reporters or other curious onlookers from joining under false pretenses. Everyone here has their own burdens and wishes to protect their identity."

"I understand," Jenkins replied, keeping his voice low. "How do we confirm it?"

"We have a special mirror. Please stand before it. It has a way of revealing... unusual things."

Jenkins's heart skipped a beat. Nelly had never mentioned that bringing an evil spirit along was a prerequisite for joining the support group. But it was too late. Before he could come up with an excuse, the man had already wheeled a full-length mirror over.

The mirror wasn't covered, and it immediately reflected Jenkins's image.

In the mirror, a white cat stood perched on the slender man's shoulder, a chilling green light gleaming from its eyes.

Jenkins glanced to his side. He could feel Chocolate still perched on his shoulder, its swishing tail brushing against his cheek, but his eyes couldn't see a thing.

"Chocolate can turn invisible!"

He didn't know whether to be pleasantly surprised or just shocked. Meanwhile, the man let out a long sigh of relief and nodded.

"It seems your luck isn't half bad. No offense intended, but compared to what our other companions are dealing with, an animal spirit is probably the safest affliction to have."

He enthusiastically pulled over a chair for Jenkins and invited him to sit. It was only then that Jenkins learned the mirror could reflect spiritual entities. The man, who introduced himself as Mr. Scotter, had found it in the theater's storeroom.

He was also the organizer of the Spirit Incident Support Group. He'd hoped to bring people who had encountered "those sorts" of things together, to brainstorm solutions and offer each other courage.

"So, the mirror has nothing to do with the antique shop after all."

Jenkins felt a pang of disappointment, but leaving right away was clearly not an option. He decided to stick around for a few hours. When he returned to the church, he could use Nelly's "little problem" as a pretext to report this gathering.

It was a win-win situation. The Church could recover a supernatural item, and they surely wouldn't hesitate to help these people resolve their issues with haunting spirits.

Including Mr. Scotter, everyone who had arrived before Jenkins was an ordinary person. Seated in the circle, they were close enough for him to use his own eyes to observe the problem plaguing each one of them.

Starting from his left, the spirits attached to the five individuals were:

A repulsive, obese, middle-aged man; his appearance gave no clue as to his cause of death.

A young woman with ligature marks around her neck, the corners of her mouth stretched unnaturally to her ears, crying tears of blood.

A pair of identical twin boys, no older than ten from their height, each juggling his own severed head.

A white-haired old man, leaning over his host's shoulder and whispering constantly in their ear. He looked the most normal of the bunch and was the only spirit that came close to noticing Jenkins's observation.

And the person to Jenkins's right had a head floating above their own—just a disembodied head. Because it couldn't make any obvious movements like looking up, Jenkins couldn't discern its features or age.

As for Mr. Scotter, who stood by waiting to open the door for the next arrival, a long-haired man clung tightly to his back. The spirit's head could twist a full one hundred and eighty degrees, and its limbs were wrapped snugly around Scotter's body.

To these ordinary people, encountering a spirit was likely a terrifyingly rare event. But to Jenkins, none of these spirits seemed to be anything beyond "ordinary." Even the old man who nearly noticed him was just a common soul, a far cry from the entity clinging to Nelly.

Any Enchanter with even a modicum of power could banish them with a simple ritual.

Jenkins had arrived at the theater shortly before eight, but another person came after him. It was a young man—and an Enchanter, one whom Jenkins happened to recognize. The most update n0vels are published on novel~fire~net

He wasn't an acquaintance from Nolan, but the young magician from the circus he'd seen during his trip to Bel Diran. The last time they'd met, the man was a level 2 Enchanter, but he had since advanced to level 3. He hadn't fully mastered his new abilities, however, which suggested the promotion was recent.

The magician clearly had the ability to control spirits. When Mr. Scotter attempted to verify his identity, Jenkins watched a spirit obediently slip out of his overcoat pocket and put on an exaggeratedly ferocious display.

"Could he be here for the mirror, too?"

Jenkins was surprised only at the encounter itself. Just last week, he'd heard from Nelly that the circus had come to Nolan; he just hadn't expected to run into one of them so soon.

The circus itself was peculiar. He knew that besides the young magician, everyone else was level six, yet they all seemed to have an utter lack of combat experience.

But even with the arrival of another Enchanter, Jenkins still believed the rest of the evening would pass without any surprising incidents.