“Hoh? What would a youngster like you be doing here?”

While I breathed a sigh of relief over that crisis, I was greeted by a voice after I passed through the door.

Before me, stood an old man with white hair and pale skin. He was similar to Giraus but this old man had a callous and wrinkled old face that looked as if it went through great tribulations. He was wearing rather light leather armor and still held a dagger with him.

“I simply passed through this door here.”

I answered.

“Passed through? Hmph, youngsters like you should really know your place.”

He said in disdain.

“This accursed place is haunted and plagued by the dead, the likes of the living like you have no place here.”

He said with a strong voice.

This warning… If I was alive and well, I would have heeded it but…

“I’m afraid you’re mistaken.”

I said gently.

“Mistaken? Really now, young kids like you are really too disrespectful and too reckless. Life is warm and the grave so cold. You should listen to people older than you.”

He said frowning.

“There’s really no point in that. I’m already dead like you.”

“What?”

He said surprised.

“You’re like me? But… You seem so alive…”

“This isn’t really my whole body. You should know about the man who lived here and what he did.”

“Hm… That is true… I guess I’m wrong here…”

The person everyone here knows who owns this mansion is the professor and that he killed people and used their limbs to create dolls. There are plenty of dolls located here in this dreadful place.

And that because they used live human part, they’re extremely similar to human beings.

“No wonder you weren’t scared of how I appeared…”

He said in understanding.

“Well, that’s natural if you think about it. I mean, the living have no business whatsoever in this place. Only people like us would be here.”

“That’s true…”

He cleared his throat.

“So, what’re are you doing in a place like this?”

“I’m heading down to crush the heart to end this curse.”

He went silent.

“You’re going to do that…? Well, I suppose I’ve got nothing to worry about that… Not like I care. Nothing ever really went right for me so even if it all ended there’s nothing for me to say…”

“Hmm?”

“I guess I’ll introduce myself. I’m Llednar, an old thief.”

I was surprised.

“The Great Thief of the East, Llednar?”

Of course I’ve heard of such a famous figure.

Llednar, the Great Thief of the East who pulled off the robbery of many treasures at times with impossible odds.

That man disappeared years ago…

He was said to retire at long last since there’s nothing left for him to steal.

His treasure was said to hidden away, never to be found for eternity.

Still, there are many who still hunt for that treasure trove.

“Oho? You’ve heard of me. Then I guess this is pretty ironic to you. The Great me to have fallen in such a place.”

“Not really. I’m Sylfern, a prince.”

“Oh? You’re a famous figure yourself. How did a prince end up dying in this godforsaken place?”

“That’s a long story.”

“Well, it’s pretty odd of fate to let an old thief and a prince who perished in the same place meet up as the wandering dead.”

He said laughing grimly.

“But I guess that’s just how life is.”

“True. But there’s really nothing we can do.”

“Yeah… Would you listen to old man’s ramblings here?”

He asked me.

“Sure, I have all the time in the world. For eternity if I wish.”

I’m in no hurry. I would surely have enough time to listen to some old man’s story.

“I was an orphan. I never knew my parents but I had family I could count on from my friends in the orphanage. Life was truly harsh. The person who took care of us was very old. The orphanage was all torn down too. We were suffering, but we were happy. We raised crops to eat food.”

His eyes reminisced the past.

There was a voice of longing in that voice.

I saw a glimmer of sadness within those eyes.

“But one day, the person who took care of us died. After burying him and mourning for him, we decided to continue raising crops for food. We might have lost a father, but we still had each other. A few years later, we had a famine. We needed money to buy food. We tried everything we knew to keep living. But suddenly, there was a plague. Too many of us were unable to work. I was desperate then. I needed money and food for my family. That’s when I started to steal from others.”

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

As he spoke, I could feel the sadness and pain in his voice.

“That’s why you became a thief?”

“Yeah, now that I think about it, that’s when my life fell apart.”

“I stole from a famous bandit group. I carefully watched them and planned well. It took a few months, but I finally pulled it off. I wrote a letter saying I’m the Great Thief of the East, Llednar. But when I came back to see my family…”

His voice grew quiet.

“What happened?”

“They were all dead when I returned. The building collapsed. Too many of them were sick and waiting and the rest were all stuck inside. If the collapse didn’t kill them, their injuries or the plague did. I despaired then. Everything I loved and cherished was lost before my eyes. I grew angry with myself. Saying I should have been there. I got the money, I got the medicine. But when I returned, it all became useless.”

He laughed mockingly on himself.

“I continued being a thief. I planned one robbery after another. The harder the better and I grew famous like that. I took on an identity as a merchant too. That way, I was able to hide my riches. When I grew older, I had everything I could have wished for. Wealth, Power, Women… And yet, I was always empty still. One day, I decided to head to a different kingdom to establish a new branch. And I died here.”

He finished silently.

“You know something? I thought I had everything I wanted when I was alive so I didn’t know why I felt so empty. But after death, I finally understand. I wanted to return there. I wanted to see them again. But it’s already too late…”

He laughed sadly.

“That’s… truly a tragic story…”

I could understand how he felt.

“Well, thanks for listening to this old fool. I hope you fare better than I.”

“Then, I bid you farewell, Llednar.”

“Yeah, see you Sylfern…”

I bid him farewell and proceeded forward.

When I managed to get a good distance away, I whispered to myself.

“When this all comes to an end, perhaps you’ll be able to see them yourself soon…”

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Hello everyone. This is one of the longest chapters I've written so far. Sorry I couldn't release as much as I like. I've been quite busy reading and writing. I can say that I've improved a bit but with this improvement, I can see how much lacking my other chapters are. I have no intention of rewriting them though I do feel that I could do better. Rather than restart, I would finish this story first. By the way, as for my blog, well, I want to work on it myself and update the novel list..Especially since I've been reading some very promising stories lately... Unfortunately, I don't have that much access at present. I do intend to continue it... But there's a lot of reasons why I cannot. So sorry and please wait. Besides that, I would like to recommend Lazy Dungeon Master and Dragon's Bloodline. I must say I was very interested in them. Also, this might be out of place, but I would like to recommend the translation from Wuxia World by He-man, Upgrade Specialist in Another World. He-man is someone quite famous. He started the translations of Stellar Transformations that sparked an interest in Xianxia. After some tireless effort, some started to take notice of Xianxia. Afterwards, people with the same interest, began translating Xianxia novels. It's been some time before he disappeared, but now he's back. As a side notice, some novels translated there are quite long but they're original novels. They were written in Chinese as Original Novels and were translated. The quality is really excellent. Some novels, like Martial God Asura, was so good that it was released as an official novel and published grandly. It's still being released and read for free at Wuxia World. One great thing about Wuxia World is that just like Royal Road in the past, they also contacted the authors for their permission. In fact, some authors even left messages and sent videos to Wuxia World to say hello to their fans. I wonder how many people present know that RR contacted the author for Legendary Moonlight Sculptor while they were translating it?