Mary quietly gazed at the side of Russell's sleeping face, while countless doubts flickered swiftly through her mind.
Why had this fellow's Fighting skills improved so dramatically in such a short span of time.
Why was it that the moment he donned that Phantom Thief getup, his entire aura transformed in an instant.
Not only his voice, but even his physique grew blurred and indistinct—so much so that it became hard for her to equate that figure with the man before her now.
And, how on earth had he managed it—down in the underground vault of Lloyds Bank, single-handedly dealing with six bandits.
These questions remained unanswered even now, and in the short term, they would likely be hard to answer.
But fortunately, the most crucial question had already found its answer.
As for the remaining odds and ends, the girl simply treated them as a kind of extra challenge.
Every riddle she unraveled meant that her understanding of the man beside her deepened by another degree.
That, too, was not without its own sort of pleasure.
When one is immersed in happiness, time slips by swiftly without one noticing.
Before she knew it, the sky outside the classroom had shifted from bright white to a dusky yellow.
The Professor's voice announcing the end of class was like a wake-up bell, pulling Russell straight back from his dreams into reality.
He yawned and rubbed his still-bleary eyes.
Right after, a notebook was promptly handed over to him from beside him.
"Slept pretty soundly," Mary said from his side.
"Did you have a good dream?"
"I dreamed Professor Fields told me I didn't have to write the final report and would just get a pass outright—does that count as a good dream?"
Russell mumbled indistinctly.
"You're already dreaming, and you still don't dare to dream of something good?" Mary looked at him helplessly.
"No good," Russell shook his head.
"Why?"
"I don't dream dreams that can't come true, otherwise the letdown after waking is far too strong."
"...You make it sound as if Professor Fields giving you an outright pass is something that could ever come true."
"Who knows, maybe?"
Mary rolled her eyes, then gently patted the notebook in her hand against him.
"Alright, hurry up and let's go."
"Got it." Russell stuffed the notebook into his satchel, then stood up and walked out of the classroom together with Mary.
The two walked side by side along a road paved by the golden setting sun, saying nothing to each other, yet appearing rather striking all the same.
Now and then a faint notification about Malice Points arriving in his account still reached his ears, but to Russell at this moment, it was honestly about as significant as a mosquito's leg.
Besides, a whole month had already passed, and he had long since stopped caring about such things.
Mixing in with that pack of vermin—how could one ever make a proper Phantom Thief that way?
If you're going to do it, do it big and do it strong, and create glory anew!
The two reached the fork in the road, and Mary was the first to come to a halt.
"Alright," she turned her head to look at Russell. "Well then, see you tomorrow."
"See you tomorrow."
Russell nodded, then set off in the direction of Baker Street.
Mary stood where she was, watching Russell's figure gradually vanish from her sight, and only then did she turn around and head toward her own carriage.
Evening, 221B Baker Street.
Russell pushed open the door and greeted Mrs. Hudson, and before he could even sit down for a cup of water, Charlotte's voice came down from upstairs.
"Watson, if it's you who's back, come up right this instant."
Hearing this, Russell raised an eyebrow, glanced up at the ceiling, then looked toward Mrs. Hudson.
"Did something happen today?"
"There... shouldn't have been, I think." Mrs. Hudson thought it over, then shook her head.
But right after, she added: "Although I do recall that around noon she seemed to be on the phone with someone."
"It's either Lestrade or Mycroft, then."
Russell set down his water glass, then got up and headed upstairs.
Pushing open the door, he found Charlotte sitting on the sofa, with that wall plastered all over with information about The Professor flipped around to its other side.
The blank face of it was now covered with countless newspaper clippings.
As far as the eye could see, a uniform row of [Moriarty] greeted his gaze.
"What is it, something urgent?"
Russell's gaze swept across that wall plastered with his own whereabouts, then settled on Charlotte.
"Mycroft called me around noon," Charlotte said.
"I thought it was Lestrade." Russell sat down on the sofa.
"Lestrade probably hasn't got the time for that right now." Charlotte gave a laugh, her tone brimming with schadenfreude.
Hearing this, Russell laughed as well, and right on cue a notification popped up in his mind.
[Malice Points from Greg Lestrade +50]
"So," he paused, "what does Mycroft want with you?"
"Take a guess?"
"The only thing I can be certain of is that it definitely has something to do with Moriarty—the Buckingham Palace business?"
"Mm-hm." Charlotte neither confirmed nor denied it. "The Queen seems to be quite angry."
"It was just a snuff bottle that got stolen, wasn't it—surely the Queen wasn't using it personally?"
Russell played dumb to just the right degree.
"According to Mycroft, what Moriarty stole doesn't seem to have been only the snuff bottle."
Charlotte stood up and walked over to that information wall.
"The snuff bottle was already recovered yesterday around noon.
And honestly, if it really were just a matter of a single snuff bottle, I don't think the Queen would fly into such a rage.
After all, it's not as though she's never had something stolen before."
"Then what was it for?"
"Based on the information Mycroft gave, Moriarty's target in infiltrating Buckingham Palace this time seems to have been Princess Louise Edwards."
Charlotte said.
"He slipped into the princess's room, stole the music box she loved most, then left behind a card and made off without a trace.
Oh, and on his way in he also happened to smash a few antiques. Mycroft is mulling over whether to demand compensation from Moriarty."
Hearing this, the corner of Russell's mouth twitched, and then a trace of astonishment appeared on his face.
"I didn't expect Mary to have actually guessed it right."
"Hm?" Charlotte raised an eyebrow. "What did she guess?"
"Today in the classroom, she brought up a possibility to me."
Russell faithfully relayed Mary's conjecture to Charlotte.
"She said this didn't fit Moriarty's style, so it was possible the snuff bottle was just a decoy."
After listening, Charlotte pondered for a moment, then nodded.
"Not a bad line of thinking."
"So then, what did Mycroft call you for?" Russell steered the topic back on track. "To have you go catch Moriarty?"
"If we're approaching it from a purely results-oriented standpoint, yes." Charlotte nodded.
Hearing this, Russell knitted his brows, his tone full of puzzlement.
"How would you catch him? Never mind that he and Moriarty have a cooperative relationship—even without that connection, you've got no leads at all, so where would you even go to find him?"
"There's no need for me to go find him."
Charlotte drew her gaze back from the information wall, turned her head to look at Russell, and the corner of her mouth curved upward.
"He's the one who'll come find me."
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