With just this one click, countless lights traveled around the stone wall.
The stone wall began to slowly move downwards, shrinking into the ground.
The dust fell to the ground.
“…”
In that instant, everyone was stunned, including Jeremy himself.
He stood there, staring blankly at the stone wall in front of him, cracks appearing on his dead-white face.
Impossible!
It couldn’t be!
How could Annie have set his fingerprints to unlock the key to the Davis family vault!
The stone wall completely disappeared into the ground, revealing a space so large that it couldn’t see the bottom, and inside threads of light swam in all directions, ceiling, walls, floor, brightening and then darkening.
Inside, there was nothing ancient.
There was just an empty, oversized space lined with odds and ends, paintings, books, arranged independently on stands like the most ordinary of personal exhibitions.
Paige followed the dim light and saw a portrait of Annie, which also confirmed the suspicion in her mind.
Annie really had guessed that Jeremy would take this step.
She gripped Enrico’s hand tightly and raised her eyes to the bleeding Jeremy, “Any painkillers? Gotta bandage his wounds, otherwise, he won’t last.”
At that, Blanca didn’t even think twice about walking over to Paige and pulling a bottle of painkillers out of the pocket of the trench coat she had draped over herself.
“Why do you carry this around?” Alonso frowned.
Blanca didn’t answer him, stepping forward and pinching Jeremy’s jaw, opening it, and pouring three painkillers directly into his mouth, forcing him to swallow dry.
Jeremy was in so much pain that naturally he didn’t refuse, his eyes staying glued to the inside.
Seeing this, Alonso asked the Davis family to fetch a piece of cloth and tied Jeremy’s broken hand down casually.
Jeremy’s whole body was almost unsteady, shaking, his breathing was extremely heavy, he was staring at the inside of the stone wall, suddenly, I don’t know what came to his mind, he pushed Alonso away, and rushed into the inside with a single step.
The moment his feet hit the ground, the lights inside completely lit up, illuminating the entire space stretching inward.
It was as if some kind of machine was running inside, making a heavy sound, about too long without maintenance.
Suddenly, an ethereal and bitter young female voice rang out.
“Jeremy, when you showed up here, I thought I was dead and, well, losing.”
“Annie?”
Alonso looked startled at the voice.
Jeremy’s expression was terrified, he couldn’t stop backing up, his feet stumbled and he sat down on the floor, his eyes staring inward with dead eyes, his pupils clenched, “Annie? You’re dead, you’re dead …”
Right.
He had set it up himself, drove her insane, had her killed by the police.
He had taken care of her body.
Jeremy thought as he sat on the floor in fear.
Paige glanced at Enrico, whose face sank as he led her inside.
There was a book on a stand in the entryway, and Paige reached out and flipped through it when a photograph fell from the inside.
In the photo, the young girl was sitting by the lake in a light-colored dress, her two white, slender legs not in the lake to play in the water, and the moment when she turned around and smiled was framed.
Paige turns the photo–
[Gift of instantly recognizable beauty. Jeremy.]
The handwriting is golden hooks and lines like water.
It’s a great handwriting.
Paige is looking at it when Annie’s ethereal voice rings out again, as if from all directions.
“I’m sitting at the lake where we recorded this on every date before we left THE DAVIS FAMILY, and I’m in a bit of a trance, as if I’m seeing the way you asked for directions the first time we met back then, and when I look up, I see you fall into the water, and when I turn my head, I see the despondency in which you said you wouldn’t leave.”
The recording was probably made on a dawn, or at night, with the sound of water gurgling in the background, and the sound of frogs chirping in the distance, and the silence.
It just sounds like … there doesn’t seem to be any light.
Annie is smiling as she says these words, talking to herself in general, “Do you remember the first thing you said when you woke up from falling into the water, you were white-faced and wet and wretched, and you grabbed onto me and said you were responsible for me, just because I did artificial respiration on you.”
“…”
Blanca looked over at Jeremy who was struggling to get up from the floor, no wonder he was out of his mind when he had just seen Enrico giving Paige water by mouth.
“I thought then that my father’s words were good, that the ice is no match for the heart, and look at this man, trying to take advantage of me at every opportunity, it’s no fun.”
Annie laughed softly, “From when did I change my mind about you, was it you who waited for me at the cabin by the lake for a long time like day after day? Was it the countless portraits you drew that weren’t very good? Or was it the fruit you bought for me after traveling dozens of kilometers? I can’t really count, it seems like once a person is in the demonic barrier, they firmly believe what they want to believe.”
Paige stood there and saw several paintings standing before her.
Jeremy’s painting skills were not as good as his writing, which was indeed average, but each one of them was considered to be the essence of the painting, especially the pair of eyes, which was beautiful, a heart that could be seen by people at a glance.
Jeremy in chasing Annie this aspect, put enough time and energy.
She turned her eyes to Jeremy, whose face was as white as paper and haggard and wretched at the moment, what does a man have to do? To clear his head and realize that he’d been taking advantage of it all along?
“Demonic?”
After the painkillers gradually took effect, Jeremy struggled to get up from the ground and began to talk to the voice, his expression was almost maniacal, “If you were really into the demonic barrier, how would you have set up all these things here! Annie, you’re basically doing a double-take as well!”
There were no antiques here, just a few outside.
She just wanted him to be full of hope and then lose it!
“Jeremy, you know what? I really like you.”
Annie laughed softly, and in contrast to Jeremy’s midlife mania, her tone was one of obsessive to-the-end fondness.
“…”
Jeremy stiffened again, glaring at one of the portraits standing in front of him, his teeth clenched, a cold hardness piling up in his eyes.
“You said that I shouldn’t be a little bird trapped in THE Davis family, but the little bird is willing to live like this, she’s trying to fly out because of you, she doesn’t want you to be so tired of fighting in THE Gustin family’s villa, she wants to cover the storm over your head with her tiny little feathers. ”
“From the beginning to the end, she did it because of you.” Annie said with a bitter laugh, “But you don’t seem to understand that you tried me by showing me that picture of the Purgatory Beings.”
“…”
Jeremy stood motionless, frozen at his words.
She knew he was testing her then?
Annie’s voice was unmistakably astringent, “You said that you weren’t afraid that I had a genetic disease, that you were sure that you would keep me from developing it for the rest of my life because you wouldn’t put me through any stimulation. But when you tested me, I knew you were afraid, so you’ve always been jealous of me.”