Alice in the Land of Steam

Chapter 836 Can’t find him anywhere?

Thanks to the unremitting efforts of the three little ones and Sister Livia, the recruitment operation was a complete success... right?

"It seems like we have overlooked someone else?" Crouching at the door of Tianxin Church, the pink-haired little girl took out her notebook from her pocket, opened it, and looked at the names that had been crossed out one by one. Finally, she fixed her eyes on a name that had just appeared in the notebook: "Ah, it's Sister Gloria, we haven't found her yet!"

However, when it comes to this new member of Yunjing Sky Island, no one has much impression of him.

"It seems that I can only see her when I eat." The little elf Shemi sat on Metien's head, holding his chin with both hands, and fell into deep thought: "Although her room and my room are on the same corridor, I can't hear any movement at ordinary times. Moreover, I almost never run into her when I get up in the morning and go to bed at night. Don't you think this is very strange?"

It was like living under the same roof with a ghost, which gave Shemy the creeps.

In response, Metien said: "Isn't it because you always stay in bed in the morning and stay up late at night? Sister Gloria gets up on time at six in the morning and goes to bed on time at ten in the evening, so of course you won't meet."

“This is the weirdest part!”

After being exposed for staying up late, Xie Mi did not feel ashamed at all. Instead, he said confidently: "It's super scary that a person's work and rest schedule can be so regular, and he insists on going to bed early and getting up early every day!"

"Then you should also insist on going to bed late and getting up late every day."

Dual personality? Livia was obviously hearing this for the first time, and she couldn't help but raise her thin eyebrows. Leticia was busy picking up small stones on the ground and didn't answer. Only Shemi hummed: "Didn't Linger say it a long time ago? I heard it was because of the curse."

She simply ignored Shaymi and turned her gaze to Leticia, asking her what she thought of Gloria.

"Eh, how is that possible?"

“I would occasionally see Gloria outside the hotel,” she recalled. “Sometimes she would be in the herb garden, staring at the sky; sometimes she would be walking alone in the forest. At that time, I would want to go over and say hello to her, but before I could get there, she would just look at me, turn around and disappear. At that time, I thought Gloria hated me, but when I ran into her again when I returned to the hotel, she greeted me warmly and asked if I needed any help.”

Of course, the answer was as expected.

Because it was Metien's question, Leticia thought about it seriously for a while, and after a while, she tilted her head and said, "Interesting woman?"

"Is that so?" Metien thought thoughtfully, "What if it wasn't her now, but her before? What do you think? When you were still in Lunweiting City, you should have had contact with Sister Gloria many times, right?"

"Nothing, my opinion." Leticia said slowly, "I rarely see her, I don't know what she is doing, and my grandma said not to pry into other people's privacy."

"I've said it before, but it's hard to believe until I see it with my own eyes." Metien said with emotion: "Also, why would Gloria's other personality distance herself from me? Did I do something to make her unhappy?"

As for Metien’s own opinion…

She lowered her voice and asked mysteriously, "So, is it true that Sister Gloria has two personalities?"

When did she become a philosopher? Metien looked at her friend in confusion, as if she had gotten to know her all over again, and then shook her head and said, "Of course not, but Sister Gloria is a princess, so she should have all those court etiquette and rules engraved in her bones. Maybe this is what is called aristocratic cultivation?"

If Shemi and Leticia couldn't give any useful advice, let alone Livia, who had been lying in bed for the past half month recovering from her injuries. She had just recovered a few days ago, and then she was pulled over to participate in the revival of Tianxin Church. In this way, she had never met Gloria even once.

"Because Lingge is a very nice person!" Metien argued for his brother: "It's impossible for anyone to hate Lingge. Sister Xiaoxia does, and so does Sister Aovila. Sister Rolena and Sister Yieta must also like that... Everyone likes Lingge very much, right?"

Xie Mi curled his lips and said, "Is it possible that the woman named Bai Ye treats everyone like this? I heard that she treats Ling Ge the same way."

Metien was a little speechless: "It's not your fault. There is no shortcut in learning magic. Have you forgotten that you were chased and beaten when you used fairy magic to awaken the tree spirit last time? So, Sister Lorena is doing this for your own good... No, aren't we talking about Sister Gloria? How did we get here?"

"Why not?" Xie Mi looked at his friend strangely: "Don't you think Lingge will not be disliked by others?"

Although it was Lingge who dealt with her every time, given the little bat's personality, she might be too lazy to deal with people outside Yunjingkong Island.

"You don't understand, Metien." The goblin said solemnly, "It's easy for human laziness to overcome rationality, but it's not so easy the other way around. Usually, we call such people saints. Do you think Gloria is a saint?"

It was a very fitting answer for her, but also a meaningless one.

"Olvera is also a princess, but she stays up late all day. Lorena is the sea princess of the Azure Sea, but she is such a stingy person. Last time I asked her to help me refine a prop that can enhance fairy magic, she refused and even said she would tell her sisters. It's so infuriating!" The little fairy was still indignant when she mentioned this matter, because she was lectured by her two sisters afterwards. She thought that even if Lorena didn't agree, there was no need to tell on her. People who tell tales are the most annoying, even more annoying than Leticia.

"What about Alice?"

"Eh……"

Metien was silent. Leticia, who was standing next to him, snorted coldly and threw the small stone she had picked up. It hit the bushes with a clattering sound, covering up her muttering: "I hate Lingge... I hate him the most."

"..." Livia watched the interaction of the little girls in silence, and suddenly felt that their world seemed to be more complicated than that of adults, not based on the complexity of reality, position and interests, but based on emotions. Or, it is precisely because it is based on emotions that it is more complicated than reality, because emotions are something that people can't understand. Adults are unwilling to admit their ignorance, so once they become adults, they only think about talking about interests and ignore emotions. Maybe only children can be so persistent.

Livia suddenly felt a little embarrassed and didn't want to look at herself in the mirror in front of these three little girls, so she quickly changed the subject, or rather, pulled the topic back: "Why are you talking about this all of a sudden? Didn't you say you were going to invite Miss Gloria to attend the Seven Days Ceremony?"

"It seems so, but we can't find her." Metien thought for a moment and said, "Maybe Linger knows?"

There was no reason, it was just a hunch. It seemed that Lingge should know everything about everyone, be familiar with their personalities, and be able to accurately tell where everyone liked to stay, so anyone who wanted to know anything could ask him directly.

Then the problem is coming.

"Where is Lingge?" Leticia asked casually, and then picked up a small stone from the ground, but this time she did not throw it away. Instead, she held it in her hand and looked at it carefully. It was smooth and round, and could even reflect her face. The little bat thought to herself, I'll take it back and give it to grandma.

Leticia's question made the remaining three people look at each other in bewilderment, because they found that they really didn't seem to know where Lingge was. Normally, the young man would either stay in his room reading or stay alone by the pond in the forest. Apart from that, he would occasionally take the initiative to chat with others, mostly when the other person had psychological problems, such as Olvera who always stayed up late and Ieta who couldn't leave the windmill tower room.

But when I was recruiting people just now, it seemed that everyone I met was asking about Ling's whereabouts. In other words, no one has seen Ling recently?
It was not until this moment that Metien realized that although his brother gave people a very self-disciplined feeling, his style of doing things was so irregular that several people here guessed his location and got many different answers: Metien wanted to go to Lingge's room to find him, Shemi insisted that he should be by the pond in the forest, Sister Livia thought that maybe she could ask a few more people, and Leticia curled her lips and said noncommittally that maybe he was in the Tianxin Church behind us?

Eh?
The speaker may not mean anything, but the listener may take it seriously. Metien's eyes lit up, thinking that although this was unlikely, what if? Sister Alice had said that Ling Ge was a proud person. What if he only said he opposed the reopening of Tianxin Church, but actually cared about it all the time? Thinking of this, she immediately became energetic, stood up and clung to the church door, quietly pushed open a gap, and looked inside, trying to catch the scene of the young man appearing in front of the goddess statue with a false heart.

After a few seconds, she silently closed the door and sat back on the steps.

Leticia asked, “No?”

Metien looked depressed: "No."

How abominable! How could Lingge be so cruel? He said he didn't care, but he didn't even want to sneak over to take a look. Could it be that Tianxin Church only occupied such a small position in his mind?

Ugh.

The pink-haired girl sighed deeply, feeling that even as a younger sister, she could not see through him. Then she raised her head again, staring blankly at the azure sky, seeing endless white clouds passing quickly from her emerald eyes, and she couldn't help but think: If Lingge is not in Tianxin Church at this moment, then where would he be?

……

But in fact, Lingge was not anywhere, he was in his room.

He didn't do anything, he was just sleeping, and at the same time, he had a very long dream about the past.

In his dream, he seemed to have returned to his youth, when he lived in Tianxin Church with Mr. Yanke and Metien. The white city plane trees in the backyard had just been planted, and the windowsills and corners of the church had not yet accumulated dust. Only the statue of the goddess on the altar was as holy as ever, as if it had never been worn away by the years since its completion.

For the young people, that was the warmest time in their memories. Although their days were not very affluent due to the need to run the church, a stable place to live and a life experience without having to worry about where tomorrow's bread would come from were invaluable compared to their previous wandering life.

His adoptive father was a gentle, knowledgeable and wise man. He taught him many truths through his daily life and helped the boy to get rid of the hostility he had developed while wandering. His sister was well-behaved and sensible. Although she was clumsy, she always cared about her family in her own way. The residents of the same street initially responded to these outsiders who suddenly broke into their lives with indifference and vigilance, but they were soon moved by Mr. Yang Ke's sincerity and gradually regarded them as an indispensable member of the community. They also gradually got used to the existence of Tianxin Church. Even if they were not on the seven-day ceremony of distributing bread and milk, they would occasionally take the initiative to come to the church and offer prayers to the goddess, which were not pious but sincere enough...

The young man who didn't know what faith was at that time grew up little by little in such an environment. He understood the preciousness of this kind of life better than anyone else, so he always tried his best to treat it, although sometimes he tried too hard and went in the wrong direction. For example, he once told his adoptive father that if necessary, he could inherit his ideals and wishes in the future, but he shook his head and smiled and refused.

Don't live just to meet other people's expectations, you should do what you want to do. At that time, he said: The only requirement is not to hurt others, and not to hurt yourself.

The young man remembered these words firmly until he graduated from the church's national school, went to Linville University to study history, decided to leave the university and return to Tianxin Church, and inherited the position of resident pastor after taking care of his adoptive father's funeral... He never forgot them.

But did he really do what he remembered?
The young man slowly opened his eyes, and his slightly hollow golden eyes contained a dim ceiling. The wood texture had long been mottled after years of rain erosion and insect bites. Even though the owner had repaired it with great care, it could not conceal the oldness and decrepitude that emanated from it.

In fact, he sometimes wondered what his future would be like if the life he was living at that time continued.

But thinking about these things is meaningless, so he slowly stood up and looked up at the window. A gray-haired girl stood quietly by the window. She was admiring the dusk of Yunjing Sky Island. The magnificent sunset dyed the sea of ​​clouds into an orange-red color, like the fiery clouds in midsummer. A large group of flying birds were passing over the distant skyline. One of them seemed to fall behind, flying slower and slower, and completely out of the team. But the companion in front did not wait for it, but flew forward on its own, gradually disappearing at the end of the afterglow. The abandoned bird circled in place for a few circles, and its mournful and mournful cry sounded like a crow and a night owl. Finally, it was forced to lower its altitude and landed on the sky island that happened to pass by.

So, for those abandoned birds, is this Yunjingkong Island the only choice when they are desperate? They would rather come to a strange environment and face unfamiliar faces, but also want to have a place to stay, because that is always the most important thing for a lonely soul.

The girl retracted her gaze and turned to look at the young man on the bed, her tone unchanged: "Congratulations, you finally woke up."

"Mr. Linger."

　Give me some meow
　　
　
(End of this chapter)