Chapter 1 Hao Ren is Stunned by the Golden Estate

Hao Ren was stunned when he heard about the Golden Estate, and Pierre was even more surprised to see Hao Ren's reaction. He didn't expect that this vampire in front of him (he subconsciously regarded Hao Ren as a vampire as well) didn't know about the Golden Estate. What were these two doing here?

"What is the Golden Estate?" Vivian frowned and looked at the freelance detective in front of her. "Listen, we don't want to hurt anyone, but you better tell us the truth. This place is already being watched by many people, and others may not be as easy to talk to as we are, so if you confess honestly now, maybe we can still protect you."

The cold aura around Vivian made Pierre's teeth chatter uncontrollably. Hao Ren saw that he was about to have another seizure, so he patted Vivian on the shoulder. "You should withdraw your supernatural powers first. If I have to resuscitate him twice more, I don't think I can save him."

This was not a good place to talk, so Hao Ren took Pierre to a bedroom next door. The room only had a rickety old wooden table and a few dust-covered chairs. Vivian quickly cleaned it up a bit, and it was barely suitable for sitting. Pierre was pale and was helped by Hao Ren to sit at the table. He took a cleverly designed hanging lamp from his carry-on bag and fixed it on the wall next to him. When the bag was opened, Hao Ren saw that there were many strange things inside, including oddly shaped iron bars, lens assemblies that looked like telescopes, and bizarre devices that squeaked. These things were dazzling, and Hao Ren couldn't help but sigh, "You have quite the complete set of tools – what are these for?"

Pierre sighed. "There's one thing I didn't lie to you about: I really am a detective, but the things I investigate are a little different from ordinary detectives. I investigate the things that people treat as urban legends and myths... that is, your world."

Hao Ren immediately became interested. "Ghost hunter? Supernatural detective? Vampire enthusiast?"

He could roughly guess what kind of profession Pierre was in: a supernatural worker who was an ordinary human without any special powers, relying on some small technical tools to dabble in the surreal realm. They could be said to be special individuals walking on the very edge of the alien society, like scavengers in the magical realm. There was no room for such people to survive in the Age of Mythology, but with the end of the Age of Mythology and the contraction of alien forces, many unsupervised gray areas were formed, and this kind of low-risk "legacy field" gave birth to people like Pierre. Hao Ren had known for a long time that there must be people in the world who made a living from this, but he had never met one before.

Pierre nodded slightly embarrassedly after hearing Hao Ren's words. "More or less... I thought you would understand our profession better, since you actually live in 'that world'."

"Have you ever been in contact with other 'aliens'?" Vivian asked casually out of curiosity.

"Rarely, but I have had some contact occasionally," Pierre nodded. "They were all near-death experiences, but thanks to those experiences, I can barely calm down after seeing you."

Hao Ren waved his hand. "Let's not talk about this. What exactly is this Golden Estate you mentioned?"

A light flashed in Pierre's eyes, and then he carefully took a wrinkled notebook from his bag. "The Golden Estate is a lost ancient ruin. Very, very few spirit world detectives know that this estate exists, and even fewer should believe in its existence and be able to find it. It is said that thousands to ten thousand years ago, a group of 'Tala' people from the dark depths of the universe were exiled from their homeland. They wandered in the cold starry sky and landed on this land on a stormy night. Although they came from the cold and dark starry sky, these 'Tala' people were originally a civilization surrounded by light and wealth, so when they landed on Earth, they built an incredibly powerful fortress, which was the Golden Estate."

When talking about the "Golden Estate," Pierre's spirits were obviously lifted, and the timidity and panic he had shown before completely disappeared. He pointed out the messy illustrations and notes in his notebook to Hao Ren and Vivian. "According to legend, the ancient gods on Earth fought with the 'Tala', but after the battle, the two sides reached an agreement. The Tala could build their own camp around a small mountain in South America. This small mountain was made of black stones and dark brown soil, with two rivers flowing parallel on each side. At a certain moment during the summer solstice every year, sunlight would pour down from the top of the small mountain, evenly covering the entire plain in front of the small mountain. The location of the Golden Estate is on the hillside where the sunlight shines. I have been searching for many years, and I have finally determined that this place is the location of the legendary Black Mountain."

Pierre's notebook was full of rough and crude hand-drawn illustrations, with many annotations written next to the illustrations in strange shorthand symbols. These things should be secret codes used by so-called "spirit world detectives." Hao Ren couldn't understand these records, and he wasn't interested in these maps. He was interested in the Golden Estate itself. "Is this estate really built of gold?"

"This is the most crucial part of the story!" Pierre's face flushed with excitement. "The Tala people mastered magical magic, and they could turn sunlight into gold! And gold was the most worthless thing in their society. They used extremely purified gold to make gold plates and pasted them on every wall of the Golden Estate, and the railings and benches in the estate were all made of pure gold. The purity of these golds is more refined than the best gold that humans have ever been able to purify, and it carries the power of the sun. People who touch these golds can master magic and can also understand the mysterious Leta runes!"

The other party even knew about the "Leta runes," so the legend of the Golden Estate was probably not just the fantasy of spirit world detectives. This was probably the distorted version of the Ankatelo family's legend in human society. Hao Ren turned his head and glanced out the window. There was only darkness under the night. "Where is this Golden Estate you mentioned now?"

"It was exiled by the Tala people themselves," Pierre said with a serious face. "Because the major planets in the solar system disturbed each other, the magical power on this planet was declining day by day. Slowly, even the Tala people could not maintain their own power, so they decided to leave this planet. In order to collect the necessary energy, they closed the Golden Estate and sealed it in the shadow formed by the intersection of sunlight and darkness. Because the Golden Estate itself was built with sunlight, it became untouchable like light after it was exiled. To find a way to enter the Golden Estate, you must change your vision and be able to see the road in the light..."

Hao Ren quietly poked Vivian's arm. "By the way, I didn't expect the popular version of the end of the Age of Mythology to be like this."

Vivian looked at the strange lens assembly in Pierre's bag. "So you plan to use this thing to change your 'vision' so that you can find the entrance to the Golden Estate in the sunlight?"

"It's very effective. I've used this thing to find the entrances to many secret realms," Pierre said confidently, but soon he thought of the identities of the two people in front of him, and he showed an embarrassed expression. "Of course, this is just something that we people with shallow magic knowledge have to use. You certainly don't need it."

Vivian picked up the lens assembly casually. She saw that the lenses emitted a faint blue light in the darkness, and some lenses showed strange patterns when they overlapped each other. She was a little surprised. "Treated with magic potion? You really have some genuine goods."

"I inherited these lenses and the knowledge of making several magic potions from my grandfather. My grandfather was..."

"Most likely a servant of some vampire or werewolf," Vivian said casually. "This is what he learned from his master. The descendants of the servants of the gods rely on this incomplete inheritance to become spirit world detectives, and these spirit world detectives turn around and dig out the secrets of the gods from the broken walls left by the Age of Mythology... really, who would have thought there would be such a day."

As Vivian spoke, she put the lens back. "I suggest you stop while you're ahead. Magic potions are harmful to the human body, and this lens will allow your eyes to see things you shouldn't see. Those things will invade your spirit. If you don't want to spend your fifties in a mental hospital, you should stay away from this field while you are still sane. Of course, it's up to you whether you listen or not. I'm just being nosy and saying a few words to you."

Pierre responded vaguely a few times. Hao Ren saw that the atmosphere was starting to become awkward, so he brought up the matter of the Golden Estate again. "So you're going for the gold?"

Pierre's expression changed slightly, but his answer was beyond Hao Ren and Vivian's expectations. "Gold... is indeed one of the reasons, but I mostly hope to see the legendary sun wheel that seals the Shadow of Divine Wrath. My desire for wealth is far less than my yearning for knowledge. If I can see the sun wheel, I can abandon the gold of the entire estate."