Chapter 1001 Sixty-eight. A new beginning

  The bleak world is brought alive by the appearance of the white dress, as if emitting a shimmer.

  Lu Li watched quietly, until the figure got stuck in the narrow picture frame hanging on the wall, disturbing the silence, and approached the oil painting that seemed to be illuminated by light beams with echoing footsteps.

   The girl in the white dress raised her head due to the sound of footsteps and looked at Lu Li's black eyes.

   A patch of blush quietly spread from the white neck to the delicate face, clearly visible under the dim oil lamp.

  No one knows why the ghost blushed, but it was the same as when Lu Li had seen her.

  Lu Li reached out to her, the shy girl hesitated a little, put her illusory white palm lightly on it, and climbed out of the frame with help.

   She was a little nervous, and when she stepped out under the pleated lace dress, her feet got caught in the picture frame and jumped forward.

   The palm that stretched out towards Anna changed to wrap around her waist, and the left hand turned back to make the action like a pas de deux.

  Anna stayed in Lu Li's arms, immersed in the starry sky. After a while, she panicked and left Lu Li's arms.

   "Sorry...thank you."

  Ana shyly looked away and didn't dare to look at Lu Li again, but soon the girl's nature and awkward silence made her ask her out of curiosity, "Have we met before? Why do you seem to know me..."

   "This is our first meeting."

   "Are you a new employee?"

   "I'm Qu... Benjamin's friend." Lu Li's voice seemed softer than before.

   "It's really not like an employee..."

  Lu Li's handsome face and black eyes made Anna's memory fresh, and then it was quickly replaced by something more important: "He left you here? That's a bad guy, because this gallery is haunted..."

   Anna, who is also a member of "Haunted", said hurriedly.

   At this moment, before the chill shrouded it into an oil painting of landscape, it was cold and biting.

   "Did you... see... my child..."

   "Come, come, let's run!"

  Ana was so frightened that she hid behind Lu Li and pulled the corner of her clothes to let him leave.

   Lu Li tilted his head slightly, calmly watching the ghost figure emerging from the edge of the oil lamp.

   The long white dress like a nightgown was stained with blood, and a swollen skirt fell out and dragged behind him.

   "It should be in the upstairs office."

   "Why... not avenge me..."

   Athena's words suddenly changed, Lu Li lowered his black eyes and said nothing.

   "Why... not avenge me..."

   When Athena asked for the second time, and her voice was even more bitter and tearful, Lu Li said to her: "He is already dead, dying with pain."

   After getting the answer, Athena was silent, with "Did you... see... my child...?..." She retreated into the darkness, as if everything that happened before was just an illusion.

   The coldness gradually faded away, and Anna, who was hiding behind her, came up with her head again: "You seem to know Athena too?"

   "She used to be an employee here, but she was cut open by her fiancé Bill Eddy and killed along with the child."

   "Is she so pitiful... eh? How do you know this?"

   "Benjamin told me."

  Anna had no reason to doubt Lu Li, although his mysterious color was like those black eyes, but the appearance of a "friend" who could communicate made her happy.

   "Aren't you afraid of ghosts..." But she still tried it out cautiously.

   "Not afraid."

  Lu Li stared at those clear dodging eyes.

   "What if... I'm a ghost too?"

   "You came out of a painting."

   "Yes..."

   Soon, Anna forgot her shyness, although she still didn't dare to look into those eyes. Pulling up my skirt and sitting under the oil painting, it is like a sparrow twittering about life in the gallery.

  As one of the protagonists of the story, the statue moves from far to near, Lu Li calmly looks at it, as if reading Lu Li's eyes, the statue re-goes away with the sound of heavy objects rubbing against it.

   Anna, who was so immersed in her conversation, continued to speak without noticing the arrival of the sculpture. After telling the gallery's story, she began to tell her own story, her family's story.

   Occasionally accompanied by an inquiry sound.

   "I don't know your name yet."

"Land from."

   "Strange name...is this a pseudonym?"

"no."

   "Are you Belfast?"

"no."

   "Is that a Shymfast?"

"no."

   "You know Benjamin, did you come from the kingdom of Ellen?"

   "Neither."

   "Um... have you always been like this?"

   "Always what."

   "Don't like talking?"

"Um."

  It's okay, Anna has countless things to say.

  Lu Li quietly listened to Anna once again recounting the past she could recall, and was also immersed in a certain peace and beauty...

   The distant church bells rang faintly, and the morning mist enveloped Belfast, who had not yet woken up.

  The wick of the oil lamp placed on the floor became weak, and the gloomy coldness that swept across the body from time to time no longer appeared, and the statue deep in the gallery had returned to its original position.

   "Thank you for listening to my story."

   And getting along with Anna is also coming to an end.

   "Will you come tomorrow?"

   With some kind of expectation and shyness, Anna looked up at the pair of black eyes that reflected the oil lamp and mist.

"Maybe."

   "...Goodbye, Mr. Lu Li."

   With undisguised loss, Anna returned to the oil painting, the vivid color gradually faded, and it solidified into the original thickness of the oil painting.

   Only Lu Li stood alone in the empty gallery filled with gray and white mist.

   Stopped in front of the oil painting for a while, Lu Li suddenly reached out and took off the frame.

  In the early morning, when Benjamin arrived, he saw the exorcist holding a picture frame with a statue beside him. And his calm words scared Benjamin almost to the ground.

"There are five spooky creatures in the gallery. The painting and the statue, the Dracula painting at the stairs, and the two ghosts, Athena and Ruth. Athena has been resolved, and I'll take the painting and the statue with me. "

   "Please wait—" Benjamin, who was in a cold sweat, had no doubts, because he knew about the ghost Athena and the statue: "That Dracula painting and... and the ghost Ruth."

   "You can sell Dracula's oil painting to the exorcist, I haven't met Ruth."

   Lu Li, who didn't intend to clean up the gallery, ignored Benjamin's plea and left the gallery.

   returned to the detective agency in a carriage that ran by in the morning. Lu Li put the statue back to its original position, lit the oil lamp, and tapped the oil painting frame lightly.

  Anna slowly woke up and floated out of the oil painting with sleepy eyes.

   "Where is this?" She found herself not in the gallery.

"Family."

   Anna leaned forward under the oil lamp and approached Lu Li. There was a hint of blush on the delicate doll's cheeks, and the clear eyes were sparkling, as if there were thousands of stars twinkling, conveying the same message as the old days: "So you bought me?"

   "No money, I told Benjamin that there was a ghost in the painting and he let me take it."

  The shy Anna gently lifted the skirt, and bowed to Lu Li in aristocratic manners.

   "Nice to see you again, Mr. Lu Li."

   (end of this chapter)