Love That Transcends Millennia

"Did you remember everything I told you?" In a daze, Shade finally came to his senses, looking around in confusion. Just a second ago, he was helping his friend with posthumous affairs. The next moment, he found himself here. It was a bedroom—certainly not a bedroom from the twenty-first century. The dim yellowish light wasn’t very strong, and though the slightly worn wooden floor was clean, the walls had already turned yellowish with age. A stack of books was piled haphazardly in the corner, leaning as if about to topple over. Next to the stack, a wooden bookshelf held metal kettles and framed pictures. All the photos were black and white. Besides oil paintings, two metal pipes ran along the walls. The clasps connecting the pipes were rusted, and a thinner pipe branched off near the desk. The brown wooden desk was covered in sheets of paper, its drawers slightly open, revealing stacks of documents. A lamp, connected to the brass-colored pipeline, cast a glow over the desk. The lamp's heavy, horn-shaped design was quite novel— "Huh? Not an electric lamp? A gas lamp?" It was hard to tell whether it was a gas lamp just by looking, but considering the pipes running along the walls and the wall-mounted lamps connected to them, they definitely weren’t electric lights. The warm yellowish glow wasn’t particularly bright, only illuminating the desk area, yet Shade inexplicably felt a sense of comfort from it. By this light, he saw the decorative oil paintings on the walls, the black-and-white portrait on the desk, and the newspaper spread out in the floor’s shadows. Though he couldn’t make out the content, he could see that the text wasn’t Chinese characters but letters. From its aged appearance, no matter where this was, it was no longer home. A faint smell of decay lingered in the air, reminiscent of a funeral home. Shade recognized it well—after all, just moments ago, he had been helping his deceased friend. "Did you remember everything I told you?" The voice rang out again, snapping Shade completely back to reality. A quick reflex told him that someone was gripping his right wrist. Now fully aware of his body, he instinctively looked down. He was standing beside the bed in what seemed to be a 19th-century gentleman’s bedroom. The bed was a four-poster, but only three sides had curtains. The frame and headboard gleamed with a metallic sheen under the glow of the bedside gas lamp. The lamp was held aloft by a small angel figurine, and for a moment, Shade was mesmerized by its exquisite design. The one holding his hand was the man lying in bed. This middle-aged man, presumably the bedroom’s owner, was dressed in dark checkered pajamas. Except for his head and right hand, the rest of his body was covered by the blanket. He had distinct Caucasian features, but his sunken eyes and hollowed cheeks made him look like someone on the verge of starvation. His skeletal hand gripping Shade’s wrist looked terrifyingly frail. He seemed so close to death that Shade felt as if speaking too loudly might push him over the edge. Shade had no idea what was happening, and he needed answers from this man. "So... have I transmigrated?" He thought to himself, beginning to grasp his situation. Thankfully, the man, though weak, didn’t have signs of livor mortis. Otherwise, Shade would truly be worried about his predicament. "Did you remember everything I told you?" The weak man repeated for the third time, his brown eyes sunken deep into his sockets but locked firmly onto Shade. Though Shade had no idea why he had suddenly appeared here, he knew that playing along for now was his best course of action. At the very least, he needed to understand his situation before making any decisions. He opened his mouth to speak, only then realizing that the man wasn’t speaking Chinese—or any language he knew—yet Shade inexplicably understood him. When he tried to respond in the same language, however, he found he couldn’t speak it. "No way... I can understand but not speak?" A buzzing sensation filled his ears, and an anxious itch crept down his spine. The inability to communicate in this world’s language was an unforeseen and serious problem. Then, the buzzing sound in his head grew louder. Shade quickly realized it wasn’t his own nervousness—he was actually hearing a voice. It was a woman’s voice, whispering: "The Sixth Era, Common Calendar Year 1853, Summer, under the shining Silver Moon. You have arrived in this dark world. You understand that you need an identity, so you must inherit everything from this body. This is the first step—prove that you can enter this world." "A system?" His first instinct was that this was the legendary ‘system,’ but he immediately realized it wasn’t. The woman’s voice was elegant and soothing, like poetry whispered in the night, intoxicating and profound. Yet, the language she spoke was neither Chinese nor the language of the weak man before him. It was older, deeper, carrying the weight of ancient winds that had traveled through time itself. The language was a manifestation of mystery. Simply understanding it filled Shade with a sense of overwhelming dread, as if he had glimpsed the abyss. Though Shade understood this second language as well, merely comprehending it caused his head to throb, and his stomach churned with nausea. This was the pressure of the supernatural—the language itself held power. "This is the linguistic system of this world! That voice in my head isn’t a system—it’s something that already existed in this body!" Shade came to a startling realization, his pupils narrowing. From everything he had seen so far, one terrifying conclusion stood out: "This new world—this seemingly Victorian, steam-powered era—is a world of the extraordinary and the occult!" He wasn’t the kind to reject reality. If transmigration was possible, then the supernatural wasn’t beyond belief. But for now, his first priority was understanding his situation, answering the dying man’s question, and figuring out his own identity. So, Shade directed his thoughts toward the voice in his head: "Whoever you are, listen. I want to accept everything about this body, but I have no memory or linguistic knowledge of it." "Now, you do." It felt as if a brick had been shoved into his skull and twisted around. The fact that he didn’t pass out was nothing short of miraculous. He hadn’t gained memories, but knowledge—specifically, knowledge of the "Northern Kingdom’s Common Language of Delarian Royal Kingdom." It was like having an internal translator. However, it wasn’t a complete mastery—he lacked fluency, understanding of idioms, dialects, religious references, and cultural nuances. "I apologize, sir. I am feeling unwell. Could you please repeat what you need me to remember?" Using this new linguistic knowledge, he roughly translated his thoughts into the Northern Human Common Language and intentionally spoke in a foreigner’s accent. The sickly man suddenly gripped his wrist tighter, showing surprising strength for someone so frail. "You’re still the same—always slow in the head. Fine, I’ll say it again." "Shade (Shade)." The name sounded familiar. "I’m about to die. Three months ago, I learned of my impending death. So, I chose you from among the vagrants, changed your life, gave you a new name, taught you to read and write, and provided you with some basic knowledge. After I die, you will inherit everything—my detective agency, all my possessions. But in return, you must do one simple thing." His sunken eyes locked onto Shade like a dying lone wolf, sending a chill down his spine. "Keep my detective agency running, no matter what you use it for, until September 5, 1853—three months from now. On that day, you will receive a letter. Retrieve it and burn it. That is the price of inheriting everything I leave behind." He tightened his grip on Shade’s hand, his skeletal fingers like iron. "This is my only request, from me, Sparrow Hamilton, to you, Shade Hamilton."