The older man spoke a country-accented British English, but it was still much easier to understand than Torren's Cologne dialect.
"The ability to control fire? The information I got when I received the mission yesterday you're still a level 1 agent, did you get the Secret Stone of Fire last night?" English Uncle Richard looked at Shaun with great interest, "Just obtaining abilities can sometimes be poorly controlled and thus dangerous, especially the ability of fire. Just now you almost burnt down this beautiful hotel."
Shaun, who stood dumbfounded in his underwear on the bed, slowly calmed down after being startled, feeling the peculiar sense of connection between the Secret Stones.
"You're an agent here to support us?" Shaun asked as he cleared his thoughts.
"Yes, get reacquainted, level 4 agent Richard." The older man smiled and extended his hand towards Shaun.
Shaun reached out and shook the older man's hand, feeling the warmth and thickness of his hand.
"Richard, you, how did you get in? Been waiting long?" Shaun asked.
"Ugh, blame it on the damn ability, door locks basically don't work on me, get used to it. I just arrived not too long ago either. Went straight to the Roman Teutonic Museum when I got off the plane and looked around there before coming to you. There was another agent that went to contact Lola." Richard said.
"The Roman Teutonic Museum?" Shaun asked as he got dressed, thinking to himself, "I'm afraid if the agent who went to find Lola had trespassed into someone's bedroom like you did, I'm afraid I'd have flowers coming out of my nose."
"Yes, there was a theft from the Romano-Germanic Museum next to the Cathedral last night at the same time you were having a big fight at the Wallraf Museum." Richard said, suddenly changing the subject:Â "Is there any breakfast left in this hotel?"
Shaun looked at his watch: "There is, let's go together."
Richard said with some embarrassment: "I haven't eaten anything since I got off the plane, I'm hungry, let's eat and talk."
In the restaurant, Richard took several plates of food and chewed them. Shaun looked at his protruding stomach and thought to himself, "Didn't they say that an agent must be in excellent physical condition? Is this uncle any good?"
"Breakfast in Germany is similar to England, it's still very good, much better than those countries in the south of Europe. In those lazy countries, breakfast seems to be something superfluous." Richard said as he ate, noticing Shaun's gaze at his stomach, Richard smiled in embarrassment: "The years are getting on."
"Richard, what was the story with the theft from the Teutonic Museum in Rome last night?" Shaun asked sardonically.
"Oh, from what I was told by the people at the church, last night around three in the morning the museum's monitoring system was alerted to an intrusion into the museum. When the guards arrived, they didn't find anyone, nor did they find any doors or windows or display cases broken, let alone any artefacts missing." Richard swallowed a slice of Black Forest smoked ham wrapped in 'Mozzarelle cheese and began cutting another crepe.
"In light of recent events, the church instructed the police to notify the church of anything out of the ordinary. So the police reported what happened to the Church after questioning the guards." Richard ate the crepe, which was coated in thick chocolate sauce, and ate his scrambled eggs with the bacon.
"The church thought it was fishy and sent someone to join the museum staff and take an inventory of the museum's exhibits and found that one thing was indeed missing." Richard was eating with his mouth full and hadn't stopped.
Shaun had eaten his fill and was sipping a cup of Earl Grey tea, the strong aroma of the tea filled his mouth with just the right amount of bitterness to neutralise the greasy taste after eating a bunch of sausages and bacon.
Richard finished the eggs and bacon patted his stomach and tackled another plate of fruit, saying as he ate, "Such things as are missing are strange, they cannot be considered artefacts, they can even be considered worthless."
Shaun cooperated by asking, "Oh? What is it then?"
Richard chewed the chunks of fruit in his mouth with a spray of juice and Shaun thought to himself, "Uncle, could it be that you really are from the English countryside? Don't care about table manners at all!"
"You know how the city of Cologne got its name, don't you?" Richard asked without answering.
"Oh, as I understand it, the word Cologne is derived from a word from the ancient Roman period, meaning fiefdom, possession. Because the former queen of ancient Rome, one of the most famous women in the history of ancient Rome, the generation of poisonous queen Agrippina Jr. was born here. So this place was first called Agrippina's belongings." Shaun replied.
"Well, that's very nice. So you know, there have been a lot of relics and artefacts unearthed in Cologne from the ancient Roman period, and there are some artefacts related to Agrippina the Younger." Richard finally finished the fruit on his plate and looked at the several empty plates in front of him, and seemed to be contemplating whether or not to get something more to eat.
"Something stolen in the early hours of the morning has something to do with little Agrippina?" Shaun decided not to give Richard another chance to get something to eat and rushed to ask the question.
"More than related. Cologne had unearthed a stone box and other jars and bottles from an ancient Roman site that were identified as containers for Agrippina's make-up. In the well-sealed stone box, there was a bunch of light golden hair, presumably belonging to Agrippina herself. This stone box, along with the hair, was placed in a nondescript display case in the Teutonic Museum in Rome until it was stolen in the early hours of this morning." Richard finally stopped eating and sipped his black tea.
"The Earl Grey black tea at this hotel is very authentic." Richard complimented.
"Attila's blood, little Agrippina's hair, there seems to be a connection." Shaun said thoughtfully.
"Yes, there is a connection. Attila and little Agrippina have at least one thing in common:they're both epic badasses." Richard said with a smirk as he sipped his tea.
Shaun pondered:``Deacon Andre, the real demonic agent in last night's battle, was clearly trying to stop Father Schwartz and the others from getting Attila's blood, so it can be ruled out that it's the demonic agent side that's using the stuff to stage resurrection rituals or set up boundaries. Then the other force, Father Schwartz from the Dark Church is just a collaborator, which also rules out the possibility of the Dark Church doing it directly."
Shaun tapped the table: "Then it seems that the other few are the forces that really want the short sword and hair. The master they are talking about is the black hand behind the scenes."
Richard nodded his head and said, "That's true, I also came to that conclusion after analysing what happened yesterday."
Shaun asked:"How's the interrogation of the guy who was captured yesterday, the one who can use the Phantom Pupil's superpower?"
"The priest who reported to me in the morning told me that the man's eyes were already blind and there was no way to heal them. When interrogating him the church borrowed a professional from a government intelligence service and used some drugs, the guy even told me about stealing his classmates' pencils when he was a kid, that is, he couldn't tell me who his master was, apparently he's been put under some kind of restraint." Richard said.
"The guy who was caught said he was a high school teacher himself, the church found out that the big guy was a professional athlete, and the other guy who used his tentacle powers was a factory security guard, all of them lived in and around Cologne, and all of them had witnessed miracles and thus secretly believed in the master. Previously unknown to each other, they were brought together on this mission to snatch the shortsword, operating under the orders of Father Schwartz." Richard continued, "That is all that can be asked from him."
Shaun thought for a moment and asked, "Have you met with Father Frank? Did he get anything out of his trip to search Father Schwartz's place?"
Richard said, "Haven't met yet, let's go together now.MaternusHaus, I have an appointment with the church side to meet there, and the other agent along with Lola will go straight there to meet us."
The two left the hotel and walked to the Maternushaus, talking as they went.
Shaun asked: "This time it seems to be behind us, do you and the other agent have any other assignments?"
Richard shook his head: "It's not that simple, the Demon Spirit Agents have suffered a big loss this time, although they have no notion of avenging their teammates, I'm afraid that they will make even bigger and crazier moves to prove themselves, and it's hard to predict their next move."
"The Dark Church shouldn't make any moves, they've been suppressed by the Church so much that they don't dare to show their faces easily. Unless this cooperation with the black hand behind the scenes involves great interests for the Dark Church." Richard shook his head as he said this, not knowing if he felt that the Diablo Church wouldn't make any moves or something else.
"The most worrying thing is this force behind this incident, the black hand behind this incident, doing such a big thing, the Church and the Yingling world actually didn't have any information at all. This shows that this power hasn't existed for a long time, and on the flip side, this power that hasn't existed for a long time casually made the Church, which has dominated Europe for over fifteen hundred years, suffer a big loss, it's chilling ah."
Richard analysed as he walked, those who didn't know would think he was a nagging farmer imparting milking lessons to a friend.
Shaun listened as he walked, he did like Richard's easy-going personality without a stance, Shaun also knew that Richard, as a level 4 agent, must be crushing to himself in terms of both experience and combat prowess, so Shaun never really judged a book by its cover, thinking that Richard was an English country bumpkin.
But Shaun was still curious about how strong a level 4 agent could be.
It didn't take long to walk to their destination and Lola was already waiting at the door with another dark haired European woman. Lola changed her dress to jeans and sneakers and white shirt, only her expression was still cold, when she saw Shaun, the corner of her mouth hung out a light smile and slightly nodded.
The brunette next to Lola looked like she was from southern Europe, petite and pretty, but also had the same cold face as Lola and a pair of sunglasses.
"All these female agents have mental problems, don't they, all of them have spiteful faces." Shaun ventriloquised, but a warm smile piled up on his face.
After Richard introduced himself to Lola, the brunette nodded coldly to Shaun and said, "I'm Chloe."