Lu Sheng looked at the dilapidated attic in front of him. The nameplate on the iron fence outside the building read: Hall of Strange News.
Originally, he planned to find the library here, but he saw this place on the way. His keen intuition told him that it was very possible to find the clues he wanted here.
So he stopped and planned to go in and take a look.
Pushing open the iron fence, he walked slowly in. Inside were two young men who were cleaning. They took brooms and methodically cleaned up the yellow and fallen leaves in the yard.
Lu Sheng walked along the main road towards the entrance of the attic.
There is a price list at the door.
‘It costs ten marks to visit. Please buy a ticket to enter.’
Lu Sheng put ten marks into a glass cabinet placed on the inside of the door and walked in slowly.
The attic is a zigzag-like structure, with black and white oil paintings and corresponding explanatory texts hanging on the walls. In some places there are some key items that seem to be related events.
Lu Sheng walked around, and most of them were about various weird and strange things that happened near Berlin, and in front of all the events, he added the sentence, "Absolutely true."
'In 1855, a case of missing cows occurred on a farm outside Berlin. The three police officers who went to investigate, Tom, Johnson, and Vincent, disappeared that day. So far, no clues have been found.'
'In 1843, a murder occurred in the West End of Berlin. The face of the deceased was blackened, and other body parts were the same as before death. Forensic examination revealed that his head had been dead for several months, but his body looked like he had just died.'
'In 1871, the painter Paul, who came from France to hold an art exhibition, mysteriously disappeared in the corridor of his art exhibition. Ten minutes ago, he was discussing with his assistant how to move some of his paintings. Ten minutes later, when
When he crossed one of the corridors, he completely lost track of him.
Since then, no one has seen him again. Only a strange symbol was left at the scene.’
Lu Sheng's eyes narrowed slightly. In the photos left in this case, the symbol vaguely resembled the eyes of a snake.
His throat moved and he continued reading.
The remaining cases are either mysterious disappearances or various bloody and bizarre murders.
But the type that left the mysterious symbols has never been found.
Lu Sheng soon returned to the previous case of the painter Paul.
There are several remnants of the time left in front of this case.
A rusty kettle, a half-painted canvas, and a paintbrush broken in two.
"No. 183, Temple Street." Lu Sheng wrote down the address.
"How's it going? Isn't it exciting? The places recorded here with addresses are basically famous supernatural places." A young man in a suit with a mustache next to Lu Sheng said with a smile.
"Not bad." Lu Sheng smiled and nodded.
"It's really good, but it's a pity that there are fewer and fewer people who like these now, and I don't know how long I can last here." The young man said with some regret.
"Let me introduce myself, I am William Clark, the organizer here."
"My name is Jack, nice to meet you." Lu Sheng stretched out his hand and shook his hand.
"I have been running this theme exhibition here for more than a year. Unfortunately, the income is far from being able to sustain consumption, rent, daily expenses, staff wages, etc. Every day is a torture." William said helplessly.
He glanced at the case of the missing painter that Lu Sheng was paying attention to.
"Speaking of which, I personally followed up on this case at the time. I rushed there the day after Paul disappeared. He and I were good friends. Before he disappeared, he told me that he tried his best to draw
It’s the best work I’ve ever done. Let me go and admire it.”
"He disappeared in the end?" Lu Sheng continued.
"Yes." William was a little emotional. He was obviously only less than thirty, but he was like an old man, sighing.
"Actually, I am a policeman." Lu Sheng said softly, "I have experienced similar weird cases before. Unfortunately, my power is limited and I cannot really bring the murderer to justice."
"Police? That's really a coincidence." William said in surprise, "At that time, the Berlin police didn't know why, they ignored it, and they were not even willing to mention it. It was only a few years later that they stopped blocking it so strictly.
"
"Are there any additional clues?" Lu Sheng asked casually. He didn't hold out any hope of getting clues from here.
The clues to this case must have been dug up by the police here long ago.
"Does that painting count?" William said with a wry smile.
"Can you take me to see it?"
"Of course." William agreed readily.
He took Lu Sheng directly to the depths of the exhibition hall, opened a locked room, and pushed the door open.
It was densely packed with all kinds of things.
There are life-size dolls with clockwork on their backs, various dark red vases with strange patterns, rusty swords and full-body armor, feathers of some unknown birds, and huge bones of unknown biological species.
All kinds of messy things are piled together, like a grocery store of various discarded items.
William rummaged around inside and quickly found a tightly wrapped picture frame.
"That's it, take a look." He handed the frame to Lu Sheng.
Lu Sheng took it and slowly took off the thick cloth layer by layer, revealing the innermost canvas.
In the darkness, a huge snake-like shadow stretched across the huge city in the night.
The city's night was lit up with tiny lights.
"The shape of this city is today's Berlin." William reminded. "I looked at the map, and the city Paul drew is an aerial view of Berlin.
I guess from this picture, he must be hinting at something."
"What does it imply?" Lu Sheng frowned.
"Yes, a year before he disappeared, when I occasionally exchanged letters with him, I often heard him mention some weird terms and places. Since then, I have been a little worried about his mental state." William felt a little sad.
He said, seemingly feeling sad for the disappearance of his former friend.
"What noun and place?" Lu Sheng asked.
"I can't remember most of them clearly, but I still have some impressions of some of the most repeated ones. For example, Miska University, tutors and so on." William shrugged. "I guess he may have wanted to go back to university for further studies.
, I was a bit in a trance, and I was very tired during that time.”
"Miska University? Tutor?" Lu Sheng touched his chin.
"I checked and found that there is no such university in the whole of Germany, or even in the whole of Europe. Maybe there is such a university in other states, but it must be an unknown place. I can't figure out why he is so attached to this place.
"Single Bell" William looked puzzled.
"Do you still have information about this university?" Lu Sheng asked again. His intuition told him that there was definitely something wrong with this place.
"Let me think about it." William scratched his hair, "Oh, yes, Paul also mentioned that he seemed to have passed the Foreign Special Recruitment Adult Examination and applied for the assessment. At that time, he was very excited and said that he had a hard time.
If you pass the initial written test, you will be interviewed for the second time soon.”
"Test? Do you know where to apply?" Lu Sheng asked quickly.
"You can go to the education department and ask about the situation. That's all I know here," William shrugged helplessly.
"Okay" Lu Sheng returned the painting to William. After thanking him, he left the exhibition hall.
After wandering around for a while, he soon went straight to the nearest school nearby.
After several inquiries, Lu Sheng quickly found a school called Berlin Heller Middle School.
A sports meeting was being held in the school, and there was a huge crowd. Lu Sheng found a gap where the guard was not paying attention, and easily passed through the school gate.
The loudspeaker was playing deafening sports music. After asking a few students, Lu Sheng easily found the location of the teaching and research building.
Using psychological guidance, it took him less than ten minutes to find the specialized management office responsible for recommending students to various universities.
Boom, boom, boom.
Lu Sheng stood at the door and knocked softly.
"Please come in." An older man's voice came from inside.
Lu Sheng twisted the door lock and walked in slowly.
There were three or four people in the office sorting things. An old man was sitting at the desk near the door, wearing reading glasses and looking carefully at the directory in front of him.
Hearing the sound of the door entering, the old man raised his head and looked at Lu Sheng carefully.
"Hello, what can I do for you?"
"I would like to consult. My child is worried about which university to apply for. From his conversation with his classmates, I learned about a school called Miska University. He really wants to study in this school, but
I haven't heard of this school, so" Lu Sheng slowly used his psychological guidance skills and asked sincerely.
"Miska University, I can introduce this to you." The old man smiled happily, which made Lu Sheng's psychological guidance skills come to nothing. It seems that he himself is such a character who is willing to help others explain.
"It's normal that you haven't heard of it. This university has only started to recruit students from Berlin in recent years. It is not as famous as other famous universities, but their teachers and background are still good, and the required admission scores are not low.
It’s just that their interviews besides the written test are a bit strange.”
"strangeness?"
"Yes, their interviews screen out a lot of students who think they are excellent. Many people don't even know that they have been interviewed. And they are one of the few universities that only look at grades, regardless of age."
The old man smiled and said, "Speaking of this, I still admire their school philosophy. No matter how many times students have repeated a grade, they treat them equally. They even have adult entrance exams."
"They still have adult recruitment exams? So, I can accompany my son to study together?" Lu Sheng showed a hint of excitement.
"Theoretically, it's possible." The old man was also surprised, "Well, let me give you one of their admission application forms. After you fill it out, you can send it directly to the address written above. They will arrange exams, written tests, interviews, etc., to accompany you.
It’s up to you if you don’t accompany me.”
In this day and age, there are very few adults who are willing to pay so much for their children. The old man was quite moved and pulled Lu Sheng along to talk a lot.
More than an hour later, Lu Sheng was able to leave the office with the application form.