April 17th, 1955
5:20 p.m, Palermo's outskirts, on the team's car
"Your driving speed is too slow!"
Next to the driver's seat, the girl who had black and white-colored pigtails pouted and complained.
"As if it wasn't your fault!"
The driver wearing sunglasses argued.
"Who the hell could drive fast with the instructions that always crashed into the buildings or dead-end valleys?"
"If I didn't owe you last time, I would have thrown you out of the window already."
He clicked his tongue with the frustration on his face that was clearly reflected on the rearview mirror.
Unaffected by his threatening words, Balloon Party continued to focus on the special GPS in her head.
"After 230 meters, turn left and keep going forward!"
"You'd better wish there was a fork ahead." He accelerated the car, "...Or else I'll definitely crash into some houses and drive through them."
On the middle seats, Vertin and Sonetto were discussing the next use of X's invention.
"Apart from Mr. Click's cell phone and yours, we still have 5 devices in total."
From a close distance, Vertin could see some pages on Sonetto's small notebook were filled with calculation formulas.
"Based on X's instructions and your cell phone's performance earlier, the approximate duration of one device can last 10 minutes on average, if the battery is fully charged."
"However, we still need to use at least one more device to give out a more accurate result."
Vertin nodded and gave her opinions.
"I think we should limit the numbers in our directories and add essential numbers first, since its selection mechanism is totally random."
"Though all the people in our directories are our colleagues, some of them may be on field missions or far away from Laplace and the Headquarter. It will take a lot of time for them to get back."
"I agree with your points." The orange-haired chief assistant nodded.
Some minutes later, the car actually met a fork in the road. Pavia once again clicked his tongue, as if dissatisfied with the fact that he couldn't crash into some houses like he had said earlier. After a few more minutes driving forward, the man suddenly announced to other members in a rather serious tone.
"Hey, we're about to enter Greco's territory."
From the car, they could see a group of armed men in casual clothes blocking the road 200m ahead. Instantly, everyone stopped what they were doing to listen to him.
"Have any of you gained their permission yet?"
Although he said that, his eyes were looking at the reflection of the blond-haired woman on the rear seat.
"Oh, what do you expect from me?"
Tennant replied to him with her usual smile, as if saying that she didn't know what he meant.
"That bride is the favorite granddaughter of Greco's old man."
Somehow, his voice seemed like he was amused.
"The last time I saw a fool dared to cheat on an old man's granddaughter, his corpse was used to feed some piranhas in the pond in his mansion."
In response to his words, the woman narrowed her eyes. Her smile looked much brighter and a little scary.
"What a coincidence."
She exclaimed in surprise.
"I once watched a filthy-mouthed man who proclaimed his words were smart and humorous."
"But in the end,..." Tennant slightly shook her head and expressed her pity, "...his bloody body that still had heart beats was thrown to a hungry piranha's pond."
"And you know what, the only remains of him that those piranhas left was a pair of sunglasses, floating on the water surface now tainted by red."
The woman used the palm to cover her mouth and let out some chuckles.
"Wanna die, huh?"
With a glower at her face, Pavia took out one of his guns.
"I don't mind if my bullets kiss your forehead and become one with other parts of your body."
At the same time, Tennant also pulled out the gun from her gun bag.
The atmosphere inside the car immediately became extremely tense.
"I won't cure any of you if you get hurt."
Balloon Party's sudden words broke the strained situation in no time.
"As if you've ever cured any of us before!"
The man turned his sight to her and argued.
"Necrologist won't cure you, either!"
She pointed at the girl in black on the rear seat, who was puzzled about what was going on.
Before Pavia could respond, Balloon Party continued to point at Vertin and Sonetto respectively.
"They won't cure you, either!"
Looking at a temporarily speechless Pavia, Tennant began laughing heartily. Next to her, Necrologist even saw some tears in the corner of her ruby eye.
"Alright, I have received my treat."
Facing the fierce gaze from the driver's seat, the charming woman wiped the remaining tears on her eyes and spoke more comfortably. Between her fingers, a piece of emerald earring appeared like a magician's trick.
Next, she pressed a certain embossed pattern on the earring that led to the bright green color of the gemstone losing its shine.
"I can't guarantee if my lovely Beatrice is able to come here and pick us up."
Tennant shrugged her shoulders.
"Let fate decide if the lucky goddess is still on our side."
—---------
5:30 p.m, Ciaculli - Palermo's outskirts, in the mansion of the Greco's family
"Miss Beatrice! Please at least tell us where you are going!"
Breathing heavily, the middle-aged woman, who wore a long dark blue dress and a white apron, chased after the young lady in front of her along the hall.
"Mi principe azzurro is calling me!"
(*Mi principe azzurro: my prince charming)
Without turning back, the young lady shouted with joy. She had brownish-red shoulder length hair and was wearing a sleeveless floral print dress, court shoes and a pair of white gloves.
Along the way, many men in black suits all lowered their heads and greeted her as she passed by them.
"Good afternoon, Miss Beatrice!"
She waved her hand at them as her response.
The young lady, or we could call her Beatrice Greco, was the granddaughter of the current boss of Greco's clan. If her wedding in Taormina yesterday went smoothly, she would have already become a new member of Marino's clan.
After the reinforcement from Greco's family came, she was escorted back to the mansion of Greco in Ciaculli, an outlying suburb of Palermo as well as the main territory of Greco's family.
Both her and her groom, Giulio Marino, refused to continue this wedding because of the awkwardness between their relationship and their minds which were focusing on more important things. From the beginning, their wedding was arranged by both families, so there was nothing called "love" here. They just carried out their responsibilities for their families, that's all.
With Beatrice, the most important reason that made her change her mind was her prince charming that she had finally met in her wedding!
Despite the fact that they had to be temporarily separated afterwards, she had given her lover one of her special earrings as their love token. Whenever her prince missed her and wanted to meet her, they just needed to press a certain embossed pattern on the earring and her ability would lead her to their place.
Yes, Beatrice was a half-blood arcanist, unregistered one. One of her abilities allowed her to extract a small amount of arcanum, put it inside an alchemy object and use that object as any devices she could imagine. For example, she had turned her earrings into small GPS devices in Tennant's situation.
As the young lady approached the car's garage, the middle-aged woman seemed to be left behind at some point. She easily opened a black Lancia Aurelia with the key hanging on the board at the garage's door and started the car.
"I'm coming to you, my love!"
As soon as her car passed the entrance of the mansion, the middle-age woman, who finally caught up with her young lady, shouted in panic.
"Miss Beatrice! It's dangerous outside!"
Then she immediately turned to some bodyguards nearby.
"Follow her!"
No more than one minute, two cars that were full of armed men left the mansion.
"Oh, God! Please let her come back safe and sound."
The woman murmured as she remembered Boss's previous words.
'Those Ferrozas wanted to take away my Beatrice because of her abnormal abilities. They want to squeeze out all of her useful value like they used to do with her mother.'
The middle-aged woman was a long-serving maid of Greco's family. That was why she still remembered the bloody vendetta 16 years ago, when her young lady was just a 4 year-old little girl. The incident in 1939 was also the beginning of the internal feuds in Greco's clan due to the death of Boss's second son, Beatrice's father.
She once heard from other members that the young master was killed when trying to take his wife, Beatrice's mother, back from Ferrozas' family. Right after he was shot to death, his wife also suicided on the scene.
From the bottom of her heart, she felt so lucky that Beatrice was inside Greco's mansion with Boss at that time.
—-------
5 p.m, somewhere in Palermo's outskirts, in a secret abandoned shelter
The old lady just finished giving herself first aid on the serious wound in her right hand, which was above the elbow. It was a wound caused by a gunshot and the bullet had already been taken out by her.
Under the flickering light of the oil lamp, her appearance slowly revealed.
She was Mrs. Mozzoni, who had successfully escaped from the hidden trap that was prepared for her, thanks to Click's help.
In exchange for her escape, the ghost reporter was now on the verge of his second death. Meanwhile, Mozzoni was being hunted by the minions of Zanelli, the current Chief of Sicily's Office.
Well, his merciless actions weren't beyond her expectations because if she were in his place, she wouldn't be less ruthless than him. Still, she used to hope that he could listen to her advice a little.
'I had become more sentimental since his passing...'
The old lady let out a sigh of tiredness, waiting for all those mobs to leave this area.
Now she was unable to contact the outside since her communication device had been destroyed in the duel earlier by the intentional attack of Zanelli.
'I should have known what he meant when he put that white lupara on the table.'
Suddenly, she widened her eyes in surprise as feeling her arcane skill was about to reach a decisive stage of the bet.
"I haven't lost this bet yet..."
The old lady quickly regained her calmness and smiled.
A Fair Bet was the name of Mozzoni's innate arcane skill. Its ability allowed her to create a fair bet between herself and any living subjects.
To begin a bet, the two subjects must place their "betting money" on an invisible scale until two sides of the scale meet the balance. Furthermore, they must agree on the certain contents of the bet that consisted of the sides they chose, the "betting money" they wanted and the rules of the bet.
Next, her arcane skill would ensure two subjects have the same competitive advantages, as well as prevent both sides from breaking the rules when the bet was still proceeding.
For instance, Mozzoni began a bet with a not-yet ripe apple tree. Though the tree couldn't speak, her arcane skill also counted its silence as an agreement.
Then she bet that if its legs couldn't run farther than hers, all the apples would be ripe tomorrow. And if they could, she would have to take care of it everyday until all the apples were ripe.
The "betting money" of Mozzoni was her time and care in the future, while the one of the apple tree was all of its apples becoming ripe the next day.
As the apple tree didn't have legs, her arcane skill would create a pair of legs for it.
Despite the fact that it seemed to be far-fetched, Mozzoni had unconsciously created a bet with Destiny, while experiencing a terrible shock on a certain day in 1945.
Her "betting money" were an eye and 1/3 of her life span, while Destiny gave her a chance to take her son back to life.
Therefore, most of the incidents that happened in Sicily lately, including the appearances of Vertin's team in Sicily, were caused by the bet between her and Destiny.