"Could it be that these are all the voices of the deceased?" Louis murmured to himself, his gaze gradually focusing.
He pulled out his wand and cast the "Revealing Spell" on the trunk once more.
This time, a familiar, faint fluorescence rippled across the surface of the trunk.
Although it didn't directly connect to images of Hogwarts or teleport anything over like last time, Louis could feel that the trunk had "woken up."
It was like a device being charged; although the power wasn't yet enough to turn it on for a call, the indicator light had already lit up.
"It seems my direction is correct."
Louis stroked his chin, his brain working at high speed.
If the first "Why?" represented The Shepherd's unwillingness and despair when his ambitions were shattered and his life ended;
If the second "Thank you" represented the determination of the elderly in the nursing home to face death calmly so as not to burden their descendants;
Then this time, the "Goodnight" represented the peace of a captive soul finally finding liberation.
Though he didn't know how he was hearing these voices, these three seemingly distinct sounds shared a common point—they all originated from death.
But it wasn't just death.
People die every day in this world. Louis had killed many Walkers before and even seen people die in the hospital, but the trunk had never reacted.
"So, simple death is not enough."
Louis looked at the flickering words on the trunk—
[Tear through barriers with despair; construct bridges with hope.]
If he combined this riddle with his recent experiences... could "embers of destruction" refer to tragic, unnatural deaths?
Like The Shepherd and those Believers. They were tortured to death, died miserably, and their beliefs collapsed.
Perhaps it was precisely because of that massive impact of energy that Louis noticed the trunk's anomaly at the time, which later led him to find a way to use it.
And could "sincere prayer" refer to... a last wish? Or some kind of strong, unfulfilled desire?
The wish of the elderly in the nursing home was not to burden their children; although Annette had become a Walker, Hershel and Maggie's farewell, in a sense, fulfilled her wish to "rest in peace."
"If that's the case, the logic holds up."
Louis's eyes lit up; he felt as if he had grasped the key point.
Having figured this out, a memory he had almost forgotten suddenly surfaced in his mind.
It was on their way to the CDC, when he had that "dream" about Hogwarts in the back seat of the RV.
At the time, he hadn't taken it to heart, thinking it was just a case of dreaming what one thinks about by day.
But thinking about it now, that might have been the trunk's first attempt to connect!
During that time, they had killed a large number of Walkers in the camp defense battle, and everyone had survived, fulfilling the group's strong desire to "stay alive."
Perhaps because the energy at that time existed but wasn't strong enough, it resulted in only a fragmented and blurry dream. It hadn't made him realize the trunk's anomaly, and he had even forgotten it directly after waking up.
As for today... Louis rubbed his chin.
Although the liberation of Maggie's mother counted as a fulfilled "prayer," simply clearing out a few Walkers probably didn't qualify as "embers of destruction."
The energy level was too low, so while the trunk reacted, it couldn't teleport.
"So, to stably open the teleportation, I might need to satisfy both conditions simultaneously."
Louis wrote down two lines on the paper:
1. Embers of destruction: Create death.
2. Sincere prayer: Fulfill a wish.
Of course, this was still just a hypothesis for now.
After all, it could also simply refer to "The souls of the dead" or some specific "emotional fluctuation."
Even the so-called "last wish" might just be something he had imagined; it still required actual verification.
Having deduced this far, Louis closed his notebook, his expression somewhat subtle.
"Verifying this conjecture is going to be a bit troublesome..."
"embers of destruction" was easy enough to handle.
In this post-apocalyptic world, the things in least supply were scumbags and villains. As long as he looked hard enough, he could always find a few 'talents' like The Shepherd.
Arranging a suitable end for them wouldn't weigh on Louis's conscience; it could even be considered as ridding the people of an evil.
The hard part was the "sincere prayer."
What defined 'sincere'? How strong did the wish have to be to count?
This was too subjective and too uncontrollable.
He couldn't exactly catch someone and give them a counseling session before killing them, asking what their last wish was, could he?
"Hey, brother, I know you're about to die, but before I do the deed, could you make a wish first? Like, hoping your death could be a bit more artistic?"
Setting aside whether he was that perverted, even if he did ask, who knew if the other person was telling the truth?
"It seems the 'prayer' part will have to be left to chance, or planned for the long term."
Louis sighed and locked the trunk again.
However, while the "bridge" was hard to build, there was nothing wrong with preparing the "fuel" first. Who knows, maybe if one type of energy was sufficient enough, it could force the door open a crack?
Thinking of this, Louis suddenly felt a bit sentimental.
Actually, when he heard that "Why?" on that rainy night, he had felt a bit creeped out, wondering if The Shepherd had died so miserably that he had turned into some kind of vengeful ghost.
Looking back now, that was actually the man's final "gift."
If not for that shout, he probably wouldn't have discovered the trunk's issue so quickly, let alone successfully made that "phone call" to Hogwarts later.
Who would have thought that this guy, who didn't do much good while alive, would end up doing him a huge favor after dying? He really should thank him... The next morning, however, the farm fell into a small state of turmoil.
Hershel was gone.
Beth discovered in her father's room that he had pulled out all of his late wife's belongings and scattered them across the bed.
And Shane, with his sharp eyes, immediately noticed an old silver flask sitting on the empty bedside table.
"It looks like... he went to find an old friend." Shane picked up the flask and shook it; it was empty.
"I thought he didn't drink," Glenn said, somewhat surprised.
"He's been sober since I was born, he even banned alcohol in the house," Maggie said with a grim expression.
"But looking at it now, he's probably preparing to pick that hobby back up."
She looked at the empty room, thought for a moment, and said, "I think I know where he is—that bar in town. It's a place he used to frequent when he was young."
With that, Maggie turned to grab the gun and car keys hanging on the wall, her movements resolute. "I'm going to bring him back."
"Wait, you can't go alone." Rick stopped her and immediately grabbed his revolver. "I'll go with you. Two people can look out for each other."
Glenn and Shane also immediately offered to go along, but Rick refused them.
"No, the farm can't be left unguarded."
Rick glanced at Guillermo and the others who were reinforcing the fence. "If Hershel really is drunk, having too many people might just provoke him. Maggie and I are enough."
In the end, besides Rick and Maggie, only one more person joined the team for this operation—Louis.
"I'm going too."
When Louis slung his bag over his shoulder and skillfully hopped into the back seat of the car, Rick's head began to ache.
He naturally didn't want to take Louis into danger, but the child's attitude was exceptionally firm, and he even brought up a bunch of messy reasons that Rick didn't know how to argue against.
After a brief and futile standoff, looking into Louis's determined eyes, Rick could only sigh helplessly and choose to compromise.
"Fine," Rick said while buckling his seatbelt, staring seriously at Louis in the rearview mirror, "but you must stay close to me at all times. No running off without my permission."
"No problem," Louis agreed obediently, though his mind was calculating something else.
His reason for insisting on coming was actually very simple.
On one hand, he remembered that in the original plot, on the day Hershel went out to drink, the bar would receive two uninvited guests, eventually leading to a tragic gunfight.
Although the plot had already changed, he had to go and confirm if that potential threat would still appear.
On the other hand, last night's speculation about the trunk had made him a bit eager.
Since it needed "embers of destruction" to charge, if those two thugs seeking death really showed up on time, Louis wouldn't mind using them to verify his conjecture.
And even if those two didn't come, he could take the opportunity to look through the town's bookstore or ruins.
He wanted to see if he could find other Harry Potter novels or setting guides, since Glenn had only brought back one last time.