Chapter 25: The Hanged Man

Back to our little home.

The mission was over.

Lu Xiu got the money, and I got a cup of Bitter Rock Fire Village.

We were both very happy.

“Hehehe….”

I hugged my milk tea and drank, not even sure why I was so cheerful—just felt really, really pleased.

“Stop giggling like an idiot. This is just the beginning. That grotesque was the lowest grade. Don’t get cocky.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know.”

I waved my hand.

“You know nothing…”

Though he said that, he couldn’t help but look out the window. Sunlight swept across the window pane, illuminating every speck of dust on the table. Outside the glass, it was a calm and peaceful city.

I looked at him, opened my mouth, and swallowed the last bit of jelly pearls.

Crunch.

It was sweet in my mouth, like a huge lump of fruit-flavored hard candy.

Delicious.

Another grotesque was taken down by Lu Xiu and me the next day.

The third one.

In the alley, the stench of tentacles being ripped apart filled the air, making a wet tearing sound—claws, fangs, black blood—I opened my mouth.

Crunch.

It tasted like yogurt.

At a convenience store in the middle of the night, Lu Xiu was pushing a shopping cart, cold lights casting his face in expressionless relief. I was stuffing a giant bag of chips into my mouth.

Ding—

My phone screen lit up.

That was the sound of a mission.

A new address, a new code, a new… meal.

“Let’s go.” he said.

Inside an abandoned factory, rust and dust invaded my nose and mouth. I swallowed black blood, and with a scream, I pulled a round sphere from the lifeless grotesque’s body.

Under the moonlight.

I put it in my mouth.

Bit down gently.

Crunch.

Back home.

Hot water poured down from the showerhead, washing away the sticky fragments clinging to my body.

Red water flowed into the drain.

The TV was on, playing some dumb variety show full of laughter.

I dug into an entire tub of ice cream and finished it.

The sweet taste was just a little bit bitter.

Crunch.

Blood splattered on me.

Warm.

I stuck out my tongue and licked it.

Lu Xiu stood not far away, not looking at me.

He just gazed at the sky, where a few stars twinkled, stretched out his hand, glanced at his watch, and spoke tiredly:

“Next one.”

Ding

Ding

Ding—ding—ding

Crunch, crunch, crunch…

Ding

I didn’t even know how many times this was.

Neon lights of the city flowed across my face through the car window—red, blue, green.

Everything was spinning.

I leaned against the seat and yawned, my stomach warm and full.

It felt… like a dream I’d never wake up from, just a little too stuffed.

Until—

[Code ED-04332. Location: above Happy Residential District. Observers: Bian Capital Response Department, White Tower Branch. Initial Rating: Fierce. Hound squads dispatched.]

Ka—

Empty.

Boom——

Thunderstorm. The night sky looked down on the city’s neon, the dazzling colors spreading like mold, crawling up the upside-down raindrops, climbing the clouds, filling the night with sticky slickness, like gutter oil gleaming beneath street lamps.

Shhhhh.

Rain flowed, gathered into streams, swirled a few leaves, “huff huff,” running into the drains.

Tap.

The surface of a puddle was broken by a leather shoe, shattering into a flower-like reflection, Lu Xiu’s face mirrored in it.

He wore a black trench coat, while I was in a black dress as we arrived outside the building complex.

“This time, three Hound squads will be cooperating on the mission.”

He looked up at the roof, where the center of the storm was gathering.

I followed behind him, holding up a small umbrella.

Raindrops fell, sliding along the umbrella’s ribs and the clear plastic, blurring my face.

“We’re the last and also the smallest team. The others are already in position. Just waiting on us.”

“Oh.”

I was only concerned about when we could go home. I hadn’t finished the food I left in the fridge last time.

“Sigh…Let’s go.”

He sighed and led me into the building with the storm overhead.

Tap tap——

A light and a heavy pair of footsteps echoed through the empty hallway.

Then they reverberated.

“Lu Xiu, when we get back, I want two cups of Bitter Rock Fire Village.”

“One cup. No more.”

“Can I have a jumbo size?”

“No. Eating too much is bad for you.”

“Tch.”

Boring conversation, a boring ascent.

Everything felt so boring to me.

I really wanted something to eat.

“This incident is a demon event, and it’s a fierce-grade. Don’t underestimate it. Even the lowest demons are stronger and craftier than grotesques, because they possess intelligence.”

“So how does their flavor compare to grotesques?”

He pinched his brow, “Demons can’t be eaten. You can only kill them if you know their true name, got it? That’s why we’re the advance team—to investigate their abilities, not to fight.”

“Really can’t eat them?”

I was still a bit unwilling. If you can’t kill them, does that mean you could eat them forever?

“You probably couldn’t even get a bite, let alone eat them.”

“Fine.”

Tap tap.

We kept going up.

Endless stairs.

First floor, fourth floor, eighth floor…

By the time we reached the eleventh floor, the rooftop was just ahead.

But at that moment, my earpiece suddenly crackled, a frantic voice shouting over and over, “Attention! Evacuate immediately! Grade miscalculation! Third Hound Squad wiped out! Repeating…”

“Huh?”

My steps froze on the suspended stair.

Grade miscalculation?

Was there a mistake?

“Go back, Sui. Quickly.”

Lu Xiu didn’t hesitate for a moment, instantly grabbing my hand to go back down.

Then his body froze in place.

Thud.

“What—”

My voice stuck. Looking past his back, I saw that the stairs that had always gone down were now just a wall of concrete.

Everything was gone.

He—

“…This is Lu Xiu, requesting backup, mm mm…damn.”

He stuffed his signal-less phone back into his pocket, then drew that black-backed silver-patterned handgun.

“Stay sharp, Sui. We might be in big trouble this time.”

Seeing how tense Lu Xiu was, I realized how dangerous the situation was and said no more.

Gurgle gurgle——

Suddenly, my ears caught a churning, chewing noise, and soon, as the sound grew louder and louder, the entire world began to melt.

Yes, melt.

Like hot chocolate, all the steel and concrete flowed downward.

The surrounding walls, the stairs beneath our feet, and even the ceiling above peeled away chunk by chunk, like rotting flesh, splatting and merging with the floor, exposing the sky and the black shadow in the heart of the wicked green storm.

It was a hanging human silhouette.

A shriveled black figure, its belly split open and empty, with only a pumping heart beating black blood that poured downward, flooding back into its head, then leaking from the hollow eye sockets and gaping mouth, spawning thorny vines that grew upward, twisting into a cross, binding itself.

Its feet were planted atop the storm, gazing down at the world.

Like a reaper.

Directly below, a crooked magic array was drawn, four weeping heads placed at its points—tongueless, eyeless, faces to the four directions, bleeding tears.

“…It’s the Third Hound Squad…”

Lu Xiu’s voice sounded hollow, as if from far away.

Only then did I recognize two familiar faces among those ruined features.

That pretty boy I’d met once, and Liu Xue.

They were dead.

Nausea and dizziness twisted with the burnt, acrid smell in my stomach.

I couldn’t help but clamp my hand over my mouth, retching a few times.

Nothing came up.

Just then, my brain seemed to ache, and before I realized it, warmth began to trickle from my nose, drip by drip, blooming like plum blossoms on the floor.

Was I hurt?

I glanced at Lu Xiu and found he was clutching his nose, too, blood seeping through his fingers.

“Run. ”

He spoke to me.