The Bizarre Detective Agency

Chapter 1013: Betrayal

"Sisoran... we can ask him to help us get out..."

Professor Haig recalled the betrayal that had caused him such pain.

"He's a member of the camp."

Professor Haig shook his head slightly.

"Sisoran is innocent, I know it. It was my wife... Mim seduced him. Perhaps I can convince him to help us."

"Where would we find him?" Lu Li asked, saying nothing more.

"I don't know..."

Silence fell in the dark room.

Lu Li walked to the window and peered out through the dust-streaked glass.

A red beam swept past intermittently. The heretics of the camp put their complete trust in the eyeball, so there were no patrols roaming the deep streets."We're going back," Lu Li announced.

The door creaked open. Following Lu Li's lead, Professor Haig extinguished his oil lamp and stepped out silently onto the dark, unlit ground of midday.

In the distance, over the quiet city of Midnicht, the shadow of the World Tree—the very symbol of human civilization—and the flickering lights of the four alchemical towers seemed both near and far at the same time.

Professor Haig shook himself from his stupor and followed Lu Li deeper into the camp.

As the eyeball on the beacon-church swept by at its fixed frequency, Lu Li and Professor Haig were already hiding in the narrow, cramped alleyways between the houses.

At first, everything went smoothly. The trouble started midway through.

As this was the most frequently scanned area, crossing it required speed and agility. For Professor Haig, an ordinary man with no mystical powers, it was a daunting challenge.

Then disaster struck. The red beam vanished for a moment, and as Professor Haig followed Lu Li toward an alley a few dozen meters away, he tripped on a jutting stone and fell with a thud just short of the entrance.

The red beam was rapidly approaching from a distance. Lu Li caught the oil lamp before it could hit the ground and make a loud noise, then grabbed Professor Haig and dragged him into the alley.

The red beam swept past right after them, revealing only the rising dust and the flash of a shoe disappearing into the shadows.

The one thing they had hoped to avoid happened: the red beam stopped at the mouth of the alley, its dangerous scarlet light spilling into the edge of the passage.

Deep within the narrow alley, only a few dozen centimeters from the red beam, a calm Lu Li and a pain-wracked Professor Haig remained perfectly silent.

After a long pause, just when Lu Li thought the heretics had been alerted, the red beam vanished. No footsteps followed.

Professor Haig relaxed his body, caught his breath, and was just about to say something when the red beam horrifically swept back over them.

Lu Li and Professor Haig held their breath.

After a pause of several dozen seconds, the red beam slowly disappeared, seemingly returning to its normal pattern.

Lu Li waited patiently for several minutes. Once he was certain the eyeball was no longer watching the area, he left their hiding spot, quickly guided Professor Haig across the dangerous section, and, after dodging the red beam twice more, returned to the house where they had started.

Creak—

After carefully closing the door, Lu Li lit the oil lamp.

The spreading, dim yellow glow illuminated the room. The sight of the heretic tied to the wooden frame startled Professor Haig, who then let out a sigh of relief.

He was now in a wretched state. The fall had torn his clothes and scraped his palms, and he had twisted his ankle. Dirt, sand, and blood were smeared together on his skin, and he had no time to clean himself up.

They had more important matters to attend to.

"After I enter his dream, keep whispering the scene of our arrival into his ear."

Lu Li gave Professor Haig the exact words to use, then leaned against the corner and slowly drifted into sleep.

A faint, misty orb of light hovered where the heretic lay. Lu Li plunged into the fog-like dream. The heretic's consciousness was scattered everywhere, with no center, no substance.

"I saw Lu Li and Professor Haig being brought to the camp..."

A loud, echoing whisper suddenly sounded from the sky, and the fog seemed to thin.

"I saw Lu Li and Professor Haig being brought to the camp..."

A few dozen seconds later, the echoing whisper sounded again, and the fog grew thinner still. Lu Li looked down and saw the muddy ground appear beneath him.

Then, with each repetition, the dreamscape changed. The fog receded, revealing more and more of the camp's layout.

"I... sa... w... Lu... Li..."

The whisper from the sky gradually stretched out until, after many repetitions, it became an unrecognizable, distant echo.

And the heretic's dream had now fully formed into the camp, with a carriage slowly rolling in—

Professor Haig's wife, Mim, and Sisoran rode into the camp in the carriage. Lu Li and the professor were led out. The heretics bowed slightly to them before Lu Li and Professor Haig were taken deeper into the camp. Mim drove off in the carriage, while Sisoran, holding a bundle, headed toward a warehouse at the edge of the camp.

Having memorized the warehouse Sisoran had entered, Lu Li exited the dream.

"Lu Li and Professor Haig were brought... did you find the place?"

Professor Haig asked as Lu Li's black eyes opened.

"Mhm."

Remembering the bundle Sisoran had carried, Lu Li realized his belongings must be inside it. Even if Sisoran couldn't resist temptation, Lu Li could still retrieve the Book of the Apocalypse, his spirit gun, the stomach, and the eyeball.

Assuming, of course, that the heretics hadn't discovered the power of the Book of the Apocalypse.

And they would have to cross the area patrolled by the eyeball once again.

Lu Li checked on the unconscious heretic, making sure he wouldn't wake up anytime soon. Then he and Professor Haig left, evaded the eyeball's patrols, and slipped into the house where the professor had been imprisoned.

Beyond lay the camp's main square. Professor Haig couldn't cross it with his twisted ankle. Only Lu Li could go, disguised as a heretic under a black cloak. The disguise would only work from a distance, however; up close, his unique human aura would be palpable.

"You stay here. If any heretics show up, try to buy me some time."

Lu Li threw on the black cloak, left the oil lamp with Professor Haig, and exited the house.

Silently leaving the eyeball's patrol zone, Lu Li imitated the slow gait of a heretic, moving like a drifting shadow—

Several bonfires burned in the camp square, dispelling the cold and darkness. A few heretics were gathered around them, whispering and praying.

Lu Li's appearance drew no attention or suspicion.

His black eyes, hidden in the shadow of the cloak, were fixed on the tall warehouse at the edge of the camp as he slowly approached.

Just then, a believer emerged from the farthest house.

He turned to Lu Li, raised his hands... and pressed them together vertically at his chest, palms kept apart.

Lu Li took a slight step back, maintaining his distance. He mimicked the heretic's gesture, holding his hands vertically with a gap between his palms.

Such gestures, unique to a church, often concealed a hidden danger... but Lu Li couldn't worry about that now.

The heretic noticed nothing unusual about Lu Li. After that, Lu Li encountered no further problems. He successfully reached the tall wooden door of the warehouse, pushed it open just enough, and slipped inside.

Darkness churned inside the warehouse.

Just then, a flame flared ahead. A lit torch illuminated a familiar face.

"As expected, Your Excellency Lu Li... you managed to escape the prison even on your own."

Professor Haig stood on the wooden stairs of the warehouse, his expression as admiring and respectful as ever.

And beside him stood two heretics holding torches.

"This is a trap. You're the one who orchestrated this," Lu Li stated, his black eyes reflecting their figures.

"Yes... the ritual is complete."

Professor Haig spread his arms, a fanatical expression on his face, yet his voice was unusually quiet.

"Light and darkness, trust and betrayal, friendship and enmity, abduction and escape, hope and despair, life and death... We call this equilibrium."

"Esteemed Your Excellency Lu Li, you are the finest sacrifice we can offer our Lord."