The Bizarre Detective Agency

Chapter 527: An Old Acquaintance

Icy frost, like a living creature, spread from the hoofprints.

The advancing Death Wind, carrying an aura of destruction, washed over him, yet it couldn't stir a single hair on the Demon of the Ice Heart.

He lowered his head, gazing at the already fading hoofprint.

Shhh... shhh...

Whispers drifted from all around him.

Not far from him, a strange figure in a white dress stood on the scorched earth.

The Demon of the Ice Heart frowned.

He had heard of these foolish creatures of Hell: they just stood in one place, waiting for their meals to come to them.

Ordinarily, he wouldn't have minded "getting acquainted" with a few of them, but right now, he had more important matters to attend to.

The Demon of the Ice Heart glanced in the direction of the hoofprints, tilted his head slightly, and a cold whisper echoed around him."Human, where do you think you're going?"

...

"How much further?"

"Less than halfway."

The near-endless ascent was finally behind the Skeletal Steed's hooves.

They had to be approaching the crater of the Black Rock Volcano.

Lu Li and the Skeletal Steed had no intention of passing directly through the crater's center, so their path veered slightly to the side.

The heat from the summit scorched the three figures on the steed's back; even the Skeletal Steed's protection couldn't block it completely. Ruth was in terrible shape; she discovered that her soul was being consumed several times faster than it had been at the base of the mountain.

Besides the slow drain on her soul, something far more terrifying was pursuing them.

Ruth kept glancing back. Though the Death Wind obscured her view, she asked, "Will we make it?"

"I hope so."

The calm in Lu Li's voice never wavered.

Other than Ruth, no one knew why Lu Li was crossing the volcano. This might have made the Son of the Devil, who was trailing them, lower his guard and not press his pursuit too aggressively.

The Skeletal Steed galloped along the slope of the Black Rock Volcano for about ten minutes. The terrain shifted from an incline to a decline as they began their descent.

Racing at full speed, the Skeletal Steed was like a bolt of fire tearing through the grim haze, deftly avoiding the dangers in its path.

As they left the summit behind, the Death Wind shrouding the volcano gradually began to subside.

"Lu Li..."

At that moment, a whisper thick with emotion echoed clearly in Lu Li's mind.

From the steed's back, Lu Li looked toward the area they were skirting. A figure in a white dress stood there, seemingly identical to the others they had seen along their journey.

"Wait..."

Just as they were about to pass the figure, Lu Li tilted his head and called out to the Skeletal Steed.

Leaving a long skid mark on the scorched ground, the Skeletal Steed came to a halt.

Lu Li slid off the steed and stared intently at the approaching figure in the white dress.

"What are you doing? Wait..." Ruth exclaimed from the steed's back, a stunned look on her face. "You know her...?"

"Yes."

The figure in the white dress, now thirty meters away, was close enough for Lu Li to make out her face.

A few memories surfaced in his mind.

In some ways, she had left a deeper impression on Lu Li than Ruth had.

Michelle. The girl who had died because of rumors and slander.

"You died too..."

The faint voice came not from within Lu Li's mind, but directly from Michelle herself.

Lu Li looked at Michelle, now a creature of Hell, and replied, "I'm not dead."

"Not... dead..."

Michelle lowered her head, as if trying to process his words.

She drew within ten meters of Lu Li. Ruth warily kept a hand on her holster, ready for anything.

"I'm a medium. I'm here on business," Lu Li replied, his brow furrowed.

Michelle's state was strange; she seemed sluggish, almost slow-witted.

"Stay..."

The faint whisper came from her lowered head. Suddenly, Michelle looked up, reaching her hands toward Lu Li. A horrifying stream of blood gushed from her eye sockets, carving two tracks of bloody tears down her face.

The instant Lu Li sensed danger, the black, scorched earth buckled violently. A massive, horrifying monster erupted from the ground beneath them.

Flying rock and dirt obscured his vision. The Skeletal Steed whipped its head around, snatched Lu Li by the collar, and flung him onto its back before bolting forward like an arrow.

Snap!

A sharp crunching sound, as if the creature had snapped its jaws on empty air, was followed by a gust of wind that whipped past the Skeletal Steed's tail.

Clinging to the Skeletal Steed's ribs, Lu Li glanced back.

A huge, hideous creature resembling an anglerfish was scrambling after them on eight short legs.

Its jaw was split wide open, and its tongue had taken the form of Michelle—or rather, it was Michelle.

Michelle was like a pearl emerging from a grotesque shell. She reached for Lu Li as he grew more distant, her lovely face, streaked with bloody tears, full of a tender reluctance to let him go.

"Stay forever..."

The racing Skeletal Steed quickly left Michelle behind, and she gradually vanished into the swirling Death Wind.

"Did we lose her?" Ruth yelled.

"I don't sense her anymore," Lu Li replied.

"Why didn't you say she was your enemy!"

Letting out a sigh of relief, Ruth glanced back before turning to glare angrily at Lu Li. If the Skeletal Steed hadn't reacted so quickly, they would have perished in the jaws of that creature from Hell.

But Lu Li remained as calm as if nothing had happened. "She's not an enemy."

Recalling Michelle's words, Ruth gave Lu Li a scornful look. "A lover you abandoned?!"

"Not that either."

There was no point in hiding it. Lu Li recounted Michelle's story to Ruth.

"I thought you'd done to her what you did to me, and that she came after you full of resentment," Ruth said, a look of understanding on her face.

It seemed Michelle's tragic fate didn't concern her; she was more interested in whether Lu Li had been the one to kill her.

"See who's more reliable now?" Ruth scoffed through Whitley's body. "The people you help try to kill you, while the one you killed wants to help you."

Lu Li didn't answer.

He was merely impassive by nature, his feelings suppressed by absolute rationality, but that didn't mean he was devoid of emotion.

The encounter with Michelle had inevitably stirred a faint ripple of emotion within him.

But only on the inside.

"This is why I don't want to turn into a demon..."

Ruth's voice was suddenly a quiet whisper, stripped of its usual pride.

"If thoughts like that take me over... would I even be myself anymore?"

Ruth wasn't entirely indifferent; like Lu Li, she simply didn't show it.

"You will still be yourself."

Ruth raised her head in astonishment, staring at the back of Lu Li, who had unexpectedly responded.

"As children, everyone imagines they'll become a brave warrior or a brilliant inventor, someone ready to help people. But as they grow up, most cast aside those unrealistic fantasies."

It was the first time Lu Li had ever said so much to Ruth.

"That doesn't mean those children stop being themselves."

"Are you saying... it's a kind of growth?"

"More like change," Lu Li said, his gaze fixed ahead. Far in the distance, a boundless, dark line was faintly visible, barring their path. "No one stays the same forever. Everything eventually fades away."

This was another reason Lu Li had given Anna her freedom.

She needed to have her own mind.

She had to be the one to choose how she changed.

Whether for better or for worse.