The Bizarre Detective Agency

Chapter 532: Gades's Shelter

"He's back..."

Anna, who had been sitting silently with her head bowed as if asleep, abruptly raised her head, her gaze fixed on Lu Li's face.

"Has he woken up?"

Remi, standing guard at the shelter's entrance, materialized quietly in the doorway. She saw that Lu Li was still lying on the bed, his eyes closed.

He hadn't returned.

She started to offer some comfort, but Anna shook her head and whispered, "No... his soul is back."

Anna's gaze seemed to pierce through the thick cave walls, past the withered Elm Forest, and settle upon the town on the far side of Sugard Mountain.

"I can feel it."

Remi didn't press for details. "What are you going to do?" she asked.

Anna's cold gaze settled on Remi. "I'm leaving his body in your care. I'm going after his soul.""Alright."

Remi agreed. Besides, even if Anna hadn't asked, she and her brother would have done so anyway.

"...Thank you."

Anna's figure vanished into nothingness. Remi felt her icy aura rapidly recede, dispersing from the clifftop.

...

The sensations now were vastly different from those in hell.

In hell, the sensations of the soul had been indistinguishable from those of the body; he could touch objects, smell scents.

Upon his return, all of that seemed to have been stripped away, left behind in his body, far away in Belfast.

A bottomless, turbid aura enveloped his soul, and it did not fade even in the light of the oil lamp.

Lu Li suddenly realized: perhaps this was the aura of the In-Between that enveloped Anna and corrupted her soul.

Because of his unique constitution, Lu Li couldn't feel its mental influence, but its thick, sinister chill gave him a fleeting glimpse of its terrifying edge.

"So... you died, and then your soul found my secret vault, and from my secret vault, it returned to my vault?"

Gades noticed that the approaching Lu Li was translucent—a disembodied soul—and pieced together what must have happened.

"I didn't die. I just contacted hell through a spiritual ritual, and couldn't find my way back properly."

"So... you didn't die, and then your soul found my secret vault, and from my secret vault, it returned to my vault?"

"You could say that."

After all, the stone door was located in two of Gades's vaults.

Gades eyed Lu Li suspiciously, finding his explanation hard to swallow. After all, everyone had witnessed what just happened on the other side of the mountain.

"You unlucky bastard," Gades muttered, his eyes suddenly sharpening. "The things hidden in my vault and my secret vault..."

"Didn't touch a thing."

"I don't believe you. Swear on it!"

Lu Li just stared at Gades silently.

"For old times' sake... come with me. How much longer do you plan on occupying my vault!" Gades grumbled, gesturing for Lu Li to hurry up and leave.

After Lu Li passed him, Gades took out a ring of keys, locked the vault's seven locks one by one, led him out of the basement, bypassed the crowd in the main hall, and returned to the second-floor bedroom through the back courtyard.

"Damn it all, why do I keep running into you..."

Grumbling under his breath, Gades shut the bedroom door.

Lu Li drifted to the window. Gades went over to pull open the curtains for him, then slumped into an armchair, crossing his arms and glaring.

Outside the window, everything was shrouded in a light haze. It was a pale red, and the higher up the mountain, the denser the color became, until the peak was a terrifying, fiery crimson.

It was as if Lu Li hadn't returned at all, and was still gazing at the Black Rock Volcano.

An invisible, familiar warmth beckoned to Lu Li from the other side of the mountain—it had to be his body.

It seemed he would be spared the tragedy of a soul unable to return to its body.

Remembering something, Lu Li reached for his chest. The solid object in his pocket confirmed that the Evil Spirit Chess Piece had returned with him.

"What happened in Belfast?" Lu Li asked without turning around.

"'When the stars are right, the claws of the Outer Gods will reach for this world, the ancient deities will awaken from their slumber, and the overlapping realms of the In-Between will draw infinitely close to our own. The end will come, and we will all perish with this world.' Gades picked up a book lying face down on the table, read a passage aloud, and tossed it back down."

"Although it's just the strange ramblings of a mad exorcist from the past, reality is usually stranger than fiction."

Lu Li knew all this would happen someday.

But now that it had actually happened, a profound sense of bewilderment still washed over his soul.

His dark gaze fell upon the street below: refugees from Belfast resting against the walls, patrolling police officers, and fellow exorcists.

They didn't yet realize that their doom had come.

Although this catastrophe had plunged them into despair and fear, true hopelessness was still a long way off. Perhaps when dawn broke, they would set off for Himmfast or other cities on the Main Continent.

They still thought that this disaster, like the one in Zenster, was just a coincidence.

Perhaps it was Gades's presence that made Lu Li recall the words the man had spoken to him months ago, when he had first arrived in this world.

Ignorance is bliss.

Tearing his gaze away from the scene outside, Lu Li looked at the man who had likely known this was coming all along. "The Sentry Post won't be safe for long."

"I know, which is why I've prepared a way out."

Lu Li had a good idea what that escape route was. He had just seen it, after all.

The greedy exorcist was surprisingly bold. No ordinary person would ever dream of seeking refuge in hell.

Lu Li's gaze returned to the crimson haze enveloping Sugard Mountain, as if he could see right through it to everything happening in the burning city beyond.

"You're not planning on going back, are you?" Gades spoke up.

"My body is in the city."

"As your senior, I have some advice," Gades said, crossing one leg over the other, a hint of gloating in his voice. "Get used to being a ghost. Honestly, it's a lot easier for a ghost to survive these days than a human."

"My body is still there. I can feel it."

"But how will you get back? Belfast is on fire, the streets are crawling with monsters, and countless anomalies are stirring. It's nothing but a giant meat grinder now!"

Lu Li finally looked away from the window and met Gades's gaze, his own eyes calm. "So, will you take the job? Get me to Belfast. Name your price."

Gades was genuinely tempted, but he still shook his head decisively, turning down the alluring offer of money.

"However, you've reminded me of something," Gades suddenly straightened in his chair, his face growing serious, as if he were about to discuss something important.

"You used my passage to hell to get back. Now, it's time we discussed compensation..."

Lu Li didn't hear what he said next.

His gaze was fixed on the window, from which a familiar, soul-chilling icy aura was rapidly approaching.

Crash!

The window suddenly exploded inwards, spraying shards of glass across the room. The curtains were ripped to shreds.

Amid the frightened screams from the street below, a figure crashed into Lu Li's embrace.

The piercing cold emanating from the figure nearly caused Lu Li's soul to dissipate, and it was only the Evil Spirit Chess Piece that held him together.

"You're back."

A soft whisper brushed against his ear as the tattered curtains slowly settled.

"Yes."