The Bizarre Detective Agency

Chapter 619: Sanctuary

Lu Li reached for her back, but Doreen, her own back turned to him, dodged with the uncanny flexibility of a boneless creature, contorting into a grotesque pose.

At the same moment, Anna extended an invisible hand to grab Doreen’s back, but the instant it made contact, the hand silently dissolved, like a snowflake landing on a hot chimney flue.

“My power is being suppressed...” Anna frowned.

“You stay here,” Lu Li said, pushing through the throng and lunging after Doreen.

“Mama! Mama, where are you?!” a cry rang out, barely audible over the screams of the crowd.

Lu Li saw a little boy standing helplessly by a wall, nearly trampled several times by the fleeing people. He went over, scooped the boy into his arms, found the woman searching for her child, and returned him before continuing his sprint toward the fork in the tunnel.

The maddened citizens had completely torn down the planks barricading the fork, broken through the exorcists' cordon, and were now shoving one another like beasts as they plunged into the side passage.

Two exorcists struggled to their feet, saw Doreen approaching, and tried to stop her. As she drew near, Doreen suddenly displayed an unnatural flexibility—or rather, a slipperiness—and evaded the exorcists’ grasp, diving into the side passage.

“Leave her to me,” Lu Li yelled as he caught up, leaving the hesitant exorcists with that command as he darted into the side passage.

Darkness instantly enveloped him. Lu Li pulled out his flashlight and switched it on, navigating by its weak beam and the sound of footsteps ahead.Doreen was pulling away from him, and the frantic pounding of the citizens who had rushed in earlier had already faded to silence.

A muffled thud...

Suddenly, the sound of Doreen falling echoed from the depths of the dark passage. The excavation was clearly incomplete; the uneven surface was treacherous to walk on.

But Doreen hadn’t fallen because of the tunnel floor. She had tripped over a suitcase, its color blending into the stone wall. It burst open, spilling gold with a clatter.

The fate of the previous mayor was now painfully clear.

Lu Li caught up to Doreen as she was getting to her feet. She had fallen just before an abyss at the end of the passage. The fall seemed to have shocked her back to her senses, and she stopped running. But she just stood there strangely, oblivious to her scrapes.

Doreen lowered her head, her face hidden by shadow and strands of hair.

As Lu Li took a step forward, she slowly raised an arm and extended it, pointing at the wall beside her.

The dim beam of light fell upon the uneven stone, revealing Doreen’s shadow... No, it wasn’t a shadow.

A black silhouette was carved directly into the rock, an unnerving and perfect replica of Doreen’s form.

Lu Li shifted the flashlight and discovered more human silhouettes surrounding the black figure on the stone wall.

Figure after figure stood within the rock, some distant, some near. Their outlines were etched into the stone, as if they were calmly watching Lu Li stand among them.

Doreen’s slowly lowering arm drew Lu Li’s attention back to her.

“This is my end...”

Doreen whispered, took a step back, one foot dangling over the abyss, and then the other followed...

A young, fragile life vanished before Lu Li’s eyes.

Darkness and silence pressed in on Lu Li from all sides. Through them, he seemed to hear a faint call emanating from the abyss that had swallowed Doreen and the others.

Lu Li ignored the call, backing away step by step. The human silhouettes in the stone walls on either side drifted into his field of vision. He suddenly understood that these black figures likely belonged to the citizens who had leaped into the Abyss.

Perhaps it was because Lu Li’s will was strong enough, perhaps because his humanity resisted the temptation, or perhaps because there was no black silhouette of him on the wall... Whatever the reason, Lu Li made it out of the side passage safely.

Meeting Anna’s anxious gaze, Lu Li gave a slight shake of his head.

The chaos in the underground passage had been brought under control. The incident had likely already been reported to Mayor Valentine. But at a time like this, unless the side passage was made completely impassable, the evacuation process could not be stopped.

Anxious officials asked for Lu Li’s opinion before hurrying back, pressing themselves against the wall.

The two exorcists managed to block the passage again, and the evacuation plan resumed. However, the shadow of the sudden disappearance of two dozen people still hung over the crowd. As they passed the side passage, the citizens instinctively pressed themselves against the opposite wall, giving it a wide berth. Parents covered their children’s eyes, shielding them from whatever horrors lay within.

Lu Li and Anna followed the crowd, moving farther away from the side passage until it disappeared from view.

Lu Li recounted the grim events of the side passage to Anna. When he finished, his thoughts turned to the Abyss in the Fallow Lands that had swallowed dozens of exorcists. Had they, like Doreen, discovered their own fates carved on its walls?

Doreen’s fate was just as she had said at the end—it was her end. It seemed she wasn't being chased by some strange silhouette from a nightmare, but by herself, by her own destiny...

Either way, Lu Li had failed to fulfill Tom's request. His sister had been found by that silhouette in the end, and she had perished in the Abyss of the underground passage.

Thirty minutes later, Lu Li and Anna reached the exit at the other end of the tunnel.

Darkness once again shrouded the land.

Lu Li and Anna left the procession, watching as the people turned their backs on the distant city of Flarand, lurking in the night, and entered a corridor that stretched in a straight line toward the horizon.

Bonfires burned at regular intervals on both sides of the path. They provided light and kept the Dandelions at bay.

For most of the citizens, this was a stroke of luck. Help arrived from a nearby town an hour before dawn, and until then, no anomalies troubled the long line of evacuees.

Lu Li and Anna didn’t meet up with the exorcists. Once they learned of their arrival, they prepared to return to Flarand.

But before they left, Lu Li saw Tom among the evacuees.

He seemed completely oblivious to his surroundings and didn’t even notice Lu Li and Anna nearby. Having lost his sister, he moved like a zombie, shuffling mindlessly forward in the final pre-dawn gloom, just following the crowd.

Lu Li and Anna returned to Flarand, traveling through the air. Mayor Valentine was surprised to see them back, but then he remembered their original purpose and asked, “Do you need any help?”

“We can handle it,” Lu Li said.

“A quiet bedroom and some food,” Anna added.

Since the events in Ellen Royal City three days ago, Lu Li had only slept for a few hours.

“Of course,” Valentine replied, ordering a servant to show them back to their guest room and prepare a hearty meal.

Lu Li was truly exhausted and fell fast asleep before the food even arrived.

When he awoke again, Anna was sitting in a wooden armchair by the fireplace. A cold meal sat on the dining table. Aside from the crackling of the logs in the hearth, there was no other sound.

Lu Li looked out the window. It was as dark as it had been when they returned that morning.

“What time is it?”

“Almost evening.”

Lu Li had slept the entire day.

Getting out of bed and walking to the window, he saw that the desolate square outside was utterly devoid of life, with only black smoke rising from extinguished bonfires.

The dandelion mist had completely enveloped the lifeless city.

Anna came up behind him and handed him a map, on which the location of the Flarand Sanatorium was marked.

“Valentine was the last one out. He left an hour ago. Now, we’re the only ones left in the city.”