The Bizarre Detective Agency

Chapter 880: Return to Innsmouth

Even an evil god is but His servant.

The only silver lining was that rescuing Katerina didn't require a direct confrontation with the Lord of the Depths himself, a being who had ruled the world since the dawn of time.

"He awoke when the stars aligned, but He has not yet recovered His strength and sleeps at the bottom of the sea. His minions and followers roam the coast, seizing newly made servants..."

Katerina was most likely in a camp inhabited by the minions, servants, and faithful of the Lord of the Depths.

And the sentient ship, Andrea, already had a general idea of her location, though the details were hazy.

The Andrea, with an unconscious Katerina on board, had headed for Vinnelag, passing through a particular bay. Certain creatures that made the ship uneasy had followed her stealthily, but nothing happened before she reached Vinnelag. They broke off their pursuit before drawing too close.

The city authorities took Katerina for medical treatment, while the Andrea was sent to a welcoming shipyard for repairs.

On her third day in port, as the Eternal Night shrouded the world, the Andrea once again sensed the same unsettling creatures approaching from the depths of the sea. And among them was a familiar aura—Katerina's.

The Andrea left the port in pursuit, but she was discovered, and a battle ensued.

In the end, the Andrea failed to retrieve Katerina and limped back to Port Roadster just before sinking.By piecing together the information later received from Vinnelag, they managed to reconstruct the truth: Katerina, her mind tainted by corruption, had been sent to Vinnelag. There, she was spotted and pursued by the followers of the Lord of the Depths, who had infiltrated the city and taken her away after she succumbed to their influence.

Katerina hadn't been taken by force... at least, her conscious mind had offered no resistance. The investigators found her footprints on the floor, mixed with silt and seaweed.

The Andrea remembered the route, and Lu Li located the sea region on a map. It was north of the Allen Peninsula, near where the trans-peninsular railway ran.

The area itself was unremarkable on the map, but Lu Li's attention was drawn to a neighboring bay.

There, nestled along its shores, was a town called Innsmouth.

Lu Li had passed through it once on a steam train, and the behavior of the locals had struck him as strange and unsettling.

He once again tasked his contacts in Vinnelag with gathering information about Innsmouth.

The results were disappointing. Since the end of the Ancient Era, when Himmfast, the last star of the Allen Peninsula, was destroyed, that 'tentacle' of land stretching southeast from the Main Continent had all but vanished from the records.

Any information on Innsmouth was outdated and useless.

The city authorities could try to find survivors from Himmfast who had fled to Vinnelag, hoping they might have news of Innsmouth, but that would take time.

Meanwhile, upon learning that Lu Li intended to go to Innsmouth to find Katerina, they desperately tried to stop him.

Lu Li, however, was done waiting.

The tentacled cultist had said Katerina was in no immediate danger—she wouldn't be eaten or sacrificed, merely brainwashed into becoming another one of the Lord of the Depths' faithful.

But that was no different from death.

And Lu Li had to find her before his own Mind Level dropped any further.

Besides Lu Li and his companions, the tentacled cultist and his followers would also be going, and the Distorted Figure could do nothing but let them leave.

And the Everlasting Dreamer was still lost in a sleep as long as eternity.

Boarding the hastily patched Andrea, Lu Li and his companions entered the gloomy fog and set a course for the northern coast of the Allen Peninsula.

...

The Andrea sailed calmly across the cold sea.

In the captain's cabin, Lu Li opened another letter delivered by Antoni, the Merchant.

Aside from Bishop John, the rest of the believers and the tentacled cultists were housed in a neighboring compartment following the repairs at the shipyard.

"From them again?"

Ophelia watched as Lu Li unsealed the envelope.

"Yes."

This was the third letter to arrive from Vinnelag.

The first two had been attempts to dissuade Lu Li from traveling to Innsmouth.

They didn't know what was there, but they knew why he was going.

Before heretics, mortals were as fragile as seafoam in the dead of winter, and exorcists were no exception.

This third letter was different. It bore the signature of Mayor Matteus.

"What... does it say?"

This time, he took longer to read the letter.

Lu Li didn't answer immediately. Only after reading it to the end did he fold the letter and speak.

"Mayor Matteus has found two members of the Church of Shadows. They were secretly detained and interrogated by the Inquisition, and it seems they've uncovered some information that doesn't reflect well on me."

Bishop John bowed his head, his voice trembling. "They are traitors... Only blood and souls can wash away such a stain."

"It doesn't matter."

The Church of Shadows worships the Shadow Maiden, and Lu Li is searching for the Shadow Maiden.

That fundamental connection meant his relationship with the Church of Shadows couldn't stay secret for long.

And Vinnelag was the human city most hostile to anomalies—even the Andrea had drawn numerous complaints from its citizens.

From the tone of the letter, Lu Li sensed Mayor Matteus's desperation. Yet, the mayor wasn't distancing himself or cutting ties. Instead, he had resolved to face the problems coming for Lu Li, even if it meant dealing with a conspiracy.

After some thought, Lu Li penned a reply. He laid out his relationship with the Church of Shadows and stated that his reputation could be sacrificed if necessary. He then handed the letter to Antoni, the Merchant.

Lu Li needed Vinnelag's strength, but he wasn't bound to it.

Besides, Vinnelag didn't speak for all of humanity's cities.

The letter was sent. Mayor Matteus did not reply again.

They were still three hours from Innsmouth, so Lu Li lay down to get some rest.

The flickering firelight, the swaying of the ship, and an indescribable murmuring all blended into a nauseating swirl of color.

It was less a rest and more an exhausting nightmare, which continued until the lurching of the ship and Prusius's call woke him.

The clock on the table read four in the afternoon. They were still an hour from their destination.

Wiping beads of sweat from his brow, Lu Li looked at Prusius's surprised face. "What is it?"

"The Eternal Night... it's over!"

Still groggy, Lu Li glanced out the window, but all he saw was the gray, anomalous fog shrouding the deck.

The Light Stealer had retreated, allowing light to return to the world.

Though the dangerous tide of fog still lay before them, the light brought with it a primal sense of security.

Lu Li rolled up his sleeves and splashed cold water on his face, washing away the lingering fatigue of the nightmare.

Glancing out the window again, he could only hear the rush of waves and the cold wind whipping past the cabin. The sea was invisible; it was as if they were sailing through the clouds.

The anomalous fog showed no sign of dissipating.

But as they neared the waters off the coast of Innsmouth, the fog began to thin.

A query to Vinnelag confirmed that the anomalous fog still shrouded that region, just like every other city. This meant it wasn't the great fog that had dissipated, but rather that this stretch of sea had somehow... expelled it.

Soon, condensation on the windows obscured the view more than the fog itself. Ophelia took a cloth and wiped the pane. As the murky steam cleared, they could see the outline of land in the distant twilight.

And with it, a gray, damp, ancient town sprawling along the bay and up into the hills.