The Bizarre Detective Agency

Chapter 916: The Shattered Truth

The black crow, flapping its wings, flew toward the silhouette on the sea's surface, carrying a note for the Andrea to moor closer to the town's bay.

On the second floor of the coastal house, Ophelia watched the Andrea approach the town. She waited until the unseen black crow on its deck shrank to a black dot, returned to the town, and flew into the room. She closed the window and went back to Lu Li, who was recounting what had happened.

"So, was it the Beacon or the Dreamwalker that activated?"

Prusius suddenly understood about the faint mist that only Lu Li could see, and why it had suddenly vanished: Lu Li had woken from the dream... No, Lu Li had woken from the second layer of the dream and moved into the first.

"Perhaps both."

The Beacon could pierce through illusions, allowing Lu Li to realize it was a dream. The Dreamwalker could control the dream, allowing Lu Li to kill enemies within it.

The immense, indescribable great entity possessed terrifying power, even within an imagined dream.

"If... you... master... entering... dreams... then you... will no longer... be... helpless... against... certain... entities."

Although his physical body still constrained him with its weakness, Lu Li could now handle his enemies by wielding the power to control dreams. This was especially true after the power of the Lord of the Depths from the rib and Prusius's dream power were removed; seemingly absorbed by Dreamwalker, they had triggered unfathomable changes in the Cursed Title.

Perhaps for the better, perhaps for the worse.Prusius suggested that Lu Li enter his or Ophelia's dream that evening to practice. Ophelia also agreed, saying:

"If... you... wish... to enter... my dream."

In any case, though the power to enter dreams had many limitations, Lu Li was no longer an ordinary exorcist who could only use a spiritual pistol and fight at close range with his left hand.

With half an hour left until dark, Lu Li and the cultists searched the other houses in the town, hoping to eliminate any remaining dangers and find something useful.

Or, more accurately, something they could give to the Merchant, and that the Merchant could sell.

On behalf of the Merchant Antoni, Lu Li refused a faded door panel pried from a house by one of the overzealous cultists. He then outlined what they should be looking for: books, newspapers, artifacts, food, and intact tools.

Although furniture could indeed be sold through the Merchant, Lu Li didn't want to waste his only three Merchants on selling it. At least, not right now.

The rocky mountain, split in two, had already widened into a hundred-meter fissure. Debris constantly crumbled from the far side as it continued to drift away.

By the time they departed at dawn tomorrow, they might not even be able to see the other half of the mountain across the sea.

Lu Li knew the island was an extension of the continental shelf, but science couldn't explain its "drifting." From a mystical point of view, however, it all made sense: the mutilated body of the Deep God had been suppressing Saint Lina Island, allowing it to mercifully escape the force that had shattered the Lennon Archipelago. But now, after the Fusion with the body, that suppression was gone, and the power that had cursed the archipelago was beginning to take effect here once more.

Lu Li calmly surveyed the surrounding streets. The cultists buzzed in and out of the houses like bees.

He felt like he had missed something.

"Mr. Lu Li, does this mean you can no longer worship His Highness, the Deep God, to gain power?" Prusius suddenly asked, interrupting Lu Li's thoughts.

"I'm afraid so."

If the Deep God hadn't changed with its reawakening consciousness, Lu Li would have had no reason to distrust the entity. But since the Deep God had departed, He was no longer the same being with whom Lu Li had made an agreement. One day, after another Fusion with a piece of His mutilated body, He would ignore His promise and forcibly convert Lu Li to His faith.

The frightening part was that by then, Lu Li wouldn't even resist. He would only bow down, fanatical and joyful, thanking the Great Old One for the gift.

The Mother of the Swamp wasn't a suitable candidate either. She was still weak. Even with an entire swamp forest under her command, she was just a minor god with negligible power. In the Fallow Lands, she would struggle to protect even a small town.

His thoughts returned to the present. The town's advertisement on the poster had been right about one thing, at least: most of its residents were middle-class.

The cultists had brought back mostly books, which now lay in a pile on the ground. Prusius couldn't resist leaping into them and rolling around.

Half the pile consisted of professional books on various sciences; the rest were mainly geography and history books, biographies, and a small number of notebooks.

Lu Li ignored the book titles on the covers and began looking through the notebooks.

Many of the notebooks were just used for keeping accounts and recording daily routines. While they helped Lu Li understand life before the destruction of the Lennon Archipelago to some extent, going through a dozen of them would take a long time.

[...After returning home, I couldn't sleep. They didn't see it, but I did... It was the body of a god, and what roiled below was not a river, but the god's power...]

The passage, which he had flipped to by chance, caught Lu Li's attention. He turned back to the diary, read the full page, and then began reading backward from there.

It was the diary of an archeology professor from the Fallow Lands. It described how the men of the town had stumbled upon a cave during an exploration, and how only he had sensed the mutilated body within.

The diary ended after the catastrophe struck the Lennon Archipelago. The professor had decided to go to the cave to investigate the body and its power. Then, the entries stopped abruptly.

"Which house did this come from?"

The cultist pointed down the street, several houses away.

"Anything unusual there?"

After getting a negative response, Lu Li took an oil lamp and entered the house as the gloomy night deepened.

"Do you... suspect... this is... the house... of the one who... ate... him?" Ophelia guessed.

"Mm."

It turned out Lu Li's guess was correct. In a second-floor bedroom with boarded-up windows, he found a picture frame holding a photograph of a married couple.

The husband's face in the photo was blurry and slightly distorted, but he was still recognizable as the man from the dream.

Lu Li's gaze lingered on the distortion of the photograph itself. A god cannot be seen. He had almost succeeded.

Back on the street, Lu Li had the Merchant Antoni collect the items the cultists had gathered, and the group returned to the coastal house.

"Mr. Lu Li, I... I don't feel so good..."

Prusius, who was carrying a book on his back held in place by his two tails, suddenly frowned.

"What's... wrong?"

Ophelia knelt and asked.

"My whole chest really hurts... Like it's being torn apart..."

Prusius shifted uncomfortably.

Ophelia removed the book and saw a visible, bleeding scratch on his patchy fur. It encircled his chest as if trying to slice him in half.

"Was there... a curse... in the house?"

Ophelia released her aura, subconsciously wrapping it around Prusius.

Lu Li looked at Prusius's wound, realizing what it was he had missed.

The destructive force afflicting the Lennon Archipelago was now manifesting on them. Prusius, being the weakest, was the first to be affected.

"The problem is the Lennon Archipelago itself. It makes everything here fall apart... We're leaving."

Lu Li declared. Before Prusius's condition could worsen, they retreated to the beach, got into the boat, and boarded the Andrea. They had to sail out into the deep sea, into the night, with the anomalous fog closing in.