The Bizarre Detective Agency

Chapter 977: Corpsofication

[Midnight — Outer City — Faussane District]

[Residents of the outer city recently noticed that the Mike family has been acting strangely. They've become afraid of the light, speak little, go out less often, and have lost a noticeable amount of weight. The monster meat hanging outside their window is only taken down after it begins to rot. Neighbors have reported a putrid smell coming from the Mike house, and on quiet nights, they can hear muttering that sounds like prayers.]

[Mission: Investigate the strange behavior of the Mike family]

[Advanced Objective: Completely resolve this mission]

[Hint: Corpse-eaters, madmen, the Seng tribe, and certain heresies or infections exhibit characteristics similar to those of the Mike family.]

[Base Reward: 1 Academic Credit; 2 Team Points]

This mission had been posted two days ago. Missions left unattended for too long were taken down and handed over to Midnight to prevent the situation from worsening. Therefore, missions that remained unclaimed or unresolved for a while usually meant the reward was low or the situation hadn't escalated—exactly the kind of thing the Holy Light Squad needed to continue building their teamwork.

"Lu Li, after this mission, we'll go to the mission hall together to pick the next one," Kiruet said in the elevator on their way down to Midnight.

"Team points aren't just for climbing the rankings; you can think of them as a valuable currency. You can use them to trade for items exclusive to the Academy, things you can't buy with shillings or Anomaly Currency."

Besides understanding the mission system, Lu Li, as the vice-captain, also needed to grasp the purpose of team points so that if Kiruet were to die... Lu Li could smoothly take over as captain of the Holy Light Squad.Fifteen minutes later, the elevator descended into the Midnight encampment. The sphere of light atop the tall tower, like a morning dawn, cast a dim and gentle glow.

The Faussane District was on the outskirts of the outer city, a place that could only be described as a slum—a chaotic, poorly managed area made up of a tangled mess of dilapidated shacks.

"The hundredth-ranked team has 63 team points. We still need another 40 points to even make it onto the leaderboard..."

Kiruet sounded a little embarrassed. The bottom 50 spots on the leaderboard changed frequently, and teams could drop off abruptly after spending their points. Even so, the Holy Light Squad still had a long way to go before they could get ranked.

After all, the Holy Light Squad had never bothered with the rankings before, and they always traded in their accumulated team points quickly.

"If we save up 80 team points, we should be able to hold a stable position at the bottom of the rankings," Yeger interjected.

Although neither Lu Li nor Kiruet showed any interest in the rankings, the fact that they couldn't even make the list with him on the team made the others feel a little guilty.

In any case, Lu Li's supplies meant the Holy Light Squad no longer needed to spend team points on items, and the remaining two months would be more than enough for them to appear at the bottom of the leaderboard—

provided Lu Li wasn't promoted to the senior courses before then.

Upon entering the Faussane District, they saw numerous cults spreading their faith by handing out resources. It was a simple transaction: you provide faith, I provide food and water.

After navigating past the churches, they arrived at the mission location—the Mike family's house.

It was a small house, connected to the surrounding dilapidated shacks. In the outer city, or the slums, such interconnected shacks, almost forming longhouses, were a common sight—it saved a lot of money on building one or even two walls.

But it created huge problems in case of a disaster. Like fires or plagues.

Something seemed off.

Lu Li scanned his surroundings. The Mike family's situation hadn't been dealt with, and the area wasn't even cordoned off. Residents walked calmly past the shacks, and the neighbors hadn't moved away.

A suspected plague was not something to be taken lightly. The proper response should have been immediate intervention from Midnight, not waiting for the Academy of Giant Trees.

There had to be a reason.

Lu Li wondered, but unfortunately, this sort of thing wasn't part of the Academy of Giant Trees' curriculum.

The good news was that the Mike family wasn't spreading the plague outwards. But it seemed that was about to change, because when they asked the locals, they were told no one had seen the Mike family leave their house all day.

"Stay back, everyone. Yeger, protect Lu Li and Nasi," Kiruet commanded, equipping her diamond-shaped hand shield without activating its second form, and approached the window.

After a brief observation, Kiruet stepped back from the window and gestured for her teammates to approach.

"What is it?"

Yeger glanced at the dust-covered window.

"It's very strange... I think I saw the Mike family, but..."

Kiruet couldn't explain what she'd seen. She told Nasi to drink a revealing potion and approach the door.

Crash—

The bolt broke and the door flew open, kicking up a cloud of dust that almost completely obscured their view.

"Three sources of contamination! They're weak!" Nasi shouted, keeping his distance from the shack.

Kiruet, however, had already seen what was inside the little house, and the source of the contamination.

"Is there anything else?" Kiruet's voice was laced with uncertainty.

"No, I'm not detecting anything."

"...Come closer," Kiruet said, even lowering her shield and dropping her guard.

Confused, Yeger and the others approached the shack. The dust settled, revealing three figures tied to wooden chairs.

They were emaciated and weak, their skin covered in grayish-brown, corpselike spots, and was shriveled from malnourishment. Their hair was falling out, and clumps of it lay scattered around their canvas clothes and the wooden chairs.

"Did they do this to themselves? Or did someone..." Nasi felt he was asking a stupid question, but there was no one else in the room besides the Mike family.

Lu Li opened a stomach pouch and pulled out a tracking potion, just as clenched teeth snapped shut inches from his wrist.

"I'll do it this time," Yeger said, taking the potion.

Sequence Potions had side effects, like contamination, as they were, after all, a part of an anomaly themselves.

After drinking the potion, Yeger began to look around, and a moment later, he shook his head in disappointment.

"They were tied up here an hour ago."

"In any case, it looks like we got lucky," Kiruet concluded, not dwelling on it.

They had completed the mission without doing a thing, and might even get the advanced reward.

Nasi searched the shack and found a hastily drawn magic circle on the bedroom floor. It was a sacrificial circle dedicated to a corpse-eating god.

This was the source of the Mike family's corpsofication.

After destroying it, they returned to the Mike family.

"What should we do with them?"

Kiruet asked for Lu Li's opinion.

"Can they still be saved?"

Lu Li's gaze swept over the bodies of the couple, deep in the process of corpsofication, and their seven- or eight-year-old child.

"I'm not sure... Nasi," Kiruet looked at Nasi, who understood her unspoken request. He used a protective potion and approached the husband.

"Don't move, I don't want to kill you by accident..."

He muttered to the mindless Mike, took a bandage from his bag to secure the man's head, and then used a sharp scalpel to open his skull.

A sticky, dark gray substance stretched out in viscous threads. Nasi recoiled from the foul stench and examined the decayed, atrophied, grayish-black brain within the skull.

"It's already stage three... Irreversible."

Closing the skull, Nasi retreated to his teammates.

The craniotomy didn't seem to have harmed Mike, who continued to sway senselessly.

"So, do we sell them to the Academy of Giant Trees or grant them release?"

Kiruet looked with pity at the mindless child then raised her eyes to ask Lu Li.

In silence, Lu Li drew his artifact daggers.