Mystery Detective of the Steam World

Chapter 254 Special Squad
Boss Wood was quick; soon, MI7 members, having received Inspector Lestrade's report, arrived. Dressed in police uniforms, they looked like ordinary police officers. However, their familiar use of cordoning off the area revealed that this wasn't their first time doing something like this.

Sir Levi.

The squad leader, who was leading the group, jogged over and saluted Li Wei.

What is the current situation?

"As it stands, it seems that everyone in the house is probably missing."

"Is it a very urgent case?"

"It's not exactly an emergency, but it could be a bit dangerous."

"I understand."

Upon hearing Li Wei's answer, the squad leader nodded with a serious expression.

"Should we go and search immediately?"

"Um……………"

Li Wei looked at the squad leader and thought for a long time.

"No, we'll go together. I'll lead the way, and you send a small team in with us. The rest of you can stay outside and keep watch."

"Yes."

The squad leader moved quickly, and before long, Li Wei saw three men dressed as police officers come up to him and salute him again.

"Greetings, Sir Levi, Alpha Squad reporting for duty."

Are you sure you can do it?

"Yes, Sir Levi, we also have a certain degree of strength."

"Oh?"

Hearing this, Levi became interested. The only thing he found strange before was Katie's strength. Of course, since the royal family had Katie, Levi figured there must be similar individuals. Moreover, the old butler had told him that after MI7 was established, it specifically recruited a group of people who seemed to possess extraordinary talents and abilities.

However, Li Wei wasn't entirely clear on the specifics.

What are your capabilities?

Upon hearing Li Wei's question, the woman at the head of the group stepped forward and saluted Li Wei.

"Code name 'Prophet,' I can foresee the future."

"Predict future?"

"Ah, no, not the kind of thing that can predict the distant future, at most a few minutes into the future. I can see what will happen in the next few minutes, and it's random. I can't completely control it yet."

"oh……………"

To be honest, this ability is both useful and useless. It mainly depends on the user's reaction speed. If you can react quickly enough, that's fine, but if you can't, you're basically doomed.
Next, a tall, thin man stepped forward.

"Code name 'Rat', I can shrink my body and squeeze into places that ordinary people can't."

As he spoke, the tall, thin man glanced around and pointed to a skylight above the main entrance that was about the size of a basketball.

“I could just crawl through a window like that.”

"Um……………"

This trick is quite useful when you're trying to escape.

Then, the last man walked over.

"Code name 'Secret Agent', I can hear all sounds within a ten-meter radius, including a person's heartbeat."

"oh……………"

After listening to the three people's self-introductions, Li Wei's expression was somewhat strange. How to put it... these abilities seemed useful, yet also useless... and you couldn't say they weren't superpowers, more like special abilities or something... and their effective range was quite small, with virtually no direct combat ability...

Strictly speaking, these abilities don't seem particularly extraordinary.

"Isn't there anyone who can manipulate fire, wind, or lightning?"

Li Wei asked the question out of curiosity.

"I was just asking out of curiosity."

"…………………"

The three of them exchanged a glance and shook their heads.

“I’m sorry, Sir Levi, we haven’t heard of such a person. However, we have heard of someone in the Beta Squad who can teleport items over short distances.”

That would probably be very limiting; it might only be able to transmit things the size of a palm or something.

Li Wei discovered that the rules of this world don't change overnight. In other words, regardless of whether it's friend or foe, it's rare to see things like conjuring a giant fireball, throwing lightning, or creating a tornado, which Li Wei often saw in fantasy novels. The closest thing to this is the sword energy that the Ghost Knight used when Li Wei fought him.

The only one who fits Livy's imagination is King Solomon, but that was a man from thousands of years ago.

Apart from that, they are basically either physics majors who do things themselves, or mental majors who interfere with others mentally.

Even the previous séance, which created a bunch of strange monsters, relied on rules and order to fight, rather than being able to cleave a canyon with a wave of its hand.

It's not like we're cultivating immortality, how are other people supposed to play if we do this?
"let's go."

Li Wei didn't want to stand there for too long, so he spoke to the three of them.

"Remember, our mission this time is not to find people, but to find paintings."

"Looking for... a painting?" "A print. Where in this house should it be? As it stands, it might not be covered with a cloth, which is why everyone here has disappeared."

Ordinary people would probably find it hard to understand what Li Wei was saying, but these three people clearly did.

"So, we're going to deal with that painting?"

"No, leave it to me. If you see that painting—you'd better not see it. Even if you do, get out of sight immediately. You absolutely cannot keep looking at it, understand?"

"Yes."

The three gave the same answer, without any problems, indicating that they had indeed experienced some mysterious events and were at least not novices.

"Okay, come on."

Li Wei walked into the house, and then the other three followed him inside.

I wonder if all art dealers' houses are the same. This place is similar to Wood's gallery, with paintings hanging everywhere, making it quite difficult to determine the location. Wood kept his paintings locked in a warehouse, which is why he felt safe. But this place is different. From what I can easily guess, perhaps the family members here, completely unaware of the situation, hung that painting out, and then… and then what happened?
who knows.

But finding that painting among all the paintings in this room is not easy, because it means that to find that painting, you have to see it.

And once you see that painting…

Sigh, that's why laymen are the most troublesome.

The art dealers that Li Wei had met before all chose to hide or lock up the painting. Perhaps it was because they were all art dealers who had been appraising all kinds of paintings for many years, and thus they were able to understand how bizarre and terrifying T. Pickman's painting was.

But for ordinary people, it's probably just a pretty painting; they might think it's beautiful and put it out there.

Then?

That's it, game over.

So Li Wei didn't even ask anyone else to look for people, he just asked them to look for paintings.

After all, the person is probably already dead, so it won't make a difference if it's only for a short while longer.

"...There's not a sound in the house at all, that's strange."

Upon entering the room, the spy first revealed a strange expression and spoke.

"Wouldn't that be strange?"

"Yes, we've been on many missions before. How should I put it? Even if there are no people, there should be animals and insects like rats, flies, and spiders around. But here, I can't catch anything. It's like this place is completely desolate, there's no living thing at all, not even earthworms or anything like that underground."

Your hearing is so sharp; that's definitely a special ability.

Li Wei grumbled as he pressed a switch, instantly illuminating the entire corridor. He then walked ahead, silently staring at the floor.

"What are you looking at, Sir Levi?"

The prophet asked curiously from the side, while Levi shrugged.

"I'm just observing the footprints to see if I can reconstruct the scene. Hmm... this is interesting. It seems there's something really interesting going on."

"Something interesting?"

"Yes."

As he spoke, Li Wei stretched out his hand and pointed to the depths of the corridor.

"Judging from the footprints, it's clear that someone noticed something was wrong. He rushed out from the living room over there, and perhaps because he was in such a hurry, he bumped into this cabinet..."

As he spoke, Li Wei's finger moved to a cabinet on one side of the corridor. The sculpture on it had fallen over, and there were broken pieces of debris all around.

"But the victim didn't care at all and ran desperately toward the door. He even reached the door and reached out to open it."

Li Wei stared at his feet, and he could almost picture it: a pale-faced, panicked man stumbling out of the living room, running towards the front door. He reached out, opened the door, and perhaps even had half his body already leaning out…

"Then, something grabbed him and pulled him back."

Li Wei looked at the door frame, where there were several faint bloody fingerprints. Clearly, the victim had desperately tried to struggle, his arm instinctively reaching towards the door frame to grab it. But he only touched it briefly before something swiftly pulled it back.

"………………………"

Listening to Li Wei's description, the three of them tensed up and looked solemn. Then the prophet spoke in a low voice.

"May I ask, Sir Levy, is this your... ability?"

"ability?"

Li Wei smiled slightly upon hearing the prophet's question.

"This isn't a special ability; it's just a skill. In fact, most experienced police officers or detectives can do it, but perhaps not as meticulously as I can."

"Hey?"

It must be said that this answer was truly unexpected for the three of them, and Li Wei looked at them and spoke.

“I think you are all very confident in your abilities, which is a good thing, but you don’t have to rely solely on your own abilities. You can also learn some skills such as fingerprint identification or crime scene investigation. Just like now, although we don’t know what the killer is, we can at least be sure what happened here before.”

"Yes, Sir Levi."

"Alright, that's enough lecturing."

Li Wei withdrew his gaze and looked at the living room next door, its door wide open.

"Since that unlucky guy escaped from the living room, let's go check it out first."

(End of this chapter)