Shut up, brave man! I don't want to atone for my sins to you!

Behind the gap, you feel the same voyeuristic feeling as before, with a certain intense color.

The thing that was spying on you also noticed that you had discovered it the moment you turned your head, so it ran away with a hurried sound.

After a brief hesitation, you decide to go see what's going on.

So, you gripped your cane tightly and chased after him.

[To be continued]

-

38. Original wish

You catch up with the thing that was spying on you earlier, fleeing out the door.

As expected, it was also a dark figure.

But compared to the black shadow you killed before, it looks much thinner, a little underdeveloped, and has a slightly hunched back.

Once you become aware of its presence, it begins to flee in panic.

It was so panicked that it ended up running into the hotel's kitchen.

The room was a little small and tidy, but there was no sign of life.

You saw the dark shadow trying to break through the window to escape but failed, and finally he could only collapse limply to the ground.

The black shadow has no face, so you shouldn't be able to see its expression, but you can clearly feel the fear and despair that is almost overflowing from it.

It's afraid of you.

But you are not confused by this.

You think it should be afraid of you.

Because the shadow can be killed, and your body is still stained with his blood; because you are holding the cane sword tightly in your hand, the instant death spell on the blade is still working normally.

But you feel like something is wrong.

The abnormal feeling like a maggot in your tarsal bone prompts you to check your own condition again, but you soon realize that the problem may not be with you, but the thin black shadow in front of you.

It feels familiar to you.

It's as if...as if you had seen it not long ago.

Following this inspiration, you quickly compared the black shadow in front of you with the Diesel people you had dealt with before.

Eventually, you give it back its original identity.

——It’s the owner of this hotel, the thin old man who always hunches over and likes to nag.

I don't know why it became what it is now.

So you silently put away your cane sword, staring at the innkeeper who was lying on the ground, his face completely changed, and whispered tentatively:

"How did you become like this?"

Although you know better than anyone that the innkeeper who suffered such serious pollution has probably lost all his sanity and gone completely crazy. But just like the oath you made in the White Tower, no matter what, as long as there is even a glimmer of hope, you must never give up.

You wonder if it still has any sanity.

The result is no.

After hearing your voice, the black shadow lying on the ground began to struggle violently.

The limbs were twisted, the voice was shrill, and they no longer looked like humans.

While you are not paying attention, it will even quickly take the kitchen knife from the table next to you, and while making extremely strange hoarse mumbling sounds, it will stab the kitchen knife straight into your throat.

But before the kitchen knife could pierce your throat, you thrust the blade of your cane sword into the shadow's chest.

Then, you calmly turn the hilt of the sword, crushing the shadow's heart, and activate the instant death spell attached to it to ensure that it is killed completely.

So, the second black shadow died.

The arm holding the kitchen knife was still raised high, and a slight "ho ho" sound kept coming out of its mouth.

It seemed to feel confused, fearful, and unwilling, but in the end, all these emotions were smoothed out by the face that had lost its facial features and turned black, reducing it to complete nothingness and silence.

"Dang Cang——"

The kitchen knife fell to the ground.

You squatted down in front of the shadow, took the cane sword back from his chest, and remained silent for a moment. You closed your eyes, mourning the passing of the deceased and sincerely wishing that he could find peace in the afterlife.

This is the only thing you can do for him.

You don't have time to feel sad for him.

The moment he starts mumbling madly and raises a kitchen knife at you, you know he's beyond help.

He has probably been completely twisted into some kind of deformed and twisted existence that should not exist in this world. If he is allowed to continue to survive, perhaps, it will not only be the Diesel people who will suffer the same tragedy as him in the future.

Speaking of which...

“The shadow that appeared in the alley earlier,” you couldn’t help but think, “plus the innkeeper who has now become a shadow…”

A terrifying thought came into your mind, and you shuddered.

"Could it be that the shadow is somehow contagious? Without anyone noticing, it has already quietly infected all the Diesel people?"

It's best to prepare for the worst in advance.

You gradually begin to think that the entire Diesel may have fallen. Except for you, there is no living person in this tiny country. There are only endless dark shadows that may break out at any time.

But you did not get discouraged by this bleak reality. After saying goodbye to the old owner of the inn, you turned around without any hesitation, tightly grasped the cane sword, and resolutely decided to continue to do what you should do.

Take your notes, leave Diesel, return to the White Tower, and report everything you saw and heard truthfully.

But soon you remember that there is more to do - you also need to take that big box with you.

That black wooden box that appeared in your room at some point in time and that looks particularly heavy because you don't know what's in it.

“It must contain something very important,” you explain to yourself, “otherwise, it wouldn’t have the same importance in your heart as the notebook.”

You felt that although this explanation was a bit far-fetched, it made sense, so you returned to the room, picked up the wooden box with your exceptionally strong arms, and even tore off a few strips of cloth from the hotel's bed sheets and hung the handle of the wooden box tightly on your left wrist.

这样，一切就准备妥当了。

You took a deep breath silently, preparing yourself to be attacked by countless shadows as soon as you leave the inn.

You don't feel sorry for yourself - you are already an old man who is about to die, and even if you didn't die in Diesel today, you probably wouldn't live much longer - so compared to yourself, you feel more sorry for those young people who have not yet enjoyed their prime youth.

After realizing this, you couldn't help but shake your head, feeling a little bitter, and turned your head with a little guilt, saying:

"I shouldn't have brought you here."

Then, as if you got an answer, you smiled again and whispered comfortingly:

"I knew you would say something like 'This is my own decision and has nothing to do with you, teacher.' But as a teacher, you should be responsible for your students. I was soft-hearted and let you sneak along. That's your responsibility."

Then your expression turned serious and you said firmly:

"Since I brought you here, I will definitely take you out and back to the White Tower. You must follow me closely and don't fall behind!"

After saying that, you rushed out first.

And after you, a thin black shadow, whom you had instructed and whom you had tried your best to protect, also crawled out of the room and followed your footsteps obediently and cleverly.

It’s as if it has always been your most trusted student.

……

You and your students leave the inn.

As you'd expect, all the Diesel people seem to have turned into eerie black shadows.

But you have no idea why.

Logically speaking, any anomaly should have a source. Even if a situation seems absurd or bizarre, if you dig deep, you will eventually find its starting point.

While carrying the wooden box and protecting your students as they evacuated from Diesel, you used your remaining energy to try to figure out the origins of the black shadows.

The first question that needs to be solved is - do all the anomalies in Diesel come from the same source?

Through investigation, you learned that the Diesel people have an inexplicable, weird and fanatical loyalty to their emperor. But other than that, you did not collect more useful intelligence.

Logically speaking, you should directly meet with His Majesty the Emperor through diplomatic means. After all, you are a senior investigator of the White Tower, and Diesel is just a backward and weak tiny country.

You are qualified to do so.

But before you could test the emperor, the shadows suddenly appeared. These damn, weird things completely disrupted your plan. They seemed unwilling for you to leave Diesel and make everything that happened here public, so that the White Tower and the human nations would strangle them in their cradles before they grow up.

So they stand in front of you.

At first there were only a few scattered ones.

Without hesitation, you killed them with a single blow of your knife.

You discover that although these shadows look creepy, they actually pose little threat to you.

They are so weak that compared to your body which is gradually getting younger and stronger, they are just like newborn babies. You can easily stab your cane sword into their hearts one by one and kill them.

Although you were only trying your best to defend yourself and the students behind you along the way, the number of shadows who died in your hands gradually added up to more than your hands and feet combined.

Even so, the number of black shadows continues to increase.

As if they were irritated by you, more and more dark shadows appeared in front of you. They rushed towards you fearlessly, and then fell down in large numbers like wheat blown by the wind.

By the end, you are covered in blood.

You don't understand why those shadows are so persistent in rushing towards you, but you have to admit that they are gradually tiring you out and becoming powerless. You swing your cane sword slower and slower, and your reaction becomes slower and slower. Finally, a shadow breaks through your defense and leaves a bloody wound on your face.

As you stabbed the cane sword into its heart, you suddenly realized that you were not far from the inn. You just turned two streets and came to the center of this small country, the square named "Wish Fulfillment" by the king himself.

You remember that your investigation in Diesel started from this square.

In this square, you met the particularly enthusiastic Mr. John, and at his suggestion, you made a wish to the wishing well which is said to fulfill all wishes.

"Come to think of it," you suddenly paused, "what was the wish I made at that time?"

The answer to this question is simple. This time you don’t feel lost at all. You recall it immediately.

“I hope,” you clasped your hands together sincerely, thinking to yourself, “I hope I can…”

"——I can find out the truth about everything."

[To be continued]

-

39. As Human

You want to get to the bottom of everything.

Regarding the magic shock that happened thirty years ago, and what you investigated in Diesel thirty years later.

The Emperor, the tall and thin ghost, everything...

It is the duty of every investigator to uncover all hidden truths and dispel the fog and clouds surrounding history.

You are eager to know what happened thirty years ago.

So you made a wish into the wishing well.

Even if you know that the wishing well should not be able to fulfill your wish, after all, even the limited wishing machine in the White Tower cannot fulfill every wish, let alone it is just an ordinary wishing well.

"But what if..."

An absurd idea suddenly pops up in your mind, just like the monkey that jumps out of the stone in the Eastern mythology.

"But what if," you turned your head and looked at the wishing well involuntarily, "but what if, it really is like Mr. John said, it can fulfill anyone's wish?"

But even you almost laughed at the thought.

How can it be?

Why can the wishing well fulfill your wish? Why can it let you see the truth of everything...

Oh, the truth.

Your thoughts suddenly stop here.