Chapter 18: Investigators

He was back, back in this strange "Boundary City."

Not long ago, this place had been a massive, eerie, and unsettling metropolis to him, yet looking at those familiar streetlights and buildings now, seeing the streets and sky bathed in the faint light of dawn, a sense of "nostalgia" welled up in Yu Sheng's heart—a feeling so profound he could hardly believe it himself.

The experience of being trapped in that Valley of Nightfall had made his return to the Boundary City feel as moving as coming home.

But in the next second, the trance brought on by the loss of life interrupted his sentimentality. He lowered his head somewhat dully, seeing bright red blood slowly spreading beneath his body.

His body had been pierced through. The horrific wound was enough to cause death in a short time; even though this body currently possessed formidable recovery abilities and vitality, he knew he was dying again—he had become quite proficient at using the word "again" regarding this matter.

And the culprit responsible for this terrible wound was right beside him. That scaled "tail," severed from the monster, had fallen out of the gate along with Yu Sheng. It seemed to still possess residual life or even "thought," as it was currently writhing slowly in the pool of blood, attempting to crawl away from the spot.

Yu Sheng even felt that this thing was moving away from him... this piece of flesh was afraid of him.

Yu Sheng frowned and struggled to rise from the ground. He glanced at his front door not far away, then casually picked up the writhing, scaled severed tail and struggled to walk forward.

As he walked, he muttered to himself, "Didn't they say once the protagonist escapes a desperate situation, everything is fine... what kind of trash setting is it where injuries are still retained after the map settlement... Dammit, it hurts so much..."

The continuous blood loss gradually blurred his consciousness. The loss of physical strength made every step he took wobbly and incredibly difficult, as if he would collapse at any moment. In his final few steps, Yu Sheng was moving forward almost entirely on instinct. He didn't even know why he was so determined to get home—perhaps to say hello to Irene? Or perhaps to avoid having his "corpse" discovered by people heading out in the morning?

Everything before his eyes gradually sank into darkness, and the morning light took on a dark red hue. Hu Li's golden-red eyes surfaced in Yu Sheng's mind—at the end, those eyes were filled with a hungry, bloody light, yet there remained a final, lingering trace of humanity, struggling to persist deep within the crimson.

That fox... I wonder how she is. She said she wouldn't die, but I don't know if that's true...

As these thoughts flooded his mind, he finally struggled to reach his front door. The door was unlocked; he fumbled with the handle, pushed it open, and stepped inside.

He saw the dining room diagonally across from the entrance, and the oil painting still leaning against the wall. Irene was lifting her head from the painting, looking at the doorway in surprise, her eyes slowly widening.

Yu Sheng forced a terminal smile toward her. "Irene, I'm back."

He knew his injuries were severe. If not for the incredible recovery capacity and strength of this body, he would likely have died outside the house by now.

Just as that thought surfaced, Yu Sheng felt his vision tilt. He slid down against the doorframe, and the familiar, heavy pressure of darkness rushed in from all sides—accompanied by Irene's terrified scream.

Now, he was dead in his house.

...

Accompanied by the faint sound of braking, two electric scooters stopped deep within Wutong Road. Two figures dismounted, looking at the old and quiet alleyway before them.

One was a steady and reliable-looking middle-aged man wearing a long brown coat. He was tall and robust with slightly dark skin and short black hair. An irregular scar near his neck added a touch of intimidation to his aura, but the weary expression and dark circles under his eyes were incongruous with his powerful physique and menacing scar—he looked like someone who had worked overtime for three consecutive months without a single day off.

The other was a young man who looked to be in his early twenties. He had the same short black hair, but his build was much smaller than the middle-aged man's. He had an ordinary appearance, the kind that would be immediately lost in any crowd. Wearing a black and blue jacket and trousers, his expression was somewhat tense, carrying the nervous awkwardness of someone who had only been on the job for a few days and had just been dragged out for field duty by a supervisor.

The two rode their scooters into this quiet old district, observing the unremarkable buildings around them. Occasionally, residents living there passed by the intersection in the distance, but very few cast a glance toward them.

"This place doesn't look strange at all..." the black-haired youth muttered. "Captain Song, are you sure it's here?"

"There was a boundary alarm just now, and the coordinates definitely point to this location," the middle-aged man, addressed as Captain Song, nodded. "Even though the signal vanished in an instant, we can be certain it was an otherworldly reaction."

"We rushed here as fast as we could and still missed it," the youth glanced at the electric scooter beside him and spoke hesitantly. "Should we have come by car..."

Captain Song glanced at him. "All the Bureau's vehicles are out on field assignments. All that's left is Xu Jiali's seventh-hand piece of junk. You want to drive it? That thing might not even be faster than your scooter even with the throttle floored."

The youth gave a dry laugh and awkwardly changed the subject. "So, uh, that person from before... her codename was 'Little Red Riding Hood,' right? From the Fairy Tale Organization. It seems she didn't find anything here either?"

"Yeah, nothing at all. Which makes it even more certain that something is wrong here," Captain Song nodded slowly. "'Little Red Riding Hood' has done a lot of work for the Special Affairs Bureau. I know her abilities; her wolf can sniff out even the faintest, smallest 'anomaly' in the surrounding environment. But she searched this place all night and found nothing."

The youth blinked, seemingly failing to grasp the implication immediately.

"Nothing found, didn't you hear me?" Captain Song reminded him again. "It's too 'clean,' too 'normal.' There isn't a single plot of land in the Boundary that is this clean! Little Red Riding Hood's wolf can sniff out anomalies anywhere in this city, even if the scent is incredibly weak, but here... from a mystical perspective, this entire street is as 'clean' as a vacuum!"

Hearing this, the youth finally understood—the training he had received at the academy finally aligned with the reality of the situation.

"Either this place really is that clean, and a 'pure zone' that runs deeply parallel to the 'outside world' has actually appeared within the Boundary—which isn't impossible, since this is the Boundary and any place in the world could be connected to it," Captain Song waved his hand, speaking with some fatigue, "or, this place is hiding a... 'big player.' Something is constantly altering the environment of this entire plot, and Little Red Riding Hood's pack encountered a boundary vacuum here."

The tension on the youth's face became visibly more pronounced.

"I'm not approving your transfer to the logistics department," Captain Song lifted his eyelids to look at him. "And not to any other team, either."

"I didn't say I wanted to run!" the youth waved his hands hurriedly. "I was prepared when I joined the team. I will definitely be loyal, diligent, professional, and fulfill my duties..."

A sudden ringtone interrupted their conversation. It was a pleasant melody—a classic tune from a popular new anime.

The youth froze instantly, looking at his leader with a strange expression. "...You watch that too?"

Captain Song's face twitched visibly. As he reluctantly pulled his phone from his pocket, he muttered, "My daughter must have swapped it secretly. She's been watching this lately..."

The youth's expression shifted subtly; he struggled for a long time but couldn't bring himself to say, "Isn't it a bit weird for a middle schooler to watch a bunch of girls in a band?"

Captain Song answered the call. After listening for a few moments, he spoke: "Yes, Li Lin and I are already at the scene. It's the same as what Little Red Riding Hood investigated; this place is 'clean' to a suspicious degree. Make arrangements; we might need to set up a fixed monitoring point here. I'll decide on the specific personnel when I get back. Also, contact the 'Fairy Tale' side and see if they can send someone else over. This might be a long-term mission..."

Hanging up, Captain Song let out a long sigh. He turned to see the young man, Li Lin, still staring at him.

He paused, then couldn't help but say, "It really was my daughter who swapped it. I don't usually watch anime."

Li Lin coughed twice. "Uh, cough, cough. I believe you. I believe you."

After a moment of awkwardness, the two tacitly chose to skip the topic.

But just then, Li Lin seemed to suddenly discover something.

His brow furrowed slightly, and he walked quickly toward a corner of a wall nearby.

"Captain Song, come look at this!" He leaned down to inspect it, then immediately looked up to call him over.

Captain Song walked over and looked in the direction Li Lin was pointing.

A dark red mark was visible on the corner of the wall, looking like dried blood. The area was very small and easily overlooked from a distance, and it was currently shrinking at a rate visible to the naked eye.

It wasn't soaking into the cement; it was rapidly vanishing into thin air.

"Blood?" Captain Song frowned immediately, then reacted quickly, pulling a plastic tube and a portable scraper from his long coat. "No, it's not blood. Take a sample!"

"Right," Li Lin agreed. He took the sampling tools and prepared to scrape the residual dark red "blood" from the wall. However, just before the scraper touched the surface, the last tiny bit of red abruptly emitted a hissing sound and then vanished completely.

(End of Chapter)