Chapter 68: Clue

Chapter Sixty-Eight
Clue

In the western outskirts of the North Borough, inside a three-story building close to abandonment.

This place had originally belonged to Backlund Medical College, but the college’s main body had already moved to a better and more suitable location. Only a small number of instructors and students from the current year who had failed to graduate smoothly remained here to “guard” the premises.

Audrey wore a white coat. Her face was covered by a mask of the same color, and her moist, golden hair had been coiled up and tucked into a cold-colored surgical cap.

Her eyes shifted. Looking at Fors Wall, who was dressed the same way, she somehow felt that the other lady possessed a special temperament, as though Fors was more suited to such clothing than she was.

Uh… the kind of temperament where she might pick up a scalpel at any time and cut open a patient’s stomach…

Audrey did not speak. She followed half a step behind Fors and entered the classroom ahead.

After receiving Xio’s information through Fors, she had been greatly startled, because Mr. Fool had said this was a simple mission.

Considering that “simple” might only be relative to Mr. Fool Himself, Audrey took the opportunity while disguising herself alone to recite His honorific name and quietly pray, reporting the whole course of the matter exactly as it was.

However, up to now, she still had not received a response.

Passing through the door and entering the room, Audrey instinctively scanned her surroundings. She discovered that this was no ordinary classroom. It actually contained four skeleton specimens and four coffins made of glass. The coffins were filled with preservative, soaking four pale, completely naked corpses.

At the very front of the classroom stood a transparent glass column, likewise filled with liquid. Floating inside it was a male corpse dressed in a black academic robe.

The corpse’s clothes clung tightly to his body, giving off an extremely heavy, sunken feeling. He had not slumped over, but remained upright, rising and falling slightly at the center.

As though he had drowned alive inside, rather than been placed there after death…

Audrey made an initial judgment as a Spectator.

In addition, she saw that around the long tables inside the room, quite a few people dressed in white coats, white masks, and surgical caps were scattered sparsely. None of them said a word, just like the corpses and skeletons around them.

She looked outside, where at last a corner of the crimson moon showed through the gloomy, dark night. Then she turned back toward the scene inside the classroom and could not help shivering. This was fear born from instinct.

Yet in the same way, she also felt excitement and thrill.

This is what a Beyonder’s life should be like…

Audrey silently muttered. Following Fors, she found a seat in a corner and sat down.

After waiting a little longer, the floating male corpse wearing the black academic robe inside the upright glass column at the front of the classroom suddenly opened its eyes, letting its voice pass through layer after layer of obstruction.

“Begin.”

…

East Borough, Daravi Street.

Klein wore a dust-stained gray-blue worker’s uniform and a peaked cap as he walked along the dim street, where only a sparse few gas lamps were still functioning.

From the apartment buildings on both sides, a little candlelight spilled out. It intertwined with the crimson moonlight struggling through cloud and fog, barely outlining the forms of pedestrians on the road.

Klein encountered one passerby after another with old, tattered clothing and faces numb with despair. They were tramps being driven along by the police.

They had nowhere to sleep and could only walk aimlessly through the streets. Occasionally, they might seize an opportunity to rest in some unremarkable corner or on a park bench, only to be chased away again very quickly.

In the cold, deep night, Klein felt that they were more like living corpses than any living corpse he had seen, and that the entire East Borough seemed more like the Abyss than the Abyss of myth and legend itself.

He drew in a hurried breath, only for his throat to be irritated into two coughs. Quickly, he reined in his thoughts and used the corner of his eye to observe the apartment building at the street corner, the one bearing obvious explosion damage that had yet to be repaired.

“If one wants to monitor the crime scene, the best and most concealed position is the other apartment building directly across from it. The third floor, the fourth floor, and the rooftop all fit the requirements…”

Klein analyzed the situation using the knowledge he had learned in the Nighthawks squad.

Throughout the entire process, he did not slow his steps, so as not to draw suspicion.

Arriving at the street corner, Klein smoothly passed the apartment marked number 1 and entered the building across from the crime scene.

Such places were not unfamiliar to him. The one-room apartment he rented in the East Borough was located in a similar building, and back in Tingen, he, his older brother Benson, and his younger sister Melissa had lived for a long time in an apartment only slightly higher in quality. This was both Klein’s personal experience and came from the original owner’s memory fragments.

Amid a swirl of thoughts, Klein lowered the brim of his peaked cap and buried his head. At an unhurried pace, he stepped up the creaking staircase all the way to the third floor.

Because of the unlucky encounter that evening, he currently had no revolver. He could only thrust one hand into his pocket and pinch several tarot cards between his fingers.

In the third-floor corridor, which had no light and only a sliver of moonlight, Klein did not hurry forward. He carefully observed the layout.

The crime scene is on the left. The room with the best monitoring view should be the third room from here…

Klein began carefully walking forward in slow steps.

After passing two rooms, he also placed his right hand into his pocket and lightly opened the iron cigarette case.

An instant later, his finger touched the All-Black Eye. Immediately, ravings that seemed to tear apart his mind and burst open his brain rang beside his ears.

At the same time, with the aid of that contaminated item, Klein saw one strange black thread after another.

Those threads drifted in the void. Although there were some crossings and a few tangled points, by tracing them back to their source, one could still distinguish whom they belonged to.

Corresponding figures appeared inside Klein’s nearly boiling mind: men, women, and children sleeping on bunk beds; several tenants lying on floor bedding.

Apart from that, there was nothing special, and no hidden person existed.

Klein hurriedly withdrew his hand, no longer directly touching the All-Black Eye. Only then did the hallucinations before him and the auditory illusions beside his ears slowly improve.

Suppressing the pain, he continued forward. As soon as it eased slightly, he immediately began observing the other rooms.

Unfortunately, after “searching” every part of the apartment building convenient for observing the crime scene across the street, he gained not the slightest result.

Hah, hah…

Klein shrank into a corner of the balcony, hands braced on his knees, panting heavily.

Tears kept spilling from the corners of his eyes, and mucus occasionally ran from his nose, making him look as though he had suddenly fallen ill.

This was the consequence of frequently touching the All-Black Eye within a short period of time. Even with Klein’s resistance in this area, he could not become completely immune.

The only thing that satisfied him was that this was merely stimulation, not contamination. Otherwise, he would have long since given up and dared not try again. That would directly lead to madness.

After resting for a while, Klein finally calmed the reaction. He changed to an apartment building with a less ideal view, but still obtained nothing.

Did I interpret it wrong? The clue is at the crime scene?

Klein returned to the street, puzzled, using the corner of his eye to examine the apartment building marked by traces of explosion.

With the attitude of simply trying once more, he inserted his hand into his pocket again, propped open the iron cigarette case, and reached inside.

He wanted to inspect the entrance area of the crime-scene apartment and see whether anyone was hidden there.

With a buzzing sound, Klein’s head instantly felt as though it had been smashed by something, and even his body swayed slightly.

Like a drunkard, he staggered forward, looking toward the apartment building bearing the explosion scars.

Because he was too far away, he could not “see” those black threads clearly, nor could he trace their origins and observe their owners. He could only barely distinguish where threads were clustered, and where such clusters existed, there were people.

No, no, no…

Klein swept across the area rapidly, making a rough judgment.

Suddenly, he discovered black threads drifting out from the crime scene on the third floor, merging into the air.

This…

Klein’s pupils contracted. After confirming it, he swiftly drew back his hand and no longer touched the All-Black Eye.

There was actually someone inside the blasted room!

That killer was mad enough to wait at the scene?

Was he not afraid that official Beyonders might incidentally investigate the case?

I misjudged earlier. The reason I could not find him was that my logic is completely different from a madman’s…

Thought after thought flashed rapidly. Klein slowly exhaled, pretended nothing was wrong, circled around once, and arrived at the entrance of that apartment.

At this point, all of his negative reactions had already subsided.

Controlling his facial expressions and bodily language, Klein went up to the third floor as though returning home, his steps quick but carrying a touch of heaviness born from exhaustion.

Inside the dim corridor, he saw at once the room without a door and with more than half its wall collapsed. Then, “casually,” he walked toward the public washroom.

As he neared that room, his hand, which had remained in his pocket the whole time, touched the All-Black Eye.

Once more came the ravings that seemed to split his head apart. Once more came swaying, blurred hallucinations of every kind. Through the corner of his eye, Klein glimpsed black illusory threads stretching out from the crime scene.

Following them back to the source, he discovered a man who had completely merged into the shadows, his aura colors the same.

This man was extremely tall, close to two meters. The corners of his mouth drooped slightly, making him appear rather withdrawn.

His eyes were like those of a wild beast. Within their coldness, unhidden ferocity lurked.

Not Lanevus…

Klein withdrew his finger, relaxed his tense body, and outwardly, with complete normality, ignored the possible gaze upon him. Without stopping, he walked to the end of the corridor and entered the public washroom, without alerting the man.

The public washroom was not on the same side as the crime scene. After wiping away cold sweat and briefly calming the negative influence, Klein directly flipped out the window, climbed down skillfully, and left quickly without lingering.

He knew that in several more minutes, that man would discover that the person who had gone to the washroom had not returned, becoming alert and giving chase. Therefore, he had to get as far from Daravi Street as possible.

It was not that Klein did not want to return the way he came. It was that he did not know which room he could enter, and that would likewise expose the problem.

The Clown ran swiftly, took a long detour, and entered the one-room apartment he rented in the East Borough. There, he went above the gray fog and confirmed that there was no danger of having been followed.

That fellow should have a deep connection to Lanevus…

After brief thought, Klein manifested the portrait of the man he had just seen and transmitted it, through intent, to the crimson star symbolizing Miss Justice.

Immediately afterward, he said in a dignified, low voice, “This is a clue.”