Chapter 17: Ghost Dog and Demon Child (Part 2)
The blunt force of the blows continued, the pain unbearably intense. It felt like it was burning nerves, even deep within his brain, aching faintly. Chu Hengkong gritted his teeth, clenched his fists, and spun around, attempting to free himself from the giant wolf's grasp, but this time he failed. The scene in his vision gradually blurred, the scenery blurring like a pitch-black soup. He was clearly in mid-air, yet he was "standing" on the ground. The strong stench was nauseating, and all he could hear was an unpleasant laugh...
Late at night, in an alley, a woman, her head bruised and bleeding, lay buried in a pile of garbage bags, while men wielding clubs savagely kicked her in the head. The barking of dogs shattered the night's silence, tears blurred her vision, and the world shook like an earthquake.
“Mom! Mom!!!”
Dogs barked. Curses were hurled. They ran into the garbage. They clutched the pitiful, unrecognizable corpse. They cried heartbreakingly, but no one responded. When they realized what was happening, men were standing around, their clubs still stained with red and white.
"How lucky!" the white-browed man grinned, "It saves us the trouble of searching everywhere."
The club fell, the painful, snapping sound of bones. It hurt. It hurt.
"Brother Baimei, are you really going to kill him?" his companion laughed.
"Nonsense! If I said I'd kill her whole family, of course I'll kill her whole family!" The white-browed man roared, as ferocious as a wolf. "Otherwise, what will you do if that gossip doesn't want to go to bed with you? You're going to sleep with the guests?! Right!"
"It's OK to sleep for the guests, but forget about accompanying them..."
"Damn, this dog bit me!"
"Kill with a stick, do we need to teach you this?"
"Hurry up, the kid is still yelling."
They were even joking. Taking someone's life was as easy for them as throwing away a bag of garbage. They felt no guilt or fatigue, only the urge to get it over with quickly so they could get back to drinking. The girl being beaten could no longer hear the words, only the pain and the burning hatred in her heart.
It hurts. It hurts so much. No one came to save me. Hawu is dead too. Why don't you die? Go die. Go die...!
"--roll!"
The roar dispelled the curse, and the illusions in the alleyway dissipated, revealing the true scene. The talisman in Chu Hengkong's coat glowed faintly, and its power dispelled the illusions, allowing him to see the reality clearly.
Chu Hengkong wasn't injured at all; a mere stick couldn't possibly injure him. The previous hallucination was the little ghost girl synchronizing her own "experiences," causing the enemy to suffer the pain of her death. If it weren't for the city lord's talisman, he would have been killed by the evil spirit in his hallucination... But even now that he'd regained his composure, the situation wasn't much better.
Dark night, rooftop, a massive wolf head, howling wind. In the few seconds he'd been lost in the hallucination, he'd been slammed onto the rooftop by the wolf. Another second and he'd have been hurled six stories down. Wooden fangs tore through his sleeves, slashing long gashes across his arm. Chu Hengkong's arm hadn't been severed by the bite thanks to his honed instincts. At the last moment, he'd raised his iron spear to block the giant's maw, helping him through the most perilous moment. But now the spear was severely warped, and before it could even reach the rooftop, he'd be ripped apart, both gun and body, by a single bite.
"You should die too! All of you should die!!"
The little ghost girl's bitter curse echoed in his ears. He felt the prospect of falling from the rooftop if he retreated, and the giant wolf's maw was in his grasp as he advanced. For a moment, Chu Hengkong had nowhere to escape. As the edge of the rooftop neared, Chu Hengkong released his gun from his right hand. He twisted his waist, lunged to the right, and the tentacle holding the gun on his left arm extended with the wolf's momentum. This extra length allowed him to continue to block the wolf's bite, allowing him to maneuver from an impossible angle to get to the wolf's side.
From this position, the collar on the wolf's waist was within reach. Chu Hengkong loosened his fist and chopped it down. The little ghost girl saw it clearly and quickly shouted, "Haw, get out of the way!"
Startled, the giant wolf immediately let go and rolled away. Chu Hengkong's knife hand was no longer within reach, so he decisively transformed his palm into a hook and swung forward. The sticker on the back of his hand activated, and two transparent water bullets appeared between his fingers. With a series of piercing sounds, the water bullets leaped out one after another, smashing the collar inside the giant wolf to pieces!
The little ghost girl froze in a daze. The giant wolf froze on the spot, its red eyes revealing a human-like despair. Chu Hengkong swung his spear and made a "tsk" sound.
It's that simple.
If he hadn't been intentionally letting the dog off, it would have died long ago. But the little girl was so unreasonable that she had to be beaten before she learned to listen. He glared at the little ghost girl and said unhappily, "Are you quiet? Come out with me now. I'll finish my ideological education so I can call it a day..."
Chu Hengkong paused mid-sentence, his expression becoming serious for the first time. The evil spirits had indeed stopped moving, but their bodies hadn't weakened at all; instead, they had grown larger.
The ghost girl's form grew increasingly ethereal and blurry as it grew, like a low-resolution image on an old television. The giant wolf was being dragged into the illusion, seemingly being devoured by the ghost girl. Her face was almost fading, and a pure black tornado erupted around the illusion. Suddenly, sand and rocks flew everywhere, and the wind was strong enough to lift trees. Chu Hengkong plunged the tip of his spear into the ground. Otherwise, even he would be blown away!
"Kill! Die! All of you! Die!!!"
The sound of the wind was the cumulative effect of countless small curses, and at its core was the growing number of wronged souls. Chu Hengkong had misjudged the situation. He had thought that shattering the relic would deprive the evil spirit of its fighting power, but he hadn't anticipated that the relic also served as a restraint. If it weren't for the stone collar, which constantly acted as a "constraint," the evil spirit would have long since left the abandoned apartment and wreaked havoc in the city.
"damn it……!"
Chu Hengkong cursed profusely. The little ghost girl now felt unreal and fuzzy to him, like a demonic illusion. She was probably just a fantasy demon on the verge of formation! What a fucking waste of time! She's already a demon larva, and there's no point in criticizing and educating her. She should have been stabbed to death with a talisman long ago, and she'd gotten a high-level relic for nothing!
But then he remembered the look in the girl's eyes, so stubborn and resentful, as if she'd been steeped in hatred for a decade, completely different from her weak father's. Her father's eyes were empty, completely hollow, filled with only sadness. One was seeking revenge in solitude, the other was waiting in solitude.
"Chu Hengkong, I'm warning you, spirits have a lot of tricks up their sleeves. Remember to clean up afterward, don't leave any messes behind."
Jie An's instructions before leaving echoed in his mind, the slick middle-aged man now unusually serious. Chu Hengkong was almost unable to stand still. The strange black wind blew away bricks and tiles, and the concrete on the rooftop seemed to be flying. He took one last look at the female ghost. The stubbornness in those illusory eyes was gone, only a dark resentment remained.
As a killer, you'll always encounter difficult situations after a while. Even in this other world, it was no different. Haien's pleading, Jie An's instructions, the little girl's cries, the ghost's venom. The images in his mind shifted, lingering on that initial sentence.
Clean up and don't leave any mess.
Chu Hengkong donned the power bracelet, drew his spear, and attached the shimmering talisman to the tip. His last foothold was blown away, and he leaped onto the large debris in the air, venturing into the pitch-black wind alone, running towards the female ghost and the giant wolf.
The man shouted and drew his gun. The power in the relic burst out with the rising emotions. The talisman was picked up on the iron tip of the spear, and he shot through both the man and the dog!
·
The hands pointed to half past eleven, and the windows were rattling in the cold wind, making it impossible to sleep. Hain stared at the moldy ceiling, and all desire to sleep was gone.
With only half an hour until work, he should have been out the door, but Hain felt very tired today, so tired that he couldn't even lift his arms. He usually lived on hope, telling himself over and over that he would find it, but the inspector's words before leaving shattered that false hope.
He'd known it all along; there was no hope for more than half a year. Any further searching would only lead to a surviving life. He struggled out of bed and prepared for work. It felt pointless, like a zombie whose movements were frozen.
The door slammed violently, each sound so fierce that it seemed to break the iron door. Hein subconsciously opened the door, and the man with a gun strode in, with a murderous look between his eyebrows that was so thick that it could make people tremble with fear.
"Inspector Chu...?" Hai En almost didn't recognize the man.
"Open your safe." Chu Hengkong said hoarsely, "Quick!"
Hai En's head spun. Was this a robbery? The detective in the newspaper was the robber? He felt this city was ridiculous. He didn't even realize he was laughing when he opened the safe. The small iron door opened, and inside lay the family's most precious things. The beads he had painstakingly saved, the property deed, the marriage certificate, the birth certificate...all those small treasures were thrown out by a huge hand. After emptying the safe, Chu Hengkong slapped a piece of paper inside. Hai En vaguely saw that it was a talisman.
Chu Hengkong closed the safe door, sat on the floor, and breathed a sigh of relief. Hai En looked at the certificates scattered on the ground, his fingers trembling non-stop. The shock made this honest man completely collapse: "What are you doing?! What on earth did our family do wrong?! I——"
"……dad?"
Hein's screams stopped abruptly. The little girl in front of the safe looked up at him, her eyes bright black, her hair dark, her face pale and tender. The cute little dog was beside her. She hadn't changed at all, everything was the same as in the last fragment of his memory.
He fell to his knees, his trembling hands touching his daughter's hair. It was a little cold, but solid and tangible.
"Tina?" Hein smiled. "Where have you been? Dad has been looking for you."
"I'm lost..." the girl whispered.
"Why don't you go home? Dad is worried about you! Very worried about you..."
The father hugged his daughter tightly, tears streaming down his face. The little black dog, Hao, lay quietly beside him, wagging his tail vigorously.
Tina's father was out looking for people during the day and working far away at night. The two were only a block apart but never saw each other again. Of course, Tina was very desperate because she heard the threats of the mob before she died and never saw her father again. She thought that both her parents were killed and that they were going to destroy this ruthless city with them.
And now she was sealed in a safe, this collar wasn't something she could easily remove, it was just a heavy piece of iron. She couldn't go far, at best she could walk around the building, waiting for her father to come home.
I wonder what level of relic this safe with the talisman attached to it is now?
Chu Hengkong stretched his shoulders and looked at the little girl: "Your father is still here. If you continue to act up, you will cause trouble for your father."
"I won't make a fuss anymore!" Tina cried, "I'm sorry, Dad. I won't make a fuss anymore..."
At this time, she apologized again. What was there to apologize for? That's why she said the child was troublesome. Chu Hengkong stood up and patted Hai En's shoulder: "Put the money and certificate somewhere else. From now on, this will be the most precious treasure in your family. Take good care of it."
Hai En was awakened from his dream. He was so confused that he didn't know what to do. In a panic, he picked up the fallen beads and said, "Inspector Chu! Please!"
Chu Hengkong took a quick glance and suddenly revealed a rude expression like a thug.
"Do you understand the rules of the underworld?"
Haien shrank back in fear: "I didn't mean to do that. Please give me some time--"
"It's just to help the child accumulate good karma, why give so much?" Chu Hengkong returned to his usual indifferent expression, "It's enough to reimburse the travel expenses."
He picked up the smallest bead, shouldered his gun, and walked out the door into the night.
(End of this chapter)
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