As they were talking, a stuffed puppy came scampering past them, wagging its tail as it ran. It flinched as it passed Shirley, then seemed to immediately recognize her as its owner, and immediately came up to her and lay down with its tongue hanging out.
But Shirley noticed that it was just panting, and there was actually no sound of air flowing when it stuck out its tongue and flapped its nostrils.
She glanced at the dog lying at her feet, then looked away without caring and asked Igor calmly, "Are you real?"
Igor actually couldn't figure out what this woman was thinking.
He once thought he understood her, but later he realized that everyone only saw one side of her.
Margarita, Shirley's contact in the Red Line Army, said that Shirley didn't use her abilities well. If she knew the full facts, she might change her mind and think that Joyce was constantly using her methods to manipulate others, including herself.
"If you think I'm real, then I am." Igor's expression was also very calm. At this moment, the sounds from the basement had been isolated. They were standing in the hall of Joyce's old house. Except for the specimens running around, all the statues on the pedestals and the portraits of Wendy hanging on both sides were staring straight at them. Even those works that were not originally facing outward, their still eyeballs turned in that direction, which made the silent space seem particularly weird.
A statue of a girl, dancing in ballet poses, stood behind Shirley. She could almost hear the white plaster statue's eyes rolling. The other person's cold, outstretched fingertips were less than fifteen centimeters away from her shoulder.
"..." Shirley didn't speak for a while, and there was no expression of fear on her fair face.
On the contrary, all emotion seemed to have drained from her.
"Are you here to seek revenge on me?" She thought for a moment, then gave up on the question of whether Igor was real or not. She changed the subject and asked directly, "Is it for yourself or Wendy? I've heard a little about what happened to Longman Griffin, and I've met him."
She adjusted the gray-blue dress she was wearing today. It was still a retro British style, with a wide hem that fell to the toes of her brown boots. This outfit was not suitable for running away, and this Alpha didn't look like he was planning to escape.
"Some say he simply couldn't suppress his true nature, but I know that's not the case." Shirley smiled wanly, without even a hint of emotion. "He's crazy, that's obvious. I'm familiar with that feeling. Langman has done many things that violate social morality. He often mocks me for not having a business acumen because it's difficult for me to seize any fleeting opportunity and profit by any means necessary like he does."
Igor thought for a moment and said, "I don't think this has anything to do with our topic today."
"I'm not discussing... basic issues like good and evil," Shirley said to herself. "I'm not as adept at hitting the target with one strike as Langman, nor do I possess his rare acumen. So, over a long period of time, I've learned to play the long game... just like a spider weaving a web, I don't care if there's prey or when it stumbles upon me. I simply spread the web and wait patiently."
"You or Wendy, I'm not approaching you out of active purpose."
She said.
"You just happened to fall into this web."
Igor's expression showed no emotion. "I heard that the Red Line Army contacted you to be their subordinate. They also instructed you to do this."
For the first time, Shirley showed a surprised expression.
"You know the Red Line Legion? This shouldn't be... No, they exposed themselves. The internal forum of the Holy See was hacked some time ago. Were those your people?"
Igor remained silent.
Shirley thought for a moment and said, "Yes, this is their order."
"Why?"
"Shouldn't you already know this? You and your sister have special physiques, especially Wendy. She's a one-in-a-million genius. They feel that letting her wander around out there is a waste of such talent."
Without waiting for Igor to speak, Shirley continued, "Ever since you disappeared, I knew you would find out about this sooner or later, but I didn't expect it to be so soon. The people or forces behind you are formidable. They are practically single-handedly taking on the entire Federation."
"Longman Griffin, you should have met him, but you didn't kill him."
"But is this the end? Not really," Shirley said, pondering. "He played a significant role in framing your crime. He's practically one of your number one enemies. If I were you, I wouldn't let him off so easily. But why did he survive?" She carefully observed Igor's expression. "Because the decision wasn't yours. The people behind you wanted him alive. A lunatic who doesn't play by the rules would be more beneficial to him as the head of the Griffin family than the renewal of this power."
Igor almost laughed at her 'speculation'.
Will Azathoth still remember that there is such a person?
He thought of the god's weary expression when facing strangers, his face full of "Let him be, I don't want to understand or fight", if it weren't for the trouble that always came to him... or for Igor.
Of course, the trouble was all because of Igor.
His smile was fleeting, and it became a little apologetic, but he didn't show it in front of Shirley.
Shirley continued to slowly articulate her speculation: "You're not particularly valued by that being, who knows whether it's human or not?"
Igor didn't know how to explain to someone who had never come into contact with Azathoth, a rather... salty god and his different values from humans.
Then he was tainted with a bit of the god's salty fish aura and simply gave up on defending himself.
"Whatever you want to think, where is Wendy now?"
Shirley said without hesitation: "In the basement of this old house."
"She wasn't doing well, but she wasn't terrible either."
This was something Igor hadn't thought of... If he had known that Wendy was in this house, he would never have wasted so much time talking to Viscount Joyce. Thinking of this, Igor could no longer bear it and started walking towards the basement.
The portraits of Wendy hanging on the wall looked at him with burning eyes, as if expectantly.
"Wait a minute!" Shirley shouted after him.
The plaster hand of the girl statue behind her silently pressed down on Shirley's neck.
Igor looked back at her: "What else?"
Shirley stood there, the pale hand seemingly lightly placed on her neck, like an overly curious collar.
She lowered her head, and the puppy lying at her feet seemed to have its pupils dilated a little. It stuck out its tongue and simulated breathing, watching the scene excitedly.
"I killed everyone here." She smiled, clasping her hands in front of her. Her demeanor was cool and elegant, like a lady walking to a ball. "Sorry, every living thing." Shirley glanced apologetically at the dog at her feet. "At first, my father thought I was too obsessed with a mere dog and didn't have the heart of a family head, so he ordered me to kill it."
"I felt really sorry at first and cried a lot about it."
"But just like what people have said about me... I'm not particularly brave or capable of defying fate," she said to Igor, as if talking to herself. "It seems unnecessary to blame my sins on fate at this moment. Or perhaps I've never been a good person. So after a while, I began to think that this kind of life isn't bad either—I mean the feeling of sitting on a spider web and hunting."
The smile on Viscount Joyce's face remained unchanged, and the hand on her neck tightened little by little.
The air gradually faded away, and Shirley felt her lungs struggling to squeeze out the last bit of oxygen she depended on for survival. Pitch-black snowflakes slowly appeared before her eyes.
"I'm sorry, Igor. I'm just telling you this to let you know." She struggled to utter the last few words, "As a friend, I feel immense sympathy for Wendy and your situation."
"But as Shirley Joyce herself... ahem... ahem... "
Her left hand pulled off the white lace glove on her right hand.
Igor's pupils shrank.
The newly serviced mechanical hand didn't tremble even a little at the desperate situation its owner was in. Its upper middle finger precisely turned 180 degrees and pressed firmly against the center of the back of the hand.
There's a little switch there.
"boom--"
The next second, the violent fireworks caused by the explosion engulfed the statue behind Shirley Joyce and swept her entire body into it.
"... being manipulated, that's how I survive."
Her last words rolled out from under her tongue, and the boiling flames instantly illuminated her vision. Amid the unbearable burning pain all over her body, Shirley forced her blue eyes open wide - these eyes were almost the only thing that represented coolness in the firelight.
She saw dark black vines that came out of nowhere, growing out from the ceiling of the room, stretching out from behind the statues, coming out of the mouths of the figures, and slithering out like snakes on the carved handrails.
They moved along the blazing ground, approaching the gray-haired young man and gently enveloping him like a delicate cocoon. Even the blazing flames couldn't imbue these tentacles with even a hint of warmth. They still looked cold, sticky, and terrifying, filled with a maddening aura that could drive one mad.
But Shirley knew that was not the case.
She knew she was a lunatic, but she also understood that there was irrefutable rationality in the actions of those tentacles—they were protecting.
How incredible.
They are protecting.
Shirley fell on the burnt carpet in pain.
The only mechanical hand she could still move helped her stand up and turn over, facing the towering ceiling.
In front, a few meters high, a portrait of Wendy Sullivan, half the size of a person, was pasted on the wall. The paper was inevitably burned by the flames, and its yellowed edges were about to be swallowed up.
A girl with gray hair, red eyes and fair skin looked down at her. The person in the portrait maintained the same posture as when she was painting, with her hand raised to touch the hairpin on her forehead, and a shy smile on her face.
But Shirley knew that Wendy was using her ability to look at her through the portrait, so there was no smile in those red eyes.
They just stared at each other in the bright firelight, neither of them speaking.
The pain grew deeper, and she gradually lost all sense of her own body. Shirley lay motionless in the flames, her consciousness hazy, and she felt as if she were covered in angel feathers. Wendy continued to watch her from afar, her red eyes, identical to Igor's, a fleeting glint of water in them.
Shirley Joyce didn't even have the strength to open her eyes.
She let her consciousness sink into the darkness of unconsciousness, recalling the crystal clear tear-like thing, and finally classified them as an illusion that could never have happened.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
