Chapter 11: Metaphysical Detective



The dim room was covered with a thin layer of pink moon gauze, and everything was indistinct and not clear enough.

The three men in black coats were sleeping soundly in different places. On the small sofa, Klein closed his eyes as if half-melting into the darkness, and seemed to have fallen into a deep sleep.

His dreams were of a grey and distorted world, with occasional flashes of light.

Finally, these lights were frozen into a picture.

It was a gloomy corner with sewage flowing on the ground. A man with short tan hair, a white shirt and a brown vest was lying against the wall, surrounded by dense swarms of gray rats.

The man's lips were half bitten off, revealing slightly yellow teeth and rotten gums. His nose was covered with blood and a few short hairs. Pieces of flesh on his face had disappeared, revealing the clear white bones. Fat white maggots were drilling in and out everywhere, wriggling constantly. His throat seemed to have been gnawed by a wild beast, and at least half of it was missing.

Klein could barely recognize that this was Zreal Victor Lee. He was no longer the mature and handsome man in the black and white photo Ian had given him.

Zreal is already dead. In a few days, he will probably be gnawed to the bone, or even incomplete bones... Klein woke up from the dream and recalled the scene he had just seen.

His past experiences have enabled him to view similar corpses with relative calmness.

Looking at the crimson moon outside the window, Klein thought for about ten seconds and decided to try to communicate with the man in black next to the sofa.

——He had already prepared a bottle of the corresponding "Amanda" hydrosol and "Eye of the Spirit" potion in the preparations over the past few days. As for the tranquility potion, Klein did not need it. He was able to remain calm and rational when others invaded his dreams and forced him to communicate with spirits.

After setting up a simple altar and letting the quiet and peaceful fragrance spread out, creating a state of half-sleep and half-wakefulness, Klein prayed to himself and to the "fool who does not belong to this era."

Then, he entered above the gray fog and responded with more than two-thirds of his spiritual power.

“When I advance to Sequence 7, similar prayers should be able to slightly leverage the power of the mysterious space above the gray fog, just like summoning and sacrificial rituals…” Looking around, Klein made a rough judgment and quickly returned to the real world.

He passed through the starry sky and the chaotic and noisy storm of thoughts, entered the target man's mind, and saw the other party's illusory figure floating in the air.

“Who sent you to Zreal’s house?” Klein took a look and asked in a deep voice.

The man's shadow replied in a daze with lifeless eyes:

"Meursault, Meursault sent me to wait for a boy named Ian."

The light and shadow in his spiritual world changed accordingly, revealing a thin, sturdy man with dark skin. He was the leader of the group of people who were chasing Ian that Klein had met on the steam subway before.

It was indeed him... Klein had consumed too much spiritual energy in responding to the prayer and was beginning to feel tired. He hurriedly asked:

"Who ordered Meursault?"

"I don't know... He is the 'executioner' of our Zmanger Party. No one can order him around except the boss." The man said blankly.

Zmange... the word for "warrior" in the highland language... Klein, the pseudo-historian and true mystic, suddenly felt a sharp pain in his head, and his body involuntarily flew out of the storm of thoughts.

It didn't take long for him to come out of the trance state, and he felt his head twitching empty.

He did not leave in a hurry. He packed up the materials and his short brown hair in an orderly manner, opened the bay window, and let the cold night wind blow in, dispersing the smell of "Amanda" hydrosol and "Spirit Eye" potion.

During this process, Klein returned to the balcony, locked the door from the inside, and wiped all the places he had touched.

When Zreal's bedroom returned to its previous state, he bowed to the three men who were still sleeping.

Straightening his back, Klein put on his gloves, and with one push and one jump, he nimbly flipped out of the bay window, and stood steadily on tiptoe, using the extremely narrow space.

He lifted the vertical pin upwards, blocked the bottom with a tarot card, and used the Joker's ability to feel the details and adjust the balance.

After a few seconds, Klein slowly pulled back the tarot card. The vertical pin actually remained stable in place and did not fall down.

brush!

He first closed the half of the window that had no latch, then stepped forward and pushed the other half inward with his right hand, closing it.

The movement was so fast that the pin did not fall down until it vibrated and was accurately inserted into the matching iron hole.

Clang! An indelible sound was heard, like a strong wind hitting the surface of glass.

Klein knew that the three men in the bedroom would slowly wake up, so he didn't delay any longer and jumped directly to the street.

The height of the second floor would not be dangerous for him now, but he could no longer remain silent when landing, and also created a not-so-obvious noise.

Klein quickly left the area and left Rose Street, but did not take a cab directly back to Minsk Street in Cherwood District.

He turned a few corners and headed towards the neighboring East District.

It was a cold night, and the chill wind pierced his bones. Klein shivered and decided to wear a sweater in the future. He decided to buy charcoal in the next few days so that the fireplace could play its due role.

An unknown amount of time had passed, but he relied on his intuition to enter the East District of Backlund without a map.

There were very few gas street lamps here, and only one or two could be seen from a distance. If the dark clouds had not obscured the red moon tonight, Klein believed that many sections of the road would be so dark that he could not see clearly.

As he walked, he suddenly saw pairs of eyes appear in the deep darkness in front of him, and a series of hunched figures appeared one after another.

They swayed from the vague distance, silent and soundless.

Zombies? Klein paused abruptly, reached out to hold the "Requiem Charm" and tarot cards, and quickly activated his spiritual vision.

He saw the unhealthy and weak aura color, and also saw the appearance of those figures.

These are all living people, normal living people, but their expressions are numb, their eyes are empty, their movements are weak, and they are both men and women.

It was almost midnight, why were they still walking on the street... Klein cautiously moved aside in confusion and passed the group of people along the curb, but soon he encountered the second and third waves, with the same numbness and pain.

He frowned slightly and was about to go up to ask when he suddenly heard a shout from the front:

"Get up! Everyone, get up!"

"You sons of bitches!"

"Streets and parks are not for you guys to sleep!"

…Klein was stunned for a moment, and the corresponding words of "Poor Law" popped up in his mind, and he understood what was going on.

He himself had experienced the same thing.

Huh… Klein exhaled and quickened his pace, heading towards his one-bedroom house on Black Palm Street in the East District.

There, he slept for two hours, regained his spirituality, and then went out again, breaking off a withered branch as a "divination rod."

"The location of Zreal's body."

"The location of Zreal's body."

Klein walked for a long time through divinations, using the short brown hair to divine. He came to a corner of the East District, where there was a sewer entrance.

——After the great plague 12 years ago, the Kingdom of Loen gradually built an advanced sewer system in its capital, surpassing the "Roselle Legacy" of the Republic of Intis in one fell swoop.

After removing the lid, Klein held his breath and climbed down the vertical metal stairs.

Because it was not a special piece of clothing and did not have many pockets, he could not carry many items. He discarded the "Kragg's Oil" he learned from Frye, which was used to refresh the mind and eliminate odors. He regretted it very much at this moment.

Ten seconds later, Klein landed on his feet and felt the stickiness of the ground.

The dirty feeling stimulated his arms and body to the point that fine bumps appeared, but he could only endure it and continue walking forward in the empty and quiet sewer.

There was a fork in the road ahead, one of which was relatively hidden, and there was a stronger stench that was even more disgusting than the other places.

Klein turned and walked to the end, where he saw dense spiritual light spots and aura colors.

There was no need to use a candle. His eyes, which had opened up his spiritual vision, directly reflected the gloomy corner and the rotten, gnawed corpse.

This was exactly the same scene he had seen in his dream divination.

squeak!

The densely packed grey rats fled in all directions, but some stayed where they were, refusing to leave, unwilling to part with the food.

After confirming that it was Zreal, Klein hesitated for only a moment before quickly setting up the spiritual ritual.

Well... if Ian's description is correct, and Zreal has only been dead for a few days, "spiritual communication" should be able to obtain certain, superficial information... he thought confidently.

Woo!

As the wind swirled and the spiritual wall was built, all the rats fled, and Klein performed the ritual step by step, just like before.

"Zreal's cause of death."

"Zreal's cause of death."

As he recited the mantra over and over again, Klein's eyes turned dark, his pupils and eye whites disappeared, and he quickly entered a dream with the help of meditation.

However, nothing appeared in that foggy and illusory world.

Klein opened his eyes and frowned slightly before making a judgment:

"The communication failed..."

"Someone has 'dealt with' Zreal's spirit..."

"There are Extraordinary people involved in this matter."

"Disguised as Zreal, he was not discovered by any detective, which proves this point."

After pondering for a while, Klein made a decision, which was to stop here and not get involved any further. After all, he had exceeded the commission.

"Let Ian call the police." He whispered, put away the materials, and removed the spiritual wall.


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