After the lights went out, the room became gloomy and chilling.
The sheriff’s office, once spacious and bright, with a desk, a set of guest sofas, and walls adorned with neatly hung honor banners, felt completely transformed. The wide window across from the desk, which usually offered a view of the street outside, was now shattered, letting in the salty breeze that seemed to whisper of the earlier strange events.
The room was engulfed in darkness, except for the faint, flickering glow of an emergency light. Everything felt eerily silent and unnerving.
Shen Ye took two slow steps back, his gaze shifting to the corner behind the desk.
There stood a tall cabinet with its doors firmly shut.
Such cabinets were common, standing about two meters tall and capable of storing various items or even hanging coats. Offices in schools often had similar ones.
Suddenly—
A voice came from inside the cabinet:
“A hunter killed by his prey, with the prey disguising itself as the hunter… What a pitiful end.”
“How tragic,” the voice continued.
Steadying himself, Shen Ye spoke, “Are you referring to the man from earlier, Luo Feichuan—”
“The leftmost drawer of the desk isn’t locked. Open it, and you’ll find the truth,” the voice instructed.
Shen Ye hesitated briefly.
Should I really rifle through a sheriff’s personal belongings? What if there’s an issue?
—Can this voice even be trusted?
Yet he couldn’t ignore the activation of his innate ability, Whisper of the Abyss.
It was a peculiar sensation, one that couldn’t be mistaken.
Whisper of the Abyss was a foundational talent for the Undead clan, one of the three oldest inherited abilities.
Fine.
He decided to take the risk.
Shen Ye walked over to the desk, pulled a napkin from his pocket, wrapped it around two fingers, and used them to pull open the leftmost drawer.
Inside lay a pair of light-brown pilot sunglasses.
Shen Ye’s pupils contracted sharply.
He had seen those sunglasses before.
During his visit to Chen Haoyu in the hospital, Shen Ye had noticed a tall, thin man standing on the rooftop of the building across from the hospital. The man had faced the hospital, hands clasped, lips moving as though chanting something.
That man had been wearing an identical pair of light-brown pilot sunglasses.
—Exactly the same!
Closing his eyes briefly, Shen Ye reopened them with a calm expression.
A chilling realization began to take shape in his mind.
Could it be…
With the napkin-wrapped fingers, he gently closed the drawer and swiftly moved to the corner cabinet. Using the same method, he opened its doors.
Inside, a corpse was bound upright within the cabinet.
It was Luo Feichuan!
His body was covered in horrible wounds, though no blood seeped from them, clearly treated with professional care.
“Sheriff Luo, how did you end up dead?” Shen Ye rasped.
“The weapon failed me,” the corpse replied, its eyes closed.
“He was an assassin, and I was a special combatant, balanced between strength and agility,” it explained.
“—I needed powerful equipment to unleash my full potential. He only needed a moment of distraction to strike.”
“What was his goal?” Shen Ye asked.
“He must have been seeking answers. Otherwise, why go through such lengths—using my identity to lure you here and interrogate you directly?” The corpse’s tone was resolute.
Shen Ye’s heart shaken.
That’s right!
The imposter Luo Feichuan had been questioning him about the hospital.
Perhaps the man was deeply puzzled—
The Cursed Sculpture of the Fallen King of Malice had never failed throughout history.
Why had it been ineffective against a 15-year-old boy?
He had to uncover the mystery behind this anomaly.
Fortunately, the sequence of events—police officers reporting to the scene, Shen Ye’s intentional stalling, and the unexpected arrival of a lunatic causing chaos at the police station—
had disrupted everything.
—The killer hadn’t had a chance to finish questioning him!
“Sheriff Luo, the man impersonating you was taken away by someone in brightly colored pajamas, using some sort of sorcery,” Shen Ye explained.
“Sorcery? What sorcery?” the corpse asked.
Shen Ye recounted the events.
The corners of the corpse’s lips curled slightly in mockery.
“A prey that disguised itself as a hunter, unaware of the greater danger lurking behind the hunter.”
“You’re saying the pajama-wearing person is even more dangerous?” Shen Ye asked.
“That individual is the Judicator of the Silent Church—mental cases, all of them. I accidentally killed one of their members recently, and now he’s come personally for revenge,” the corpse elaborated.
“The Judicator… mistook the killer for you?” Shen Ye asked.
“Exactly,” the corpse said, smirking.
It continued, “What you witnessed wasn’t sorcery; it was an Anomaly.”
“Anomaly?” Shen Ye repeated, unfamiliar with the term in both his past and present lives.
“When other worlds suddenly connect to ours, engulfing, eroding, or abducting parts of our world—or living beings—”
“That’s an Anomaly.”
“Above it are more catastrophic occurrences, referred to as Calamities.”
“What’s a Calamity?” Shen Ye pressed.
“Powerful creatures from other worlds, finding ways to descend abruptly into the main world—”
“Such events often lead to widespread disaster.”
“Do you recall the flood in Jiangnan City? The one that triggered an earthquake, wiping out the entire city?”
“Ordinary people didn’t know the truth, but that was a typical case of a Calamity descending.”
Shen Ye was speechless.
The horror of it all…
Wait!
Something doesn’t add up here.
“If that killer reveals his true identity, will the Silent Church’s Judicator spare him?” Shen Ye asked.
The corpse said, “‘The anomaly’ has already taken shape; trying to reverse it is utterly impossible. Besides, the Silent Church is willing to kill all of humanity—that’s the will of the beings behind them.”
“The Church… I haven’t had any contact with them,” Shen Ye replied.
“Never engage with any Church. The gods they serve are utterly insane, and their followers are no different. You must be extremely cautious and stay far away from them if you want to keep your soul intact,” the corpse advised.
Shen Ye rubbed his temples in pain, forcing himself to stay calm.
—Is adulthood really this dangerous and complicated?
How am I supposed to survive long enough to grow up?
“Captain, is there anything else you can do to help me?” he asked.
The corpse thought for a moment before speaking.
“Our time is limited. We can’t idle around chatting; we need to act quickly.”
“Why?” Shen Ye asked.
“If that killer manages to withstand the Silent Church’s ‘anomaly,’ he might return soon. After all, that ‘anomaly’ is the weakest type and has a time limit,” the corpse explained.
Shen Ye wiped the cold sweat from his forehead.
He might come back!
That meant he was still in danger.
—When I met the killer earlier, my instincts made me cautious and kept me from revealing the truth.
Good thing I didn’t say anything!
If the killer got the information he wanted, I’d have no value left to him.
He could kill me effortlessly.
Stalling for time was the right move!
“Couldn’t that judicator kill him earlier?” Shen Ye asked.
“There are always unexpected changes when engaging in a real fight, things no one can foresee. For example, me—I accidentally captured some of their followers and was planning to flee to a military fortress under the World Government to lay low for a while,” the corpse replied.
—Only to be killed by the killer before you even got moving.
Shen Ye silently added that thought in his heart.
As the conversation with the corpse continued, he gradually realized something.
He would never experience the peaceful times of his previous life.
Countless conflicts and battles were erupting constantly in this world.
—In this world, if you don’t want others to control your fate, you must work hard to become stronger.
The corpse spoke again.
“Listen, you need to immediately go to the weapon storage room on the third floor. On the silver wall outside the storage room, input this code:”
“2EGY-57XC-9Q61-7SKR-81MT-3DPW-76AP-5E2K-99VS.”
“There’s a special pen there, designed to write on walls.”
“Report the truth. You’ll be able to receive protection.”
“Time is running out. This is your only way to stay safe—go now!”
With that, the corpse fell still.
A glowing line of text appeared on Shen Ye’s retina:
“The soul has departed.”
Shen Ye stood there for a moment, then suddenly said, “I have more questions.”
A new glowing line of text appeared:
“The soul has returned.”
The corpse spoke again.
“I’ve told you everything I can. What else do you need to know?”
Shen Ye grabbed a pen and paper from the desk, using his leg as a makeshift writing surface.
“That password is way too long. I’m human—I can’t remember all that.”
The corpse had no choice but to repeat it.
Shen Ye wrote it down.
Seeing that he had recorded it completely, the soul departed again.
Shen Ye stared at the paper, reading it over and over, still feeling uneasy.
—This password is too long. Should I call him back one more time?
Forget it.
I’d look ridiculous as a compulsive perfectionist.
Besides, I’m a “polite person.”
—If it really turns out to be wrong, I’ll call him back then.
But now, Shen Ye finally understood why the ancient undead ability “Whisper of the Abyss” came with such a description:
“By calling upon a corpse, the dead must answer your summons, climbing up from hell to truthfully reveal what they know so their souls may rest in peace.”
—If you don’t speak, I’ll just keep calling you.
—You’ll be annoyed to death.
Rest in peace? In your dreams.
