I am Zhu Shi, a demon hunter from Luo Mountain.
My brother, Zhu Changan, might soon beco a target for the Fallen Demon Hunters. Although I feel this possibility is low, we indeed have no clues on hand to trace these Fallen Demon Hunters.
I never expected him to visit our mother at the hospital. Although I'm happy he has taken this rare interest, what if the Fallen Demon Hunters really attack and affect those nearby? It's also difficult to explain to him why not even a military hospital is safe, and since I'm not good at lying, I couldn't find a proper reason to send him away quickly.
Moreover, sharing a room with him is very uncomfortable; there are several agents watching him, and I have to pretend to be a literary college girl in front of him, which makes the agents' scrutiny a bit intense. So, I found an excuse to step outside to catch so fresh air and relieve my weary spirit. Not only were there people watching him, but I also set up my spells nearby, and my awareness covered the hospital. So, there was no need to worry about soone taking advantage of his vulnerability.
He even asked why I brought my guitar case when I was leaving. Actually, it contains my spirit gear, but all I could say was that I was going to play the guitar in the courtyard. I had no intention of telling him about my work in Luo Mountain.
Just after I stepped out of the hospital, I saw Agent Kong approaching from the opposite direction, likely preparing to swap shifts with other agents.
In Luo Mountain, agents are officially known as "probes." Their primary job is to investigate unusual incidents and notify demon hunters to handle them, though they also do various other tasks.
Agent Kong is one of the elite; his insights into unusual incidents are richer than mine. The university I am currently attending is also within his patrol area, and we have collaborated many tis. I heard that his superiors have recently imposed so excessive duties on him, forcing him to impersonate a police officer and rush around.
Many demon hunters look down on agents, believing agents are defective because they cannot beco demon hunters; it sounds like if they can't beco demon hunters, they are a level below them. Yes, that's exactly what they think. So, they also look down on ordinary people. Perhaps Agent Kong's superiors share that view too; I really don't get along with them.
With half an hour still to go before the shift change, we sat down in the courtyard's gazebo and chatted for a while. Agent Kong is a man in his thirties, who naturally has nothing in common with about everyday topics, so we could only talk about work. Soon we were discussing the anomaly in the fifteenth-floor room that he had ntioned on the phone earlier.
"Zhu Changan ntioned that the appearance of the cave is still unexplained, although it was I who first asked if you were available to handle it, but are you really okay?" he asked with concern.
"Whether I'm okay or not, I'll only know after trying. Moreover, I don't know if that cave belongs to the type of strange phenona that can affect those who co into contact with it, regardless of distance. He's my brother; I must protect him."
"But your expertise is combat. If it really cos to it, you could ask other demon hunters who are better at dealing with such matters."
"I can't just ask other demon hunters to handle an odd phenonon that I know nothing about..."
"Well, since you say so, I won't persuade you anymore," he sighed, then changed the subject, "But while dealing with the cave, you could also try probing that Zhuang Cheng."
"Zhuang Cheng? Do you still think he's connected to the cave's appearance?"
"That's a secondary reason, and it's unlikely," he explained. "What I really an is that he may have already co into contact with our world. With the frequent strange incidents in the past two years, soone like him, who relentlessly pursues these incidents yet remains unhard, don't you find that odd? Maybe he has acquired so protective powers."
He had said sothing similar before, but this ti I caught another implication: "Are you suggesting we recruit Zhuang Cheng into our ranks as an ally?"
"Even if he cannot beco a combatant, he could surely make an excellent agent, fulfilling his wish," he smiled. "Recruiting potentially talented individuals from the public is originally part of my job as a probe, but if you could discover him, you could then guide him and have him assist you. Even without mana, he's a very capable person and would definitely be of help to you."
"Thanks for the thought, but..."
Although I acknowledge that Zhuang Cheng is talented, so realities may differ from what Agent Kong thinks.
I recalled my past acquaintance with Zhuang Cheng.
-
It was around my freshman year of high school when I first heard about Zhuang Cheng from my brother.
Unlike ordinary families, my family, the Zhu family, is a family of demon hunters. It's said that our ancestors included Impermanence, but our glory has faded now. Initially, my brother was supposed to inherit the family's Magic Artifact and beco a demon hunter, but due to an accident, I beca the successor, and he lost his childhood mories. Our family also blocked all information concerning the world of demon hunters from him.
They said it was amnesia, but it seed to be not a total loss; he still retained fragnts and vague impressions. Therefore, from a young age, he firmly believed in the existence of strange creatures and claid to those around him that he had seen and encountered such beings.
Naturally, our family did not acknowledge his claims, and outsiders were even less likely to believe him. When he was in middle school, he was mocked and bullied by classmates, and teachers often called him in for talks. People are easily influenced by their environnt, especially during adolescence, a ti of rapid personality developnt; external negation and recognition are crucial.
Additionally, after his amnesia, he never encountered strange creatures again, and over ti, he might have slowly accepted that those disjointed fragnts and impressions were just delusions from his childhood, and finally, he stopped ntioning those events.
However, he surely still harbored so defiance and anticipation in so corner of his heart, hoping for an opportunity to vent and express it outward.
I felt imnse sympathy for my brother, while at the sa ti, I envied him as well.
I had once thought that I would never beco a demon hunter.
One day, during dinner, he suddenly brought up soone, saying there was a weirdo at his high school who was keen on investigating urban legends, nad Zhuang Cheng.
This person was sowhat like my brother in the past, though he didn't proclaim the existence of bizarre entities to those around him; instead, he was earnestly trying to prove their existence, even more aggressively than my brother had done.
I thought my brother was reigniting his interest in these strange entities. For reasons we could not explain to outsiders, my family and I did not want him delving into this world. So I dismissed the topic from the perspective of an ordinary person as "a waste of energy," and after a mont of silence, my brother agreed with .
Later, I conducted so investigations on Zhuang Cheng. He hadn't started researching ghost stories just in high school but had shown an extraordinary passion for them since at least middle school. His classmates all had lasting impressions of him, but hardly anyone befriended him. A senior of mine in high school had been his middle school classmate, and she shuddered when she ntioned Zhuang Cheng.
"That person often brought candles to school."
"Candles?"
"Yes, candles. He'd pull out candles from his desk drawer whenever he felt like it, and then stare at them with a terrifying gaze as if he was possessed. He didn't just love ghost stories; he also frequented haunted places for adventures. He must have been possessed by so dirty spirit..."
Moreover, I learned from others that he used to focus on researching Feng Shui and mystic rituals, often carrying a Compass and divination tools with him for practical use. After a while, losing interest, he shifted to other fields, still related to mysticism. Most people thought he was either ntally ill or incredibly childish, exceeding in these traits even more than my brother during his middle school years.
Yet, he seed oblivious to others, as if their voices just couldn't reach his ears, and he did whatever he pleased.
In high school, there was a girl in my class who liked paranormal romance novels and developed so strange fantasies about making herself appear as a "mystical girl," claiming she "could see." He sniffed her out and "caught her in the act," ruthlessly exposing all her pretenses.
There was even a ti when a visiting Feng Shui Master from abroad tried to con a local tycoon, and Zhuang Cheng, still in high school, sohow sniffed out the situation and exposed the fraud on the spot.
Years passed, and I'm not sure how many tis he's encountered impostors of the supernatural, yet he remained "ntally ill" and "childish."
While this is just my own speculation, maybe it was this quality that attracted my brother.
So later, when I criticized Zhuang Cheng in front of my brother, he no longer pretentiously agreed with like in the past; instead, he took Zhuang Cheng's side.
I only realized afterward that from the first ti he ntioned Zhuang Cheng, he had been secretly following him, collecting information about him like a fan.
When he talked about Zhuang Cheng, his tone was increasingly animated, as if he saw him as another possible version of himself.
"Do you know? Right before graduating from his senior high school, he took a trip to another province to investigate a child disappearance case related to local folklore, similar to the mystic vanishings in Japan. It apparently involved a formidable evil force behind the scenes..."
Hearing such topics frequently, I had to admit that he indeed was a "legendary figure."
But it was dangerous, extrely dangerous.
One day, Zhuang Cheng would find himself in an irreversible plight, dying with regret for the very pursuit he was relentless about.
About two to three years ago, organizations around the world related to oddities noticed that the bizarre entities hidden in the shadows of the world had inexplicably begun to act more frequently, and phenona of space-ti distortion that were once rare were steadily increasing. The severity of this was escalating yearly, and reports of ordinary people dying due to odd phenona were piling up.
In Luo Mountain, soone even made a heretical prophecy that this was a sign of an impending cataclysm.
If we were to define all of human history up to this point as "the era of humanity," then starting from today and within the next ten years, the prosperous history of humanity would et its end.
Thereafter, not only all humans, but all life forms and all oddities would be destroyed in the looming catastrophe.
Ultimately, all matter would turn into nothingness.
And the next era... there likely wouldn't be another era.
If one had to na it, it would be "the era of the apocalypse."
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