A week had passed since Michelle's rumor-fueled tragedy, and the newspapers had already fallen silent.
The story, however, had beco a staple on the radio broadcasts. It was brimming with drama and tugged at the listeners' heartstrings.
"A virtuous girl from a humble background, driven to despair by vicious gossip, takes her own life and returns as a ghost to take revenge on her torntors"—it was the perfect plot for a novel.
It was rumored that so writers in Khimfast had already taken up their pens.
"What do you think about it?"
Anna deeply sympathized with Michelle, even though she had tried to attack Lu Li.
She believed that if she were in Michelle's place, she would have undoubtedly sought revenge... and taught those people a harsh lesson.
Lu Li set down the newspaper and looked calmly at Anna.
"What are you talking about?"
Anna gestured toward the radio, where the story of Michelle's tragedy was being recounted:
"About Michelle."
"You already said so."
Lu Li wanted to go back to his reading.
Anna pressed her hand on the newspaper.
"And what did I say?"
"That it's a tragedy," Lu Li clarified, afraid Anna might misunderstand. "That's what I think."
"But why did it happen?" Anna snatched the newspaper, wanting Lu Li to tell her more. "Why did those people do that to her..."
Anna expected Lu Li to say sothing about "base instincts" or the like, but after a mont of thought, he answered:
"Because the transmission of information through conversation inevitably leads to its distortion. Entropy increases."
"Hmm..." Anna nodded seriously, trying to look as if she understood everything.
But she didn't let go of the newspaper.
"Let
give you an example. Old Francis lost one hundred shillings and told Big Francis that now they'd have to eat nothing but black bread. Big Francis told Little Francis that their father lost money and they couldn't afford any other food. Little Francis told everyone that his father's money was stolen and they were starving."
"Information gets distorted during transmission for various reasons."
After listening to the explanation, Anna silently returned the newspaper to Lu Li.
"Understand?" Lu Li asked, taking the newspaper and eting Anna's clear eyes with a calm gaze.
"Uh-huh..."
Anna averted her gaze, embarrassed.
Silence settled over the detective agency once more. Ti flowed by unnoticed, until it was broken by the crash of sothing falling.
Lu Li put down the newspaper again and saw Anna by the window, a shattered flowerpot and scattered soil on the floor.
From Anna's posture, it was clear she'd tried to catch the falling pot. But she had forgotten she was a ghost.
"I didn't an to..." Anna mumbled guiltily.
"It's alright."
Lu Li went back to his reading.
Anna quickly cleaned up the shards and the soil. Lu Li finished the newspaper, stacked it with the others, and headed for the door.
"Where are you going?"
"To get water."
Lu Li left the agency empty-handed and returned the sa way shortly after.
Twenty minutes later, Anna saw the water he'd ntioned: a wooden tub of hot water was carried into the kitchen.
"Are you going to take a bath?" Anna guessed.
"Yes, I need to go out afterward."
Lu Li went into the kitchen and closed the door.
Anna felt a flutter of excitent, barely restraining the urge to burst into the kitchen. Lu Li had just said he needed to go out...
"Have you started yet?" she couldn't help but ask at the door.
"Not yet," ca the muffled reply.
Anna leaned closer to the door, trying to hear better. But, once again forgetting she was a ghost, she pressed her cheek too close to the thin door and... found herself in the kitchen.
Lu Li's bare torso appeared before her eyes.
"Ah! You said you hadn't started yet!" Anna cried, covering her face with her hands and flying back into the living room.
"I haven't," Lu Li turned his head toward the door. "Did sothing happen?"
"You... you said you were going out?" Anna asked, flustered.
"To buy a new pot and so groceries."
"Then... can I co with you?"
"Yes."
For a little while longer, the sound of splashing water ca from the kitchen, followed by one final splash before everything went quiet.
"Could you bring
my clothes? They're in the wardrobe."
Anna, still daydreaming about their walk together, didn't react imdiately.
"Huh? What?"
"Nothing."
The kitchen door swung open, and Lu Li's silhouette appeared before Anna.
The fleeting image of defined muscles and a slender fra montarily filled her mind.
Anna squeezed her eyes shut in embarrassnt, but overdid it and pushed her palms right through her own intangible head.
"You... why are you..." she stamred.
Anna, in a panic, shut her eyes and turned away. It felt as if her heart was pounding furiously, though she had neither a body nor a heart.
"Getting dressed," Lu Li replied, his bare feet slapping against the floor as he walked past Anna.
The wardrobe door creaked in the bedroom.
"And you... you just..." Anna stuttered, struggling to find the words. "You just ca out with no clothes on?"
"I wrapped a blanket around myself," Lu Li answered.
The rustle of clothing ca from the bedroom. A few minutes later, Lu Li, now fully dressed, returned to the living room.
"Stay close to ."
With Anna hidden away in the In-Between, Lu Li left the agency and started down the street.
The streets of the coastal district were teeming with people, the air thick with the indelible sll of fish hanging from clotheslines and clinging to the sailors themselves.
Lu Li bought a new flowerpot at the market, and the vendor threw in a packet of seeds, though everyone knew they were never destined to sprout. Then, on Anna's advice, he purchased groceries: pork, turnips, onions, and spices.
"We're almost out of books at the agency," Anna whispered.
Lu Li stopped by the bookstore on the corner and selected several romance novels. Back at the agency, he announced, "I'll cook dinner."
Though Lu Li wasn't usually picky about food, he didn't want the groceries to go to waste.
Anna was a little disappointed—she had been planning to show off her culinary talents and earn Lu Li's praise.
After dinner, night fell. The fla of an oil lamp flickered to life in the detective agency.
Anna whispered sothing to the new flowerpot before drawing the curtains.
At eight o'clock, Lu Li went to bed. The peaceful day had co to an end.
"Will we always live like this?" Anna asked from the living room, a hopeful note in her voice.
Lu Li took off his coat and hung it on the rack by the door. "If this world doesn't get any worse."
A mont later, Anna's soft voice followed, "No matter what happens, I will protect you."
Lu Li remained silent, but Anna wasn't upset.
In the quietening detective agency, she whispered to the drowsing Lu Li, "Good night."
The campfire cast a weak light on the surroundings.
Sothing stirred in the fog, as if preparing to reveal itself.
Lu Li tossed more wood onto the fire, sending a shower of sparks into the air.
The desert wind flowed around the sharp edges of the rocks, its whistle mingling with the crackle of the fire.
The anomalous fog concealed countless dangers.
The people on the ground were keenly aware of this fact.
Even Silence couldn't muffle the sounds that drifted from the fog.
From a distance ca the long whistle of a steamship. The indistinct whisper of two voices. A cry like a jackal's howl ripped through the air from above.
Quiet footsteps approached from the fog. Lu Li thought they would pass by, like the other sounds in the anomalous haze, but they drew ever closer.
A pair of dirty feet appeared at the edge of the fire's light.
Lu Li watched in silence.
The owner of the feet didn't co any closer, but sat down at the edge, and its desiccated hands beca visible in the firelight.
The rest of its body was hidden by darkness and fog, difficult to make out.
Perhaps there was no other part of its body in the darkness, because its outline was as ghostly as the fog itself.
A long, claw-like hand scraped across the ground, scooping up a handful of stones and sand, and brought it to where its head presumably was.
A soul-chilling crunch echoed from the fog.
A few seconds later, the withered claw scooped up more earth and sent it into its mouth.
A tin can rolled across the ground near the fire and fell into the pit dug by the claws.
The exorcist's manual strictly forbade interacting with creatures from the fog. Fog ant the unknown, and the unknown ant danger.
A clawed hand erged from the darkness, gripped the can with two bony fingers, and pulled it into the gloom.
The unpleasant screech of crumpling tal echoed from the fog for a few monts, then the clawed hand reappeared, opened, and hovered over the pit, waiting for sothing.
Lu Li rolled another can into the pit.
A few seconds later, the clawed hand opened again.
Lu Li continued to send cans until the last one rolled toward the creature in the fog.
It took the can, but instead of eating it, it used its other clawed hand to place sothing in the pit before standing up and retreating into the fog.
The swirling mist filled the void, and silence returned to the campfire.
Lu Li took the branch he'd been using to tend the fire and used it to retrieve what the creature had left behind.
It was a matte stone, a little larger than a fingernail, in the shape of an irregular polygon. It was both elegant and crude, like a coin.
Lu Li put it in his pocket and added more wood to the fire.
The night gradually deepened.
At so point, a bell chid—the Anomaly Detector in Lu Li's pocket had been triggered.
Amid the lodious chi, a clawed shadow stretched out of the darkness and reached for the fire.
Lu Li picked up the stone and threw it at the Shadow Stealing Fire. It seed to startle, and recoiled back into the darkness.
Preparing to rest, Lu Li lit a backup light source—an oil lamp—tossed enough damp wood on the fire to keep it burning for a long ti, and leaned against a warm rock, closing his eyes.
...
In the morning, Lu Li was awakened by the chi of the Anomaly Detector.
The anomalous fog had lifted, and a thin wisp of smoke rose from the nearly extinguished campfire.
Lu Li had survived the long night.
Stamping out the fire and extinguishing the lamp, Lu Li threw on his cloak and continued his journey in the cold morning.
The intervals of Silence were shrinking at an alarming rate.
By evening, Lu Li stopped for the night in an abandoned village about thirty-five kiloters from the oasis.
Every few hours, Silence enveloped him.
Thanks to the straw cat, Lu Li remained unhard.
Fifty kiloters, thirty kiloters, ten kiloters.
At this distance, the chiming of the Anomaly Detector beca frequent and intense.
By a river, wrapped in his cloak, Lu Li stood on a hill, looking out at a desert pockmarked with black holes. In the distance, the outline of an oasis was visible.
Silence was there.
Lu Li built a fire by the river and ate his last ration of food.
Covering the fire with earth using a plank he found on the bank, he left the river and headed toward the oasis.
The sound of the river gradually faded, and silence beca the main lody of this land.
Lead-gray clouds blanketed the sky, and even the wind dared not rustle. Silence and oppression reigned over the wounded earth.
Lu Li could only hear his own footsteps, as if he were cut off from the rest of the world.
All of this created a strange sense of the epic.
Like the final chapter of a novel: the denouent.
A huge black hole blocked his path, the breath of the abyss emanating from its bottomless darkness.
The distant oasis was now clearly visible.
Lu Li went around the abyss, but when he reached the other side, a figure blocked his path.
"I chose this place for your end."
A hoarse, distorted voice, devoid of all beauty, rasped out. The long-cold corpse of a young woman lifted its stiff head. Her face was a warped echo of Anna's, her eyes a horrifying sar of cloudy film.
Anna had finally stood in Lu Li's way.
"Do you like it?" Anna asked.
The body hadn't decomposed, likely because it was inhabited by a spirit that was already dead.
"Not at all."
Lu Li drew his spirit pistol, lowered his arm, and looked at the corpse nearby. A flicker of sadness seed to cross his calm eyes, but perhaps it was just an illusion.
"Why?" Anna tilted her head slightly, asking in confusion.
Her words and movents, expressed through the dead body, were eerie and unnatural.
"We can talk after I deal with the Third Calamity."
With his back to the abyss, Lu Li looked past Anna at what lay behind her. The oasis, where the true body of Silence was located, was only a few kiloters away.
He even thought he could see a still silhouette hanging from a tree.
"None of your thoughts are your own! It's the ritual of the Rope of Descent controlling your mind!"
Lu Li didn't argue. "Just as it controls yours."
"I know what I'm doing..." Anna shook her head, and disgusting folds, like pigskin, gathered on her blue neck. "Lu Li... people are as fragile as sandcastles, even a gentle sea breeze can destroy their world..."
"So... I will help you beco a ghost, and then..."
Anna stretched out her hand, as if closing her palm around sothing, her clouded, hideous eyes seeming to gaze at Lu Li with tenderness.
"We will be together forever."
A light breeze swirled around her, kicking up dust and outlining an invisible spear.
In response, Lu Li stepped back and raised his spirit pistol.
The three roses on the silver-plated pistol were still in bud, but a voice seed to whisper in Lu Li's ear: "This shot will kill Anna."
Only an anomaly can stand against another anomaly, and the Rope of Descent could certainly harm the Shadow Maiden.
"It's ti to put an end to this..." Lu Li thought.
His gaze softened, unchanged by the sight of Anna's mutilated form, and he said in a quiet, lulling voice, "Good night."
Bang!
Smoke billowed as a deafening shot echoed across the desert.
Lu Li pulled the trigger; Anna threw the spear.
The spear pierced Lu Li's chest, while the bullet grazed Anna's cheek and flew toward the oasis.
Lu Li fell backward into the abyss.
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