The Bizarre Detective Agency Chapter 46

As he moved further from the heart of Belfast, leaving the old, long-abandoned city wall behind, Lu Li found himself taking in the changing scenery.

On the far side of Sugard Mountain, vast fields and scattered farmhouses dotted the landscape on either side of the road. Lights flickered like fireflies in the impenetrable darkness, dim stars in a hazy night sky. The lights of the larger settlements clustered together, resembling distant galaxies.

It was a curious thing, but the city-dwellers of Belfast generally looked down on the rural folk from the far side of Sugard Mountain. They would often mock their accents, claiming they spoke as if their mouths were full of pudding.

This was despite the fact that they all lived on Sugard Mountain, separated by only a few dozen kilometers.

A single point of light crept slowly along the deserted road.

After leaving Belfast behind, Lu Li had lit a torch. He was following the coachman's advice: "Darkness is everywhere, and evil breeds where the light cannot reach. Only light can drive it away. The brighter your light, the safer you'll be."

Still, Lu Li wasn't entirely alone. Every so often, he would pass other travelers or distant caravans on the road. They had a unique way of greeting in the dead of night—a brief, acknowledging wave of their torches.

It was a simple gesture, but one that could save a life.

Lu Li remained vigilant in the darkness until his carriage finally reached the settlement marked on the map as Sentry Post.

The light of civilization pushed back the darkness, and as they entered the settlement, even the clatter of the horse's hooves seemed to ring out more clearly.

The guards at the town's entrance showed no wariness toward a stranger arriving at night, as if they weren't standing watch against travelers, but against something else entirely.

Clack-clack-clack...

The horse's hooves clattered on the cobblestones. Following the directions on his map, Lu Li turned onto a dark path.

The surroundings grew deserted once more. The lit houses became fewer and farther between, until there were no houses at all.

Ten minutes later, Lu Li reached the abandoned hospital, situated a few kilometers from Sentry Post.

The building crouched in the darkness, the iron bars of its gate glinting in the torchlight.

In the dead silence, the only sounds were the clatter of hooves and the creak of wheels.

Lu Li slowed the carriage as he approached the gates. Passing through them, he guided the horse slowly toward the dark building.

In the years since the hospital had been abandoned, untended vegetation had grown wild along the path.

A few moments later, the carriage drew up before the psychiatric hospital.

The walls of the two-story building were peeling, thick with ivy. Its state of utter neglect gave it a sinister air.

The glass doors at the entrance had been shattered long ago, shards littering the ground. The hall beyond was a scene of utter chaos. Debris, rags, and broken furniture were jumbled together. A large portion of the ceiling had collapsed, with chunks of plaster dangling precariously. Torn scraps of wallpaper clung to the walls like bloodstains.

The building looked as though it had been ransacked and set ablaze.

Then again, considering a group of mental patients had likely been left behind, the disarray was hardly surprising.

Stopping at the foot of the steps, Lu Li pushed aside the carriage flap and spoke to Anna, who was huddled inside.

"Stay here."

"Huh? I'm not going with you?"

Anna froze, alarmed.

"I left a four-hundred-shilling deposit for this carriage," Lu Li explained. "Besides, you can move through solid objects. If I get into trouble, you can reach me in an instant."

Anna glanced up at the dark, menacing building and immediately lost her nerve.

"In that case, I'll wait for you out here," she conceded.

Checking the Spirit Gun in its holster, Lu Li took an oil lamp, stepped out of the carriage, and ascended the steps.

Anna watched as Lu Li climbed the steps. He held the lamp aloft, its glow pushing back the darkness for several meters around him as he walked toward the imposing, dark building.

A strange feeling washed over her. The scene felt chillingly familiar, like something straight out of a horror novel.

...

Crunch...

Lu Li paused at the entrance, his foot crunching on broken glass, and raised his lamp.

The cluttered hall revealed nothing out of the ordinary.

Suddenly, a short, dark figure darted across the far end of the left corridor, slipping silently into one of the rooms.

Lu Li's brow furrowed, and his hand instantly went to the grip of his pistol.

A shadow of unease touched his mind, but he sensed no presence in the corridor. Not a ghost, then...

Stepping carefully over the glass at the threshold, he entered the hall.

His footsteps echoed in the empty space. The lamplight cast strange, dancing shadows across the scattered objects, making them seem to twitch with a life of their own.

Navigating around the debris, Lu Li made his way toward the corridor where the short figure had vanished.

The corridor was in the same state of decay as the hall. The paint on the walls and ceiling was peeling and faded, and the floor was littered with some kind of unidentifiable brown refuse.

Beneath the peeling plaster, the concrete walls were covered in strange drawings and scrawled messages.

The darkness stretched out before him, swallowing the far end of the corridor.

As the lamp swayed, shadows in the wall's recesses seemed to shift, and Lu Li suddenly felt a gaze upon him.

Lu Li didn't believe in mere illusions; he was certain the feeling was real.

Standing at the mouth of the corridor, Lu Li slowly scanned his eyes from left to right, then back again. His gaze narrowed.

On the wall next to a doorway on the right, a blood-red eye had been drawn.

Disturbed by the light, the eye seemed to turn, glaring at him with malevolence—a chilling and unsettling sight.

Few people could have remained composed under such a stare.

Lu Li walked up to the eye.

It was just an eye drawn on the wall, crudely colored in with a red crayon. But as the light moved, an optical illusion made the pupil seem to follow it, as if alive.

Even knowing it was a trick of the light, the red eye on the wall still seemed to radiate a piercing malice.

Lu Li bent down, picked up a loose stone, and scraped its sharp edge across the eye.

Scrape... scrape... scrape...

With a harsh grating sound, flakes of plaster fell away. The red eye was marred and broken, revealing the stonework beneath.

Having destroyed the eye, Lu Li tossed the stone aside. The unsettling feeling of being watched vanished.

Lu Li turned and headed for the room where the short figure had disappeared.

The abandoned room was coated in a thick layer of dust. A single, clear set of footprints led from the doorway to a narrow ventilation shaft in the wall.

Lu Li didn't bother with the tracks for now. He stepped into the room and paused just inside the doorway, surveying his surroundings.

It might have been a doctor's office. A row of filing cabinets stood in one corner, and two desks were pushed together beneath the window.

Everything was coated in a thick gray film of dust, except for one object: a battered notebook lying on one of the desks.

While it, too, was dusty, it stood out starkly from its surroundings, almost as if it were waiting for someone to walk in, notice it, and pick it up.

Slam!

The door behind him suddenly slammed shut.

Lu Li spun around, squinting against the cloud of dust that billowed up, and went to the door. He gripped the handle and gave it a gentle pull.

The door wouldn't budge, as if someone was holding it shut from the other side.

Lu Li took a few steps back, then lunged forward, slamming his shoulder into the door.

Wham!

A cloud of dust exploded outwards as the door flew open. At the same instant, there was a dull thud from the other side, followed by the sound of footsteps scrambling away down the corridor.

Lu Li relaxed his grip on his pistol. He still didn't sense any ghostly presence.

After a moment's thought, Lu Li decided against giving chase and returned to the room.

He walked over to the desk and picked up the journal.