The Bizarre Detective Agency Chapter 74

Gades ignored the question, instead ducking beneath the bar. A rustling sound followed. A few moments later, he reappeared, holding a candle as white as whipped cream.

From the way Gades handled the candle, it was clearly a rare item. Lu Li had only ever seen such a look on Gades's face when he was staring at a pile of shillings.

Gades removed the glass chimney from the oil lamp and, tipping the white candle toward the flame, lit its wick.

A faint flame flickered to life, pale yellow with a reddish core, indistinguishable from an ordinary fire. The wax around the flame melted, but instead of dripping, it seemed to evaporate, rising as a thin vapor that dissolved into the air.

As Lu Li watched the flame, an indescribable feeling stirred within him.

The candle's faint light seemed to disperse an invisible mist, revealing the true essence of things. It was as if a veil had been lifted from his eyes, and everything was suddenly, starkly clear.

"That," Gades whispered, a note of regret in his voice, "is a Truth Candle. It lets you see what's normally hidden, much like a Spirit Gun, but without the side effects." His gaze was fixed on a point somewhere behind Lu Li, as if something was there. "Now, look around."

Lu Li considered that Gades might use the moment he turned away to snatch the thousand shillings and bolt—or simply blow out the candle. It would be just like him. Still, he did as he was told and turned around.

The gloomy, rainy weather plunged the tavern into a deeper darkness than the fog of the past few days. The windows were just faint, gray rectangles. The oil lamp on the bar and the small candle illuminated only the immediate few feet, leaving the rest of the room as a collection of black silhouettes—tables and chairs swallowed by the gloom.

These dark silhouettes, cloaked in a sinister gloom, were so indistinct it was hard to make out their true forms. Some were vaguely humanoid, but with stark, unsettling differences.

One looked like a clump of grass magnified to monstrous proportions, its tendrils wavering in the air like seaweed. Another was a figure with a giant sphere chained to its leg and a head shaped like the spire of a steeple. A third resembled a sea urchin—a black sphere bristling with hundreds of thin projections. A fourth was a puddle of viscous liquid that constantly shifted its form, like water trembling on the head of a drum.

These beings looked like a child's crude sculptures made from wet sand on a beach: misshapen and bizarre, hinting at something familiar yet utterly, terrifyingly alien. They stirred a primal fear.

They were everywhere—on the chairs, under the tables, clinging to the ceiling, clustered on the stairs, and standing right beside him.

The detective agency, with its tavern disguise, had suddenly become impossibly "lively."

"What are they...?" Lu Li's expression turned grim.

"The thing you've always wanted to know," Gades uttered with a cruel smirk. "The true nature of the world."

"This is what hides in the dark."

Lu Li said nothing, his gaze sweeping silently over the black silhouettes.

Some of them were in motion. Every so often, a silhouette would drift out of the "tavern," only for a new one to appear and take its place. Some simply shifted their position, while others gradually faded into nothing.

Lu Li tilted his head, his eyes settling on a dark corner near the bar, separated from him by two chairs. Seated there was one of the few silhouettes that possessed a nearly human shape.

It held something indistinct in one hand, periodically raising it to where a mouth should be and tilting its head back, as if taking a drink.

Lu Li watched it in silence until, suddenly, the silhouette turned its head, seeming to look directly at him.

"Don't stare at them! They can feel your gaze!"

The sharp rebuke came from right beside his ear.

Lu Li's focus snapped back, and he instantly tore his gaze away, turning to face the bar again.

The two of them fell silent, stealing glances at the black silhouette in the corner. Fortunately, the creature hadn't seemed to notice. It turned its head away and resumed its previous actions.

The danger passed. Gades let out a breath of relief, his heart thumping so loudly that even Lu Li could hear it.

"What are they?" Lu Li asked. He began watching the silhouettes behind him again, this time careful not to let his gaze linger, constantly shifting it from one form to the next.

"I have no idea. Our study of the In-Between has only just begun. That's what we call this space, by the way—the In-Between. Some call it the void of the spirit plane, or the spiritual realm... there's no official name, so call it what you like," Gades added with a shrug.

"Do they know this is a tavern?"

"I must remind you," Gades said, his expression turning severe as he corrected Lu Li, "that this is a detective agency." He then answered the question. "And why wouldn't they? We exist on the physical plane, and they on the spiritual. Everything that exists here has a reflection there. In other words, we're two sides of the same coin, we just don't normally overlap."

"But the night allows them to," Lu Li added.

"Precisely."

"What are they?"

"No idea. Evil spirits? Evil gods? Something indescribable? You shouldn't be asking such questions of a perfectly ordinary, completely unremarkable, and exceptionally greedy exorcist," Gades said, crossing his arms in a display of mock self-deprecation.

"And they're outside as well?"

"You still don't get it? Our world is teeming with them. Simply put, the day belongs to the living, and the night belongs to them," Gades said, shaking his head as if trying to shatter Lu Li's naivete.

"So, as long as we stay in the light, we're safe?"

"Yes. At least, until the fog rolls in."

"The fog?" Lu Li repeated, his mind flashing back to the strange ringing of bells in the gallery office, and the mist that had swallowed the sea for those few brief moments.

"Exactly. They wander in the darkness, and all we have to do is stay out of it. But when the fog comes, they're right here beside us—and the light doesn't scare them away." Gades noticed Lu Li was lost in thought and snapped his fingers.

"If you still don't get it, let me put it another way."

"During the day, we're just ordinary people at the circus. Nothing can hurt us unless we frighten ourselves. At night, we're standing outside a lion's cage. As long as we keep our distance, we're safe. But in the fog..."

Lu Li's gaze grew profound. He looked down for a moment, then met Gades's eyes again.

"...we're standing in front of an open cage."