Chapter 487: The Haunted Cat and Mouse

Although Jiang Li noticed that this unfamiliar girl was lying to her, she didn’t expose her on the spot. Instead, as if nothing had happened, she walked off in the completely opposite direction from the girl.

After walking some distance and turning a corner, Jiang Li suddenly darted aside and stopped.

She pressed herself against the wall, peeking out with one eye. Her gaze followed the ancient street toward the unfamiliar girl, and she saw the girl’s back as she turned into a narrow alley.

She waited in place for two or three seconds. Seeing that the girl didn’t double back, Jiang Li began to move.

She took a swan feather from her backpack, held it in her hand, and softly chanted, “Silent night deep and still, floating light and misty veil, phoenix without shadow, people without sound…”

As the spell formation finished, the feather in her hand shimmered with light, then seemed to vaporize, dispersing and merging into her body.

In the next moment, all psychic energy fluctuations and any sounds she made while moving were concealed by an invisible psychic energy barrier.

After casting the spell formation, she didn’t pause for a second and quickly set off in the direction the girl had left.

Jiang Li had three reasons for judging that this girl she’d never met was lying.

First, although the girl acted as if she had nothing to do with Lu Yibei or the Lu Family’s old mansion, her tone and bearing carried a sense of arrogance, as if she were the master of that old mansion.

Second, there was a faint psychic energy fluctuation coming from the girl, but people native to this special space shouldn’t have any psychic energy fluctuation, making her identity suspicious.

Third, and most importantly, when the girl appeared, she showed strong hostility toward Jiang Li.

Thinking from another perspective, Jiang Li felt that if she harbored hostility toward someone, unless she had another motive, she would never tell a single truth when answering their questions.

A few seconds later.

When Jiang Li followed the unfamiliar girl to the alley entrance, she was slightly stunned to see the empty alley and frowned.

“Gone? Did she notice I was following her?”

Jiang Li muttered to herself, scanning the surroundings in hopes of finding the girl’s escape route. Just then, a woman’s scream suddenly echoed from deep within the alley.

“Ah–!”

What’s going on? Jiang Li’s eyes narrowed. Following the scream, she ran quickly to the depths of the alley and soon saw, at the entrance of a dead-end, a middle-aged woman and a stray cat “locked in combat.”

It was a stray cat with pure black fur, its size clearly abnormal–at least a whole size larger than an ordinary stray. It didn’t look like a stray cat at all, more like a lynx or some other medium-sized feline beast.

It seemed to be suffering from a severe skin disease, with several patches of fur completely gone, exposing inflamed, festering dark red skin.

It was pouncing on the woman’s face, frantically biting and clawing at her head, face, and neck. The woman struggled desperately, hitting its body with her vegetable basket, but she couldn’t shake it off and could only roll on the ground, screaming.

Seeing this, Jiang Li didn’t hesitate. She dashed forward and delivered a side kick to the stray cat.

“Meow–!”

With a pained howl, the stray cat was kicked sideways, slamming into the bluestone wall. But it quickly rolled over and got up from the ground, glaring fiercely at Jiang Li. Its eyes, cold and sinister, glowed with an unnatural red light.

Its whole body arched, mouth open to reveal sharp white fangs, emitting a series of harsh hisses.

Her psychic sense detected faint psychic energy fluctuation from the abnormally large and erratic stray cat, and Jiang Li immediately became alert. Without a word, she reached into her backpack and pulled out a piece of amber, simultaneously activating a Spirit Pattern.

With a twist of light and shadow, a silver long blade instantly appeared in her hand.

Only then did she notice that the bald patches on the cat’s body weren’t due to skin disease at all, but were instead writhing masses of dark red flesh.

As those dark red masses squirmed and shifted across its body, she could even see, on its left flank, white ribs exposed beneath the rotting flesh.

A haunting?

Looking at the stray cat’s zombie-like appearance, Jiang Li didn’t hesitate for a moment. She raised her hand, and the amber in her palm shot toward the cat like a bullet.

“Play the python flute, strike the turtle drum, moon shoots coral, pine births amber… Seal Spell Fifty-Three, Python-Turtle Amber Morph!”

Although the stray cat’s psychic energy fluctuation was only about Class D,

Jiang Li, considering her own psychic energy was restricted and that spell formations cast with alchemical materials were less powerful than normal, decided to play it safe and used a precision spell formation right away.

As the incantation finished, dazzling light burst from the amber.

The crystal-clear gem seemed to come alive, rapidly growing under the light, slithering through the air like a snake toward the stray cat.

Sensing danger, the cat retreated repeatedly, then suddenly leapt, using the gaps between the wall’s bricks to climb onto the eaves.

It glanced around, then landed on a nearby roof beam and dashed off like a gust of wind.

At that moment, a tea-colored light flashed behind it.

The serpentine crystal split at the tip into a hook shaped like a turtle’s mouth, shooting out to ensnare its body.

In the next instant, a mass of crystal followed, wrapping around it tightly like a python.

In the blink of an eye, the stray cat was sealed as if encased in amber, with only a vital spot left exposed.

“Meow–!”

Its body crushed by the crystal, limbs and bones in agony, the stray cat let out a shrill, miserable scream.

In that instant, Jiang Li’s figure suddenly flashed before it.

The silver long blade whistled through the gap in the crystal, piercing its body.

Hydra toxin, released.

The stray cat convulsed a few times, its head lolling as it lost all signs of life. Immediately after, its body began to swell like a balloon at a speed visible to the naked eye, and then…

With a “pop!” it exploded, foul-smelling pus and blood splattering everywhere, leaving only a deformed skeleton that fell to the ground as the Python-Turtle Amber Morph’s crystal faded away.

Without letting her guard down, Jiang Li strode forward, swept the blade’s spine across the skeleton, and with a jolt of the blade, shattered the deformed bones into fragments.

After quickly dealing with the haunting-transformed stray cat’s remains, Jiang Li hurriedly turned back and crouched down to check the middle-aged woman’s injuries.

The woman, terrified and bleeding heavily, had already collapsed face-down on the ground, unconscious.

Jiang Li carefully turned her over and found several bite marks on her face, the skin and flesh turned outward. The wounds weren’t too deep, but her face was definitely disfigured.

There was also a hideous gash on her neck. From Jiang Li’s experience recording An Qing’s autopsies, she could tell that if the wound had been just a bit deeper, it would have severed the carotid artery.

Jiang Li frowned, glanced at the empty alley, then looked at the seriously injured middle-aged woman on the ground.

Encountering such a sudden incident had delayed her; it was obviously impossible to continue tracking that unfamiliar girl.

She sighed silently, took out two cloth bags from her backpack and tore them apart, simply treated the middle-aged woman’s wounds, then pulled out her phone and dialed the emergency number.

Killing people, killing hauntings–she was good at that. Unfortunately, she wasn’t skilled at healing; the two or three healing spell formations she knew weren’t something an ordinary body could withstand.

“Hello? Yes, I have an injured person here, probably attacked by some kind of wild beast…”

“What kind of beast? I’m not really sure! When I arrived, I just saw her lying on the ground…”

“Location?” Jiang Li looked up at a nearby house’s address plate. “In the alley near No. 96 Mudan Street.”

“Mm-hmm, my name is Jiang Li, I know, I’ll be right here waiting for you, contact me anytime, bye.”

After hanging up, Jiang Li looked gravely at the unconscious middle-aged woman on the ground, lost in thought.

According to Bai Kai and Qi Dong, there shouldn’t be any hauntings in this special space.

However, judging by the news from the golden horn Secretary, Berses had most likely found a way to control the Beast of Inheritance.

Previously, it was unclear whether, under Berses’s control, the Beast of Inheritance’s flesh and blood had successfully invaded this special space. Now, seeing even stray cats affected and undergoing haunting transformation, Jiang Li thought, even if it hasn’t fully succeeded, it’s not far off.

——–

Hua City Central Hospital was not far from Mudan Street, just two kilometers away.

Jiang Li didn’t wait long before the sound of an ambulance siren echoed outside the alley, and soon she received a call from the emergency personnel.

“Mm, the injured person’s condition is fairly stable. Yes, just turn into the alley off the old street… Mm-hmm!”

After a brief exchange with the emergency staff, Jiang Li hung up.

Soon, several medical staff in white coats hurried over and lifted the unconscious middle-aged woman onto a stretcher.

As they escorted the woman quickly out of the alley, two of the stretcher-bearers looked at her injuries and couldn’t help but whisper to each other.

“What is going on today? How many wild beast attacks have there been already?”

“Seventh, or eighth… I’m not really sure, Lao Wang’s team got a few cases too.”

“I just don’t get it, how can there be wild beasts in Hua City’s urban area? Even if there are, why did so many suddenly appear!”

“Well… who knows?”

Hearing the two medical staff talking, Jiang Li was stunned for a moment, memories of the news she’d heard at home earlier flashing through her mind.

If only a small number of animals were affected by the Beast of Inheritance’s flesh and blood and underwent haunting transformation, the situation wouldn’t be too serious.

But if the traffic accidents and substation failures in the city were also related to the Beast of Inheritance’s invasion, then things were dire.

If that’s the case… not only would this special space be destroyed, but the real Hua City would be doomed as well.

According to Qi Dong, if this special space, constructed as a projection of Hua City, were destroyed, its shattered fragments would rise from the shadows and flood into Hua City, bringing catastrophe to the entire city.

Just like the mine where Ban Shan Primary School was located.

There were only two solutions.

First, find Berses and the Beast of Inheritance he took with him, kill the Beast of Inheritance, and solve the problem at its root.

Second, find Lu Yibei and wake him up.

“But… why does it have to be that guy?” Jiang Li muttered.

In fact, Qi Dong hadn’t told Jiang Li what would happen after waking Lu Yibei. He even thought Jiang Li would be “denied access” like Bai Kai.

After a few seconds of contemplation, Jiang Li cursed in a low voice, “Damn it, bastard Lu Yibei.”

Then, she sprang into action, taking out the alchemical materials she’d prepared in her backpack and began divination.

Both the social media and home visit approaches had failed, and she’d lost track of the unfamiliar girl who seemed to know Lu Yibei’s whereabouts.

Now, she could only use this “stupid” method.

——–

While Jiang Li was busy casting divination to locate Lu Yibei.

Elsewhere, in an old mansion on Mudan Street that had long been uninhabited.

Wisps of dark red smoke drifted through the air, and the dilapidated pavilion in the courtyard looked as if it had been shattered by a storm, “broken limbs” scattered everywhere.

Atop the “mountain of corpses and sea of blood” formed by the pavilion’s wreckage, a girl in a coarse white dress stood barefoot on the highest chair, graceful as a crane. Her long black hair floated without wind, billowing behind her like flowing clouds. In her slender hand, a three-foot sword gleamed with a piercing cold light.

In front of her, more than a dozen rats as big as buckets lay dead, their corpses oozing masses of wet, sticky flesh that squirmed furtively, releasing waves of dark red smoke.

The girl was none other than Nanling Rao Hua, and those rats, sliced in half, were the hauntings she encountered when she dodged Jiang Li’s pursuit and accidentally entered this abandoned old mansion.

“Ding-ling—-!”

Nanling Rao Hua lightly tapped her toes, the bronze wind chime on her ankle colliding and producing a clear, spring-like sound.

As the wind chime rang out, the girl’s slender figure floated down from the pavilion’s wreckage.

In an instant, the dark red flesh that had been stalemated with her seemed startled by her movement, suddenly surging up, rolling into two curtains of flesh several people high, crashing down fiercely.

“Hmph!”

Nanling Rao Hua snorted coldly, a colorless, formless wave of energy erupted from within her.

The long sword, slashed down!

Sword shadows followed one after another.

Nanling Rao Hua stepped forward, moving at an outrageously fast speed, swinging her sword at the oncoming dark red flesh, weaving a dazzling arc of blue light in midair.

The next moment, a shrill sound burst forth.

The dark red flesh was swept into the continuous sword dance, shattered by overwhelming force.

Thus, the sound of flesh tearing erupted, echoing endlessly.

Nanling Rao Hua stood amid the rain-like spray of foul blood, untouched by a single drop, gazing toward the edge of the courtyard where the boundary of the steel-and-concrete forest was faintly visible, her brows furrowing.