The Eldritch Files

He had his suspicions, but since he couldn’t be sure, he decided not to say anything to Rong Qiyue for now.

Han Su glanced around and said to Rong Qiyue, ”The analysis work you need to do—are you sure it’ll be safe here?”

”It’s guaranteed to be safe.”

Rong Qiyue said, ”Besides, I’ve confirmed the text you showed me.”

”It’s the Golden Text, which can also be called the Emperor’s Sword!”

”But if I’m to explain it to you clearly...”

”...”

Hearing this, Han Su’s focus sharpened. Rong Qiyue pulled him over to a canvas chair in the corner and had him sit down.

His female secretary with the black-rimmed glasses was just bringing over some coffee. An idea suddenly struck Rong Qiyue. He took a coffee and handed it to Han Su, then picked up a cup for himself. He raised an eyebrow at Han Su. ”First, tell me what you think of my secretary.”

”Hm?”

Han Su narrowed his eyes, studying the female secretary. Now that his Spiritual Activity had greatly increased, he could indeed sense many abnormalities. This female secretary certainly had an unusual aura about her.

”She can block bullets, handle paperwork, and if she has enough energy, she can split herself.”

Rong Qiyue said, ”On top of that, she has a special trick I don’t show just anyone.”

Han Su frowned. ”What kind of trick?”

Rong Qiyue immediately looked smug. Seeing that no one was paying attention to them, he called out, ”Miss Sisi.” The female secretary instantly took a step back, her calm gaze falling upon him, elegant and sensual.

Rong Qiyue raised his hand and snapped his fingers. The female secretary stood perfectly still, but the black, business-style stockings on her legs instantly turned white.

Han Su was stunned. ”?”

”Impressive, right?”

Rong Qiyue snapped his fingers again, and Sisi’s stockings turned black again. Still not satisfied, he snapped once more, and they turned white again.

Black stockings, white stockings...

He changed them several times, laughing smugly. ”How about that for a special trick?”

Han Su’s face had already darkened. ”Are you kidding me?”

’You specifically invited me over just to watch your black-stockings-turn-white performance?’

”Don’t be hasty, don’t be hasty. It was just a demonstration...”

Seeing the unfriendly look in Han Su’s eyes, Rong Qiyue quickly put on an appeasing smile. He then snapped his fingers softly and said, ”Miss Sisi, I have some business to attend to. Do not listen, do not look.”

Hearing his words, the female secretary nodded lightly. The next moment, the flesh on her face showed faint signs of melting, like spreading batter. It first sealed her ears, then her eyes, as she stood there quietly.

She had transformed into a grotesque figure, a strange character with no eyes or ears.

’A Pseudo-human?’

Han Su had already recognized it. He found it bizarre, but then he remembered Rong Qiyue’s background as a family from a Hidden School, and it didn’t seem so strange anymore.

’So far, this guy is the only person I’ve rescued who seems completely unreliable. His ultimate move is summoning his grandfather, and his special trick is making his secretary’s black stockings turn white...’

’...Is he insane?’

”Please don’t misunderstand. My main goal was to explain things to you clearly...”

Rong Qiyue met Han Su’s strange gaze with a slightly awkward expression. He raised his hands in surrender, then leaned forward slightly and said, ”Hey, you’re an investigator for the Disaster Management Bureau, after all. You know what she is, right?”

Han Su nodded. ”A Pseudo-human!”

”I saw them during my assessment trial for the Disaster Management Bureau.”

”Pseudo-human is just a code name, a designation.”

Rong Qiyue shook his head gently. ”To be more precise, she’s actually a type of infinitely proliferating flesh, a twisted product originating from the Radiation Age.”

”This kind of abomination once created a crisis that nearly wiped out humanity. It was a great terror that people paled at the mere mention of.”

”However, this abomination has been subjugated by modern humans, so its crisis level has been infinitely downgraded. That’s why I can keep one with me as a secretary, and why the Qinggang Disaster Management Bureau even uses them as a project to broaden new recruits’ horizons and for their trials.”

”...To be blunt, some scholars even proposed using this stuff to solve the world’s food crisis. Of course, that was later rejected. There were concerns that something bad would happen if you ate too much of it.”

”...”

”Subjugated?”

The word was new to Han Su. He mulled it over, trying to grasp its meaning.

”Correct.”

Rong Qiyue’s expression began to turn arrogant, a sign that the conversation had entered his area of expertise. ”I know that people like us have a lot of potential for development, but... you know about the Life Code, right?”

Han Su frowned. ”Of course.”

Rong Qiyue nodded repeatedly. ”Then I assume you’ve also discovered that mysterious substance inside your body.”

”That’s the key.”

”This substance has many names. Western academia once called it the God Factor. Some call it Golden Cells. Still others simply refer to it by the conventional name, Divine Material.”

”But its very existence is what gives us all sorts of different possibilities. Whether it’s Pseudo-humans or something else, their origin is actually human—humans identical to us. It’s just that this substance caused them to change.”

”Or, to put it another way, they share a common ancestor with humans. It’s just that a change in their Divine Material set them on a different evolutionary path.”

”...”

This was indeed the first time Han Su had heard such a theory, but he had a faint feeling that it aligned with everything he had witnessed. He was slightly moved. ”So, these abominations are actually...”

”Uncontrolled evolution.”

Rong Qiyue cut Han Su off, his expression growing serious, even cold. ”This evolution began in the Flare Age, reached its peak in the Radiation Age, and then gradually faded after the start of the Reconstruction Age, nearly falling outside of human cognition.”

”However, the period in between when they existed was too long—unimaginably long. And because of the lack of data and records, we can’t accurately date it.”

”All we can say is that era was far longer than our current Reconstruction Age—several times, or even dozens of times, longer. So long that it became a nightmare for human civilization. It even led many relic scholars to believe that the emergence of the Reconstruction Age was nothing short of a miracle for humanity.”

”Can you imagine?”

”Without that miracle, we wouldn’t be living in cities like this now.”

Rong Qiyue spoke slowly, trying to articulate his point precisely to Han Su. ”We... we might have all ended up like the Banshees who once lived in this region, flying out at night to capture living people, bring them back to the Black Lake, and store them to be eaten slowly.”

A realization dawned on Han Su. ”Is that the most fundamental Spell of the Banshee Sequence that the Drunkard once used—the Black Lake?”

Rong Qiyue nodded slowly. ”The Midnight Banshee, when you get down to it, is just one of the Mutant Species, or mysterious species, that once appeared in this world.”

”On the danger-level classification for these species, it’s merely a minor Beast Level.”

”There are plenty of species far more terrifying and powerful than that.”

”...”

Han Su seized on the key word. ”Beast Level?”

”Correct.”

Rong Qiyue said, ”It’s a standard of classification based on various factors, such as the time these mysterious species appeared and remained in the world, their threat level, and their area of radiation.”

”The Midnight Banshee is a Mutant Species that only ever appeared in the history of the Qinggang region. Although it developed incredible power due to mutation, it had no consciousness and couldn’t possibly form a culture, religious worship, or the like.”

”It’s just a beast born with Mysterious Power, which is why it’s called Beast Level.”

”The level above the Banshee is the Clan Level.”

”Mutant Species of this level live in groups, possess the ability of Transformation, and have even intermarried and reproduced with ordinary humans. It’s said that some Clan Level abominations have descendants living in human society to this day, who could activate their Mysterious Power at any time.”

”Higher still...”

At this point, his voice grew heavy. ”That would be the Faith Level!”

”Abominations of this level have not only mastered immense power, but they also begin to radiate out to ordinary human groups, forming a dense religious atmosphere. They even possess the ability of Transformation, allowing them to convert their believers into beings identical to themselves.”

”And above that is the Civilization Level. These Mutant Species even formed their own unique civilizations and once vied with our type of humans for dominion over the world. They just happened to fail.”

”But even though they failed, the shadow they left behind remains...”

”Humanity has had its reconstructed civilization for over two thousand years, yet when they are mentioned, it seems the only options are to kowtow and worship them...”

”...”

He stopped there, letting out an imperceptible breath, as if an invisible pressure was weighing him down.

Han Su could imagine that sense of powerlessness, but he had no intention of discussing it. Instead, he asked the crucial question, ”Then the text you mentioned is...”

”I don’t have the ability to classify this text.”

Rong Qiyue used a rather high-and-mighty turn of phrase to conceal his own lack of ability: ”The entire academic field of relic studies doesn’t have that kind of skill.”

”If I had to make a definitive statement, this text is one of the weapons that once defeated those countless abominations.”

”That...”

Hearing this, Han Su was genuinely taken aback for a moment. ”A weapon?”

”Yes!”

Rong Qiyue sighed with a hint of resignation. ”After listening for so long, haven’t you noticed a problem?”

”Beast Level, Clan Level, Civilization Level... no matter how active they once were in this world, they have now all been eliminated, sealed away in history.”

”The ones who eliminated them and ushered in the Reconstruction Age were the Emperor and the Twelve Knights.”

”But what’s counterintuitive is...”

He paused, then let out a long sigh. ”To this day, humanity still doesn’t know how the Emperor defeated them...”

”Or rather, we’ve forgotten who the Emperor was and what he did.”

”There are no true records of them in history, nor are there any legends about them among the people. On the contrary, it’s the believers tainted by the Gods who occasionally mention their names when proselytizing...”