The Eldritch Files

Chapter 304: Chapter 256: Circulating Knight Order (4)

Just as expected, he saw an inn with a dark red facade and dated decor. He picked up his suitcase and walked right in.

Behind the counter, the owner, also wearing a turban, had a little boy next to him who was hunched over a stool doing homework. They both looked up at him simultaneously. Han Su stopped at the entrance and said, “A room.”

The owner stared intently at Han Su and asked gruffly, “What’s your business here?”

Han Su smiled. “Just a tourist.”

The owner glanced at his clothes and suitcase but, surprisingly, asked no more questions. He didn’t even ask for ID. He simply took down a key with the room number written on a piece of tape and slowly handed it over.

Without another word, Han Su went up the narrow staircase to his room, shut the door, and sat down inside.

He took out a glass, poured some water into it, and placed it by the headboard. The water’s surface rippled ceaselessly.

He waited a moment, closing his eyes to rest his mind. Only when the ripples gradually faded did he begin to recite in a barely audible voice:

“I am the night itself.”

…

It was now just after sunrise, a time when this shadow-controlling Encrypted Spell should have been somewhat suppressed. However, they were in the mountains, and the tall peaks cast the entire village in shadow, so the Spell was still effective.

Han Su could feel it. In every place untouched by direct light or human gaze, the shadows stirred, as if something strange within them was awakening.

They flowed, conversed, and collided, spreading outward in an instant until they blanketed the entire village.

His contact with the Emperor’s Book had made his Spiritual Activity exceptionally high, allowing even a Zero Sequence Spell to produce a stunning effect.

In an instant, he had scanned all the roads, the people, and everything else—both in plain sight and hidden away. It was far more effective than running around to scout the place himself.

Han Su could even see the innkeeper below, who looked up toward his room with a grim expression. The man restrained himself from coming upstairs, instead shooting the boy doing his homework a cold, warning glance before turning and leaving.

“What the hell is this place…”

Han Su sighed softly. “In Qinggang, a situation like this would never have been allowed to develop so far. Miss Ai would have sent people to handle it long ago…”

He picked up the dip pen and ink bottle Akbar had given him, but he didn’t immediately write down his observations as she had instructed.

He examined the pen first, finding it to be just an ordinary dip pen, then turned his gaze to the bottle of ink.

‘I can just write the intel on anything, and she’ll know?’

‘What exactly is this woman’s power? And why is she so fixated on me?’

Focusing his mind, Han Su opened the ink bottle and took a light sniff. He immediately felt something hazy and indistinct latch onto his Spiritual Power, vaguely attempting to invade him.

Han Su wasn’t surprised in the slightest. He casually picked up his black suitcase and allowed his Spiritual Power, carrying the hazy contaminant, to seep into the Emperor’s Book.

The contamination was so weak that he didn’t even need to take the Emperor’s Book out of the case.

Han Su thought he could hear the faint, illusory RUSTLE of the Emperor’s Book’s pages flipping inside the black suitcase, as countless words streamed before his eyes:

[Hive Virus: An anomalous pheromone capable of altering the genetics of a biological collective.]

[Level: Individually Beast Level, but with the potential to develop to Clan Level.]

[Characteristics: Those infected exhibit a social structure and hierarchy similar to a bee colony, with a Queen Bee at its core. It contaminates and absorbs other individuals, making them part of the colony.]

[…]

Reading the description, Han Su was somewhat surprised. ‘No wonder her codename is Queen Bee, and no wonder she’d know whatever I wrote with this ink.’

‘This stuff is infused with the hive’s pheromones?’

‘No wonder her mercenary unit has such strong cohesion and flawless coordination. They aren’t even really human anymore, are they?’

‘When that woman was trying to tempt me, did she want me to become one of her worker bees, or a drone?’

Now that he understood her secret, he dismissed the matter from his mind. Han Su tossed the ink aside. Then, with a slight gesture, copper-colored blood seeped from the suitcase and floated silently around the room, creating a secure perimeter.

His worries assuaged, he opened the suitcase. His gaze swept over the familiar items inside before he took out the Crystal Skull Ms. Shen had given him and slowly pressed it to the center of his forehead.