Volume 7 The Inverted Hanged Man Chapter 15 A Strange Change
Beldan City, inside a bar.
Roy, Byers, Phil, and Pasha were sitting around a small round table, gulping down Southwell ale.
They didn’t talk much, listening with slight smiles to the drunks at the next table discussing superhuman powers and occult events.
”Earlier, hiccup, I saw those Forsaks in Beldan not only look like bears, but they could drive flames and make them throw like javelins!”
”No way …… really have superhuman powers?”
”Haha, that’s because you haven’t seen it, I was drunk one day, sleeping near the cemetery, and I saw people from the Church of Darkness come out with a few ghosts, oh, ghosts! They were floating in the air and were very scary!”
……
The drunks were foaming at the mouth and red in the face as they spoke of things they didn’t know whether they had personally experienced or heard over and over.
”That’s just the way they are, they’re only more excited when they’re drinking, they always like to brag, and they’re usually bitter.” Byers, a local resident of Beldan, saw the situation and explained a few words, “Ever since the resources of the coal mines began to dry up, and the young people gradually left Beldan for Constanton and Beckland, the atmosphere here has become more and more depressing, and the city has become more and more gray.”
The man, who was under thirty, had worked as a miner in his youth, and had been lucky enough not to die in the mines, and his skin was darkened as a result.
His exposed muscles weren’t too exaggerated, but they gave the impression that they were made of poured steel.
Being the leader of several men, Roy smiled and said:
”What they said might be true, not bragging, the previous war did expose the transcendent power to many people, especially the soldiers who were directly involved, as long as they are still alive, they all have the corresponding experience.
”Also, it brought about a lot of encounters that made extraordinary people out of some people who had absolutely no access to transcendental powers and true occultism in the past.”
He expressed it in a subtle way, as if he were talking about someone else’s business, but in reality, that was exactly what the four of them had experienced.
Byers and Roy were soldiers who had fought in the blockade of Beldan City, Phil had been looted by the Forsaks but was lucky not to have died, and Pasha and her fellow citizens from the past had lured and sneaked up on a couple of Intis soldiers in an alley fight.
They have all witnessed the deaths of a number of their friends and have gained superhuman powers for a variety of reasons.
Then, due to the chaos brought about by the war, they were either separated from their troops or actively avoided, all unbeknownst to the official forces, and slowly, they came to know each other and became friends in a group hug mentality.
This time, they have come to Byers’ hometown of Beldan to seek out each other’s friends and family who may have survived.
”The world is far more real than we can imagine.” Pasha, who had long dark blonde hair and deep blue eyes, followed with emotion.
She was only in her mid-twenties, and all her features were fine, but her face had no extra flesh, so much so that her bones were clearly outlined and she looked quite a bit older than her actual age.
”In the future, we will have different lives.” Roy, whose hairline had typical Rune features, raised his glass and said, “Here’s to a whole new future ……”
Before his words fell, someone suddenly screamed miserably in the bar hall.
Roy and the others had a certain amount of experience and were busy raising their guard, casting their gazes over.
They saw a young man in ordinary clothes fall to the ground, rolling back and forth, seemingly in extreme pain.
Under the illumination of the dimly lit gas wall lamp, everyone realized that on the young man’s back, the clothes were blooming, revealing one blood-red mark after another, seemingly made by a whip.
However, none of the people around him were holding whips, and the victim had only screamed once just now, unless he had been whipped countless times in that instant.
But then, how could no one notice?
”…… He’s holding a wallet in his hand …… Could this have anything to do with the anomaly just now?” The thinly built Phil glanced at it for a few moments before saying with deliberation, “Shall I bring it over and take a look?”
Roy thought about it and nodded gently:
”Be careful.”
Phil let out a “hmm” and stepped out of the small round table area, using the cover of the crowd of onlookers to approach the young man who was no longer rolling around, just grunting.
He quietly reached out with his left hand, aiming for the plain-looking leather wallet.
”Ah!”
Phil screamed in sudden agony, watching as his left hand snapped off flush with his wrist and snapped to the ground.
Blood spurted from that break, splattering onto the faces and bodies of those around him.
The scene froze for a moment, and the drunken drinkers froze at first, then swallowed their saliva before turning their bodies and frantically running towards the door and the corner!
”There’s something weird …… No one’s attacking me!” Phil nearly fainted from the pain, but still managed to tell Roy, Byers and Pasha about his “experience”.
Roy’s eyes glazed over and he said decisively:
”Let’s get out of here first!”
He then turned his head sideways and said to Byers:
”You pick up Phil’s hand and save it, I remember that the military doctor I knew before, Weber, who is also a Beldan, returned here after his discharge and opened a private clinic, and he, he can effectively treat wounds in this area.”
That military doctor called Weber was likewise an extraordinary person, he had gained promotion step by step while participating in the Southern War, and had medical skills that transcended reality, and was said to be able to sew up severed limbs and make them as flexible as the original.
”Good.” Byers replied without hesitation.
He grabbed a few steps forward, took out a wooden box, picked up Phil’s severed hand and put it inside.
Meanwhile, Pasha utilized the magical ointment she had bought earlier to initially stop the bleeding from Phil’s wound and did some bandaging.
Immediately afterward, the group of four left the bar.
Through repeated inquiries, they finally found the Weber Clinic with the help of passersby.
The clinic was not yet closed for business, and the light from the gas street lamp inside spread out, spilling a dim yellow color.
Roy politely pulled on the doorbell and heard a ding-dong sound echoing from inside.
But several minutes passed and no one ever came to greet them.
”Drunk?” Pasha glanced at the aching Phil and made a suspicious guess.
Roy shook his head:
”I remember Webb is not an alcoholic, he has no other bad habits except being rather flirtatious, perhaps, he is ……”
As he spoke, the man with a medium build and much weathered face tentatively pushed the doorway, realizing that it was not locked, but merely hidden.
As the door swung open, Roy, Byers, and the others saw two figures.
Those two figures hung in the center of the clinic, swaying gently from the wind blowing in through the door.
That one was a man in his thirties in a white coat, and the other was a young woman in a nurse’s outfit, their lower halves naked, their eyes bulging out, their mouths half-open with their tongues squeezed out, hanging from the ceiling by invisible ropes, their expressions both fearful and desperate and bewildered.
”Webb ……” Roy recognized the hanging man.
He, along with Pasha, Phil, and Byers, simultaneously felt a chill rise up their backs, not knowing exactly why this had happened, or what other horrors such an unknown could bring.
Bang!
The sound of a chair falling to the ground came from the side, waking up a somewhat stunned Roy and the others.
They looked around to see a lady holding a baby standing up in a panic and whispering in horror and confusion:
”They’re cheating ……”
What was the necessary connection between that and what had happened to them? Roy took a dark breath and decided that this was not the place to stay.
He busily commanded:
”Go!”
He didn’t ask Pasha to calm the lady, nor did he try to obtain the clinic’s disinfectant and straps.
Byers and the others swallowed hard and turned quickly, leaving the clinic with extreme caution.
For Phil, the horror of the unknown completely overpowered the pain in his left hand.
”What the hell happened?” Phil asked as he turned into another street, his face muscles twitching.
”How should I know?” Byers replied offhandedly, his emotions slightly out of control.
Roy glanced around and exhaled:
”Calm down.
”This is supposed to be a horrible, transcendent thing beyond our imagination.”
”Yeah, it’s all too bizarre for that to be the only reason.” Pasha nodded approvingly.
”So what do we do?” Phil asked in a panic.
Roy thought for a moment:
”Try to get out of Beldan.
”Also, analyze the previous encounters and summarize the patterns embedded in them.
”None of us can guarantee that we won’t encounter that kind of abnormality again next, and only by grasping the patterns in it can we guarantee our safety.”
”Right.” Byers calmed down and agreed with Roy.
As they walked and discussed, they gradually came up with some ideas.
”Webb was cheating before he was hanged, and Phil tried to take that wallet before his hand was cut off; it’s a kind of larceny ……” Pasha summarized what the two events had in common.
…… Roy was instantly inspired:
”Could it be that this happened to them because they did something illegal?”
”How could that be?” Byers and Phil responded in unison.
As soon as the words left their mouths, they suddenly had a corresponding speculation, their expressions gradually solemnizing.
”Perhaps there is an invisible enforcer, and that is the essence of this transcendent event ……,” Byers said thoughtfully.
Roy said with a “hmm”:
”That’s a big possibility.
”Next, let’s watch our behavior.”
Pasha and the others nodded and walked along the streets towards the outskirts of the city with increasing wariness.
It wasn’t long before they arrived at the town square and saw a number of people standing around the bulletin board at night.
”Bulletin?” Roy and the others glanced at each other, suspecting that it was a reminder made by the official forces about this transcendent event.
Therefore, they leaned over and looked at the announcement on the wooden sign with the help of the light from the gas street lamp.
There was a piece of white paper pasted right in the center of the place, with a piece of yellow paper underneath the white paper that seemed to be making additional notes.
During the process of quickly skimming through the announcement, Roy, Pasha and the others’ gazes were gradually colored with horror, seeming to somewhat understand where the root of the matter was.
After reading the white paper, their eyes fell onto the yellow paper:
”All citizens are invited to join together to capture the Outlander, by any means necessary.”
抓捕外乡人……Roy and the others’ hearts tightened and instinctively looked at the citizens around the bulletin board.
As if sensing their gaze, the citizens bristled and turned around, turning their attention to them at the same time.
Under the dim light of the gas street lamps, that one eye seemed to shine with a strange luster.