Volume 7 The Inverted Man Chapter 73 Behind the Door
Although there was nothing peculiar about the voice coming from the telegraph office, it was only slightly intermittent, lacked a distinctive rise and fall in tone, and would not normally strike one as horrifying, a sudden surge of fear erupted in Verdu’s heart.
This is like a bullet with flame flow, shot into the arsenal, accurately hit a barrel of easily ignited gunpowder, will Verdoux previously accumulated, forced to suppress the fear instantly detonated.
The panic that swept into every corner of his body was like a palm that clutched Verdoux’s heart and whitened his brain, causing him to turn around and frantically flee to the wrecked dock where the pirate ship was located.
During this process, Verdoux completely forgot to think, not remembering that he was wearing a classical robe that could be “teleported”, but only by virtue of his feet, stumbling and running within the ruins, sometimes tripping over debris and falling heavily, and sometimes strangled by the clothing, his face turned purple, and he had to stop and gasp for breath.
But every time there was a slight reprieve, Verdoux would get up and continue to run wildly, with the look of a man who had lost his mind and was left with pure instinct.
The wooden door, without him to provide strength, was unable to maintain its balance, and after sliding along the collapsed and crumbling wall, it snapped down to the masonry-covered ground.
The gray mist and the houses shadowed in the fog disappeared with it.
Five or six minutes later, Verdoux ran back to the dock under the stormy overcast.
His eyes were glazed over, filled with panic and disorientation, and he was completely oblivious to the figure standing on the deck of the pirate ship, silently looking down at him.
It was the young man wearing a half-height silk bowler hat, a long black trench coat, and a cold face.
Verdoux did not even think about it, and immediately, with the help of the gangway, returned to the pirate ship, rushed all the way into the cabin, rushed to the second floor, and rushed into that room of his.
Bang dang!
He slammed the door of his room heavily and shrunk into that narrow sleeping bed, wrapping the covers tightly around him and shivering.
It was only when another rib was broken and a sharp pain assaulted his mind that Verdoux initially slowed down, realizing that his arms and legs were sore, his body was hot, and every breath was like thunder.
Struggling, struggling, he finally removed the classical robe and collapsed back onto the bed, only to find his head spinning, nausea and retching, and how there wasn’t enough air.
Beyond the cabin, the cold-faced man suddenly raised his hand and pulled a human-skin glove out of the air, slipping it onto his left palm.
In a flash, the man disappeared into thin air and appeared in a corner of the ruins, next to the plain wooden door.
He then bent his back and pulled up this wooden door, allowing it to re-establish itself in front of a mostly broken wall.
Immediately afterward, the man in the black trench coat mimicked Verdoux’s movements, probing the handle and twisting it downward.
Then he pushed the wooden door forward, causing it to spread back against the wall.
Almost at the same time, he saw a grayish mist, saw streets and houses looming in the pale fog.
Of the houses, the most prominent and distinct was the Banshee Harbor telegraph office; the others appeared more or less blurred.
At that moment the plaintive voice within the telegraph office spoke through the door and asked:
”You, are, who?”
”I am, Germaine, Sparrow.” The young man in the half-high silk bowler hat answered in the same broken voice.
Inside the Banshee Harbor telegraph office, there was a sudden silence, as if some one was walking noiselessly toward the door.
Just then Germaine Sparrow turned his head to look the other way.
Deep down that long, shadowed street, a figure approached, wearing a straw hat and a towel around his neck, bending over and pulling at something.
As the figure approached, the outline of the thing behind him gradually drew out.
It was a black cart on two wheels with a roof to protect it from the sun and rain.
On the cart sat a lady with a round fan painted with flowers and birds and wearing a waist-length skirt.
Both she and the cart-puller were hidden by a relatively thick fog, making it impossible to see exactly what they looked like.
By the time they passed in front of Germaine Sparrow’s eyes, the latter could barely see through the fog to see a handful of details.
The face of the man bending over the cart was rotted to the bone and dripping with yellowish pus; where the lady was not covered by flower and bird clusters and clothing and jewelry, her skin was swollen to the point of glowing, studded with numerous greenish-black patches.
There was a clanging of bells, and a blue train with only two carriages ran out in front of Germaine Sparrow.
It was not until this time that Germaine Sparrow realized that the street floor was paved with iron-black rails corresponding to one long line after another above it.
At the top of the train’s front end, a slightly complicated metal bracket protruded, sliding on top of one of the long wires.
Through the glass windows of the train, Germaine Sparrow saw the passengers inside.
They were all facing the street, but only their heads remained, each dragging a blood-stained vertebrae.
Germaine Sparrow’s pupils dilated slightly, and he watched the scene in silence for a long time.
Nearly a minute passed before he took a step forward, attempting to enter the blurry street shrouded in that grayish mist.
However, the mist blocked him, and no matter what method he employed, he could not penetrate through it.
After a quarter of an hour, Germaine Sparrow stopped trying and closed the wooden door, eliminating the fog, and then, dragging the door with him, he “teleported” directly to the pirate ship, without worrying about the curse.
He then stood the door on the deck, and once again reached out his left palm and grasped the door handle.
Suddenly, Germaine Sparrow’s neck made a clicking sound, and his head seemed to be lifted by an invisible hand, dragging out a bloody spine.
Without a change of expression, Germaine Sparrow indifferently raised his right hand and heaved it toward his head, pressing it back into place.
Immediately afterward, he twisted the handle as if not much affected, and once again pushed the wooden door open, so that it leaned over the side of the ship.
But this time, there was no gray mist to present, no shadowed streets, houses, or trains protruding, nothing unusual, so to speak.
The next second, the wooden door decayed rapidly and rotted into a puddle, as if fleeing from being experimented upon.
Without stopping it, Germaine Sparrow went ahead and pulled a ruby-encrusted gold ring out of the air and wore it for nearly ten seconds.
After letting that ring disappear, Germaine Sparrow reached out with his right hand and dragged out the ordinary wooden door from the void, continuing to make various attempts.
Once it was confirmed that the wooden door would lose its effect once it left Banshee, Germaine Sparrow casually flung it away and made it disappear in mid-air.
Two hours passed, the cloudy sky gradually dissipated, and the storm that had been brewing for a long time eventually did not descend.
By the time the pirate ship was far away from Banshee Harbor, Verdoux, who had taken care of his injuries, took a bottle of potion to put himself into a quick sleep in order to adjust his mental state.
In the gray dream world, he ran through the barren wilderness, searching for something in a panic, but with absolutely no luck.
Suddenly, Verdoux heard a slightly broken voice coming from the depths of the wilderness:
”Great, God of War ……”
”The symbol of iron, and, blood ……”
”The, lord of, turmoil, and, strife ……”
The words were repeated over and over again without disturbing Verdoux enough to take him out of his dream.
After an unknown amount of time, Verdoux woke up naturally and opened his eyes.
At that moment, the morning sunlight from the window shone into the cabin, bringing a slightly hazy light.
Verdoux slowly sat up, realizing that he did not need the Astrologer’s power to recall the three-part honorific name he had heard in his dream.
His knowledge of the occult told him that it pointed to a hidden presence on the level of a deity.
Was this brought on by those tattered signs and symbols around the altar, or was it caused by my witnessing that street in the gray mist? Verdoux frowned slightly, lost in thought.
He didn’t rush out to try and chant the name of the djinn, because he knew how quickly and badly people who had done similar things had died.
The God of War …… Verdoux vaguely remembered that he had seen the god’s name in one of his family’s tomes and decided to do a certain amount of research before thinking about what to do afterward.
……
Banshee Harbor, on a collapsed seaside peak.
A single flame, either crimson or blazing white or orange, emerged from the cracks in the rubble and formed a human figure.
The figure was young and handsome in black bloodstained armor and had half-length fiery red hair.
He was young and handsome, with a flag-like blood-colored mark on his brow and traces of decay visible on his face, and was none other than the “Red Angel” Evil Spirit Soren Einhorn Medici.
”If it weren’t for K’s ability to have secret puppets running all over the world regardless of distance limitations thanks to the ‘Source Castle’ and ‘Secret Servant’ traits, I wouldn’t need to be so circuitous.” The “Red Angel” Evil Spirit tsked, not knowing who he was talking to.
In mid-air, a raven landed and came to rest on top of a boulder.
It had a ring of white outside its right eye, and a human voice came out of its beak:
”I can’t believe you used K instead of him, that’s not like you.”
”Red Angel,” the evil spirit chuckled:
”Because k wants to be addressed as him, not k.”
As he spoke, Soren Einhorn Medici glanced at the raven:
”It’s still more adorable than your real image, or the way you are now, isn’t it, little crow?”
The white-eyed raven responded with no offense at all:
”Your taunts are as alive in the last epoch as your person.”
”Red Angel,” the evil spirit said with a grin:
”Things are going well enough to have been hidden from K. However, I think that K will pretend not to see it even if he finds out, and for you to become the old days, the ‘Gate’ must return. The hypocritical k may still be hesitant to do it at the moment, because it could lead to a huge disaster if he’s not careful, haha, I love disasters.”
”Little Crow, when will you pay the reward? I can’t win the trust of that brainless one from the Abrahams without enough strength.”
”When he prays to you.” The white-eyed circle crow said, “If you’re worried that you won’t be able to maintain such a state for too long, I can parasitize a ‘Worm of Time’ into your body to help you maintain it, no need to say thank you.”
As he spoke, this crow lifted its wings and disappeared into the vast night sky.
The “Red Angel” Evil Spirit turned its head, and with the advantage of the terrain, looked down at the ruins of Banshee with a slightly pensive expression.