Apocalyptic Era: Starting from picking up a Bishoujo
Chapter 96 - 93 Night Talk 2

Chapter 96: 93 Night Talk 2

Mazao had the ability to use the "blessing power" to track the target’s past experiences. I gathered that the reason she kept observing the Shadow Swapping Monster’s fingers was so she could use her tracking skill to investigate clues related to the Shadow Swapping Monster.

Since we couldn’t count on Lu Youxun’s side, we had to rely on Mazao first.

And Mazao gave a response that didn’t disappoint expectations.

"I have managed to perceive a few things," she said, "this monster used to frequent a particular place for an extended period and interact with some people there. Sometimes he would go there every day and stay for a long period. If nothing unexpected happens, he should also be visiting that place frequently in the coming time."

"So, all we need to do is to ambush him there..." Suddenly, I saw a glimmer of hope for victory, "Then, what exactly is that place?"

"I’m still investigating that. There wasn’t enough time to gather that much information," she said, "This monster seems to have anti-Divination abilities. Even though my ability isn’t Divination, it still was somewhat affected. The images I tracked were all fragmented and disjointed."

"Do you have confidence in finding out the exact location of that place?" I asked.

"It’s hard to say, but I feel like it shouldn’t be too much of a problem," she said, "It’s like a puzzle game. Even those who do not play puzzles, as long as they spend time and patience exhaustively searching, will eventually find the correct way to piece it together. As for how much time this will take, I can’t give you an exact number. If we’re lucky, the results could come out tomorrow; if not... it shouldn’t take more than a week at least."

"No worries, take your time," I said soothingly.

Now, I was no longer restricted by time. Whether she needed a week or a month, it was acceptable to me. But she might not be able to accept it herself. She also had the mission of preventing Doomsday from arriving and might not be willing to waste time at such a preliminary stage.

"Also, remember to be careful of a person named Lu Chan," I reminded her.

"Lu Chan? Who’s that?" she asked curiously.

I told her about Lu Youxun and the Transcendentalism Mountain affairs and suggested she not let the opposing forces discover her.

Originally, I thought she would react with total vigilance and implement a strategy of concealment, but after hearing me out, she simply said, "Don’t worry, let them find out. You and Zhu Shi don’t need to bother hiding me. We can reveal ourselves openly."

"What?" I was quite surprised.

"This comes from experience. In the Doomsday Era, I had a bad reputation. Even when passing through places where survivors gathered, I considered being discreet in my actions. But I have a Broom Star Physique that easily causes incidents, so the thought of hiding quietly... never worked out." She spoke with a resigned attitude, "Instead of being so restrained, it’s better to carry out activities with the assumption that others will know of me. It also saves the trouble of being paranoid about my surroundings."

"What if the Transcendentalism Mountain forces try to kidnap you forcibly?" I challenged.

Her answer was straightforward: "I will use Space Transfer to escape."

Escape using Space Transfer... and then what? I waited for a while but didn’t hear her elaborate. She just looked at me with a calm gaze.

Wait, was that it?

"Is that all?" I pressed.

"That should be enough," she said. Upon seeing my reaction, she patiently explained, "I admit, many powers of the strange and their phenomena cannot be escaped simply by Space Transfer. But my Space Transfer is different. You might find it hard to believe, but consider this—

"In the past, I lived through the crisis-ridden Doomsday Era, and on top of that, I had the Broom Star Physique that endlessly attracted strange disasters to me. Almost everyone who had been involved with me has perished, yet I alone am still alive today... What do you think is the reason for my survival?

"As long as I want to escape, no one can stop me, and no one can track me."

She concluded with a mention of the Disaster Demon—an addition to the list of obstacles she’d faced.

And I gradually came to accept her point of view.

Yes, if she possessed the regular Space Transfer, not only would she be unable to escape the myriad strange phenomena, but even escaping my grasp would be impossible.

Moreover, Lu Youxun was an expert in investigating the strange. Hiding Mazao from him—someone who attracted strangeness so easily—was indeed unrealistic. And if Mazao’s Space Transfer was indeed so powerful that it couldn’t be overcome except by a Great Demon or something of the Great Impermanence Level, then perhaps whether Transcendentalism Mountain learned of her whereabouts was not important.

If there was any cause for concern, it was that the power of the strange was unpredictable, and her confidence seemed somewhat excessive. But when it came to knowledge of the strange, she was certainly ten times, a hundred times more experienced than I was. And it was she who had made the judgment that there was "no problem," lending substantial weight to that assessment.

"Alright, I believe in you," I said.

Upon hearing this, she rarely showed a smile.

"Can you tell me more about the Weirdo Maker and the Human Bureau?" she asked.

I nodded, then told her about them.

A night passed.

-

That night, Mazao insisted on giving me the bedroom and she herself slept on the sofa.

In fact, there are two bedrooms in this house, but one of them doesn’t have a bed. I thought it was about time I purchased a new bed. For now, however, I just went along with Mazao. If I kept bickering with her over such trivial matters nonstop, it might decrease her favorability toward me.

I no longer continued to set up surveillance "Fireflies" around her either. After all, she was now truly free to come and go, and it wouldn’t be good if she noticed the presence of the "Fireflies". This was the same reason I didn’t insist on her sleeping in the bedroom. Surveillance was no longer meaningful.

As for the Weirdo Maker and the Human Bureau, there wasn’t much I could explain clearly to her. Later on, I just used a laptop to display the related materials and discussed them with her as we looked at them together.

Soon after we defeated the Undying Monster, Lu Youxun had sent me and Zhu Shi information related to the Human Bureau, which contained both confirmed intelligence and information of suspect veracity.

First was the confirmed intelligence—the Weirdo Maker was not an ordinary member of the Human Bureau but a member of its decision-making body.

Because the Weirdo Maker seemed to be working on tasks that required moving about in the outside world, I initially thought he was a lower-ranking executor. Not at all. In the information file, Lu Youxun pointed out that the Weirdo Maker was not just a leader of the decision-making body but also the head of the research department, a role that logically should act behind the scenes.

Furthermore, the Human Bureau differed decisively from Luo Mountain in that most of its members were ordinary people—"ordinary" here merely meant that they didn’t possess the power of the strange; in reality, they were legitimate professionals and elites in society.

With an organization like Luo Mountain, whose main body consisted of demon hunters, the decision-makers, who were often high-ranking demon hunters, could both issue commands from behind the scenes and potentially storm the front lines. The Human Bureau, on the other hand, couldn’t do that, let alone have the Weirdo Maker getting up close and personal with those psychotic monsters.

It’s very likely that the Weirdo Maker possessed a powerful strange force—this was what Lu Youxun surmised. Although Lu Youxun had encountered the Weirdo Maker in the past, it was during his time as a test subject for the Human Bureau, and he had never actually battled the Weirdo Maker, so this speculation wasn’t entirely certain.

The information also indicated that the Human Bureau had abducted many scientists to study the power of demon hunters, and some of those scientists were well-known in the academic community and had previously served official forces.

Such unscrupulous behavior naturally deeply angered the official forces, and as a result, they commissioned Luo Mountain, hoping Luo Mountain could quickly eliminate this lawless organization.

However, according to the unconfirmed information in the materials, Lu Youxun subjectively believed that the Human Bureau likely had a background in official forces and suspected that it was a dark research institution cultivated by official forces to contend with Luo Mountain in the not-too-distant future. Even if not, the Human Bureau must have received financial support from various sectors of society, growing under the tacit approval of official forces.

Is that really the case? Thinking of the monsters created by the Weirdo Maker—who were wantonly wreaking havoc and harvesting souls among the civilians—I found it difficult to agree with Lu Youxun’s suspicions.

The next morning, I awoke in the bedroom.

As soon as I opened my eyes, I saw Mazao standing silently by the bed like a ghost, her head down, gazing at me with deep concentration.

Although I really hoped to wake up to see her face—indeed, I wished I could see her by my side 24 hours a day—why was she standing here?

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"Did you enter the Mist Dream Realm last night?" she asked seriously.

"Not yet," I honestly replied.

Her shoulders slumped in disappointment.

I see, she was still worried about Bowl Number Two, hoping I could soon enter the Mist Dream Realm again and rescue it from falling into a crisis of becoming a Sin Demon. If I had a choice, of course, I would choose to enter the Mist Dream Realm that very night, but sadly, that wasn’t something I could control.

I got out of bed, prepared breakfast, and ate with an uneasy Mazao. Afterward, I inquired about the progress of her investigation into the Shadow Swapping Monster’s finger.

"Regarding the place where that monster frequents, I still haven’t figured out the inside situation, but I now know how to get there," she said. "It’s located in this city; should we set off now?"

Hearing this, I took out my phone and contacted Zhu Shi.

An hour later, the three of us met up in the new district.

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