Waiting for a long time

Erin Parker lived in a fairly decent apartment building. By the time Yvette arrived by taxi, she happened to see two police officers walking downstairs with looks of helpless exasperation.

She proceeded to apartment 805 on the eighth floor, knocked on the door, and watched as a pale Miss Erin pulled it open. "You're finally here, Miss Nameless!"

Disregarding whether they were well-acquainted yet, Erin threw her arms around Yvette in a tight embrace, pulled her inside the room, and clicked the door shut.

Understanding the young woman's state of mind, Yvette didn't mind the intrusion. She asked, "I just saw the police downstairs. What did they say?"

The moment she received the voice message, she had instructed Miss Erin to call the police immediately. After all, the authorities could arrive much faster than she could. Even while maintaining a continuous voice connection, the most Yvette could do was use her hacking abilities to remotely manipulate nearby networked objects—such as flying cars—to create minor obstacles for the werewolf killer.

"The police told me not to contact them before another crime actually takes place, saying they aren't twenty-four-hour bodyguards, and even suggested I hire one myself," Erin said with a depressed expression, looking as though she had also received a thorough scolding from the officers.

Yvette wasn't surprised. With the werewolf killer staging so many incidents, it was impossible to provide round-the-clock protection for every potential target. Tennyson could easily employ a feint and switch to a different target at any moment.

"Tell me what happened," Yvette said.

At these words, Erin walked over to the balcony and pointed at a similarly tall apartment building across the street. "I was enjoying the view from here earlier... when I noticed someone standing in a window on the corresponding floor of the opposite building, staring intently at my place. He was wearing a mask, but the more I looked at him, the more he seemed like Tennyson. Even his black hair matched. When he realized I saw him, he didn't even try to hide. We just stared at each other until I finished sending you that message. Only then did he suddenly walk away..."

Yvette stepped up to the balcony to take a look. No one was there anymore, but that wasn't an issue; the security systems for apartments in this district were quite decent, meaning there were at least surveillance cameras around. Utilizing her hacking skills, she quickly retrieved the prior footage and indeed spotted a masked man matching the description.

In the recording, after staring in the direction of Erin's home from that specific vantage point for a brief moment, the masked man turned and left without the slightest hesitation, quickly disappearing into a poorer neighborhood devoid of cameras, making further tracking impossible.

Well, the upper half of his face matched Tennyson's photographs completely—black hair, deep eye sockets, and high cheekbones. It was definitely him... He hadn't been sold to the Rusty Bones Free State after all; instead, he had truly become the werewolf killer, acquiring the mystical ability of lycanthropy...

A wave of confusion washed over Yvette. If it really was Tennyson, why would he do this? If he intended to attack, he could have struck directly. If he didn't intend to attack, what was the purpose of appearing there? Could it be that he simply wanted to catch a glimpse of the high school sweetheart who used to be his idealized first love?

How had he obtained this power?

And what was his motive for carrying out this series of murders?

"Did you do anything out of the ordinary these past couple of days?" Yvette asked, sudden realization dawning on her.

"I... after I went back, I took your advice and looked into Tennyson's disappearance case..." Erin said nervously. "Oh, right! I made a discovery!"

"What kind of discovery?"

"The investigation results from the AJSP stated that Tennyson was originally lured away by a rumor claiming someone 'got rich overnight within three months by going to the Rusty Bones to smuggle daily necessities.' I looked into similar deceptive schemes and found something wrong." Erin's expression turned serious. "Those scams all require arriving at a border city first before kidnapping and smuggling victims across. Yet the AJSP claimed Tennyson was abducted right here in Agartha, which completely contradicts the traffickers' usual methods."

She continued, "So I consulted a reporter friend I know to understand the missing persons cases from around that time last year, and I discovered that most of them were linked to a gang called the Black Shark Syndicate. Yesterday afternoon, I visited the Black Shark Syndicate's territory and made some inquiries, only to find out that the syndicate had disbanded half a year ago, with their leader fleeing abroad and dying in an accidental crash along the way... And then today, Tennyson showed up."

Pausing for a moment, she asked nervously, "Miss Nameless, do you think this information has anything to do with Tennyson showing up today?"

"The werewolf killer's attacks usually don't involve giving advance notice of a crime. I suspect this might be a warning," Yvette said thoughtfully. "Tennyson doesn't want you to continue your investigation, so he deliberately showed his face to you."

"He doesn't want me to continue? Why?" Erin asked, deeply puzzled. "Wouldn't he want me to expose all the suffering he endured to the public?"

"Perhaps he's afraid you'll be implicated, or perhaps he's merely doing preliminary groundwork and plans to come attack you in a couple of days."

"What should I do then?" Erin shrank back, feeling her heart race as she asked with a pale face, "Can I hire you to protect me, Miss Nameless?"

"Yes."

"Uh, can you beat him in a fight?" Erin asked tentatively as another thought crossed her mind.

"I can."

"I... I... I believe you!" Erin said, though she hardly sounded convinced herself. She had never actually seen Miss Nameless take action; she only felt that the woman carried an aura of mystery about her, but nothing more.

However, given her current financial situation, it seemed she couldn't afford to hire any other mercenaries willing to take the job.

"Thank you," Yvette said. "But for you, the best choice is still to leave Agartha and live in another city."

Erin fell silent at once. She wasn't a local; her parents had spent their savings to send her here for her studies precisely so she could establish a foothold in this sprawling metropolis. Packing up and flying far away carried an unacceptable cost, especially now that she had leveraged her university professor's connections to secure an internship at Bird News—an opportunity extremely difficult to replicate elsewhere. She simply couldn't give it up.

Seeing that she remained silent, Yvette dropped the persuasion and merely asked, "Are you going to continue the investigation or not?"

"I'm going to continue, whether it's for the truth or for my career as a reporter," Erin replied with firm resolve.

"Very well." Yvette nodded. As a bounty hunter, this outcome was entirely to her liking as well.

To ensure the employer's safety, Yvette spent that very night at Erin's place. She carried almost no luggage and only needed the sofa to sleep, making her movements exceptionally unencumbered.

The next day, she and Erin revisited the streets formerly controlled by the Black Shark Syndicate. But unlike Erin's verbal inquiries, Yvette's methods were far more violent—she directly hacked into the police records of that precinct and breached numerous terminal devices used by the gangsters, pulling a specific keyword from the vast ocean of illegal, gray, and pornographic data.

—Ecdysis Biologics.

It was a fragment of a chat log where a former Black Shark Syndicate member was boasting to someone else, claiming that the syndicate's leader at the time had maintained a long-term, clandestine partnership with Ecdysis Biologics, and that these operations were intimately tied to the gang's core business of human trafficking.

If true, this effectively explained a great deal: why the AJSP hadn't told Tennyson's parents the truth, how Tennyson had acquired such formidable power, and why he had seemingly given Erin a warning to cease her activities.

In Agartha, this was a topic no one dared to touch.

***

Yvette did not share the intelligence she had hacked with Erin. On the one hand, the findings could not be verified with absolute certainty; on the other hand, they ultimately required physical, tangible evidence, as proof obtained through hacking would never hold up in court—let alone mere chat logs from street thugs.

She could merely use it to steer their direction, akin to checking the answer key first to deduce the process, thereby unearthing a few crumbs of useful information.

Of course, for Yvette personally, uncovering the "truth" held little actual importance. Her primary hope was merely that Erin's continued investigation would flush the werewolf killer out into the open.

Compared to digging up the secrets of Ecdysis Biologics, she cared far more about that million-credit bounty.

***

Five days slipped by in a hurry.

Amidst the ongoing investigation—perhaps owing to the deterrent presence of Yvette as a spellcaster—Tennyson had not made another appearance, while Erin felt she was inching closer and closer to the truth.

After all, the Black Shark Syndicate had engaged in human trafficking on a massive scale; it was impossible for them to leave no traces behind. Where those victims were eventually sold, and the routes taken by the transport vehicles, could be figured out with just a little effort—most of them vanished into a specific suburban district.

And that very suburb happened to house the industrial park belonging to Ecdysis Biologics.

Another evening fell, dusk descending like spilled ink to swallow the silhouettes of distant buildings while dim streetlights cast solitary, lonely halos in the encroaching dark.

This was a desolate highway abutting the industrial park of Ecdysis Biologics. Yvette and Erin had walked out here during daylight hours primarily to investigate where the illegal transport vehicles used by the Black Shark Syndicate back then had ultimately disappeared. Having conducted a brief reconnaissance, it was now about time to head back.

Lowering her head, Erin began swiping across her terminal's projection, attempting to summon a nearby ride-hailing vehicle.

Amidst the quiet tranquility, as if lying in wait for this exact moment, a massive silhouette burst roaring out from the roadside shrubbery.

It was a gigantic beast-like shape covered in pitch-black fur and reeking of a heavy, foul odor. It lunged forward with unimaginable speed, leaving a string of afterimages in its wake. Its maw gaped wide, bristling with dense rows of fangs, while its eyes flashed with a frenzied crimson glow like burning embers from the abyss.

—The werewolf killer! Wolf form!

For a moment, Erin froze in place, her body seized by an overwhelming terror that rendered her chillingly rigid. Perhaps Tennyson's previous attitude toward her as his former idealized love had fostered a delusion that he wouldn't harm her, leading her to believe she could recklessly court danger—yet clearly, that was both an illusion and sheer arrogance.

Terrifying. This was too terrifying... This was something human strength simply could not contend with...

Feeling the breath of death at close range, she thought in absolute despair.

However, before her stagnant mind even had time to experience regret, Miss Nameless responded with unexpected and impeccable timeliness.

Taking two steps forward, Yvette suddenly launched into the air with a kick aimed precisely at the lower jaw of the charging giant wolf.

Without a doubt, this was an act as futile as a praying mantis trying to stop a chariot. Could a slender young girl possibly halt such a colossal beast?

Yet, a scene that defied all imagination unfolded. In response to that kick, the giant wolf reacted as though struck by a devastating blow, sent flying backward by that petite foot clad in a small leather boot. It tumbled and crashed onto the roadside more than a dozen meters away, instantly stripping away that heart-stopping, terrifying pressure it had emitted just moments before. In fact, it looked somewhat comical, resembling nothing more than a beaten husky whimpering in pain on the ground.

Kick... kicked away?

Watching Miss Nameless casually retract her foot, and listening to the distant, miserable wolf howls, Erin froze once more. She rubbed her eyes in utter shock, wondering how reality could possibly take such an absurd turn.

Could it be that she still hadn't woken up from a dream?

***

Yvette had no idea what kind of emotions Miss Nameless—ah, Miss Erin was experiencing right now. Even if she had known, she wouldn't have cared, because her entire focus was locked onto the giant wolf before her.

She had waited many days for this walking million-credit payday—over half a month, in fact. It had finally arrived and hadn't failed her expectations.

However, considering that the werewolf killer might possess crucial intelligence, she was still willing to leave him alive under non-essential circumstances, or simply hand him over to the police station. Once that news got out, she figured she could secure even higher-level contract commissions from Catus at the Gleaming Light Bar by the very next day.

After struggling for a moment, the giant wolf climbed back up from the ground. That kick seemed to have snapped a bit of clarity back into it, as the red glow in its eyes faded significantly, replaced by a glint of human-like lucidity.

Yet for reasons unknown, even knowing its chances of victory were slim, it stubbornly renewed its attack, lunging forward to bite at Yvette.

Yvette summoned her rune rings. Her current limit was twelve rune rings, meaning twelve spell forms could bombard a single target simultaneously.

Strangely enough, however, the moment all those spell forms approached the giant wolf, they seemed to be deflected instantly, veering off toward entirely unexpected trajectories.

Yvette narrowed her eyes. She knew the reason behind this: the giant wolf had also mastered the technique of spell hijacking. The very instant her spells struck, parts of their parameters had been altered, causing them to take random paths and creating the illusion of being repelled.

This was also related to the lack of security protocols in her own spell designs. Fighting aberrant entities didn't ordinarily require a spell firewall, and she hadn't anticipated witnessing the consequences of neglecting one today.

Even so, she didn't mind, because she still had her fists.

Under the dual enhancement of her Crimson Armor and Muscle Limit-Release, Yvette closed the distance to the giant wolf. These two spells happened to be among the rare few she had equipped with firewalls, granting them high stability.

Raising a hand, she blocked the giant wolf's descending claws as easily as one might grasp a dog's paw during a handshake. Using that grip as leverage, she violently slammed the massive beast into the pavement, hauled it back up, and hurled it down onto the opposite side. Amidst a dozen repetitions of this piling-driver motion accompanied by dull impacts, the wolf's struggles finally grew feeble, reducing it to a dying breath while leaving behind two shallow, crack-webbed craters on the highway.

The stunned Erin stood frozen not far away. Perhaps because she had finally confirmed this wasn't a dream, the sight of the silver-haired girl toying with the giant wolf using her diminutive frame appeared all the more earth-shattering—she looked every bit an peerless goddess! This was completely absurd! Was she really a spellcaster? Why was this so different from the legends?!

Realizing that if the beating continued any longer, the wolf might actually drop dead on the spot, Erin hurriedly shouted out and trotted over, putting a stop to Miss Nameless's ongoing canine-abuse session.

"Tennyson, is that you?" Erin asked immediately once Yvette halted her movements.