The Record of Unusual Creatures

Pierre mentioned that in the forest village, where the flow of time was out-of-the-way, the process of decay would be accelerated on some things while stagnant on others. What would happen when the village’s space-time distortion suddenly disappeared?

It seemed that the distorted time would be immediately compensated.

The village of 300 years had instantly decayed completely. The forest, once blocked outside the fence, had reclaimed this once-civilized soil quickly, and those villagers who became a part of the magic system had turned into bones. They were instantly compensated into time.

Pierre was overjoyed seeing Hao Ren and his team. What happened a while ago was a horrifying experience to him as he saw everything around him decomposed instantaneously. The scene of the forest growing as if it were lunging at them had almost caused a heart attack in him. The Wang brothers and Catherine beside him were a lot more confused than him. The three of them had been trapped in the village for too long; they had almost lost their free will. To them, what happened in the past years were just a nightmare. They seemed to have also lost part of their memory before the ‘dream.’

As Pierre told of what happened, the Wang brothers and Catherine could not believe what they heard. Catherine especially thought that she had just started on an expedition journey from outside the forest, and was ready to collect samples of fauna and flora in the woods.

But in the blink of an eye, everything changed, and it was no longer what it was used to be.

“The curse of this place has now disappeared. So what is your plan?” Hao Ren asked Pierre. “The three of them behind you, have they thought of the future?”

Apparently, to the Wang brothers and Catherine, the future had never crossed their minds. They had only heard about this bizarre experience in the mythic stories, which most probably did not contain a guide for what one should do after surviving the absurd event. People might have heard of the story of Wangzhi, who went into the mountain to collect firewood and saw two sages were playing chess on the river bank. Interested, he watched for a couple of hours. When he finally arrived home, he was shocked to find that a few hundred years had passed. But the story did not mention how the poor guy got back his identity.

Hao Ren felt that the three chaps here were more fortunate than the guy who watched two sages playing chess in the story—they were only out of touch with the outside world for a dozen years.

“I am seriously considering to quit this job,” Pierre said sincerely to Vivian. “You are right. With my kind of physique and luck, I would probably be dead in five years. As for my three friends; there is an old Eastern saying: fate has brought us together. We have been trapped here together; I’m going to help them. At least I will ensure they could return to their place and start their life again.”

Hao Ren was instantly relieved. Since Pierre had offered to take care of them, he could not ask for more. But he was still curious. “Do you know the way? I mean, let’s not talk about the two brothers but Catherine. She has been missing for 15 years since the Bush Jr. era. Wouldn’t it be more difficult to get her back to society?”

Pierre smiled. “We spirit detectives have our networks. There were quite some cases where missing persons suddenly showed up after disappearing for years. As long as their families are still there, everything would be fine. The worst case scenario would be to faking their I.D.”

Hao Ren was struck dumb.

It seemed that this spirit detective was all sizzle but no steak, Hao Ren thought.

“Well, anyway, I’m fine since you can take care of yourself,” Vivian said. “But if you are in trouble, you can go to Athens in Greece, and draw a six-pointed star and an eye pattern on any monument near the city center. Someone will look for you, and they see the pattern. When you meet them, tell them my name, and you will get help from the Shadow Council.”

Pierre was touched. It was probably the first time since he became a spirit detective that he had a chance to come face-to-face with this kind of supernatural power. He did not know what the Shadow Council was, but merely hearing the mighty name had him excited. While he was at it, Hesperides reminded, “There is something you need to pay attention to.”

“I’m all ear.” Pierre instantly became attentive.

“When you draw pattern, use water, not paint,” Hesperides said. “Last time there were two silly chaps from the American Brotherhood spray-painting on the city monument. In the end, we had to bail them out from the police station.”

Pierre was struck dumb.

Hao Ren patted on the back of the spirit detective. “Quit while you still can. Those demons and monsters aren’t what you think they are.”

Pierre again was struck dumb.

After settling the victims of the strange village, Hao Ren did not leave but head deeper into the village ruins.

Without experiencing it personally, it was hard to imagine that a village with hundreds of ‘people’ only a few hours ago would become a place overgrown with thick grass and shrubs. Due to the distorted space and time, the rapidly emerged vegetation was still unstable; they proliferated and withered just as fast. Plants are still in a precarious state. Shrouded beneath these plants were the severely weather-eroded remnants of the village: rotten wood, and gravel of pavement.

Hathaway still followed behind them in cloaked mode. With the direction in her memory and the pathfinding ability of her ghostly vision, she was able to point them to the destination. Very quickly, they came before a seemingly featureless marshland.

Meanwhile, Pierre and the other three had wisely chosen not to come along. After going through hell, they knew that the inner area was not a place they should go.

“It’s here,” Hathaway said as she floated above the swamp. Only Hao Ren and his teammates could hear her voice. “Dig here.”

Lily jumped in the first instant.

The husky started to dig with her claws, throwing out tons of peaty soil and some gravel. Before long, Lily had dug a pit before them. Suddenly, Lily hit something with a tink.

The doggy maiden instinctively halted the digging. Otherwise, her claws, which could cut through metals, would probably rip apart whatever thing in the soil.

With the help of a swarm of bats Vivian had summoned, Lily lifted a heavy black metal box, around one cubic meter, out of the ground.

The metal box, buried underground for more than two centuries, was still intact and sturdy. Its deep back body glistened with a metallic luster. Each side of the box had mysterious ancient runes and pattern engravings. As sunlight filtered through foliage, the ancient runes on the metal box seemed to began to come to life as they glittered with a colorful brilliance.

“This is what Hercules brought out from Mount Olympus,” Hathaway whispered. “This thing, the only estate his majestic father left him, was more important than his life, although, in reality, it was only his burden.”

“Is there a way to open it? Hao Ren examined the box curiously. It seemed that the box had no upside or downside, it was multidirectional. There was no lid and lock. This thing should have a self-opening mechanism—a delicate container. Regular means would probably not be able to open it.

“Hercules had anticipated his fate, so he told us how to open the container,” Hathaway said as she slowly descended. Her ghostly fingers slid gently over the old metal box, the text began to glow and pulsate with a rhythm. “But I can only unlock the rune here; it needs a crucial key.”

“Key?” Hao Ren and Vivian said in unison.

“The blood of the descendants of Olympus,” Hathaway said. Her eyes landed on Hesperides. “Zeus designed the container personally and limited it to being opened only by the descendants of Olympus to prevent valuable information from falling into the hands of outsiders. Hercules had mentioned this limitation. He knew that there were survivors of the Olympian family, so he sought our help, and if necessary, we can pass this on to his people. But you already know what has happened after that. Things have been beyond our control, and we are unable to complete his entrustment. But now, this sacred covenant could finally be fulfilled.”

Hesperides’ face suddenly turned solemn.

She took a deep breath and stepped forward, cut open the tip of her finger, squeezed a drop of blood, and applied it onto the metal box.

Vivian grabbed Hesperides’ finger and put it in her mouth, sucking while watching the changes on the box. Hesperides was struck dumb.”What are you doing?”

“Don’t waste the blood,” Vivian said matter-of-factly. “I lost a large amount of magic power. At this time, I need to seize the opportunity to get replenishment. Oh, by the way, you seem to have an exuberant liver fire symptom.”

Everyone was dumbstruck.

There was a sudden movement in the metal box, and the complicated container finally opened.