20 Zhu Shi1

I am Zhu Shi, a demon hunter from Luo Mountain.

My brother, Zhu Changan, might soon become a target for the Fallen Demon Hunters. Although I feel this possibility is low, we indeed have no clues on hand to trace these Fallen Demon Hunters.

I never expected him to visit our mother at the hospital. Although I'm happy he has taken this rare interest, what if the Fallen Demon Hunters really attack and affect those nearby? It's also difficult to explain to him why not even a military hospital is safe, and since I'm not good at lying, I couldn't find a proper reason to send him away quickly.

Moreover, sharing a room with him is very uncomfortable; there are several agents watching him, and I have to pretend to be a literary college girl in front of him, which makes the agents' scrutiny a bit intense. So, I found an excuse to step outside to catch some fresh air and relieve my weary spirit. Not only were there people watching him, but I also set up my spells nearby, and my awareness covered the hospital. So, there was no need to worry about someone taking advantage of his vulnerability.

He even asked me why I brought my guitar case when I was leaving. Actually, it contains my spirit gear, but all I could say was that I was going to play the guitar in the courtyard. I had no intention of telling him about my work in Luo Mountain.

Just after I stepped out of the hospital, I saw Agent Kong approaching from the opposite direction, likely preparing to swap shifts with other agents.

In Luo Mountain, agents are officially known as "probes." Their primary job is to investigate unusual incidents and notify demon hunters to handle them, though they also do various other tasks.

Agent Kong is one of the elite; his insights into unusual incidents are richer than mine. The university I am currently attending is also within his patrol area, and we have collaborated many times. I heard that his superiors have recently imposed some excessive duties on him, forcing him to impersonate a police officer and rush around.

Many demon hunters look down on agents, believing agents are defective because they cannot become demon hunters; it sounds like if they can't become demon hunters, they are a level below them. Yes, that's exactly what they think. So, they also look down on ordinary people. Perhaps Agent Kong's superiors share that view too; I really don't get along with them.

With half an hour still to go before the shift change, we sat down in the courtyard's gazebo and chatted for a while. Agent Kong is a man in his thirties, who naturally has nothing in common with me about everyday topics, so we could only talk about work. Soon we were discussing the anomaly in the fifteenth-floor room that he had mentioned on the phone earlier.

"Zhu Changan mentioned that the appearance of the cave is still unexplained, although it was I who first asked if you were available to handle it, but are you really okay?" he asked with concern.

"Whether I'm okay or not, I'll only know after trying. Moreover, I don't know if that cave belongs to the type of strange phenomena that can affect those who come into contact with it, regardless of distance. He's my brother; I must protect him."

"But your expertise is combat. If it really comes to it, you could ask other demon hunters who are better at dealing with such matters."

"I can't just ask other demon hunters to handle an odd phenomenon that I know nothing about..."

"Well, since you say so, I won't persuade you anymore," he sighed, then changed the subject, "But while dealing with the cave, you could also try probing that Zhuang Cheng."

"Zhuang Cheng? Do you still think he's connected to the cave's appearance?"

"That's a secondary reason, and it's unlikely," he explained. "What I really mean is that he may have already come into contact with our world. With the frequent strange incidents in the past two years, someone like him, who relentlessly pursues these incidents yet remains unharmed, don't you find that odd? Maybe he has acquired some protective powers."

He had said something similar before, but this time I caught another implication: "Are you suggesting we recruit Zhuang Cheng into our ranks as an ally?"

"Even if he cannot become a combatant, he could surely make an excellent agent, fulfilling his wish," he smiled. "Recruiting potentially talented individuals from the public is originally part of my job as a probe, but if you could discover him, you could then guide him and have him assist you. Even without mana, he's a very capable person and would definitely be of help to you."

"Thanks for the thought, but..."

Although I acknowledge that Zhuang Cheng is talented, some realities may differ from what Agent Kong thinks.

I recalled my past acquaintance with Zhuang Cheng.

-

It was around my freshman year of high school when I first heard about Zhuang Cheng from my brother.

Unlike ordinary families, my family, the Zhu family, is a family of demon hunters. It's said that our ancestors included Impermanence, but our glory has faded now. Initially, my brother was supposed to inherit the family's Magic Artifact and become a demon hunter, but due to an accident, I became the successor, and he lost his childhood memories. Our family also blocked all information concerning the world of demon hunters from him.

They said it was amnesia, but it seemed to be not a total loss; he still retained fragments and vague impressions. Therefore, from a young age, he firmly believed in the existence of strange creatures and claimed to those around him that he had seen and encountered such beings.

Naturally, our family did not acknowledge his claims, and outsiders were even less likely to believe him. When he was in middle school, he was mocked and bullied by classmates, and teachers often called him in for talks. People are easily influenced by their environment, especially during adolescence, a time of rapid personality development; external negation and recognition are crucial.

Additionally, after his amnesia, he never encountered strange creatures again, and over time, he might have slowly accepted that those disjointed fragments and impressions were just delusions from his childhood, and finally, he stopped mentioning those events.

However, he surely still harbored some defiance and anticipation in some corner of his heart, hoping for an opportunity to vent and express it outward.

I felt immense sympathy for my brother, while at the same time, I envied him as well.

I had once thought that I would never become a demon hunter.

One day, during dinner, he suddenly brought up someone, saying there was a weirdo at his high school who was keen on investigating urban legends, named Zhuang Cheng.

This person was somewhat like my brother in the past, though he didn't proclaim the existence of bizarre entities to those around him; instead, he was earnestly trying to prove their existence, even more aggressively than my brother had done.

I thought my brother was reigniting his interest in these strange entities. For reasons we could not explain to outsiders, my family and I did not want him delving into this world. So I dismissed the topic from the perspective of an ordinary person as "a waste of energy," and after a moment of silence, my brother agreed with me.

Later, I conducted some investigations on Zhuang Cheng. He hadn't started researching ghost stories just in high school but had shown an extraordinary passion for them since at least middle school. His classmates all had lasting impressions of him, but hardly anyone befriended him. A senior of mine in high school had been his middle school classmate, and she shuddered when she mentioned Zhuang Cheng.

"That person often brought candles to school."

"Candles?"

"Yes, candles. He'd pull out candles from his desk drawer whenever he felt like it, and then stare at them with a terrifying gaze as if he was possessed. He didn't just love ghost stories; he also frequented haunted places for adventures. He must have been possessed by some dirty spirit..."

Moreover, I learned from others that he used to focus on researching Feng Shui and mystic rituals, often carrying a Compass and divination tools with him for practical use. After a while, losing interest, he shifted to other fields, still related to mysticism. Most people thought he was either mentally ill or incredibly childish, exceeding in these traits even more than my brother during his middle school years.

Yet, he seemed oblivious to others, as if their voices just couldn't reach his ears, and he did whatever he pleased.

In high school, there was a girl in my class who liked paranormal romance novels and developed some strange fantasies about making herself appear as a "mystical girl," claiming she "could see." He sniffed her out and "caught her in the act," ruthlessly exposing all her pretenses.

There was even a time when a visiting Feng Shui Master from abroad tried to con a local tycoon, and Zhuang Cheng, still in high school, somehow sniffed out the situation and exposed the fraud on the spot.

Years passed, and I'm not sure how many times he's encountered impostors of the supernatural, yet he remained "mentally ill" and "childish."

While this is just my own speculation, maybe it was this quality that attracted my brother.

So later, when I criticized Zhuang Cheng in front of my brother, he no longer pretentiously agreed with me like in the past; instead, he took Zhuang Cheng's side.

I only realized afterward that from the first time he mentioned Zhuang Cheng, he had been secretly following him, collecting information about him like a fan.

When he talked about Zhuang Cheng, his tone was increasingly animated, as if he saw him as another possible version of himself.

"Do you know? Right before graduating from his senior high school, he took a trip to another province to investigate a child disappearance case related to local folklore, similar to the mystic vanishings in Japan. It apparently involved a formidable evil force behind the scenes..."

Hearing such topics frequently, I had to admit that he indeed was a "legendary figure."

But it was dangerous, extremely dangerous.

One day, Zhuang Cheng would find himself in an irreversible plight, dying with regret for the very pursuit he was relentless about.

About two to three years ago, organizations around the world related to oddities noticed that the bizarre entities hidden in the shadows of the world had inexplicably begun to act more frequently, and phenomena of space-time distortion that were once rare were steadily increasing. The severity of this was escalating yearly, and reports of ordinary people dying due to odd phenomena were piling up.

In Luo Mountain, someone even made a heretical prophecy that this was a sign of an impending cataclysm.

If we were to define all of human history up to this point as "the era of humanity," then starting from today and within the next ten years, the prosperous history of humanity would meet its end.

Thereafter, not only all humans, but all life forms and all oddities would be destroyed in the looming catastrophe.

Ultimately, all matter would turn into nothingness.

And the next era… there likely wouldn't be another era.

If one had to name it, it would be "the era of the apocalypse."