Chapter 3196: The Detective Will Die (10)

With the Transcendent's declaration of "The battle begins!" everyone entered their second fight since arriving here, and their opponent was naturally the now bizarrely acting Madeline.

But a peculiar situation had arisen—Madeline had no desire to fight them; all she wanted was to get the revolver. This supported the theory that the creature known as the Wandering indeed followed certain patterns of behavior. Although it was unclear if it was attempting to complete the last action of the possessed before their death, there was definitely a connection. Otherwise, she wouldn't have such a strong obsession with this revolver.

However, Greed was faster than her. As soon as he had rushed downstairs, he directly picked up the revolver that she had thrown down from the second floor, and he firmly intended not to give the gun to the monster.

If it were some other thing, maybe the others would have persuaded him. But guns are indeed dangerous. They might not be useful against monsters, but they would certainly be deadly to humans. It seemed problematic to just hand it over to a monster.

Greed didn't yield, and Madeline was insistent. She chased, and he fled, while others could only watch helplessly as they ran circles in the snow.

Using this opportunity, Shiller observed Madeline and discovered that the monster's speed wasn't very fast—roughly equivalent to an average adult's jogging pace.

If she were chasing anyone else in the group, she might have been able to catch them. But Greed had likely invested heavily in dexterity for the monster chased him fruitlessly, only leaving a mass of footprints on the ground without so much as touching his clothes.

Greed ran past Shiller again and stopped to catch his breath. Waving the revolver in his hand at the monster, he taunted, "Keep on chasing, will you? You really think I can't run here with you for a year?"

This blatant provocation clearly enraged the monster. Madeline suddenly let out a roar, and Shiller saw her head split open—as if she were a detective, her entire upper body was divided in two.

She reversed her way of walking, moving much faster with her hands than her feet. Everyone prepared for Greed to abandon the chase. The Primary Universe Batman even raised his shotgun.

Greed dodged her first pounce but remained calm. By then the fire in the house had grown quite intense. He turned around and ran towards the house, with the monster closely behind him.

Arriving at the front door of the house, Greed paused deliberately, sidestepping to avoid Madeline's second lunge, and then he threw the revolver in his hand forcefully into the flaming house.

Madeline plunged into the inferno.

If this were a movie, it could be considered a perfect ending, but unfortunately, everyone knew that fire could destroy a body, but it could not eradicate the monster.

Everyone moved to the front of the house, silently watching the raging fire inside. Madeline was quickly charred black but still staggered to her feet, reaching out for the revolver on the ground. However, a collapsing beam fell on her, and she moved no more.

"Is it over?" Greed asked knowingly.

"Can the monsters in this game possess us?" Shiller mentally asked the Transcendent.

The Transcendent replied, "They can, but they will follow the original constraints."

Shiller nodded to indicate he understood, then turned to the others and said, "I surmise that this creature known as the Wandering must attach itself to a living person. Madeline must have been possessed even before she shot herself."

"First possession, then death?" Primary Universe Batman summarized Shiller's explanation precisely.

"Exactly, possession doesn't necessarily lead to death." Shiller thought for a moment before adding, "Even after being possessed, for a while, the possessed doesn't know about the possession and can act freely until they trigger some rule and are killed."

"Now only a few of us are alive here," Night Owl spoke, "If the monster can still possess, it can only choose us."

"One of us may already be possessed," Primary Universe Batman said coldly.

"Should we try walking a few steps?" Joker suddenly suggested with a grin, "If someone's footprints are off, maybe we can kill them in advance."

Greed, however, stood in the snow, studying the ground. The others approached, and Greed pointed to the tracks on the ground, saying, "Our hypothesis was correct; human blood can erase the footprints of the monster."

It was only after they all gathered that they realized Greed had been running with the monster with a purpose. He had led the monster around in circles as it had crossed over its own footprints.

Before Madeline jumped out the window, she had been shot in the head, and upon landing, her leg also broke. The blood volume was not significant, but still there, and during the chase, blood inevitably got on the ground.

They found that human blood fell on the hoof prints of the goat, and the dark traces completely disappeared, proving that human blood can indeed cover up footprints.

Shiller immediately grasped the key point and said, "There was no blood from the first floor to the second floor of the house, could it be that the monster doesn't leave footprints while the person is still alive?"

"I think we can think of the Wandering as a kind of virus," Greed said. "The process of possession goes: infect the living, incubation, virus outbreak, host death, control the corpse, and leave footprints."

Primary Universe Batman mentally reviewed the condition of the three corpses and then said, "I also believe that those who are possessed won't immediately die but will have an incubation period."

Primary Universe Batman picked up a twig and started drawing in the snow beside him. He said, "A normal adult has about four and a half liters of blood in their body. If we use it in a very precise way to cover tracks, I think we could erase about five miles of footprints. The question is, can a monster do that with such precision?"

Shiller thought about the posture of the first body. A cut that cleaved open the upper half of a person's body wouldn't allow blood to flow at such a slow rate. Such a wound could potentially cause a loss of 30%-40% of blood volume in a matter of seconds.

"With the way the monster uses blood, it's pretty good if it can cover 1-2 miles of footprints," Primary Universe Batman said. "However, this cabin is very remote, around seven or eight miles from the village. Assuming that there were no footprints left along the way, it's clearly not as simple as just using blood to cover them."

Shiller understood what Batman was saying. An adult's blood volume is not enough to cover a 7-8 mile road, even if the monster could perfectly control the blood flow, it couldn't cover all the footprints along the way.

So if the detective had been killed in the village and cut open there, it was likely he would have bled out halfway, and there would certainly be footprints around the house.

Although the house outside was already covered by heavy snow, making any footprints invisible, inside the house, there should have been black goat hoof prints left uncovered due to the absence of blood.

But in reality, there was blood inside the house and no footprints, which means that the detective was still bleeding all the way until he made it into the cabin.

This proved that the detective couldn't have started bleeding from the village, and it was more likely he was split open halfway there. Only then would there have been enough blood to cover the footprints inside the cabin.

Now there was one question left: Was the detective possessed and immediately killed halfway there, or was he possessed in the village but the monster lay dormant for a while, only killing him halfway?

Shiller tended to believe the latter. For one thing, the Wandering monster appeared in the village. On the other hand, if possession meant immediate death, then Madeline wouldn't have had the chance to commit suicide.

So it was very likely that the detective, having received the diary owner's letter and prepared to investigate the village, rested in the village overnight but was possessed by the Wandering.

The next day he set out for the diary owner's cabin and triggered the monster's killing rule halfway there. After being killed, he then arrived at the cabin.

The snow kept falling, and the atmosphere became very silent. They didn't feel cold since the cabin was still burning, but the raging fire would eventually die out.

No one seemed in a hurry. They were as if appreciating an art performance, watching the house burn.

"One of us might have already been possessed," Bruce brought up the topic again. He said, "It's just that we don't know what conditions will trigger the monster's outbreak."

Shiller thought about Madeline's death. She wasn't killed by the monster; she had killed herself but was controlled by it just the same.

This meant the monster had two ways of controlling humans: either wait for a person to trigger some condition, kill and control their body, or a person commits suicide or is killed by someone else, and the monster can control the body all the same.

"Is it time to leave this place?" Night Owl said.

Shiller looked at him but shook his head. Primary Universe Batman didn't say anything, and Night Owl frowned, "I don't understand the riddles you are playing."

"Madeline's behavior has proven that the monster indeed controls the body to complete the last thing the possessed wanted to do. Madeline tried to trap or kill the monster by leading it to suicide, and that didn't work," Shiller said, his voice colder than the blizzard. "But what if the last thing I want to do is to kill all of you? What would he do then?"

Night Owl froze in his action.

Joker, however, suddenly burst into mad laughter. He cupped his cheeks and said, "Did you hear that, little guy? If you're inside me, I would do just that. You'd listen to your good mom, right? Hahaha!"

The Pale Knight frowned, realizing what Shiller was implying.

They were in a godforsaken, bird-shit-free place, surrounded by nothing but snow, which was as good as a place with no animals, just them, a few living people.

Within the range an adult human's blood could cover, there was no second civilization to be found.

If Shiller was possessed, and the last thing he was doing before death was killing all the living people within range, then the monster that took control of his body would have to do the same.

There would be two outcomes, one being that all the others are killed. Since the monster cannot possess the dead, it would have to leave using Shiller's body. But his blood could only cover a short distance of footprints, so when the monster appeared again, people could immediately see its abnormality from the footprints.

The other outcome is, he cannot kill the surrounding people, they escape, and he must chase them. Until he finished his goal, he couldn't go after others.

"The frightening thing about this monster is that ordinary people's wishes are always very simple," Shiller said. "Reach a certain place, eat something, understand some issue, such constraints are almost nonexistent."

"But we are different," Shiller turned to look at Primary Universe Batman and smiled, "If your wish is to save a city that can't possibly be saved, maybe there will be another superhero named Wandering in that place."