Chapter 1490 Direction <TOC> Chapter 1492 Bad News Comes in Waves
Translator: SumTLMan
Two significant incidents occurred today in Ghust Town.
The first event took place this morning when Mrs. Martin, who was shepherding at a pasture near the town’s entrance, vanished without a trace. Given that Mrs. Martin was a devout believer, Father Bertrand went to the pasture with the sheriff early in the day to investigate. Despite a day’s efforts, there was no sign of where Mrs. Martin might have gone.
However, they did find traces of fresh blood and fragments of flesh near the area where Mrs. Martin disappeared. While they couldn’t yet confirm if the fragments were human tissue, the sheriff was not optimistic about Mrs. Martin’s current situation.
This is also why Father Bertrand was absent from the church for the entire day.
The second event involved the nine-year-old son of a local tailor, Mrs. Santi, who discovered that her son Anthony was dead.
While these two incidents aren’t directly related, the morning’s unsettling event involving Mrs. Martin left the entire town on edge. Mrs. Santi felt this tension. Normally lax in her supervision, she figured that if Anthony got hungry, he would come home to eat. However, today, with the unsettling disappearance of Mrs. Martin, Mrs. Santi had an ominous premonition. After inquiring among Anthony’s usual playmates, she found out that he had not been with them at all. They had assumed he was grounded as a punishment by Mrs. Santi.
Upon hearing this, Mrs. Santi’s unease escalated. She quickly went to seek help from the sheriff.
Shortly after, the sheriff, accompanied by a group of knights, questioned Anthony’s young friends and eventually located his lifeless body in his favorite secret hideout.
“Is only the skull remaining?” Alex asked, his eyes filled with a grave intensity.
Father Bertrand nodded, “Yes, all his limbs are gone. Only the skull remains, perched on a tattered doll in Anthony’s secret hideout.”
Father Bertrand looked visibly somber, his eyes tinged with pity and sorrow.
Alex mirrored the same anguished expression, seemingly in empathetic resonance with the distraught tailor, Mrs. Santi, within the church.
Yet, underneath the surface, Alex’s thoughts were rapidly churning, darkening his eyes even more.
After Father Bertrand finished speaking, he moved on to comfort grieving relatives and soothe the restless community affected by the recent tragedies.
Alex retreated to a secluded corner, observing the chaotic scene in the church and softly muttered, “The situation has escalated.”
Angel, who was hidden nearby, nodded in agreement.
The disappearance of Mrs. Martin was still without a clear explanation, leaving her fate — likely death — as yet unresolved.
However, the death of Anthony marked a watershed moment. His demise followed the same pattern as a series of previous murders, but the motive for targeting him appeared to be different.
In the past, individuals like Knight Reven and Miss Camille met their end primarily because they were about to leave the town of Ghust and had stumbled upon a terrible truth, thereby inviting doom upon themselves.
Anthony was different. He was just a nine-year-old boy. Even if mischievous, he wouldn’t venture miles away from home without family supervision.
Moreover, Mrs. Santi explicitly stated that Anthony was still at home when she woke up in the morning.
Anthony had been victimized sometime between the morning, when Mrs. Santi left for her tailor shop, and the evening.
Given Anthony’s limited mobility, he couldn’t have reached the boundaries of the ‘trap’ in the short span of time.
Therefore, the cause of Anthony’s death deviated significantly from the pattern seen in the series of murders.
If Knight Reven and Miss Camille really were behind Anthony’s murder, then the situation has indeed escalated to a new and alarming level.
“Why did they kill Anthony?” Alex murmured.
“For a long time, there has been a constant pattern. Now a variable has appeared,” Angel responded.
Alex nodded, “Lady Connie’s escape is indeed a variable. What I don’t understand is, why did they involve Anthony?”
Just as Alex was puzzled, Father Bertrand called him to go to the place where Anthony had died.
Because Anthony’s skull was still there, Father Bertrand hoped to recite the divine funeral rites with Alex.
Angel also whispered to him, “If you’re perplexed, why not go and see for yourself?”
Alex nodded.
Soon, a throng of people left the church grandly. However, since they were going to recite funeral rites for the deceased, the sheriff and Father Bertrand advised the residents to go home first, allowing only the distraught tailor, Santi, to join them.
Led by the sheriff, the group headed toward Anthony’s secret base.
During the journey to the secret base, Alex’s brows furrowed tighter and tighter.
The sheriff of Ghust Town was a middle-aged man with a noticeably reddish-brown beard. Noticing Alex’s abnormality, he inquired, “What’s wrong?”
Everyone looked over. Alex slightly adjusted his expression and said somberly, “Nothing, I’m just a bit puzzled.”
“Have you discovered something? Feel free to share,” the sheriff said, not expecting young Alex, with his white hair, to have found anything significant, so his tone was slightly jesting.
“I haven’t found any particular clues; I just have a question. The route we are taking now seems to coincide with the one that leads to Mrs. Martin’s ranch?” Alex said.
The sheriff nodded, “Indeed, there is some overlap, as Anthony’s secret hideout is actually very close to Ms. Martin’s ranch — practically adjacent.”
“For that reason, we suspect that Ms. Martin might also…”
The sheriff left the sentence unfinished, but everyone understood: the likelihood that something unfortunate had happened to Ms. Martin was high.
Perhaps it was the unsettling prospect of two potential homicides in one day that left everyone on edge. No one spoke much for the rest of the journey.
Alex continued to portray grief dutifully, but he was somewhat puzzled internally.
Not only did he discover that the path to Anthony’s secret hideout overlapped with the ranch, but he also noticed something else: the road led out of the town.
Furthermore, if you continued along this road, it would actually take you to the Holy City!
Was there some sort of connection?
Soon after, they arrived at Anthony’s secret hideout.
It was a small structure built from discarded sheets of metal… it’s a stretch to even call it a house. From the outside, it looked like a pile of scrap metal, but inside there was a narrow partition.
Upon entering the hideout, the first thing Alex saw was a teddy bear on a worn-out table directly in front of him.
However, the teddy bear’s head was gone, replaced by a child’s head.
It was Anthony.
His eyes were tightly closed, his face pale; the blood from the wound on his neck had seeped into the teddy bear, creating an atmosphere that was both eerily tranquil and unsettlingly horrifying.
Upon witnessing the scene, others either recoiled in fear or covered their mouths as if on the verge of vomiting. However, Alex remained exceedingly composed, verging on detached.
It wasn’t until he noticed Father Bertrand looking his way that Alex’s expression momentarily shifted to one of sorrow.
“Let us begin. For the pitiable children of God, let us recite the rites for the departed,” Father Bertrand said, tinged with melancholy.
Alex nodded. In the presence of the Sheriff and others like tailor Santi, he quietly murmured the funeral rites from the Holy Scripture.
While Alex appeared to be devoutly reciting the rites, his peripheral vision was ceaselessly scanning the surroundings. The hidden base had few items.
The metal walls might have appeared cluttered, but the items within were actually quite orderly.
Because of this organization, Alex immediately noticed the splashes of crimson on all four walls and the large pool of blood on the floor.
At that point, something seemed to dawn on Alex.
After completing the funeral rites, he excused himself from the hidden base, citing sorrow and a reluctance to stay.
He moved to a secluded spot and whispered to Angel, who was lurking nearby, “Confirmed. This should be the primary crime scene.”
This implied that Anthony was killed right here in his own hidden base.
And it also indicated something else: Anthony had indeed never reached the cage barrier, or else he couldn’t have died in the hidden base.
But why would they kill Anthony when the cage barrier was so far away from here?
As Alex pondered, Angel’s gaze shifted elsewhere: “Over there is Mrs. Martin’s ranch. I took a peek earlier; from that ranch, one can clearly see our secret base.”
Alex: “What are you implying?”
“I have a suspicion,” said Angel. “Perhaps the reason for Anthony’s death was that he saw something or someone he shouldn’t have. As for Mrs. Martin, she may have faced the same fate by witnessing events at the secret base from her ranch…”
Hearing Angel’s speculation, Alex understood the implication all too well, and it sent a chill down his spine.
Both the secret base and the ranch are situated on the outskirts of town, and there’s a road here leading to the Holy City.
Could Anthony’s death be related to seeing someone coming from the other end of this road?
And who, upon being seen, would warrant such a death?
The answer was becoming glaringly clear: only Knight Reven and Camille could fit the bill.
Having arrived at this conclusion, Alex felt an icy chill crawl up his spine. Following this line of reasoning, Knight Reven and Camille could very well be… Alex couldn’t help but look back at Ghust Town.
In the nighttime silence, Ghust Town resembled a city of the dead.
Those two terrifying ghosts might just be somewhere in the town, observing them with their sinister gazes.
Chapter 1490 Direction <TOC> Chapter 1492 Bad News Comes in Waves