The Eldritch Files

The moment the Spell left his lips, a peculiar sensation followed.

Han Su felt his body tremble slightly, but it wasn’t a tremor in the conventional sense of physical space. Rather, it was a conceptual shift between spatial depths.

To describe it precisely, one could imagine real space as a two-dimensional plane. Everyone lives on this plane, never deviating. But chanting the Spell had pushed him one step deeper into a more profound layer of space.

And because he had moved one step deeper, people on that two-dimensional plane would see him as one degree fainter.

It felt as though he had distanced himself from reality by a few millimeters.

Accompanying this slight deviation, his Spiritual Power also seeped out from his right hand. However, it was extremely faint, the consumption was minimal, and the resulting effect was naturally minor.

”Hm?”

The Lady in the Red Windbreaker kept her palms resting on Han Su and Miss Crow. This was to prevent them from losing control while chanting the Spell, allowing her to pull them back to reality at any moment.

Although such cases weren’t common, it wasn’t unheard of for someone new to Encrypted Spells to lose control completely on their first try, utterly erasing their presence. These poor souls would vanish into some unknown dimension, never to be found again...

She clearly sensed the change in Han Su and, with a hint of surprise, said, ”To be able to stir a sliver of Mysterious Power on your first time chanting a Spell... Not bad.”

”Better than her.”

With that, she glanced at Miss Crow beside them. ”She didn’t cause any stir at all just now. Even opening her mouth to chant a Spell is a struggle. What a dunce.”

Beside them, Miss Crow’s face was bright red with shame, her head hanging low.

Han Su felt a little helpless. ’Can you please not use such suppressive methods to teach a child...’

Steeling himself, he asked, ”What should I do next?”

”Practice.”

The Lady in the Red Windbreaker looked at Han Su. ”Practice over and over again, until this Spell is etched into your spirit. You need to be so proficient that you can cast it with just a single syllable.”

Han Su nodded seriously.

But since the Lady in the Red Windbreaker had put it that way, he certainly couldn’t compare himself to a ”dunce” like Miss Crow. He settled his mind and began to practice the Spell repeatedly.

At first, he was very cautious, worried that his immense Spiritual Power would cause the Lady in the Red Windbreaker to notice something unusual. But he soon discovered that he didn’t need to worry about that.

As long as he didn’t chant the spell ”Gods descend with an edict,” his Spiritual Power, far from appearing immense, actually seemed quite mediocre.

Only the opening in his right hand would allow a tiny wisp of Spiritual Power to seep through to help him cast the Spell. The vast, unparalleled Spiritual Power in his mind, however, was like a dead sea, utterly still.

It gave him a strange feeling: if he didn’t chant that specific Spell, he was just an ordinary person.

Even when it came to training with Mysterious Power, he was ordinary. He even needed to work a little harder just to earn the Lady in the Red Windbreaker’s praise.

Of course, there was one thing that wasn’t ordinary. The Lady in the Red Windbreaker seemed very worried he would lose control while practicing the Spell, but Han Su felt no such risk. He couldn’t sense any danger from the Spell at all; he felt as safe as if he were living in a vault.

Afterward, he remained at the base, practicing arduously.

For the first few days, he practiced this Spell continuously and did indeed feel a sense of progress. However, this progress was purely on a technical level.

After a period of dedicated practice, he had grown accustomed to the feeling of resonance with the Mysterious Power after chanting the Spell, the sensation of his own presence being withdrawn from reality.

But the degree of withdrawal was still insufficient. He could eliminate his presence to a certain extent, but if he made direct eye contact with someone, they could still easily notice him.

And when the Lady in the Red Windbreaker looked his way, he felt his Spiritual Power drain enormously in an instant, leaving him nowhere to hide.

”That’s just the nature of this Spell.”

The Lady in the Red Windbreaker smiled. ”If you want to reduce your presence, don’t provoke your target’s attention. The more distracted they are, the easier it is for you to withdraw.”

”Furthermore, you must avoid people with strong Spiritual Activity. Normally, you might only need to expend one measure of Spiritual Power to hide, but if you encounter someone with strong Spiritual Activity, your Spiritual Power will be instantly drained to its limit, and you’ll be seen.”

”There are even some high-level individuals who will forcibly drain your Spiritual Power just by you getting close to them. Hiding yourself in their presence is utterly impossible.”

”...”

Han Su accepted this reality, but he was also thinking: ’If I first chanted the spell ”Gods descend with an edict” to activate the vast Spiritual Power in my mind, and then chanted this current Spell, what kind of change would occur?’

However, being in the Disaster Management Bureau and under the watchful eye of the Lady in the Red Windbreaker, he certainly wouldn’t risk trying it.

He just spent a week practicing diligently. In between, accompanied by Miss Crow, he would also work on adapting to the Spiritual Penetration from his right hand and sensing the state of his own Spiritual Activity.

He also gained a basic understanding of the other few Spells that the Zero Sequence had presented to him, although he didn’t practice them arduously.

But overall, it was an extremely dry and tedious process. Han Su felt his progress was too slow, like playing a game over and over but being unable to achieve a perfect rating no matter how hard he tried.

”You’re already doing very well.”

After he had been practicing for a considerable time, the Lady in the Red Windbreaker looked at his still tireless appearance. She set aside her usual sarcastic tone and comforted him, ”You’ve basically compressed what takes others one to three months of training into just ten days.”

”I’ve never seen anyone so desperate to master this Life-Saving Spell.”

”It’s clearly the simplest and most basic Spell; arduous practice won’t lead to any major improvements. Don’t you get bored repeating it like this?”

”...”

Han Su was slightly taken aback. He could only shake his head and smile. ”No.”

”Well, I do.”

The Lady in the Red Windbreaker said, ”I stayed here to practice with you at first because I was afraid you’d lose control and wipe yourself out of existence. But your progress looks smooth now, with no signs of losing control, so I don’t need to keep an eye on you anymore.”

”Besides, apart from this training, I have another question for you.”

”That Investigator License left behind by your mentor, the Investigator of Strange Birds—do you really not want it?”

At this point, her expression turned serious. ”The Investigator of Strange Birds is dead. According to custom, the license he left behind should be inherited by the assistant he trained.”

”His other assistant only had an initial rating of B Level, so he’s not qualified, which is fine. But there are plenty of other people eyeing that license. You haven’t asked a single thing about the Ghost Truck. Surely you don’t plan to just hand this opportunity over to someone else, do you?”

”...”

Han Su frowned slightly upon hearing this. ”I wouldn’t go so far as to give it away, but isn’t this anomaly supposed to be very difficult to deal with? Even with more than half of the Disaster Management Bureau’s forces assembled, they still couldn’t catch it.”

”We figured out its pattern long ago.”

The Lady in the Red Windbreaker shook her head. ”The anomaly truck’s own level isn’t actually that high, it’s just very hard to catch. Therefore, we need someone with certain abilities who is willing to risk being bait to have any hope of truly sealing it.”

”What’s being tested now is simply whether you can muster that courage.”

”...”

Hearing this, Han Su glanced at Miss Crow. Someone on the outside had been keeping him updated on the Ghost Truck matter, so he understood the details. Faced with the Lady in the Red Windbreaker’s question, he thought for a moment and said:

”Once I’m ready, I don’t mind giving it a try. But let’s talk about it in a couple of days!”

”I’ve been training with Mysterious Power for so long, day and night, that I’ve lost track of everything. Right now, I need to go home and rest first.”

Of course, he couldn’t tell the Red Windbreaker the real reason.

The Flashing was about to happen.

...

...

’Will the interval shorten again?’

The intuitive warning bell in his heart compelled Han Su to keep practicing these few Zero Sequence Spells. The formless pressure was already hanging right over his head.

Originally, based on his stacking theory, he calculated that he would be kidnapped back around July 11th. However, Han Su could only roughly estimate this date. There was still a variable: he didn’t know if the ”interval” would shorten again.

If it did shorten, then the Flashing would correspondingly arrive sooner.

It was precisely because of this worry that he chose to return early and wait for the ”kidnapping” to happen.

The Investigator License was important, of course, but first, there was no way he would mindlessly use himself as bait to resolve that matter like the Disaster Management Bureau wanted. Second, he had to escape this time before he could even speak of a future.

’The kid is pretty composed...’

The Lady in the Red Windbreaker watched Han Su’s thoughtful expression. She didn’t know his specific thoughts, only that this young man wasn’t half bad. He knew his competitors were already making moves, yet he still managed to give himself enough time for observation.

While admiring him, she turned to glance at Miss Crow and shook her head helplessly. ”That one is even *more* composed...”

After practicing for so long, all she could manage was to make her silhouette flicker for a moment...

She found it harder and harder to watch. Shaking her head, she walked out of the training room, took out her phone, dialed a number, and said coolly, ”He’s left the base.”

”After this period of training, I can confirm he’s a very talented person, but I haven’t found anything unusual about him.”

”Except...”

”...his will to live. It’s abnormally strong!”

”...”

After she finished speaking, she waited a long time. Upon hearing a voice from the other end of the line, she nodded. ”I’ll keep watching him. I also brought up the topic proactively, but he isn’t willing to discuss the matter of the Ghost Truck with me.”

”Perhaps he really has given up.”