Author: 年终 / Nian Zhong

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

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Chapter 9: A Deadly Malady

Myss stepped half a pace forward, blocking Salaar.

Salaar was used to close combat, which was good for knocking around rural bandits; in a scene like this, they would have to count on Myss.

After shielding his mortal enemy, Myss felt something was off. Salaar excelled at healing magic. The kid was clearly better suited to being the tank.

He was still weighing whether to keep Salaar behind him or in front when Salaar grabbed his collar and the two of them tumbled into the wardrobe.

Myss had no time to speak before Salaar clapped a hand over his mouth. The wardrobe wasn’t large, so he was forced up against Salaar, almost unable to move.

Salaar’s timing was perfect. The instant the doors shut, the room door was kicked open.

“Demon!” an angry roar came from the doorway. “That demon again!”

“Damn it, he’s trying to escape!” “After him!”

Salaar let out a breath. He had guessed right. The two sides weren’t together.

The “demon” had alerted them too early, and the people at the door had arrived too late. If they were coordinating a pincer move, a rookie mistake like that shouldn’t have happened.

There was a tremendous crash of tables and chairs toppling, and footsteps raced toward the window. The cawing of crows drifted farther away. The “demon” seemed to have left.

But the other group didn’t all clear out. Two sets of footsteps were still circling inside the room.

The “Resolve to Elope” was still in effect, and the men didn’t notice anyone in the wardrobe.

Unfortunately, the potion only lowered one’s presence and didn’t make one invisible. The room was small, and they couldn’t just walk out in front of the others.

“Four investigators are dead. Covington wouldn’t wander the Lower City. Where did he get infected?”

“Must be the demon’s doing!” the other man said, voice shaking. “If the demon keeps contaminating the Upper City…”

“That’s not for us to consider. Seal the windows first.”

“Sir?” came a timid question from outside the door. “Sir, is everything all right?”

It was the young girl, her voice full of worry.

“By regulation, this guest room must be sealed permanently, and the incident kept confidential.”

The men inside didn’t open the door. “A mage will arrive shortly to place a seal. No one may enter or leave in the meantime.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Go and close the front door. Pay particular attention to those who clashed with Covington. Under no circumstances are they to leave.”

The girl fell silent.

“There’s a killer among them. They must all be taken in,” the man inside the room said impatiently. “Do as you’re told and don’t obstruct the investigation.”

“Yes, sir.” She suddenly raised her voice. “Um, the standing mirror in the room is an antique. Could you move it out for me? I mean, since the room is going to be sealed…”

Unsurprisingly, men inside refused.

“A clever girl,” Salaar whispered. “If I remember right, the mirror is to the left of the wardrobe.”

What, are you reluctant to part with antiques too? Myss tried to bite Salaar’s palm and failed.

“Listen, top-tier suites usually have a secret passage for… various purposes.”

Salaar pressed his mouth to Myss’s ear, his voice thin and sticky like a spider thread. “To seal the room, they will clear it first. Once no one is inside, we can slip out through the passage behind the mirror.”

Seeing that Myss didn’t object, Salaar loosened his arms a little. Myss darted free and clapped a hand hard over Salaar’s mouth.

He was about to pin him against the side of the wardrobe, but Salaar refused to yield. The two wrestled silently in the heap of clothes until a bathrobe somehow tied them into a knot. Only then did they settle down.

……

Around midnight they slipped out through the little door into the inn’s back alley and found a figure waiting there.

Myss’s deadly fork was about to strike, only for Salaar to stop him again. The figure was the inn girl’s uncle.

“Thank goodness. You really are all right.”

The man saw their faces and relaxed at once. “Hailey didn’t see soldiers dragging you out, so she guessed you were hiding. Oh, Hailey is my niece.

My name is Huey. Please allow me to thank you properly, both of you, especially you.” He turned to Myss and said solemnly, “Hailey is only fifteen. If she were convicted of illicit relations, she would never find work in the Upper City for the rest of her life.”

Myss said, “I didn’t—”

“I should be the one saying thank you. Miss Hailey helped us a great deal,” Salaar cut in first. “If not for her quick thinking, we couldn’t have gotten away so easily.”

Huey smiled and handed them a dusty cloth bag. “I took some money and food from your room, as well as that bottle of medicine.

I’m sorry, I had to leave most of the luggage. I said you were out on business and not yet back. You signed in at the front desk, so they can check.”

Myss glanced at the bag. He didn’t see any croutons or any books. Huey had packed only the bare essentials.

“You were terrified of Covington, yet now you dare help like this,” Myss asked, puzzled. “Where do you get the nerve…”

“What he means is, it sounds like you know some inside story,” Salaar translated smoothly, taking the bag with both hands. “We only just arrived in Rosha and know nothing.”

Huey’s expression tightened. He pressed his temples and sighed. “All right. I will take you to the Lower City to lie low, and we can talk on the way.”

Rosha’s Upper and Lower City were sharply divided, with a high wall between them. Many iron gates pierce the wall, their bars mottled with rust that quietly testified to their age.

“Rosha has suffered multiple plagues. Each time the Lower City was always worse. That was when the wall was built.”

Huey held the lantern high and led the way. “A strange disease has appeared in the Lower City again lately. Everyone is on edge.”

Salaar: “A strange disease?”

“Hailey and I both live in the Lower City, and we have seen it with our own eyes. In the past two months people have been dying in a…” Huey struggled to choose his words. “A bizarre way. The corpses curl up in midair, and no one can move them.”

The manner of death sounded familiar, and Myss, for once, listened in earnest.

“The city lord believes it’s some kind of plague. Yet most people around the patients are fine, and no one knows how it spreads. The soldiers can only seal off the area where the dead are, and everyone else carries on as usual.

There are rumors the deceased were cursed by a demon. The city lord arrests anyone who quarreled with the deceased, and those people never appear again. If you two were taken away…” Huey shook his head and did not go on.

“Hailey will be all right, yes?” Salaar asked. The girl had technically clashed with Covington too.

Huey’s mouth curved. “She can say she slipped in the corridor and bumped her nose.

After all, the only witness besides Covington was Mr. Myss. I don’t think Mr. Myss will report her.”

Mr. Myss agreed. He had better things to do.

Talking about Hailey brightened Huey’s expression.

He said Hailey was the child of his late sister and his only family. The girl was healthy and quick-witted, raised by his own hands, and the two depended on each other.

“My parents were both drunks, and it was my sister who raised me,” Huey said affectionately. “Of course I will raise Hailey well and let her grow up smoothly…”

Myss let the words pass in one ear and out the other and let his eyes roam.

Beyond the wall and its iron gate, the air grew murky and clammy.

The night in the Lower City seemed even deeper. The wind carried acrid smoke and the sour stench of garbage. Clouds of gnats and flies drifted above the river. The stone steps were as crooked and broken as an old man’s teeth.

“Please put up with this place for a few days. Once the fuss over there is done, I will send word at once.”

Huey stepped over the stone steps with practiced ease. “I have a contact nearby who can arrange lodgings.”

The conditions were a world apart from the Upper City, and he glanced at them apologetically. The two looked utterly unconcerned—one out of an inability to tell good from bad, the other out of long-habituated indifference.

Myss crooked a finger and pinched a flying insect dead with a pop. He found the place rather lively.

That “demon” had dressed without much care. Perhaps he lived in the Lower City too. For now the guy had hidden his aura. If Myss hadn’t lost his power, he could have…

Salaar grabbed the back of his collar and hauled him up. Myss’s feet left the ground, and he narrowly missed a ditch.

“Watch your step and don’t waste my cleansing magic,” Salaar said.

Once upon a time, the Demon Lord had a massive body and no habit of watching his path. Myss looked down at his two human feet and gave a mournful hum.

Huey’s destination was hard to miss—this late at night, the Lower City lay pitch-black, and only one tavern still had its lights on.

The two-story wooden house was crooked, and the sign that read “Hammer Tavern” hung at an angle, as if the building itself were drunk. It was unclear whether it was a construction error or the designer’s intent.

They hadn’t even reached the door before rough laughter rushed out to meet them, and Myss caught the rank smell of alcohol and tobacco.

“Our Huey!” “Huey is off work?”

The customers called to him enthusiastically.

Myss and Salaar followed close behind. The moment Myss stepped inside the greetings turned into a chorus of whistles. When Salaar came in, the whistling continued, only with less breath behind it.

So the “Resolve to Elope” couldn’t withstand that many eyes, Myss thought.

“Hey. They are my guests,” Huey called out.

“Of course, who else would they be? No way you could score someone this—ow!”

Huey raised his palm and smacked the man hard on the head.

“Sorry,” he said to the two of them. “They are unbearably crude. No offense intended…”

Halfway through he noticed Myss was busy examining the drunkard’s rum, and Salaar was staring fixedly at Myss as if he might swallow the glass in the next second.

Forget it. Huey shook his head and led the two of them to the counter.

A bearded burly man sat there polishing glasses with a creak. His arms bulged with exaggerated muscle, and the tattoos writhed with his skin.

“Uncle Hammer, look after these two guests,” Huey said. “They’d helped me out.”

“How much did they help?” Hammer paused.

“They saved Hailey.”

“Then they should be looked after,” Hammer rumbled with a laugh. “I will clear a room for them on the second floor.”

“Thank you,” Huey exhaled.

His thanks were swallowed by the caw of a crow.

The tavern’s clamor cut off at once. A shadow darker than night appeared in the doorway.

The “beaked demon,” nearly two meters tall, stood at the threshold. A few black feathers drifted out of the night and dropped into the warm light.

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The author has something to say:

Natural-born nonhumans are undemanding, hardy, and full of energy.

You do have to keep a good eye on them, otherwise they are liable to fall into some very strange places.

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