S.C.I Mystery Series Volume 1 Chapter 84

The Murderer Is Not Human 17 – Demons and Monsters

---

Soon, Shang Luo's car drove out of the basement, picked up Zhan Zhao, and drove towards the villa area in Linjiang.

Because Zhan Zhao had a special satellite locator on him, Bai Yutang didn't follow their car too closely.

Sitting in the car, Shang Luo asked Zhan Zhao as he drove, "Dr. Zhan, I would like to ask a few professional questions."

Zhan Zhao was looking out of the window, and after hearing Shang Luo's words, he turned back with slight interest, "About psychology?"

“That’s right." Shang Luo smiled and nodded, "I've long wanted to find an expert to ask about it."

"Let's hear it." Zhan Zhao crossed his legs and waited quietly for Shang Luo to ask a question.

"... Does Dr. Zhan believe in ghosts?" Shang Luo asked in a low voice.

"Ghosts?" Zhan Zhao faintly stared and asked, "Do you mean literally or something else?"

"It is something that exists in the world, other than living and non-living beings, that cannot be explained by science..." Shang Luo said after a moment's thought, "Similar to demons and monsters."

Zhan Zhao smiled faintly and said lightly, "I believe."

Listening to the conversation coming out of the receiver, Bai Yutang scowled as he drove, "This cat... bullshit."

Bai Chi beside him asked in a surprised whisper, "Brother... you don't believe it?"

Bai Yutang glared at him: "How can the police believe this and still handle this case?"

Bai Chi muttered in a low voice, "Just because you don't believe it doesn't mean it doesn't exist."

Bai Yutang laughed and thought to himself that this child has learned to talk back, "Not to mention that I have never met one, even if I did, as long as I don't believe him, he doesn't exist!"

Bai Chi continued to mutter in a low voice, "No wonder he was called a demon seeker..."

"What are you talking about?" Bai Yutang glanced at him.

"... Nothing..."

"You believe that?" Shang Luo was also taken aback when he heard Zhan Zhao's answer, "I thought psychologists wouldn't even believe in these unfounded things."

Zhan Zhao smiled, "Why can't psychologists believe in this? By the way, why is Mr. Shang talking about this topic?"

"Oh... I was going to ask if seeing things that aren't human or hearing voices that aren't supposed to be there... is a special ability, or is it an illusion?!" The expression on Shang Luo's face seemed to be somewhat distressed, "This question has been bothering me for a long time."

"That depends on exactly what is seen." Zhan Zhao said, "Could it be that Mr. Shang can see non-human things?"

... Shang Luo hesitated for a moment, then nodded and said, "Indeed... this happened after bringing the box corpse back, which was in the last few days."

As they spoke, the car had already driven into the villa area of Linjiang. Shang Luo stopped outside the courtyard wall of a small villa and said, "Here we are."

Zhan Zhao surveyed the villa behind the iron gate through the car window, secretly surprised... This villa was not much different from the other villas in the district in terms of design and style, but for some reason, it just felt a bit haunted...

Shang Luo parked the car, got out with Zhan Zhao, opened the big iron gate of the small courtyard, and walked towards the villa.

After the two of them entered, Bai Yutang's car stopped behind a flower bed not far away.

Bai Chi took one look at the villa and let out a "Yah".

"What's wrong?" Bai Yutang thought he had spotted something and asked him nervously.

"This house is scary." Bai Chi pointed at Shang Luo's villa and said, "I feel a chill when I look at it."

Bai Yutang looked left and right but didn't see anything scary about it and asked Bai Chi in confusion, "What's scary about it?!"

"I can't say..." Bai Chi put on the jacket that was placed on the back of the seat, "It's just that looking at it makes your scalp tingle and your whole body chill."

“Head... we also feel..." Zhao Hu, on the other end of the walkie-talkie, also tremblingly said, "it looks so much like a haunted house. "

Bai Yutang was silent for a long time, "All of you go get your eyes checked tomorrow!"

......

At this time, they heard Zhan Zhao's voice coming from the receiver, "This house, it feels a bit special ah..."

Shang Luo took out the key and opened the door, "Did you notice it too?"

Zhan Zhao smiled, "This house is eerie, if you can't see the strangeness like this, then you should really go get an eye appointment..."

"Ahem ..." Ma Han coughed on the other end of the walkie-talkie.

Zhao Hu asked in a whisper, "Does your sister know an optometrist? Refer a good one to Head for a visit."

Bai Chi stifled a laugh, Bai Yutang was so angry that he gritted his teeth – Cat~ you wait!!!

"This side of the house is the darkest… it doesn't see sunlight all year round, so it feels especially gloomy." Shang Luo explained, "I specially asked a feng shui master to pick the house."

"Feng shui?" Zhan Zhao wondered, "Why did you purposely choose such a gloomy house?"

"It has something to do with my collection." Shang Luo raised his hand to turn on the light in the living room, and with the bright light, the eerie atmosphere in the room dissipated a little, "The corpses cannot be exposed to sunlight during the day, otherwise there is no telling what will happen at night."

Zhan Zhao followed Shang Luo into the living room, "You usually live here alone? Mr. Shang has a lot of courage."

Shang Luo sighed, "There is no way... to do this business."

The more Bai Chi listened to the car, the colder it got. The thought of this ghostly house full of corpses inside unconsciously gave him goosebumps... There is no need to live in such a house, this Shang Luo is enough of a freak.

The person beside him, Bai Yutang, was smiling, "What nonsense is this kid talking about? A corpse is a corpse, if it's in the sun during the day, can it still become fraudulent at night? Bullshit..."

Bai Chi trembled at the sound of a fraudulent corpse and asked Bai Yutang in a low voice, "Can a corpse really be fraudulent?!"

Bai Yutang glared at him, "That's superstition!"

"But I heard from an old man that it really does happen." Bai Chi trembled, "It is said that people who die horizontally on the battlefield often turn into zombies and come out to pounce on people..."

Bai Yutang angrily said, "That is just freshly dead, not dead. The mummies in Shang Luo's home can turn into oil if they are rotten, so how can they be fraudulent? If there is really a fraudulent corpse, Gongsun would have died long ago!"

Bai Chi lowered his head and muttered in a low voice, "I... am worried about Brother being inside alone..."

"Just this cat?!" Bai Yutang grimaced, "Even if there really was one, his first reaction when he saw it would be to catch it and bring it back to raise it, and in the process, bring one for Gongsun to play with as well..."

Bai Chi gulped... So scary ah~~~

"What should we drink?" Shang Luo opened the wine cabinet and turned back to ask Zhan Zhao.

"Anything will do."

Zhan Zhao admired an oddly styled wooden carving on the coffee table and took the glass of wine that Shang Luo handed over.

"This also looks like something from the Tu Xi tribe..." Zhan Zhao pointed to the wooden carving.

"Good eyesight..." Shang Luo nodded appreciatively, "This is a small wooden carving symbolising a child of the Tu Xi tribe, quite cute isn't it?"

Zhan Zhao nodded, "~~ Why don't we take a look at the collection first."

"Okay." Shang Luo put down his glass and took Zhan Zhao up to the second floor, saying as he walked, "The collection is all on the second floor... By the way, if there are any special noises later, you don't have to be afraid."

"Special noises?" Zhan Zhao was puzzled, "What special noises?"

Shang Luo shook his head, "These days I often hear them getting up to walk at night..."

"Pfft..." Zhao Hu spewed a mouthful of coffee all over the windshield.

Bai Chi's eyes widened in shock, “Wa... walk..."

"Heh..." Bai Yutang sneered, "What the hell does this kid want? Pretending to have a ghost."

Zhan Zhao watched as Shang Luo pushed open the door to the collection room and turned on the spotlights... What caught his eye were rows of glass collection cabinets and several glass covered coffins placed side by side...

In the cabinets and coffins were dry bodies of various shapes and sizes.

And in the round glass pillar in the very centre, there was that very box corpse on display.

When Zhan Zhao saw it, he thought that it would have been nice if he had brought Gongsun along, he would have been so excited to see this.

Shang Luo gave Zhan Zhao a short introduction, telling him about the history of each corpse, the type of civilization it came from and so on.

"This is the corpse of a teenager, also from the Tu Xi tribe." Shang Luo said as he pointed to a relatively small corpse inside a glass coffin.

Zhan Zhao looked at the well-preserved corpse and asked, "When the Tu Xi were buried, weren't they all made into boxes?"

Shang Luo shook his head: "No, only special people were allowed… In addition, women and children usually just had ordinary funerals... It's just that the Tu Xi mummification process is quite mysterious and does a good job of preserving the corpse so that there is no decay and no rotting.

... Zhan Zhao saw that there was a coffin next to the corpse of the teenager, but the lid was open and it was empty. He was about to ask Shang Luo what was going on ~ ~ but upon turning back, he saw Shang Luo's eyes wide open, staring in horror at the empty coffin...

"Uh... Mr. Shang..." Zhan Zhao gently patted him, "What's wrong?"

Shang Luo's mouth opened wide for a long time before it closed, and then he incredulously reached out and pointed for half a day "... That... she... where did she go to…"

When Zhan Zhao saw that he was pointing at the empty coffin, he asked, "Are you saying that there was originally a corpse in this coffin?!"

Shang Luo nodded, "Yes... there was... a female corpse from Tu Xi... and this child... mother and son..."

Zhan Zhao noticed that the glass lid of the coffin was open and asked, "She was there the whole time?"

Shang Luo nodded: “When I left earlier, I checked it once and it was all fine, how could..."

Zhan Zhao looked around for a moment, "It wouldn't be a burglar, would it..."

"No, the anti-theft system is very tight, there is no possibility... and...” Having said this, Shang Luo paused, seemingly with some difficulty.

"And what?" Zhan Zhao pursued.

"And I did hear the sound of an opening coffin and footsteps these past few nights..." Shang Luo said softly, "and... also the sound of a woman crying... I..."

Before his words were finished, he heard the faint voice coming from the hallway outside the door… it was the sound of a woman sobbing.

Although the cry was not loud, Bai Yutang and others on the other end of the walkie-talkie still heard it clearly...

Bai Chi was so shocked that he drew a breath of cold air.

Bai Yutang frowned, he and Zhan Zhao had anticipated many possible scenarios for today, but how could they have ever expected such an unthinkable thing to happen.

Ma Han at the other end asked over the walkie-talkie, "Chief, should we go in and see if Dr. Zhan is going to be alright?!"

Bai Yutang was a bit hesitant. At that moment, he heard Zhan Zhao on the other end say to Shang Luo, “Let’s not rush... let's go take a look."

Shang Luo nodded and walked with Zhan Zhao towards the corridor.

In the car, Bai Yutang gently breathed a sigh of relief. What Zhan Zhao had just meant was for them not to act rashly… He picked up the walkie-talkie and said to Ma Han and Zhao Hu, "You two go to the near side of the house first and keep watch, wait for my signal, don't act rashly."

"Yes." Ma Han and Zhao Hu put on their headsets, took out their guns and checked them, ready to move.

Zhao Hu tugged Ma Han's sleeve: "Xiao... Xiao Ma Ge… when we catch ghosts later, will the bullets work?"

Ma Han glanced at him: "Remember this later, do not turn around when the ghost is on your shoulder, otherwise your yang energy will be sucked away~ ~"

“Ah ~ ~" Zhao Hu hugged Ma Han: "I became a police officer in order to catch thieves and catch dirty perverts, I did not expect to also catch a ghost. Xiao Ma Ge, you have to cover me later ah... "

Ma Han opened the car door and kicked him out: "Go now! Still poor..."

The two men got out of the car and quickly ran towards the villa's courtyard wall.

"Brother is alone inside... will he be alright..." Bai Chi asked worriedly.

Bai Yutang shook his head: “Cat is not able to use a knife or a gun, but Shang Luo’s brain is not even close to his... Since Cat has said for us not to go in, he must have his reasons... "

At this time, Ma Han and Zhao Hu had arrived outside the villa courtyard gate, waiting in ambush.

Bai Yutang leaned back in his seat and stared intently at the haunted villa – Cat, it's up to you.

When Zhan Zhao and Shang Luo walked in the direction of the door of the collection room, they heard the cries in the corridor fade away... and then came a "click-click-click" sound, similar to the sound of misaligned joints, followed by the sound of light footsteps in the corridor.

Shang Luo pulled Zhan Zhao and said, "I'll go ahead... you remember to run quickly if there is danger, don't mind me..."

Zhan Zhao nodded and said to him, "Don't worry... I have a plan in mind."

Bai Yutang in the car heard these words and a smile of understanding appeared on his face – "Thieving cat..."

‿︵‿︵ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ・❉・ ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ‿︵‿︵

Previous Chapter | TOC | Next Chapter

Translator Notes

Translated: July 12, 2022 by Angel