Chapter 147: 144. What is a Vessel?

144. What is a Vessel?

The investigation of Zheng Yu's attic could be considered at an end. The attic did indeed hide some dark and sinful secrets involving some kind of Abnormal ritual, but what the purpose of this ritual was remained to be further investigated. Zheng Yu had handled the materials regarding these rituals very cleanly—so cleanly that not a single clue could be found anywhere in the house.

Having gone to such great lengths only to obtain such vague clues, Chen Xiaolin was naturally unsatisfied. As she walked down the stairs, she pressed Li Duojin: "What about the matter of Zheng Yu's daughter, Xiaopeng, saying she saw her mother in the attic? You haven't investigated that yet."

"There are indeed some residual special magnetic fields here, but I didn't see one belonging to a female. In other words, it might have existed, but the energy maintaining the magnetic field dissipated later." Li Duojin walked down the stairs with his hands behind his back. Seeing Chen Xiaolin squinting at him, he sighed. "Don't understand? Then let's use words you can understand. Simply put, my eyes can indeed see a few wronged spirits who died in the attic, but I didn't find Zheng Yu's deceased wife. She may have already left."

"You... aren't you a master? You even know how to explain metaphysics using science?"

"It doesn't count as rigorous science; it's more like pseudoscience." Li Duojin smiled slightly.

"If that's the case, how could Xiaopeng have seen her? Does she have some kind of special ability?" Chen Xiaolin asked curiously; this was also a point she cared about quite a bit.

Li Duojin shook his head: "I don't know about that, but this possibility cannot be ruled out. There are indeed people in this world born with special abilities. Investigators above B-Grade in the Xuanmi Group all have some special abilities to varying degrees, it's just that none of them are as exaggerated as portrayed in movies—destroying the world or traveling through time. Of course, for ordinary people, they are already strong enough."

Chen Xiaolin: "Is your special ability being able to see those things?"

Li Duojin: "I suppose so."

"Then the rituals you perform are indeed all scams!?"

"Who says so?" Upon hearing this, Li Duojin immediately became serious and said earnestly, "Don't you go thinking I only have a little bit of skill."

Chen Xiaolin was suspicious. Although she believed in supernatural events, things like Abnormal events just exceeded scientific common sense, but in essence, they could still barely be explained by science to some extent. But if she might speak frankly, the scene of Li Duojin performing a ritual was indeed too much like a charlatan; it was hard not to feel suspicious watching it.

Seeing that Chen Xiaolin still didn't believe him, the serious-looking Li Duojin couldn't help but laugh and said: "It's fine, you don't necessarily have to believe it; this matter has nothing to do with you in the first place."

Speaking of this, Li Duojin retracted his smile and warned Chen Xiaolin seriously: "Considering that Zheng Yu's crazy murderous behavior was caused by an Abnormal ritual, and this ritual is very likely not yet over, my advice is that you had best not dig deeper into this incident. You are just an ordinary person; if you continue to follow up, you will very likely end up losing your own life."

Chen Xiaolin also answered him very seriously: "If you are asking me to give up the investigation, then I can tell you very clearly: I will not give up. I have my own reasons for not wanting to give up."

"You really like Mr. Zheng, don't you."

"You really are a gossip, but unfortunately, your guess is in the wrong direction. The reason I am persisting is not out of that purpose."

Li Duojin blinked, pushed open the door to leave the villa, and smiled: "Then I can only wish you good luck, Miss Chen."

"Hey, don't you want to go see Xiaopeng? She might have a special ability." Chen Xiaolin tried to tie Li Duojin to her side for a while longer. Whether the other party's identity as a master was real or not didn't matter; what was important was that the other party was actually a mysterious Investigator. This identity was beneficial for her to investigate and protect herself while looking into the Abnormal events happening to Zheng Yu.

Li Duojin: "Although I have some interest, it's not very meaningful. Besides, the little girl has lost both parents now and must be very sad. In this situation, it would surely be difficult and time-consuming for a stranger like me to communicate with her. You, on the other hand, could try communicating with the little girl and ask what her father has been doing during this time, although she might not necessarily be able to give you an accurate and clear answer. If there are any intelligence clues, I would be quite happy if you were willing to share them with me."

"Since you don't want to go with me, Mr. Li, how could I share clues with you if I really find any?" Chen Xiaolin's red lips curled slightly, her eyes cunning. She walked in front of Li Duojin with her hands behind her back and chest puffed out, closing the distance between them quickly. She stood on tiptoe and looked up, saying, "Unless you share some intelligence with me when the time comes, is that okay?"

Li Duojin's expression barely changed. He didn't hesitate at all and nodded in agreement: "Alright."

The two hit it off immediately.

Li Duojin returned to the hotel where he was staying and immediately used his computer to continue investigating the records regarding those blood-red symbols.

The World Investigation Bureau's database system was becoming more and more perfect. Although the data within it certainly didn't have the profound foundation of the Xuanmi Group's database system, because it was a compilation of data from all over the world, it could at least make up for a certain degree of variety. What's more, Li Duojin guessed that those symbols were likely not a product localized to the Shenzhou Region, but had a high probability of coming from overseas, so this database system might just be able to exert some miraculous effects.

By searching with the two keywords "graphic symbol" and "ritual," Li Duojin found several hundred pieces of data. Fortunately, it wasn't extremely complex, and he had enough patience to flip through them one by one.

Favored by luck, Li Duojin actually found information on these symbols in this system, which was not even that complete.

According to the records, these symbols were a type of pictographic script called Kahn Script. It was a script that circulated widely in the New York region during ancient times and was jointly developed and used by several tribes. However, what was magical was that those ancient humans only applied Kahn Script to major seasonal activities such as sacrifices and other worship rituals; they used another set of common script for daily life.

Li Duojin tried to translate the photos he had taken of the scene at the time using the data, but it was too difficult. He spent over twenty minutes and only translated a few characters, which were of almost no value, except for the combined graphic symbol that Zheng Yu had carved onto his own head at the time.

That symbol, when translated, roughly represented one meaning—"Vessel."

But what was the significance of this Vessel?

Could it be that Zheng Yu was just a body being manipulated by Abnormal factors?

"Continue translating. Only when it is fully translated is it possible to decipher useful information." Even when it was time to rest, Li Duojin still intended to continue. He would compare it against the script dictionary left in the database, matching them one by one, translating them one by one.