Chapter 114: On the Ceiling

When Senior Cuique stepped through the gate of the Anomalous Strategy Bureau, just as she had seen before, there was not a single light around; everything in the darkness was utterly silent.

Unlike ordinary darkness caused by a lack of light, within the deep space of the Anomalous Strategy Bureau, even with a magical girl's vision, one could barely make out anything, only vaguely distinguishing the outlines of objects.

This further indicated that something was amiss with the Anomalous Strategy Bureau.

Senior Cuique stood in place, cast a probing spell pattern shimmering with magical light into the hall before her, and only after confirming there were no hidden ambushes in the darkness did she layer on several barriers and formally step inside.

As she walked forward, her footsteps echoed through the vast hall.

Click-clack, click-clack.

As she pressed onward, a certain sound emerged from the darkness.

Rustle-rustle, rustle-rustle.

The faint and chaotic noises never ceased.

This caused Senior Cuique to stop in the middle of the vast hall, looking around in some confusion.

Why did she feel that all of this was somewhat familiar?

She continued forward; the crisp sound of her heels striking the ground dispersed the surrounding noise, and after a brief silence, it was replaced by a sound of whispering.

Among them were men and women, old and young; the only commonality was that they were all laughing.

The laughter awakened Senior Cuique's memory and finally allowed her to recall the source of this familiarity—it was precisely the dream she had experienced before.

The hall in the darkness, the laughter of unknown origin, this scene and situation—all were exactly the same as her dream.

Yet, only after realizing this point did Senior Cuique's brows furrow even tighter.

She did not understand what connection could possibly exist within this.

Undoubtedly, everything she was experiencing now was reality; then, what exactly was the previous dream? A premonition? A warning? Or some kind of trap?

The doubts in her heart received no answer, but this could not stop her steps; she merely quickened her pace and continued forward.

She feared neither danger nor enemies; the only thing she worried about was failing to find clues and being unable to solve the problem.

And as she continued forward, the surrounding chuckles and the echo of her footsteps mingled and overlapped. These sounds gradually grew sharp, and finally, just as in Senior Cuique's dream, they began to evolve into noise.

Senior Cuique remained expressionless and unmoved; she merely raised her hand to strengthen the barriers around her, isolating the sound waves brought by this noise from the outside.

"A boring trick," she spoke, and instead of enduring the noise attack as she had in the dream, she reached out, grasped a sapphire-blue wand in her hand, and murmured: "Magical construct, precipitate."

Countless blue threads of magical light floated into existence around her as her words fell. They layered densely, trembling, and after Senior Cuique hooked her finger and raised her hand, they began to spread outward in all directions.

These threads of magic flew rapidly to cut toward the surroundings; every single thread was as sharp as a blade, emitting a uniform sound of tearing through the air, cutting toward every corner of this space.

As long as the enemy possessed a physical form, it would be impossible to evade such an attack.

And as long as the attack on Senior Cuique provoked a reaction, whether counterattacking or blocking, she could quickly pinpoint the enemy's location.

Senior Cuique did not believe in that dream, but she would not ignore the warning within it. She tended to believe that enemies truly existed within this space.

However, the current Senior Cuique had no time to play hide-and-seek with that enemy; she needed to be fast, as fast as possible; she knew her time was not that abundant.

Therefore, she would use her magical construct to force that enemy out from the darkness.

The threads of magic spread outward in all directions; as the attack reached every corner of the space, the echoes, voices, and laughter vanished completely, as if they had never existed at all.

However, the sensation returning from the threads caused Senior Cuique to widen her eyes slightly.

"... What kind of joke is this?"

She had not spoken those words in a very long time.

The threads indeed struck the enemy; they truly cut into something that was not a building, something distinct from inanimate objects; judging by the tactile feedback, it was clearly a living creature.

But every single thread struck the enemy.

Every single one.

To confirm the feedback she had received, Senior Cuique increased her magical output, causing all the threads of magic to erupt with even stronger power. While the immense destructive force further inflicted damage on the struck targets, the glow of the magic finally illuminated the previously unseeable darkness to some degree.

Senior Cuique looked up toward the ceiling of the hall and felt her breath catch.

She found it hard to believe her own eyes.

If she really had to draw a comparison for the scene she was seeing now, it would trace back to long ago, when Lin Yun, due to an infestation of clothes moths in his home, had searched everywhere for the source of these insects.

At that time, he had flipped open many normally sealed, dark corners, solely to find where these ubiquitous little bugs were gathering. And the place he finally found was in a completely neglected corner of a storage room, beneath a mattress that had already been abandoned.

There, he saw a swarm of insects, densely packed, that might cause someone afraid of bugs to scream.

Now, within Senior Cuique's field of vision, it was roughly this very scene.

Except what she saw were not insects, but Mutilated Beasts. Upon the ceiling of the Anomalous Strategy Bureau were countless writhing, shrieking Mutilated Beasts, densely packed.

Most of these Mutilated Beasts were only human-sized; compared to ordinary Mutilated Beasts, they could be described as resembling toddlers, yet their numbers were so vast they were chilling to the bone.

The chaotic noise in the darkness was nothing other than these Mutilated Beasts gathered together, shrieking collectively in the dark.

At this very moment, the Mutilated Beasts struck by the threads had clearly become restless; pain made them uneasy. Unwilling to continue squeezing in place, many of the Mutilated Beasts had already shifted their bodies, attempting to detach themselves from the crowded ceiling.

As these Mutilated Beasts surged, something else fell from the ceiling, smashing onto the ground.

Senior Cuique walked forward in silence, using the glow of her magic to look at the object on the ground—it was a small, square object like a card.

Using a thread to lift the object, she picked it up, and it revealed its true form: an identification badge of an Anomalous Strategy Bureau employee.

This identification badge was preserved in excellent condition; the plastic shell on its surface showed not a single scratch, so Senior Cuique could still clearly see the ID photo and personal information on it.

However, the owner of this identification badge was likely in dire straits.

Senior Cuique stared silently at that identification badge for two seconds; when she looked up again, her cold face bore no emotion whatsoever.

She raised her hand; the threads in the air hummed in response to her movement, answering her action, and in the next moment, they could launch a slaughter against the pile of monsters on the ceiling.

Kill these monsters, make them pay for the sin of killing humans.

It was as if a voice in her heart spoke thus.

Yes, kill these monsters; they ought to—

Senior Cuique suddenly released her hand.

No, that just now was not her own inner voice.

She covered her heart and said.

It was a voice that suddenly appeared in her mind, and its first words were to order her to kill the Remnant Beasts on the ceiling.

Something is wrong, Senior Cuique told herself.

It is only right for a Magical Girl to kill Remnant Beasts; why would it urge her to do this?

The dream she had this afternoon seemed inherently suggestive, causing her mindset to become unbalanced; why?

Thinking of this, Senior Cuique suddenly looked up again; she finally realized that these Remnant Beasts were also very wrong.

Ordinary Remnant Beasts act on instinct and possess no rationality at all. Their instinct is destruction and feeding; if a target brimming with magic power like a Magical Girl entered their sight, they would surely launch an attack.

That is to say, if these Remnant Beasts on the ceiling had no other abnormalities, from the very second Senior Cuique entered the Anomaly Bureau, she should have been subjected to endless attacks.

Yet they did not.

Even after being injured by Senior Cuique's Magic Gear, they still showed no willingness to attack, merely moving their bodies, trying to leave the position where they had been struck.

These Remnant Beasts were simply curled up on the ceiling, hissing, screaming, and threatening, as if they possessed no impulse to destroy and feed, but were instead... afraid?

Why are they afraid? What are they afraid of?

At this moment, Senior Cuique felt she was closer to the truth than ever before.

She lowered her head again, looking at the identity badge on the ground stained with slime, gazing at the employee photo on that badge which was incredibly clear; after pondering for a moment, she suddenly recalled something.

Something that happened not long ago.

Back then, she had gone to Bai'an City, fallen into a Remnant Beast nest, and found an office within a nest resembling the Bai'an City Anomaly Bureau; inside the office were the corpses of Anomaly Bureau employees and a Remnant Beast.

This was not particularly rare; Anomaly Bureau employees who accidentally entered a nest being killed by Remnant Beasts was a very normal occurrence.

But there were some details that were very strange.

First, the door to that office was slightly ajar.

A Remnant Beast driven only by violent instinct had no reason to preserve the integrity of a door, let alone enter an office and then politely close the door behind it; similarly, if an Anomaly Bureau employee had discovered a Remnant Beast inside the door, there would be no reason to walk in, much less close the door.

Under those circumstances, neither the Remnant Beast nor a human had any reason to close the door.

Second, within the Bai'an City nest, Lamp had once told her that she had protected those Anomaly Bureau employees and let them find a room to hide in.

That is to say, those Anomaly Bureau employees must have actively found that office and finally hid inside together.

Then the Remnant Beast must have appeared later; it must have appeared before them only after those victims had hidden, giving it the chance to wipe out everyone in one sweep.

These two facts are contradictory.

If the Anomaly Bureau employees had found the empty office first and thus hid inside, how exactly did the subsequent Remnant Beast manage to enter that office without damaging the door at all?

Could she speculate that the slightly ajar door was not originally ajar, but that those innocent victims had opened it from the inside in their attempt to escape the office before they died?

Then, what does this mean?

—That Remnant Beast appeared suddenly in the office due to some trigger?

Suddenly appeared?

This phrase made Senior Cuique feel a chill run down her spine.

Even a Pupal-stage Remnant Beast could not perform leaping spatial movement at will, so a Remnant Beast could definitely not appear suddenly. If it truly "appeared suddenly," then what exactly would the form of such an appearance be?

Looking up at the ceiling, watching those Remnant Beasts writhing in place, Senior Cuique slowly opened her hands once more.

However, this time she did not do so to manipulate her Magic Gear to kill these monsters, but rather let threads of magic power flow among the monsters, scraping and moving, as if searching for something.

Her actions received feedback as expected; as the threads disturbed the swarm of Remnant Beasts, more and more unidentified objects began to fall from the air, dropping to the ground and making a crisp sound.

Senior Cuique walked forward, confirmed them one by one, and discovered that these were all various human personal items: identity badges, glasses, watches, mobile phones, ballpoint pens, and so on.

Even more surprisingly, apart from damage caused by falling from a great height, these items were preserved in exceptionally good condition.

Senior Cuique gazed at these objects on the ground, silent for a long time.

—"Why won't you act?"

A voice came from behind her.

"I cannot kill them," Senior Cuique replied.

"But they are Remnant Beasts," that voice continued to ask.

This question carried a certain naive confusion, as if it were truly asking Senior Cuique a question; and accompanying this question, Senior Cuique discovered a shadow beneath her feet.

A shadow much longer than her own figure, completely covering her.

"They are Remnant Beasts, but they are also not Remnant Beasts."

Senior Cuique did not turn around, but continued to look at those personal items on the ground, her voice low:

"They originally should have been... humans."

Her answer also caused the questioner behind her to fall silent.

This was the conclusion Senior Cuique finally reached: those Remnant Beasts on the ceiling were humans. Furthermore, a considerable number of them were former Fang Ting City Anomaly Bureau employees.

The Anomaly Bureau in Bai'an City was the same; the tragedy in that office was not caused by enemies appearing from the outside, but because... someone among them had turned into a Remnant Beast.

Among the employees hiding together in the office, one person had turned into a Remnant Beast, attacked other unprepared comrades, and thus caused that tragedy.

She should have thought of this long ago.

Black Ash Dawn possessed a technology named "Beast's Viscera," which could grant humans the power of Remnant Beasts and even control Remnant Beasts in return. Then, this technology must surely have other applications.

For example... turning ordinary people into Remnant Beasts as well.

However, this technology must not be as perfect as their "Beast's Viscera"; it could not violently override the user's will like Beast's Viscera, nor could it allow the user to turn back into a human after use.

Senior Cuique could feel that those monsters overhead were actually just a product of simple stitching.

Humans and Remnant Beasts stitched together, like walking corpses, possessing neither consciousness nor combat ability.

It was even a stretch to call them Remnant Beasts, because their frail bodies and magic power were simply unable to support them fighting like Remnant Beasts; they were not even as good as the lowest Egg-stage.

These things on the ceiling, at this very moment, were merely a group of pitiful "monsters."

"But, they are Remnant Beasts now."

The voice behind Senior Cuique spoke thus: "If they are not killed, one day they will take the first step of hunting out of hunger. As they begin to devour living things and gain more magic power, they will also start to grow stronger, then become a true threat."

"But they are human," Senior Cuique stammered, "innocent humans."

"They are monsters, monsters that must be eliminated."

The voice behind Senior Cuique stated, "We have no ability to turn them back to their original state. The part of them that was human has been thoroughly stitched together with the Remnant Beasts; those parts will later turn into their own nourishment, causing them to become true Remnant Beasts."

"I know."

Senior Cuique's tone was calm, but her hands gradually clenched tight: "I... I know."

"You promised me, 'No matter what kind of Remnant Beast, you can eliminate it'."

That voice continued speaking, gradually approaching Senior Cuique: "Now is the time to fulfill that promise. These things are no longer human; they are merely monsters."

— "Senior."

(End of this chapter)