"Detective, you go first, this is my enemy."
Having recognized the enemy's face, Miss Beyas firmly stood in front of Shard, urging him to leave.
"Is it the Blood of Mercury again?"
"No, but this guy is associated with the Silver-Eyed One, he belongs to another organization... Don't worry, he is a wanted criminal, also a disgusting tomb raider."
Miss Beyas said softly, her eyes never leaving the man under the lamp.
"Alright, I'll go first, be careful."
"Detective, you be careful too, I'll come to your house later."
As she spoke, she had already heard Shard's footsteps receding.
"The detective is too decisive..."
With no more concerns, Miss Beyas twisted her neck:
"This time, I won't let you get away. Balance!"
She walked toward the man under the streetlight whose body was gradually showing signs of livor mortis.
Shard moved quickly along the alley; since this had nothing to do with the Blood of Mercury, there was no need for him to intervene in a fight between high-level magicians.
Of course, he didn't plan on leaving immediately but instead looked for a safe place nearby to wait for the battle to end. If Miss Beyas was at a disadvantage, he could immediately jump in; and if Miss Beyas got injured, he had a good reason to reveal his magician identity.
The alley was not very long, and there were no other exits in the middle, with two ends leading to different streets. As the light of a gas street lamp became visible ahead, another figure appeared, blocking the alleyway.
Shard stopped walking, clearly seeing that it was a somewhat decayed corpse. If the man under the streetlight still had some semblance of a human, this was undoubtedly a dead body.
[It's not a magician, nor does it show traces of Whisper elements, probably a corpse controlled by Arcane Technique.]
A whispering voice reminded him quietly by his ears.
"The magician fighting with Iluna Beath, trying to stop me... how strong?"
[I can only sense traces of elements; I can't answer how strong a corpse controlled by Arcane Technique is.]
Shard said quietly, noticing the somewhat greenish face of the corpse with a gunshot wound, which was likely the cause of death.
"Did they also get this corpse from tomb raiding?"
The silver moonlight formed an arc trace, flying forward. Simultaneously, Shard, staying alert, summoned silvery mist, using Illusion Technique to conceal himself. But then, he saw that the slash of the moonlight cleanly bisected the obstructing corpse, both halves falling to the ground motionless.
Somewhat surprised, he continued to hide in the silvery mist for a long while, confirming the other party really wasn't moving anymore before he emerged. The dim alley carried a strange odor, with the bisected corpse lying there, maggots faintly visible squirming in the nostrils.
"Thought I was a regular person, so you didn't take it seriously, huh?"
Moving his gaze away from the corpse, Shard didn't know quite what to think for a moment, so he walked out of the alley and looked around both sides of the street, not seeing other enemies or corpses.
"Pretending to be a regular person, turns out there are benefits to this?"
He turned to look towards the other end of the alley; because it was somewhat far and there were no lights in the alley, he could not make out what exactly was happening there.
"Since I could solve the problem, Miss Beyas must be fine, she must be able to..."
A cold wind blew through the alley, and Shard immediately shivered. The wind seemed to blow directly into his body, giving him a chilling sensation from inside out, as if his body had frozen stiff.
He looked behind him, where a transparent phantom wreathed in black smoke drifted out from the wall of the alley. It was unclear what it was, the phantom seeming as though it would dissipate with a gust of wind.
It reached out a pale, translucent hand toward Shard, and Shard reached out his finger:
Silver moonlight illuminated the area in front of him, and in its light, the black smoke around the spirit gradually dissipated. Squinting his eyes, Shard seemed to see the phantom of an old woman flickering before him. She bowed slightly to Shard, then pointed to the wall where she had appeared, and finally vanished under the sanctity of the moonlight.
"I always thought you were afraid of ghosts and such."
A whispering voice came to his ears, Shard withdrew his finger, looking suspiciously at the wall in front of him:
"I'm not afraid of ghosts; it's death and the unknown that make me uncomfortable. Can ghosts really be any more terrifying... Is there something in the wall?"
He placed his hand on the wall, scrawled with filthy words, and a few seconds later, without needing a whispered reminder, he found the answer himself.
A cold breath emitted from inside the wall, and even without "my other self" prompting, he directly sensed the characteristic Whisper Element of the relic. This relic was exerting its influence, which was why it was perceived so easily.
He glanced at the brick wall and tentatively tried one of the bricks; it could be removed, but his fingernails failed to dislodge it:
"What do I do now, wait, I still have one trick left."
Shard stepped back, squinting his eyes in the darkness at the brick. After a long moment, he suddenly shouted:
With the power of sorcery triggering object movement, the brick was forcefully pulled out by a third.
Neatly removing the entire brick, he reached in and felt something wrapped in newspaper. After pulling it out and removing the newspaper, inside was a segment of human finger bone, the pale yellow bone intricately and chillingly carved with tiny patterns. Running his fingers over it, he found text engraved on the back.
Unlike the "Joyful Dream Pen" where the traits were known in advance, due to the lesson learned from the "Box of Darkness," Shard dared not interpret its meaning directly.
"Relic, it seems your luck is quite good."
Meanwhile, from the other end of the alley came a man's scream along with the distinctive bright color of the Arcane Technique "Sunlight Gun":
"Damn it, who touched my relic! No, my immortality!"
It seemed Miss Beyas had won.
With the relic in his hands, Shard thought for a moment and then just stood at the entrance of the alley without moving.
A few minutes later, he saw Miss Beyas, clad in a maid's uniform, her expression stern, dragging a corpse along. Her clothes even lacked much sign of a struggle, indicating she had won rather easily:
She stared at Shard, then saw the pale yellow, slender finger bone that Shard was carefully holding:
"Are you really just an ordinary person?"
Her eyes fixated on Shard.
Shard could choose to lie again, but it was pointless, since he had already decided to help The Chosen One, there was no need to deceive her for long. This was a good opportunity, so he made up his mind and met Miss Beyas's gaze:
"Let's get reacquainted, Shard Suren Hamilton, detective... and also a correspondent First Ring Magician from Saint Byrons Integrated Academy."