The Record of Unusual Creature

As he stood in front of the window, enjoying some fresh air, Hao Ren saw a rather familiar figure staggering across the street. He squinted and was surprised to find that the figure was an acquaintance—Nangong Sanba.

Nangong Sanba however, did not look to be in a very good shape as he swayed in his steps. His face was as pale as a ghost. Hao Ren quickly ran towards the door, but someone got ahead of him.

Nangong Wuyue had been in her siren form, helping Vivian to mop up the floor in the living room. But, she scurried to the door as though she had sensed the presence of her brother.

However, Hao Ren got behind her and stopped her from crawling out the door, because she was still in her siren form. He then went out to meet Nangong Sanba himself. “Sanba? What happened to you? You look like you’re having a 60-degree fever.”

Becky and Y’lisabet, who had not gone very far heard the commotion and turned back. Both of them had never met Nangong Sanba before, and Becky looked at him curiously. “You know him?” she asked Hao Ren.

Nangong Sanba’s face was pale and he had an abnormally high body temperature. He was obviously in very bad shape, but he was still able to reply, “Stop kidding around. I’d be cooked at 60 °C. Help me inside, quickly… I have something to tell Wuyue…”

“Don’t talk for the monent. I’ve got medical equipment here.” Hao Ren hurried him into the house as he looked up and commanded the MDT, which was still lying on the tea table, watching TV. “Go and get the medical pod ready!”

At this time, everyone in the house was alarmed as none of them were expecting to see Nangong Sanba. He had been away for several months, only to show up in such a shape. Hao Ren thought that Nangong Sanba was injured, but when he examined him, he did not find any external wounds. Despite that, Nangong Sanba’s face was pale, his body temperature was very high, and the skin around his neck was covered in some abnormal black patterns as if his blood vessels were going to burst.

Nangong Wuyue, whose relationship with her brother had always been stormy, finally showed her sisterly love as she freaked out upon seeing her brother’s condition. She picked up some ice sludge with her tail and patted it on Nangong Sanba’s forehead frantically. “Brother, you’re scaring me… Please, hang in there.”

Vivian pulled Nangong Wuyue aside and said, “You’re knocking him out.”

The MDT rushed down to the basement to prepare the medical pod. Hao Ren carefully carried the half-baked demon hunter, who was now half-dead down the stairs to the basement. “What’s wrong with you?”

Nangong Sanba wanted to say something earlier, but had no chance. Now, he finally forced out a few words. “The vengeful spirit!”

There was a sudden, subtle change of expression on Nangong Wuyue’s face. She was just next to them. Hao Ren immediately realized that things were probably more complex than what met the eye. He picked up the pace and said, “Just stop talking for now. Let’s get down to the basement quickly and get you healed.”

Arriving in the basement, Nangong Sanba was astonished by what he saw. But before he had time to say anything, they shoved him into a medical pod. They only breathed a sigh of relief when the medical pod performed a scan and started to treat him.

Before Nangong Sanba went into the pod, Hao Ren could see some weird vascular patterns on his arms. He could not help but ask the MDT, which was now connected to the medical pod, “How is he?”

After verifying the feedback data from the medical pod, the MDT explained, “Short-term exposure to a high dose of radiation has caused the collapse of his tissue. There are also signs of heavy metal poisoning. His blood is full of toxins and tissues of dissolved organs, but the demon hunter is very tough; he will live. If he had gotten here a bit later, he’d be dead.”

Nangong Wuyue curled herself up into a ball and stayed in that posture for a long time.

The clock seemed to be ticking slower than usual as everyone anxiously waited. Nonetheless, the treatment had gone well. A beep sounded from the medical pod before its hatch slowly slid open. Nangong Sanba sat up and breathed out a sigh. He still looked weak, but he had apparently made it.

Right after, the MDT began to speak like an old Chinese doctor, “It’s best to get a day or two’s rest while you let your body recover slowly from exhaustion.”

Nangong Sanba climbed out of the medical pod with some struggle. The first thing he did was turn to look at the strange, high-tech equipment and asked, “For my sister’s sake… I guess you won’t ask me to pay for the treatment, right?”

Nangong Wuyue suddenly yanked her brother back into the pod with a fling of her tail. “Don’t be so thick-skinned!”

Hao Ren shrugged and said, “Looks like your brother has recovered pretty well.”

Nangong Sanba got up again, and still felt incredible. When he first arrived, he thought that he would surely die. He wanted to leave his last words, but he had no chance to speak. Now, he was surprised to find that not only was he not going to die, he was also completely healed by the strange equipment. He peered around the basement curiously and it looked like a place no normal human being would live in with all the strange equipment lying around. “Honestly speaking… I think the human race hasn’t attained this level of technology yet. Do have something more than meets the eye?”

Hao Ren had not given it much thought when he tried to save Nangong Sanba’s life. Also, because Nangong Sanba was an otherworldling himself, it seemed like he fell within the definitions of his “tenants”, which Raven 12345 had handed down to him. Hence, he led Nangong Sanba into the basement. But obviously, it was going to be troublesome to explain to him, so he could only beat around the bush. “This is an otherworldling shelter after all, how could I not have some ‘necessary assets’ lying around while I run this place?”

Lily blustered behind Hao Ren. “Who we are is not important, but what happened to you is!”

Nangong Sanba suddenly turned serious as he took a few deep breaths to calm himself down, before looking at his sister darkly. “Wuyue, I think I’ve found the vengeful spirit that took dad and mom away.”

Wuyue’s tail instantly stiffened up in a tortuous way. She was in a startled state for a few seconds before she reacted. “You mean…”

“I’m not so sure yet, but the smell was really familiar.” Nangong Sanba nodded vigorously. He then looked up at Hao Ren and explained, “Demon hunters are born hunters who are very sensitive to smells, even surpassing that of the werewolves. A mixed breed like me is no exception.”

Wuyue suddenly lunged forward, grabbing and shaking Nangong Sanba by the shoulders with both of her hands. “Where is it? Was the vengeful spirit the one who hurt you?”

“Calm down,” said Nangong Sanba, trying to break free from his sister’s claws. “Siberia. I was no match for that vengeful spirit, but I roughly know where its nest is.”

“Its nest?” Vivian immediately frowned. “Vengeful spirits have nests? I thought they never stay in one place for very long.”

“I don’t know the details, but all intel seems to indicate that the vengeful spirit has never left the physical world.” Nangong Sanba spread out his hand. “It may have even been entrenched there for hundreds of years. I believe that the attack on our family back then may be a result of its unconscious ‘wandering’.”

Hao Ren listened, but he was none the wiser. He held Nangong Sanba up. “Let’s go upstairs to the living room. We’ll talk over it there.”

In the living room, after having some water, Nangong Sanba appeared to be a lot better. He then recapped his encounters over the past months. “Didn’t I tell you that I got a job from a Russian parvenu to help him drive out some spirit? As it turned out, the situation wasn’t as simple as I thought it would be.

“At first, I thought that it was just another job where some large family’s old house was haunted by evil spirits, because of some rancor or vicious incidents. However, when I arrived there, it turned out it was more than that: the parvenu who commissioned me is actually a descendant of a very large, reclusive family with a very complicated background. The family and the evil spirit have hundreds of years of grudges, and over the generations, family members have died one after another in a series of bewildering incidents. It’s said that the evil spirit was called out by one of the family’s ancestors using a secret method described in an ancient manuscript. By doing so, the ancestor violated the taboo of life and death. You may have heard of legends like this, which were passed down from several generations ago. But, it’s hard to verify their authenticity. Anyway, when I followed the trail and finally found the so-called evil spirit, it was actually a vengeful spirit, which for some unknown reason, was stuck in the material world.

“The vengeful spirit had a scent, which was very similar to the one I encountered when I was young—a smell I can never forget. But I wasn’t a match for it since I was alone. At last, I had to use my speciality in the occult to teleport myself back to Wuyue.”

After that, Nangong Sanba smiled bashfully. “Actually, I was thinking of coming here to leave my last words before I die. I never thought that I’d still be alive.”