Great, I'm surrounded by villains.

She manipulated the eyeball robot and said her final goodbye, "If you pass by the Holy City in the future, be sure to come find me. I can take you around the Holy City."

(End of this chapter)

Chapter 203 Beware of Small Cards When Traveling

After the Baptism flagship left, the Second Prince and others in the court who were affected gradually returned to normal. However, this might not be a good thing for the Second Prince who had lost his throne.

The outcome of this fight for the throne ended in a way no one expected.

Ning Ruyue decided to return to the academy, and the third prince had no intention of taking the throne. After discussion, the people in the court finally decided that there was no need for another first king. This would no longer be a civilization where one person had the final say, nor would it be a civilization controlled by a company.

The arrival of the recommendation letter brought unprecedented unity to the court, and joining the Sixteen-Star Summit became the next top priority.

During this period, a piece of bad news came.

The one who brought the bad news was Dajiang.

During the three days when the group was away, the Hunter Association got back on track with the joint efforts of liaison stations across the country. After learning about the changes in the court, old hunters who had retired for many years responded to the call and returned to the organization. Just as Dajiang and other liaison station administrators were discussing whether to prepare a "veteran return gift package" for the hunters, the liaison station in Siyang City detected signs of Wangxu activities.

An experienced old hunter volunteered to go to the place where the incident occurred to investigate, but lost contact that night.

Then, on the morning of the next day, a missing person incident occurred in Siyang City that shocked the entire city.

The management of a company mysteriously disappeared in the office during a meeting. When the company's cleaner found them, all the top executives had disappeared, leaving only the walls and ceiling stained red with blood. The cleaner was frightened and crawled out of the office.

The local police investigation was unsuccessful and they sought assistance from the liaison station.

But problems also arose.

The missing old hunter was already the best hunter in the local area. Although there were still some hot-blooded young hunters in the association who wanted to take over the unfinished investigation of the old hunter, they were stopped by the liaison officer from Siyang City.

Ask for help from the Imperial Hunting Court.

According to the association's tradition, once an incident is beyond the scope of the local liaison station, in order to avoid unnecessary casualties, assistance should be sought from the Imperial Court as soon as possible.

But now the Imperial Hunting Court has just been activated, and its core members are only Duan Mingyuan and Jiu Yue, both of whom happened to be invited to the company's flagship.

So, in the evening of the day he returned to the court, Duan Mingyuan embarked on a business trip after a long absence.

Although Jiu Yue strongly requested to go with Duan Mingyuan, considering safety issues, she would be the one to escort Ning Ruyue back to Yunhai Academy.

After all, although the second prince has fallen, there are still quite a number of people in the court who blame the second prince's failure on the sudden return of the eldest princess, and they are likely to take retaliatory actions.

Before the plane took off, Duan Mingyuan imported all the news compiled by Dajiang into the computer. As the incident fermented, this news continued to occupy the headlines. People had different opinions. Some believed that it was the behavior of a cult organization, while others believed that it was a supernatural phenomenon.

Thirteen people disappeared at once, all of them big names who were often seen in newspapers and on TV. The way they disappeared was not only bizarre but also bloody like a horror movie. This kind of explosive news always arouses people's interest.

The local liaison station chief and Dajiang both believed that it was the work of the Wangxu Organization, but this was somewhat inconsistent with the Wangxu Organization's usual style.

After all, almost all the members of the organization are wanted criminals in the star zone, so they usually act low-key. They may have reasons to make these 13 people disappear, but they almost never take such a conspicuous way. Instead, they let them become missing persons without anyone noticing in the middle of the night.

A large number of missing persons cases occur in various places every year, and even the local police have become accustomed to it.

Duan Mingyuan had already booked a hotel before boarding the plane.

This is the hotel where the old hunter stayed on the night he disappeared. The old hunter was in disguise and his identity card was forged. Logically, even if he happened to meet Wangxu, he would not be exposed immediately. But the reality is that he disappeared without bringing back any information.

Before the early morning, Duan Mingyuan, who had finished a whole day's journey, moved into the room next to the old hunter.

The room next door was empty. It was the off-season for tourism recently, and there were few people living in the entire corridor.

Duan Mingyuan assessed the structure of the two rooms, walked to the wall, and lightly stroked the wall with his finger. A door leading to the next room appeared in front of him.

There was no room card inserted in the next room, and it was pitch dark in the room. Duan Mingyuan turned on the light on his mobile phone and took a quick look at the scene in the room.

The room was tidy and there were no signs of damage anywhere, as if no fight had taken place in the room.

The stationmaster of Siyang City was very sure that the old hunter disappeared in this room, because they had just spoken on the phone before his disappearance, and the old hunter said that he was in the room and would not go anywhere tonight. The stationmaster also used his connections to retrieve the surveillance footage, and the surveillance footage in the corridor showed that the old hunter never walked out of the room after entering it.

The information provided by Dajiang shows that according to the rating theory proposed by Duan Mingyuan, this old hunter is at least an outstanding intermediate-level professional. Long before the destruction of the first generation of Imperial Hunting Court, the old hunter was able to create simple barriers and served as an instructor for new hunters in Siyang City.

For safety reasons, the old hunter set up a simple barrier in his room as soon as he moved in.

Judging from the situation at the scene, this simple barrier did not seem to work.

The old hunter witnessed the association's rise and fall. Now the association has once again turned around, but no one expected this to happen.

“Boom boom, boom boom, boom—!”

There was a knock on the door next door, which was Duan Mingyuan's room.

Duan Mingyuan immediately retreated back to his room, removed the door on the wall, and quickly walked to the door.

"Who?"

No one answered the door.

It's almost early morning now, and it shouldn't be hotel staff.

Duan Mingyuan opened the door and the corridor was still empty. It took less than a minute from the time he retreated to his room to the time he opened the door.

The corridor outside the door was silent and the dark red carpet always made people feel uncomfortable.

If an ordinary resident encountered this situation, he would probably be scared and think it was haunted and unable to sleep all night. However, Duan Mingyuan not only did not close the door, but took a step towards the outside.

He looked around, fully expressing his willingness to communicate to those around him.

But to his regret, after standing at the door of the guest room for a minute, no evil spirit jumped out to communicate with him, so he could only retreat back to the room.

It was only when he closed the door again that he noticed the changes in the room.

A card appeared on the carpet at the door at some point.

It turned out to be a small advertisement.

Duan Mingyuan picked up the card. Unlike the traditional cards with pictures of young girls printed on them, the background of this card was mainly in a strange black tone, and it looked like tangled branches.

Rather than helping him have fun, it seems like the people who printed these cards wanted to discuss some deeper issues with the hotel's guests.

"Are you tired of your current life?"

"Do you want to change your life?"

"Do you want to know the truth behind this world?"

"Come to us and all your questions will be answered."

Thanks to book friend 20240413135421785 for the reward of Qidian coins!

(End of this chapter)

Chapter 204 Expert

Jiu Yue was very foresighted about this. Long before Duan Mingyuan set off, she warned him that when he was traveling alone on a business trip, he might be targeted by people with ulterior motives, and someone might slip a card through the crack of the door when he stayed in a hotel. She warned Duan Mingyuan not to believe these small advertisements, as they were most likely to be honey traps.

If you are really lonely and bored, you can give her a video call.

A beautiful fox demon is much better to chat with online than those women of unknown origin.

But the situation now is a little delicate.

Duan Mingyuan did receive the card, but it was not an invitation to spend a good night together, but an invitation to discuss the meaning of life. He read the card carefully and found that the four questions raised on it all hit the nail on the head for office workers who were in a period of burnout.

The monotonous life, endless overtime, business trip to a strange city, and staying in a hotel alone after dark will inevitably lead to confused and depressed times. Although I have long passed the passionate age full of middle school fantasies, I occasionally fantasize about a change in my life.

The only problem was that the card only said to go find them, but it didn't say how or by what means to find them.

Duan Mingyuan took out his mobile phone, and there were no "YES" or "NO" options on it.

However, Jiu Yue sent him a bedtime message before going to bed on the Peach, reminding him not to eat secretly.

Suppose that the old hunter also heard the knock on the door that night and received such a card, the people mentioned on the card might be the culprits who caused his disappearance.

Duan Mingyuan put the card on the bedside table, washed up, and lay in bed waiting for a long time. When he realized that the person who put the card had no intention of discussing in depth with him, he covered himself with the quilt and fell asleep.

There are still many work chores waiting for him tomorrow.

For example, contacting the police as an expert on the Imperial Hunting Court.

He had only recently learned that police forces in various places had established more or less cooperative relationships with the Hunters Association. Once cases that went against common sense occurred, they would invite experts from the Hunters Association to consult their opinions.

However, this tradition has been discontinued for nearly twenty years due to the destruction of the Imperial Hunting Court, and most of the current young police officers know nothing about it.

I slept soundly.

The criminals and evil spirits in Siyang City did not even enter his dreams to disturb him, which made Duan Mingyuan inevitably a little disappointed.

Compared to the experienced old hunter, he looked like a rookie who had only been in this business for a few years. When booking a room, he directly chose the room next to the one where the old hunter disappeared, for fear that others would not know that he came to investigate the disappearance case.

Young, brash, and dressed like an office worker on a business trip.

Most of them are reckless people who are bored with their work and life and join the association without hesitation after receiving the invitation.

No matter what Wangxu and the potential killer thought, Duan Mingyuan felt that he was easy to attack.

If he was a criminal, he would have done it that night.

It would be disrespectful to the entire criminal industry for a rookie like this to survive one more day in the hotel.

When the morning light shone into the room, the cell phone on the bedside table vibrated. Duan Mingyuan was immediately disappointed when he found himself sitting on the bed safe and sound.

But Dajiang has sent a message saying that the Siyang City Police attaches great importance to this case and hopes to meet him as an expert as soon as possible and also hopes that he can attend the case discussion meeting this morning.

……

Since the incident, the police officers in Siyang City have been on high alert.

But after countless meetings, big and small, we still had no clue.

How did the criminals sneak into the meeting room in plain sight of everyone?

How could he brutally murder 13 company executives and then get away with it?

Where did the body go?

The results from the laboratory came out, and the bloodstains on the wall came from 13 missing persons, which seemed to explain their fate.

Every detail of the entire case investigated left them scratching their heads, so a rumor has been circulating in the police station these days - this is not a crime that a human could commit!

It's more like some invisible ghost killed someone and dragged the corpse into the ghost space, causing the current situation.

Of course, this can only be said in private.

The public will not accept this kind of explanation. Even if they really want to put the blame on some evildoers, they must explain the method and motive of the crime, as well as which evildoer it is.

The vibration of the cell phone made Zheng Liu's eyes narrow. This was his third day living in the police station. He had not returned home since the "13 missing persons case" occurred.

As the youngest police officer in the bureau, he put all his effort into this incident, intending to be at the forefront and get to the bottom of the case.

He made himself a cup of instant coffee, and the large office was suddenly filled with the aroma of breakfast.

"Xiaolongbao, beef stuffed."

The meaty aroma of the buns made Zheng Liu salivate. A nearly fifty-year-old policeman, holding a plastic bag in his hand, was the first to enter the office.

"Thank you, Master!"

Zheng Liu took the bun and started eating it happily.

This is probably one of the few good things that have happened in the past few days.

"There is good news. The higher-ups have invited an expert, who is said to be a very experienced hunter."

The old policeman leaned towards Zheng Liu's desk and told him the good news.

The young man's efforts are obvious to all, and he is very optimistic about his apprentice.

"An experienced...hunter?"

Obviously, this is not a profession that can be seen frequently in modern society. Zheng Liu's entire impression of hunters still remains in the days when he and four classmates teamed up to kill dragons in the police academy.

"Didn't I tell you? Hunters are people who specialize in handling cases like this."

"Master, please wait a moment and speak slowly!"

The sudden huge amount of information almost burned out his CPU. The door to this new world opened too quickly and he was not prepared at all.

"What do you mean by this type of case? Are you saying that this case was not done by a human?"

Could it be that the netizens who are eager to watch the fun actually guessed it right this time?

As early as the first day the news spread, some people thought it was a supernatural case.

"It's normal that you don't know. Our bureau hasn't handled this type of case for more than ten years. The last time I heard about a case of evil spirits injuring people, I was only a few years older than you."