Chapter 291

Chapter 291: Seeing Through

When he heard this priest of the God of Death, the old caretaker did not cooperate at once like an ordinary gravekeeper. Instead, he frowned in displeasure: “I’m the cemetery’s warden. I’ve never heard of any operation in a cemetery that needed the warden to leave.”

“Special case, old mister,” the short man in black stepped half a step forward. His tone was serious and sincere. When he saw the stubborn look on the old caretaker’s face, he finally sighed. “Fine, I wasn’t supposed to tell you this. This corpse is to be sent to the Silent Cathedral.”

“The Silent Cathedral?” the old caretaker blurted out. “What in the world…”

“Severe unknown corruption, possibly related to something deep in the mine. We have to carry out a special purification ritual. The fewer living people at the scene, the better,” the short man said gravely. “It’s not just you who has to step aside. One of my colleagues and I will step aside with you as well.”

As he spoke, the tall, broad?shouldered man in black also stepped forward and silently came to stand beside the short man.

The old caretaker looked at the two black?clad priests in front of him, then at the woman in black who stood by the corpse platform. She had already taken herbs and holy oil from her bag and started laying out a temporary altar on the open ground in front of the platform.

“All right. If it involves the mine and corruption, then it’s not my job anymore,” the old man finally gave up his stubbornness. He shrugged, put away the shotgun, and turned toward the cemetery path. Then he looked back and called to the tall and short men in black: “Come. I’ve got some hot tea in my little hut. You can warm up by the fire. The cemetery at night is even colder than outside.”

The two men in black exchanged a look, then followed the old man and said casually: “Thank you for the hospitality, old mister.”

The old caretaker and the two men in black left. By the corpse platform, only the thin?lipped woman in black and the other, thin and silent man remained.

And one coffin, now quiet.

Duncan lay quietly inside the coffin. He thought over his talk with the warden and tried to guess where these uninvited guests had come from.

This landing trip to Frostholm really was not like the last time in Pland. It did not look very smooth, but it had its own kind of fun.

The only thing that displeased him was this body’s poor performance.

He lifted his hand inside the coffin and watched a tiny green flame dance at his fingertip, lighting up the cramped space.

Luckily, the fire of his spirit form was not affected at all.

In the wavering green light, he saw cheap, low?grade planks, coarse linen lining, and the coffin lid covered in dense runes. In the middle of those runes sat a triangular sigil – it should be the mark of Bartok, God of Death.

Those runes and that emblem were clearly not some “fine handmade work”. They were probably stamped on directly by machine. The effect was about the same anyway.

Duncan pricked up his ears again and listened carefully to the sounds outside the coffin.

The coffin was thin and not well sealed. He could clearly hear people talking outside. Just now, he had heard the warden and two of the visitors walking away. Now he heard faint rustling sounds, as if the people who had stayed behind were moving around near the coffin.

What are they going to do?

The woman in black stopped arranging the altar in front of the corpse platform.

She stood up and glanced toward the path where the warden had left. After she made sure the stubborn old caretaker had gone far away, she spat on the ground, then walked toward the coffin.

She stepped right over the “altar” she had just set up, not caring about it at all. The herbal powder and the clay dish that held the oil were kicked aside with one careless swing of her foot.

The silent man in black had already reached the coffin. He gave his gatekeeper’s cane a shake. A metal hook popped out from the end of the cane, turning it into a crowbar.

“Hold on,” the woman in black raised a hand to stop her partner, then came up to the coffin and knocked on the lid with her knuckles. “Still there?”

“Ah, yes,” Duncan answered at once. “Do you need something?”

The woman in black frowned, looking a bit puzzled, but her face quickly turned blank again. “Do you know who you are?” she asked.

“…No idea,” Duncan lied smoothly. “In fact, I’m still confused. I don’t know how I ended up here. Just now, a warden from the cemetery told me I’m already dead and will be burned in three days… What in the world happened? And who are you?”

“Ah, we’re here to help you,” the woman in black said lightly. “You don’t want to be burned, do you?”

“Of course not. Frostholm’s winter is really cold, but warming up in a crematorium sounds a bit too challenging. Are you going to let me out?”

“Your jokes are as cold as this night, mister,” the woman in black laughed. “Of course we’ll let you out. Then you only need to come with us, and you won’t have to worry about anyone giving you trouble again.”

“Then thank you very much,” the voice in the coffin said politely.

The woman in black put away her smile and stepped back half a step. She nodded to the silent man holding the crowbar: “Pry it open.”

The silent man stepped forward at once. With a squeak and creak of wood, the not?so?sturdy coffin was soon forced open. Then he gave the lid a push with the gatekeeper’s cane, shoving the dark board all the way aside.

The plank slid off the platform and fell heavily onto the gravel.

The woman in black raised a finger in a hush gesture. At the same time, a hoarse, low murmur came from her throat, a sound that did not seem human at all.

As she made this gesture, the coffin lid hit the ground without making any sound. In the blink of an eye, the heavy plank turned into drifting black dust and disappeared silently into the veil of night.

Then the man and woman in black lifted their heads and looked into the now wide?open coffin.

A pale man with large hands and feet, wearing a dark brown coat, sat up inside and looked back at them in curiosity.

After a long moment, a faint smile appeared on Duncan’s face. He sighed softly: “Ah, things do seem to be getting interesting.”

“What did you say?” The woman in black frowned. Then she quickly hardened her face and spoke in a low voice that seemed to carry a strange power: “Climb out and leave this place with us at once.”

“No hurry,” Duncan said, still sitting in the coffin. He smiled and shook his head. “The chains on you are really something – and your Abyssal demons are quite something too. I thought only Dog came with that kind of thing.”

The man and woman in black both froze. The next second, they showed clear shock. The thin?lipped woman even took half a step back without thinking. She stared hard at Duncan sitting in the coffin, shock and caution in her eyes: “You can see through our disguise?!”

“Disguise?”

Duncan raised his eyebrows and let his gaze sweep over the two in front of him.

The woman wore a dark dress. Her face was thin and mean. Between her neck and collarbone, a pitch?black chain grew out. The chain was clearly part of her body, as if it extended straight from her bones. Its end was linked to an ugly monster bird, its whole body twisted together from black bone plates.

Black smoke rose from the monster bird. It perched steadily on the woman’s shoulder. Two bloody holes in its skull stared fixedly at Duncan, and every single bone plate on its body trembled faintly.

The other was a thin man in a thick gray?blue coat. A chain stretched straight out from his throat. The other end was linked to a huge jellyfish floating in the air. The jellyfish seemed to have no real body at all. Its whole form was made of drifting smoke. Deep inside it was a blood?red core that kept swelling and shrinking, writhing like a heart.

Black chains and eerie, smoke?wrapped creatures, bound together in a symbiotic pact.

Clearly, two Annihilators.

And both cultists now looked shocked.

“Ah, right, disguise,” Duncan said at last, as if the word had only just clicked in his mind. He then slowly rose from the coffin and carefully climbed down from the platform. His movements were very slow, because this body really did not work well. “Dog seems to have a talent for messing with perception and helping people in symbiotic pacts hide their identity. So this is your common trick, huh? But with all due respect, your disguise skills are really not that reliable. I haven’t seen a single time they didn’t go wrong…”

“Stop!” The woman cultist finally came back to her senses. She suddenly retreated several steps, then raised her hand and pointed at Duncan. The words that came from her throat seemed to mix with another low, rasping voice, as if another spellcaster were speaking through her: “I strip you of the ability to move. I order you to stop where you are!”

Duncan had just stepped off the platform. He took two more unhurried steps forward and looked curiously at the woman in the distance: “So this is the so?called ‘spell’ that Annihilators borrow from the mouths of demons?

“Well, to be fair, it is a bit more elegant than Shirley.

“But from the look of it, it still doesn’t work as well as Meteor Dog – at least that one can make me jump.”