The Eerie Camp

As dusk fell, the crimson moon began to rise.

Accompanied by the crisp ringing of carriage bells, the long convoy moved slowly along the mountain valley.

The surroundings grew increasingly dark, with only the gas lanterns hanging at the front of the carriages emitting a sickly pale light.

Lynch, of course, would not tell them the truth. After the warnings from the two women, he became even more vigilant, carefully hiding his true self while cautiously calculating the potential flaws in these people.

They did not seem to have noticed anything. They were a group of professionals who enjoyed the game of code-breaking; even the unsociable Salin contributed quite a few ideas. Unfortunately, lacking the key elements, they could not break through the objective limitations and ultimately yielded no results.

In the end, everyone lost interest. Accompanied by the monotonous sound of bells and hooves, they drifted toward sleep in the jolting carriages. But just as Lynch began to drowse, he suddenly realized that faint lights were flickering in the darkness ahead.

"We've arrived."

The driver's call woke the half-asleep passengers. He immediately held his gas lantern high and waved it toward the back, and soon, cheers erupted from the convoy behind.

The bumpy journey finally ended; their destination, Split Ridge Valley, had been reached.

It was a valley covering several square kilometers. The environment was desolate, yet a collection of simple buildings had already been erected. Though they were called simple, to Lynch, they looked better than many of the shacks inhabited by the poor in the Crown District.

It was said that this had once been a forward survey station for the Norin-Rhine Railway. Later, during the surveys, many accidents occurred, resulting in over twenty deaths, and strange things were discovered in the mountains, leading to the abandonment of the route.

However, the survey camp had 'conveniently' remained for the archaeological team to use during these few days.

On one side of the valley was a small lake, and on the other was a large open space enclosed by a fence, where three rows of houses had been built in a U-shape.

At this moment, a bonfire had been lit in the center of the three rows of houses, with a grill set up beside it. A poor, fat sheep hung on the rack, already roasted to a crisp golden brown. The aroma drifted in all directions, caught by the convoy long before they even neared the fence, causing Karl Jones and the burly, bearded Jack to howl in anticipation, while even the refined Rooney felt his throat work in involuntary response.

Behind the bright bonfire, warm light shone from the three rows of houses. The windows and the ground showed clear signs of having been cleaned; it seemed Mayor Howard had arranged for personnel to tidy the site in advance.

After jolting for several hours, what could be more enticing than clean rooms, a warm bonfire, and fragrant food?

Large barrels of fine wine, of course.

From a distance, several large barrels were stacked near the bonfire, and just looking at them, one could almost smell the pungent, rich fragrance of wine.

This forced even Lynch to admit that, purely in terms of treatment, Howard was a decent employer. At the very least, he provided the best accommodations throughout and was thoughtful. In comparison, a factory owner like Chairman Grant, who squeezed his employees for every drop of effort, was far worse.

"Haha, we've arrived. Let us thank our generous Mayor."

Karl Jones whistled toward the camp from afar to notify those inside. Before the carriages had even neared the fence, he turned to the group and said:

"Everyone, settle in first, eat a good meal, and enjoy yourselves to celebrate our official start. We finish promptly at eleven. Dr. Jenna will host a strategy meeting, and after that, everyone should get a good rest; we depart early tomorrow morning. Ideally, we should solve the problem in one day. If that proves impossible, it cannot exceed three days, or the ritual will fail. Dr. Jenna, is this arrangement acceptable?"

The doctor had already tucked away that strange black notebook and nodded indifferently. The silent tacit understanding between them made Lynch narrow his eyes in thought, though he said nothing.

Because he was considering another problem.

The whistle had been blown, the convoy had reached the gate, so where were the people there to greet them? Why hadn't they come to open the gate?

Could they have fallen asleep waiting too long? But with such a massive project, surely more than one person had been sent; it was impossible for all of them to be asleep.

Karl Jones frowned, jumped off the carriage first, rushed over in a few steps to open the gate, and signaled for the convoy to enter. He then caught the rapier thrown by Dr. Jenna from behind, gripped the scabbard, and approached the fire.

No one said a word, but the joy of finally arriving vanished in an instant. A layer of gloom already clouded Lynch's heart.

Something is not right.

It shouldn't be that trouble started the moment we arrived.

The carriages stopped by the bonfire, and the others silently jumped off. Dr. Jenna waved to arrange for the other vehicles to enter, while the other five, including Lynch, consciously gathered by the bonfire.

The timing was perfect; the sheep was aromatic, the temperature was just right, and the bonfire was burning brightly, likely having been lit not long ago.

The barrels indeed contained wine—red, beer, and spirits were all there. The beer was still frothing, meaning it could not have been opened for more than fifteen minutes.

His gaze swept across the ground; there were no signs of a struggle, no bloodstains. It was as normal as could be.

But where were the people?

Big-Nosed Jack twitched his nose repeatedly but ultimately shook his head. The reclusive Salin muttered to himself, also finding nothing.

A soft sound came from across the bonfire as Karl emerged from the barracks, sword in hand, shaking his head at the expectant gazes of the group.

The camp was completely empty.

"There is no scent of blood," Jack Adams reported in a low voice, avoiding the workers who were disembarking one after another.

"And no trace of arcane power," Salin added coldly.

"Strange. Where could they have gone? We expected six workers to be here to meet us," Karl Jones pondered with a frown. "They couldn't have just packed up and left, could they?"

"Impossible. These people clearly left just now," Rooney immediately negated. "I observed carefully when we entered; there is only one road we traveled. If they had left the mountains, we surely would have encountered them, unless they went the other way."

"That leads into the deep mountains. They have no reason to go in there."

Dr. Jenna had already settled the workers. These ordinary people, unaware of what had transpired, thought everything was normal and were happily assigning rooms. Only the seven members of the archaeological team gathered by the bonfire with gloomy expressions:

"Could it be that just before we arrived, they all suddenly died?"

The camp was still that cozy camp, but it was now as eerie as it had previously been worth anticipating. Six living people had vanished into thin air, as if eaten by the camp, without a single warning.

Huff, is this to welcome my arrival? Even disguised like this, I cannot escape a mysterious pursuit?

Realizing that this was no time to hide his abilities, Lynch sighed, raised his round fan, and began to pace around the bonfire in the camp.

【Authority, Death, Ability, Death Omen.】

He could see the scenes of death from the past twenty-four hours in the vicinity; the closer the time, the clearer the scene.

As the ability activated, his pupils turned pure white. Before Lynch, the world was only black and white. Countless black threads crawled across the edges of his vision, and gloomy, eerie whispers reached his ears.

"The aura of death does not permeate this place. They did not die, at least not here."

After circling the camp, Lynch shook his head regretfully. Dr. Jenna and Karl sighed helplessly, just about to speak, when they saw the look behind the round fan change.

"Wait, no."

Lynch noticed that while he indeed saw no death scenes before him, his consciousness felt that a certain direction was faintly worth expecting. It must be another strange amplification brought by divine authority. Without further hesitation, Lynch maintained the Death Omen ability, gestured for them to follow, and circled to the back of the camp.

Beyond the camp was a forest, but it was not deep—only a few dozen meters. Emerging from it, the view opened up to a bare, steep cliff.

The moment he neared the cliff, light and shadows flashed before his eyes.

Six figures, for reasons unknown, were sprinting at full speed before one after another slamming into the cliff wall.

One of them, perhaps not fast enough, did not die on the first impact and actually crawled to the side of the cliff to bash their head repeatedly until they were completely still.

Hiss, damn it. Another one of these mindless self-mutilations. Damn mystery, if you have the ability to make me see something even more bizarre, I'll be convinced.

As it turned out, it did.

When Lynch canceled the ability and his vision returned to normal, he suddenly froze.

Because before him, everything in front of the cliff was perfectly normal.

Not only were there no corpses, but there were not even bloodstains or brain matter.

On the cliff, and in the mud on the ground, everything was as clean as if all of it had been a hallucination.