Dusk approached, and slanted sunlight spilled from the far end of the city, casting faint golden rays through the forest of high-rises. However, deep in the old town, surrounded by towering buildings where sunlight rarely reached, the narrow alley had already slipped into darkness.
The lingering dampness in the air and a faint chill felt out of place against the dry atmosphere outside the alley. Scattered ice shards, melting swiftly between the cracks in the pavement, served as a kind of "evidence," hinting that something unusual had recently occurred in this otherwise quiet street.
Several darting shadows zipped between the gaps of buildings, seemingly weightless as they leapt down from above and landed in a corner of the alley. Their edges trembled and quickly solidified into wolf-like shapes. These indistinct shadowy figures prowled and sniffed around the alley for a moment, then gradually gathered together. The leading shadow lifted its head and let out a loud howl toward the sky:
"Awooo…"
"Thunk!"
A stone struck the wolf's head squarely, cutting its howl short. A reprimanding voice echoed from the shadows of the buildings:
"Shut up! No howling in the city. And adding a 'woof' at the end doesn't make it better! Humans aren't idiots. No one's going to believe you're a dog!"
The conjured wolf-shadows gave a few sheepish whimpers and quickly backed off obediently. From not far away, a petite figure approached.
It was a short-haired girl dressed in a black skirt and a dark red jacket. A single lock of hair curled upward on her forehead. She looked around sixteen or seventeen, but her expression was unusually calm and mature. She stepped out from the shadows and walked straight past the bowing wolves, her eyes landing on the male corpse lying by the roadside.
A faint shadow crossed her face. She crouched beside the body to examine it, while one of the wolves padded closer and relayed some information with a deep, rumbling growl.
"…The scent of recent rain?" the girl muttered, frowning slightly as she glanced up at the sky, which had remained clear and sunny for days. Though evening was approaching, the sky peeking between skyscrapers was still bright and blue with no sign of clouds. The only change was the fading sunlight.
After a moment, she seemed to realize something. She looked again at the gruesome wound on the man's chest and murmured to herself,
"…Rain. Heart. Smells like frog…"
Just then, her phone rang from the pouch on her hip, interrupting her thoughts. The ringtone was the theme song from the 1986 version of Journey to the West.
She answered before the monkey flipped a fourth somersault.
"Yeah, who is—oh, right, it's me." She pressed the phone to her ear, waved at the wolves to keep watch, and stepped aside. "I've arrived. My wolves picked up the anomaly here. No luck catching it, though. Came up empty."
She sighed, her gaze falling on the unfortunate corpse.
"It was 'Rain.' It created a physical entity - a 'Rain Frog.' But this rain was only a localized projection. It affected only one person. Yes, unlucky. A rain that fell for just one man. It had already stopped by the time I got here. The area has reverted to L0. The 'Rain' has detached from the boundary."
She paused. A voice from the phone seemed to be giving instructions or asking questions. She listened patiently for a while, then glanced again at the corpse nearby.
"…Medical team? Just send someone to collect the body. A regular person caught alone by a Rain Frog wouldn't survive—his heart's gone. Tsk. I'll stay and secure the scene. Don't forget to bill the overtime."
The voice on the phone, likely a middle-aged superior, continued droning on, but the girl had already lost her patience. She gave a few perfunctory replies before hanging up.
She sighed again, stepped back, called over one of the wolves standing guard, and sat down directly on its back. Propping her chin on her hands, she stared at the corpse of Darian.
"Poor guy. I wonder if he had any family… Died here all alone. Sigh. I'll keep you company for a bit. Dying in the 'Rain' must've been cold, huh? Shame I'm not that little match girl. Otherwise, I'd help you warm up on your way…"
She muttered quietly to herself, patiently waiting for the cleanup team to arrive. Before long, she heard the rumble of an engine from down the street. It was a thunderous roar that shook the ground, as if a heavy armored vehicle dragging a burning container was charging over ten consecutive speed bumps. Even the wolf beneath her flinched from the noise, nearly jumping up. It didn't, though, since she was still sitting on it.
Following the sound, the girl turned her head and saw a large van creaking and groaning as it emerged from the intersection. The way it trembled over the speed bumps made it look like something out of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Unhurriedly, the girl got up from the wolf's back, expressionless, and watched the van rattle across the bumps and stall. Then several burly men in black tactical gear, fully equipped with high-tech arms and armor, jumped out and began pushing the vehicle.
Behind them, a sturdy, dark-skinned middle-aged man in a brown jacket got out of the van, followed by a young woman in a white dress with shoulder-length brown hair. The two exchanged a resigned glance toward the teammates pushing the van before walking over.
As they approached, the short-haired girl couldn't help muttering,
"Seriously, can't your Second Team request a new vehicle? The Special Operations Bureau can't be that broke. I bet the gear on any one of you is worth more than that hunk of junk."
"Shh!" The stocky man quickly waved his hand and lowered his voice, glancing back at the stalled van and his struggling subordinates.
"Don't say that out loud. You don't know the situation. The Special Operations Bureau is… unique. This van just happens to be in bad shape today. Replacing it is absolutely not an option."
"A big organization sure comes with a lot of trouble," the short-haired girl muttered, curling her lip. She clearly wasn't very interested in the topic. She quickly turned to the petite woman in a white dress who had come along with the others. "Good afternoon, Dr. Elara. It's been a while."
"Technically, it's evening now, 'Little Red Riding Hood,'" the woman in white, addressed as Dr. Elara, replied with a faint smile. Her lips were thin, giving her an air of restraint and composure. "How's your injury from last time?"
"It's mostly healed," said the short-haired girl, also known as Little Red Riding Hood, flexing her right wrist. "You know how it is—wolves usually have strong regenerative abilities..."
"Humans actually have the strongest recovery abilities. It's just that people are often quite averse to getting hurt," Dr. Elara corrected her seriously.
"...Oh," the short-haired girl responded absentmindedly, clearly not interested in continuing that line of discussion. She shifted the topic back to the corpse on the ground. "Let's take a look here. Victim is male, appears to be in his twenties. Heart was taken by a Rain Frog. Time of death is approximately two hours ago. I haven't searched the body yet, so I'm not sure if he had any ID on him… Right, I left it untouched to preserve the crime scene."
As she spoke, she gave Dr. Elara a curious look. "You came all the way out here… Don't tell me you were planning to treat this? Is that even possible?"
"No. I'm not a god," Dr. Elara replied as she shook her head and crouched beside Darian's corpse. "I just came to take a look. I live nearby."
She examined the body for a while, checking the wounds first, then looking through the deceased's personal belongings. Soon, she located his ID.
"Victim's name is Darian. Twenty-four years old. Registered address is 66 Wutong Road, Old Town," she said, holding up the thin ID card and comparing the face on it to the body. "Captain Song, use the Bureau's equipment later to see if you can reach his family."
The stocky middle-aged man beside her gave a grunt of acknowledgment and leaned in to take a glance at the ID in her hand. His brows furrowed. "Why's the photo on this thing so blurry?"
Hearing that, Little Red Riding Hood leaned in curiously for a closer look at the ID found on the victim.
The photo section of the card looked as if it had been smeared with a layer of gray-black grime, obscuring the entire face. It was impossible to make out any details.
Dr. Elara rubbed the smudges with her fingers but couldn't clean them off. The grime was more stubborn than expected and had nearly covered the entire surface of the card.
"You can't even read the name clearly," Little Red Riding Hood muttered. "Can't see the ID number either. You'll have to take it back and use a machine to scan the chip."
Captain Song let out a helpless sigh. Nodding, he looked down at the ruined remains with a trace of regret. "What a shame. If we could've found the victim's ID clearly, it would've helped a lot… Right now, we've got too few leads."
Dr. Elara also nodded with a look of regret, her eyes falling on the faint bloodstains that had been nearly washed away by rain. "…With no body left behind, it's going to be very difficult to piece together what happened."
Little Red Riding Hood listened silently to their conversation, seemingly deep in thought. After a brief pause, she suddenly lifted her head and looked at the woman in the white dress beside her.
"Dr. Elara Good evening."
"Good evening, Little Red Riding Hood," Dr. Elara greeted her with a smile. "How's patrol duty?"
Little Red Riding Hood glanced around and gently patted the head of the nearest wolf. "There was a 'Rain' here. A physical 'Rain Frog' may have formed, but it doesn't look like there were any victims."
Dr. Elara looked relieved. "That's good to hear."
The sound of an engine starting came from nearby. The battered van chugged to life, and the engine noise gradually steadied. The few tactical officers who had been pushing the vehicle earlier came around the back, panting heavily. One of them stepped forward and called out,
"Captain Song, the vehicle's up and running. Should we…"
Captain Song nodded and walked over to join his team.
"Alright, let's head back to the Bureau. And don't forget to give Dr. Elara a lift."
(End of Chapter)
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