Investigation Report of the Gods

At the instant the spell was uttered, a strange sensation followed.

Han Su felt as if his body slightly trembled—but it wasn’t a tremor in the sense of this physical space, but rather a conceptual shift along spatial depth.

To describe it in detail, one could understand the real world as a two-dimensional plane, where everyone lived atop this flat surface, never deviating from it. Yet, the recitation of the spell had pushed him slightly deeper into another layer of space.

And because he went just a little deeper, those on the two-dimensional plane saw him as a bit more faded.

It felt as though he had distanced himself a few millimeters from reality.

Along with this minor detachment, his Spiritual Power also seeped out through his right hand—though it was extremely faint, consuming very little, and naturally causing only minimal effects.

“Hmm?”

The Red Trench Coat’s hand had been resting on both Han Su and Miss Crow, just in case they lost control while reciting the spell, so she could pull them back into reality at any moment.

Although rare, there were indeed cases where individuals came into contact with Encrypted Spells for the first time and completely lost control during the first recitation—utterly removing their own presence, vanishing into some unknown dimension, never to be found again...

She clearly sensed Han Su’s shift and said with mild surprise, “To be able to stir a trace of Mysterious Power on your first recitation—quite a good performance.” “Better than her.”

As she spoke, she glanced at Miss Crow beside him and said, “She didn’t show the slightest reaction earlier. Just opening her mouth to chant was a struggle. Total slacker.”

Miss Crow’s face turned beet red, and her head drooped down.

Even Han Su felt a bit helpless: ‘Don’t keep raising kids with this kind of oppressive method, alright…’

He composed himself and asked, “Then what should I do next?”

“Practice.”

The Red Trench Coat looked at Han Su and said, “Practice over and over again until this spell is etched into your mind—so thoroughly that even uttering a single syllable allows you to recite the whole thing.”

Han Su nodded seriously.

Since the Red Trench Coat had put it that way, he couldn’t let himself be compared to a slacker like Miss Crow. He calmed himself and began practicing the spell repeatedly.

At first, he was cautious, worried that his Spiritual Power was too immense and might alert the Red Trench Coat. But soon, he realized that there was no need for such concerns.

As long as he didn’t recite the spell Gods descend with their divine decree, his Spiritual Power not only didn’t seem vast, it even appeared quite average.

Only the crevice in his right hand leaked a slight trace of Spiritual Power to help him manifest the spell. Meanwhile, the colossal and boundless Spiritual Power in his mind was like a dead sea—utterly motionless.

It was a strange feeling—so long as he didn’t chant that spell, he was just an ordinary person.

Even when facing Mysterious Power Training, he was still ordinary—he had to work even harder just to earn the Red Trench Coat’s praise.

Of course, one thing that wasn’t ordinary was how the Red Trench Coat seemed worried he might lose control while practicing the spell. But in truth, Han Su felt no such danger. He couldn’t even sense a hint of risk from the spell—it felt as safe as living in a vault.

Afterward, he remained in the base, relentlessly practicing.

For the first few days, he focused solely on this one spell and did sense some progress—but all on a technical level.

After devoted training, he’d grown accustomed to feeling a resonance with the Mysterious Power after each recitation—accustomed to the sensation of his presence being slowly extracted from reality.

But the degree of extraction still wasn’t enough. While he could partially erase his presence, if someone met his gaze directly, it was still easy to detect him.

And whenever the Red Trench Coat looked his way, his Spiritual Power would instantly be drained, leaving him with nowhere to hide.

“That’s just how this spell works.”

The Red Trench Coat smiled and said, “To lower your presence, don’t provoke attention. The more distracted your target is, the easier it is for you to disappear.”

“And you need to avoid people with strong mental activity. Usually, just a sliver of Spiritual Power is enough for you to go unnoticed, but when faced with someone mentally powerful, you’ll burn through your energy in an instant and still be seen.”

“There are even high-level beings—just approaching them will forcibly drain your Spiritual Power. Hiding in their presence? Impossible.”

“……”

Han Su accepted this reality, but still wondered: What if he recited Gods descend with their divine decree first, activating that immense Spiritual Power in his mind—and then chanted this spell? What kind of change would that bring?

However, being inside the Disaster Management Bureau and under the Red Trench Coat’s nose, he naturally wouldn’t risk trying it.

Only after a week of persistent practice, during the intervals, Han Su also adapted to the Spiritual Penetration from his right hand with the accompaniment of Miss Crow, sensing the state of his Spiritual Activity.

Including several other spells that the Zero Sequence presented before him—though not practiced extensively—he had at least gained some understanding of them.

Overall, however, this was a very dull and tedious process. Han Su only felt that his progress was exceedingly slow. It was like playing a certain game repeatedly, but no matter how much he tried, he couldn’t reach a perfect rating.

“Already quite impressive.”

After quite a lengthy training period, the Red Trench Coat, watching him still tireless, also put away her usual mocking tone and consoled, “You’ve basically compressed what others accomplish in one to three months into just ten days.”

“I’ve never seen anyone so eager to master this life-saving spell.”

“Clearly it’s the most basic and simplest spell, and no matter how much you train, there won’t be significant improvements, yet you keep repeating it over and over. Don’t you ever get bored?”

“……”

Han Su was slightly stunned, then could only shake his head with a smile, “No.”

“I would.”

The Red Trench Coat said, “At first I stayed with you to prevent you from losing control and disappearing. Now, seeing how smoothly things are going without any sign of instability, I don’t have to keep watch over you here anymore.”

“Besides this training, there’s another matter I need to ask you about.”

“That Investigator License left by your mentor, the Monster Investigator—don’t you really want it?”

As she spoke, her tone turned somewhat serious. “The Monster Investigator is dead. By convention, the license he left behind should be inherited by the assistant he trained.”

“His other assistant only has an Initial Rating of B-Level—unqualified, so he’s out. But there are quite a few others eyeing that license. You haven’t even asked about the Ghost Freight Truck incident. You’re not planning to just hand over this opportunity, are you?”

“……”

Hearing this, Han Su furrowed his brow slightly, “Giving it away? Of course not. But isn’t that grotesque thing notoriously difficult to deal with? Even with half of the Disaster Management Bureau’s forces mobilized, they still couldn’t catch it.”

“The rules have already been figured out.”

The Red Trench Coat shook her head. “That Grotesque Truck doesn’t actually have a high status level. It’s just hard to catch. So, it requires someone capable and willing to take a risk, using themselves as bait, in order to have a real chance to seal it.”

“What’s being tested now is simply whether you have the courage to make that leap.”

“……”

Han Su then glanced at Miss Crow. Others were keeping an eye on the Ghost Freight Truck situation for him, so he understood the details. Facing the Red Trench Coat’s question, he pondered slightly and said:

“I don’t mind giving it a try when I’m ready. But let’s talk about it in a couple of days.”

“After such an extended period of Mysterious Power Training, I’ve lost track of everything. I need to go home and rest first.”

The real reason, of course, was something he couldn’t reveal to the Red Trench Coat.

The Flickering was about to arrive.

……

……

“Will the Interval shorten again?”

That intuitive sense of foreboding kept pushing Han Su to practice the Zero Sequence spells relentlessly. The invisible pressure had already reached a peak.

According to Han Su’s layering theory, he would be abducted back around July 11. But he could only roughly estimate the date. There was still a variable—whether the Interval would shorten again.

If it did, then the Flickering would come even earlier.

Precisely due to this worry, he had chosen to return in advance and await the abduction.

The Investigator License, of course, was important too. But there was no way he would blindly act as bait to solve that matter just as the Disaster Management Bureau wished. More importantly, only by escaping this time could there be a future to speak of.

“The little guy sure knows how to keep calm…”

The Red Trench Coat looked at Han Su’s thoughtful expression. She didn’t know what he was thinking exactly but found him not bad. Despite knowing his competitors were already making moves, he still gave himself time to observe.

Impressed, she turned to look at Miss Crow again, then shook her head helplessly. “That one’s even calmer…”

After all this time practicing, all she managed was a mere body shiver…

She couldn’t bear to keep watching, shook her head, walked out of the training room, and then took out her phone and dialed a number, speaking plainly, “He left the base.”

“After this period of training, I can confirm he’s a highly talented individual, but I haven’t found any abnormalities in him.”

“Except…”

“…his desire to survive is extraordinarily intense!”

“……”

After she finished speaking, she waited for quite a while. Upon hearing something from the other end of the line, she nodded and said, “I’ll continue observing him. I also tried to bring up the topic, but he’s not willing to talk about the Ghost Freight Truck matter.”

“Perhaps he really has given up.”