988 Drowned in Blood (1/2)

Translated by XephiZ

Edited by Aelryinth

Mo Fan and Mu Ningxue proceeded to question the locals. Not just the shallow beach, a few other places close to a body of water also had similar incidents.

If they were murders committed by a serial killer, there had to be some similarities between the deaths, allowing them to identify the gender, occupation, or even a group of people that the killer was targeting.

The Drowning Curse might occur randomly to people living close to a beach, but it did not necessarily mean the victims were not related in some way. Mo Fan and Mu Ningxue wanted to find the key similarity between all the victims. Otherwise, they did not have any clues, apart from knowing that all the victims were killed by the strange curse.

They first went to visit the old man. If he had witnessed eight deaths so far, it was likely that he held some useful information.

The old man went ahead and told Mo Fan and Mu Ningxue a legend, something about presenting sacrifices to the ocean. The God of Sea was only willing to protect the people of the city once they gave it sacrifices.

The legend sounded like some pure bullshit to Mo Fan.

Anything about presenting sacrifices was pure nonsense, and anything that asked humans to sacrifice their lives was not worthy to be called a god, either. It was now the twenty-first century, science was the basis of every belief. Why would anyone still believe in superstitions?

”I've asked the families. The three victims that died this month were strangers to one another. I then looked at their photos, and realized that they were fairly tanned. Their families told me that they liked to swim,” Mo Fan said.

”They like swimming?” Mu Ningxue was confused.

”Hehe, I don't think it's useful, either,” Mo Fan shrugged.

After learning magic, Mo Fan realized he was more interested in using violence to settle disputes. He was no longer good at solving problems with his brain.

---

As they were walking along an alleyway filled with fresh flowers, Mo Fan saw a man walking toward them from the opposite direction. He was holding a bottle of beer in his hand, and seemed to be enjoying himself.

Soon, the man with the bottle of beer noticed Mu Ningxue walking toward him. His lips raised and he whistled at Mu Ningxue. His eyes were staring at Mu Ningxue's collar bones, and trying to probe deeper.

”Are you seriously ignoring my presence?” Mo Fan glared at the man and snapped in an unfriendly manner.

The man had quite a bad temper too, and snapped in return, ”Who do you think you are?”

”Piss off!” Mo Fan waved and shoved the man aside with the Space Element.

Mo Fan was going easy on the man, only trying to teach him a lesson.

To his surprise, the man was no ordinary human. He immediately summoned a Water Barrier to protect himself.

”Space Element? You're an Advanced Mage?” The man raised his brows. He immediately showed a whole new level of respect for Mo Fan.

”Aren't you going to leave yet?” Mo Fan said.

”It's just the Advanced Level...”

Mo Fan swung his hand again. He was not in the mood to listen to the asshole's crap!

Mo Fan did not go easy on the man after learning that he was a Mage too. The force rammed into the man, who failed to hold his ground this time. He immediately went flying across the alleyway.

He fell onto the ground. The beer bottle in his hand smashed into pieces too, leaving foam on the ground. The man was not really injured, and rose to his feet furiously. Knowing that he was no match for Mo Fan, he pointed his finger at Mo Fan and said, ”Kid, this is my territory! Just you wait, I'll make you kneel down and apologize to me!”

After saying that, he turned around and left. The alleyways were pretty complicated, so Mo Fan soon lost him even though he wanted to teach him a lesson.

”Coward!” Mo Fan found the fellow quite amusing.

”Just ignore him, it's no use wasting your time on a person like him!” Mu Ningxue did not agree with Mo Fan's approach.

”You're good-looking, so it's normal to catch people's attention, but he dared to act like a jerk and whistle! Not only was he disrespecting you, he was provoking me too! I'm already being very merciful, since I didn't beat all his teeth out,” Mo Fan declared firmly.

Mo Fan always had his reasons. Mu Ningxue was too lazy to argue with him. As a matter of fact, Mo Fan was pretty much a jerk to her too, if she compared him with the man!

---

Mo Fan and Mu Ningxue came to a residential area. It was the seventh family they were visiting.

If the only similarity between the victims was they liked to swim, Mo Fan suddenly felt like it was better to go back to the inn and take a nap...

As they arrived at the place and walked past the little garden full of wisterias, Mo Fan suddenly picked up a foul smell.

Mu Ningxue smelled it too, and immediately covered her nose. She was confused why the nice-looking garden would have such an unpleasant smell...

”Anyone home?” Mo Fan walked into the house and pushed the wooden door open.

”Anyone? The whole place stinks!” Mo Fan yelled.

There was still no response. Mo Fan and Mu Ningxue exchanged glances.