The ruthless morning wind howled into the open door on the west side of the temple, blowing over the two human skeletons lying side by side on the ground—the whole body was covered with tattered yellow and rancid strips of cloth, and a blood-stained body was placed between the corpses. And patches, dirty dolls.
The puppet's two dark button eyes stared straight at the empty ceiling, as if silently telling a secret.
Carl wiped the sweat from his forehead and turned his eyes to the three temple administrators who were stunned beside him.
Facing the results of their hard work all night, their silence has been maintained for five minutes, and the shock on their faces is not like a disguise, or their acting skills are amazing.
Carl coughed and pulled the three people's attention back from the corpse. "As I guessed before, the corpse was buried underground and used as nutrients to give birth to two night demon spirits."
"Night spirit?" The priestess looked at the witcher with a questioning expression.
"If a person dies with strong unwillingness, resentment, and anger, and dies very painfully, the soul may turn into a nocturnal spirit beside his corpse, or some belongings with deep emotions, and they will follow along with him. Appearing in the moonlight, stationed in a certain place, venting endless resentment against the nearby beings, torturing and killing them, and creating more of the same kind. As long as the corpse is buried in it for one day, the night demon cannot be completely eliminated!"
Carl paused and carefully observed the expressions of the three, but he couldn't see any guilt or guilty conscience, only normal fear.
"As expected of a professional, he found the source of the trouble in one night! It's blasphemous for such a dirty thing to stay in the temple for an extra minute!" Daisy complimented and took a deep breath, "It's not the right thing to do. Chi, how should we purify them now? Burn them in a fire, or transport them into the woods to be buried, and throw them into the river?"
"Don't worry, purification is not as easy as you think." Arkham sneered when he heard this, and exchanged glances with Carl.
The fox's tail is finally exposed.
When a corpse appears at home, shouldn't the first reaction of a normal person be to find out the root cause? She was in a hurry to destroy the corpse.
"Before I start, I have some questions to ask for advice. The temple is not a cemetery in the wilderness, and the sage Lebihouda is not the god of death—"
He raised his voice, his face was stern, his voice was thunderous, his eyes were terrifyingly bright,
"How can corpses be buried under the cellar, and what is the relationship between the dead and you? What about the puppets? You denied it to me at first, swearing and swearing that no one has died below!"
The three of them were taken aback by the gesture of asking for guilt.
The priestess's face turned snow-white, and she retreated to the center of the two big men beside her, and then said solemnly, "In my memory, no one has ever died in the temple, and I don't know them!"
"Really, why do I think you can't remember? How about I help you recall your memories?" Arkham squatted down and held up the white pelvis on the left with both hands. The pelvis is wide and short, and the pelvic wall is smooth and thin. Round mouth, wide front and back…
He quickly concluded,
"The deceased was a woman!"
He looked at the overall outline of the skeleton, grabbed the skull again, rubbed the yellowed teeth with his fingertips, and turned the black skeleton's eyes towards the three, as if asking a silent question, "Age between 10 and 15 years old, the time of death... unclear."
The judgment of the time of death is too affected by the environment, and the young witcher is too inexperienced to draw a definite conclusion.
The three of them didn't respond. Arkham continued to check and exclaimed.
"Ribs, leg bones, and arm bones suffered multiple fractures due to external pressure..."
"There is a row of circular paw prints on the sternum, extending from the left clavicle to the right floating rib, with four toes, not a canine... nor an ogre... some kind of big cat?"
Arkham's expression quietly became solemn, and the murderer was not a human being, which meant that there was another inside story about the demon spirit.
"The left shoulder was bitten by sharp teeth. There are twenty-five to thirty teeth in a row in the tooth marks. The length and bite force of the teeth are quite amazing."
"According to this analysis, the killer is bigger than a cheetah."
The three managers held their breath, looked at each other, and their expressions became extremely wonderful.
The two witchers took a deep breath at the same time, and a terrifying and bloody image emerged in their minds—a large beast with a streamlined body similar to a feline suppressed the thin little girl, biting and ravaging frantically.
And she wailed, her bones shattered, her body spasmed, and the blood splattered from her wounds turned into blooming roses, dyeing the clothes and the ground red.
Her screams and roars became lower and lower, and the blood pooled in a pool of blood, and she finally swallowed in agony.
But the traces on the corpse didn't stop there.
Carl glanced at the waist of the skeleton, reached out and touched it, and actually pulled a "rope" from it.
A large section is milky white, and a small area is reddish brown after being infected with blood and air-dried.
About the thickness of an index finger, if you look closely, you can see that the rope is covered with dense fine fluff, and when you squeeze it, it is a little sticky.
Grasp the ends with both hands and stretch vigorously, showing strong toughness and elasticity.
"What is this?" Carl looked at his companion suspiciously.
"Spider web!" Arkham gasped and guessed, "Ordinary spiders can't sew such thick webs. Could it be that there used to be a transfiguration spider in this cellar?"
The shape-shifting spider is about the size of a calf, has amazing speed and bounce, can spit venom and super sticky webs, and can easily prey on lions, even a Skellige man.
The priestess tightened her pretty face, her expression gloomy in the shadows.
"This is impossible, Povis has a cold climate and does not belong to the habitat of transfiguration spiders." Carl immediately denied this speculation, "Even if this is aside, if they lived in the temple, the children would have been made into human flesh pouches long ago. , full of spider eggs. So I think it's more likely to be some kind of mutant, giant arachnid creature."
Gollum.
The clear sound of swallowing saliva sounded one after another.
The word "human-flesh pouch" made the two big men and the priestess shiver with chills and goosebumps all over their bodies.
Arkham confirmed the expressions of the three with the corner of his eye, and then turned his gaze to the more petite bones on the left. "Girl...younger, the same cracks on the surface of the bones...a few cobwebs."
After speaking, he fell into a long silence.
First, the big cat with sharp teeth and claws, and then the mutant arachnid. How much sin and pain did these two poor children have to suffer before they died? ,
That's why they turned into night demons, lingering around.
But why were they the only ones killed, while the rest of the temple were safe
It stands to reason that such a big thing can't just kill two little girls and sneak away silently.
Arkham had all kinds of doubts in his heart, and he couldn't figure it out for the time being.
"Ms. Daisy, for the sake of saying that, haven't you remembered anything?"
"There are two deceased people at home, and you are the temple stewards but you don't know it? Isn't this talking nonsense with your eyes open? Is this reasonable?"
"answer my question!"
"My words are not half false. The big spiders and big cats in the mouths of the two are completely unheard of!" The priestess licked her dry and cracked lips, raised her head and shook her head stubbornly, "If they ever appeared in the temple, they would have to be created. What a commotion, so many eyes must have seen it, this terrible news must have been spread in every household in Songlin District!"
Arkham rolled his eyes, lost in thought. Along the way, they never heard any relevant rumors.
"You don't think we have anything to do with the murderer, do you?" the bald man asked in surprise and anger.
"Only the gods know the answer."
Arkham muttered softly.
Dino defended with a red face,
"The two Your Excellencies are clear, this poor child died with nothing to do with us! If we killed them, how dare we lead the two masters down and help you find the body, this is not me Dig a hole and jump in?"
Carl nodded.
"I have always regarded the children as my relatives, and I treat them with all my heart and heart, and give them meticulous care and care. I am reluctant to beat them or scold them on weekdays. How can I hurt them?" Daisy blinked innocently and beautifully. Eyes, "When I served the prophet in the temple, there were eighteen children from beginning to end, one is not many!"
Arkham thought for a while, looked at Carl, and silently said the word Dharma Seal with his lips twitching.
The latter shook his head.
The two are young and vigorous, and the most diligently practiced seals are Igni and Alder. Axie, who is confused, can't learn at home. It's okay to be temporarily absent-minded, but not enough for torture.
What's more, Roy once warned them not to use the hypnotic seal on the devout believers, otherwise there will be unpredictable dangers.
"Calm down, the three have misunderstood. We don't think you have any connection with the murderer. The two of us are witchers, not vigilantes or sheriffs. We have no obligation or interest in judging humans!"
Carl paced around,
"We just want to complete the mission and find the two murdering monsters! Only by solving them can we purify the bones smoothly. If we can't find the right medicine before tonight—"
Carl deliberately threatened,
"The night demon will make a comeback."
In fact, as long as the bones are taken away, the demon spirits will naturally leave the temple at night, but the three of them didn't know the inside story, and their expressions changed drastically in an instant.
"I repeat, we have been guarding the temple for the past six months, and we have never seen the so-called big spider or big cat beast you call it."
The priestess gritted her teeth and said,
"So these two corpses can only be bad debts left by the priest Xinni."
"Then tell me about this priest carefully. Did she leave a warning or a written record of only a few words before she went out? Hurry up!"
The priestess pondered for a moment and began to speak in detail.
"Mother Xinni has always been a good person..."
Dino and Bruzzi interjected from time to time to add.
Arkham listened for a while, and felt that it was pointless to ask, so he gave Carl a look, looked at the children outside the door, and put the puppet in his arms.
"Let's talk first, I'll go out to pee and feed the horses, so as not to ruin Wilt and Scorpion with thirst!"
The priestess turned to look at the back of the witcher stepping into the courtyard.
She continued to speak as if she had not seen it.
…