Monster - Chapter 47

Chapter 47: The Grim Reaper Wears a Maid Dress

"So, you guys all became villains because you have such tragic pasts~" Lou sat on the kitchen counter, looking with pity at the three monsters who had fallen silent after telling their stories.

"A story that would make men fall silent and women shed tears."

"The elderly would sigh, and children would shake their heads," Lou continued. This attitude made the monsters, who had been forced to bare their souls, feel deeply uncomfortable.

"...Are you trying to comfort them?" Miu rolled its eyes, thinking, Even if you were, this isn't the fucking way to do it.

"This is necessary humanitarian care. They didn't want to end up like this," Lou said righteously. But just as she finished, she saw a small red dot appear on Liu Wu's intact temple.

"Bang!" The glass door connecting the villa's kitchen to the courtyard exploded. Liu Wu's entire head exploded along with it. As shattered glass fell to the floor, his head splattered a mess of red and white liquid across the marble countertop.

"A sniper!" Miu shouted. The range of its "Island" was only a hundred meters in diameter, so it was impossible to detect a sniper two or three hundred meters away.

The moment she saw the red dot, Lou had ducked. Fortunately, she had anticipated this possibility before the interrogation and had positioned herself on the stove, which was in a sniper's blind spot.

"Bang! Bang!" Two more shots rang out. Lou knew the sniper had eliminated the other two captives. She grabbed the recorder from the countertop and ran toward the living room, dragging the rectangular black case behind her.

"Cars are suddenly closing in, surrounding us! Hiss… Do they know about my ability?" If they had approached the villa at a normal speed, Miu would have detected them. That was why it had deemed the night raid feasible—it could use the "Island" to sense enemies and allow them to escape long before being discovered.

But Miu hadn't expected this. It was as if the monsters had been waiting just outside the "Island's" range, swarming in the moment they heard the sniper shot.

This caught Miu completely off guard. It had clearly underestimated the NPCs of this Tower World. Now, it began to worry that both it and Lou would be killed here.

"Isn't this perfectly normal? We've had Sentinels and Guides killed here, and their bodies weren't even sent back to the Main World." Lou showed no sign of panic as she entered the living room and headed for the stairs.

"Wh-what's perfectly normal?" Miu couldn't process her words for a moment.

"The NPCs here have interrogated our people. Once they learned our identities, they most likely found out about our abilities." Lou didn't expect the captured Sentinels and Guides to keep their mouths shut; they were just "office workers" out to earn points, not martyrs.

"Fuck!" Miu cursed. It hadn't even considered that.

"Four at the front door, three at the back door from the kitchen. They've already climbed into the yard, and they're all carrying automatic rifles. Fuck!" Miu reported, cursing again. It felt extremely guilty. As a Guide, it was supposed to coordinate the entire operation. In a team, the Sentinel was the executor; the Guide was the one who made the plans and set the direction. Lou had been cooperative the whole time, but today, Miu had failed to manage the plan, trapping them both.

"At a time like this, there's only one thing to do: call the police." Like any law-abiding citizen, Lou solemnly put a Bluetooth earpiece in her ear, found a hiding spot on the second floor, and dialed Xing Meilu's number. She had gotten it from Lin Sandie during their last call.

Just as the call connected, a massive explosion erupted outside the villa.

"Someone tried to dismantle the bomb, but they failed," Miu said frantically. "There are two in the backyard now, plus the one in the monitoring room. That makes three."

"Hello~" Lou greeted Xing Meilu on the phone while simultaneously raising her gun and neatly shooting out the second-floor security camera.

The monitoring room door had been opened, meaning the enemy could get inside and see her position. No matter how skilled or bold she was, she disliked being watched while she worked.

"Who is this?" Xing Meilu, who had been groggy with sleep, sounded instantly alert after hearing the explosion on the other end of the line.

"Little Police Flower, I'm in a bit of a tight spot."

"Lou? Where are you?" On the other end of the line, Xing Meilu threw off her covers and got up, putting the phone on speaker and changing clothes without a moment's hesitation. Lin Sandie had told her at noon that Lou had asked for her number, but she hadn't expected a call this soon.

"Yunxi Villa Area in the West District. I'm surrounded by the same people who killed Xu Yao. Come and save me~"

"...I'll be there in about twenty minutes." Xing Meilu was speechless. She was going to arrest Lou, not rescue her.

"Twenty minutes might be too long. Can you make it five?" Lou tried to haggle.

"I'm not a miracle worker!" Xing Meilu yelled before hanging up. She immediately called Inspectorate headquarters, requesting a helicopter at top speed and assembling a team. She had no idea what Lou was planning, but she would never ignore a crime in progress.

After hanging up, Lou shouted down to the monsters gradually closing in on the first floor, "I am giving you a serious and solemn warning! I've already called the police!"

"Bang bang bang!"

Perhaps Lou possessed some special talent for drawing aggro. She had said only one sentence, and a volley of machine gun fire from downstairs was the immediate reply.

"HK416s? You guys really don't play fair. I only brought a handgun, and I've only got thirteen rounds left." Lou chattered on, making the veins on her attackers' foreheads throb. They looked ready to explode.

"Seven of you ganging up on one weak woman, how shameless!" Lou continued her accusations. The content of her words aside, her southern accent, which sounded almost like a coquettish whine, was utterly hair-raising in the tense atmosphere.

"Go," the lead monster said, gesturing forward. Two of his companions immediately advanced, with the others following close behind.

They advanced up the stairs to the second floor in a slow, orderly fashion. About two-thirds of the way up, the point man noticed an old-fashioned cell phone in the corner of a step. It was blinking with an ominous red light.

A soft "beep" sounded in the silent air as Lou's thumb pressed the screen of her own phone.

"It's a phone bomb!" someone yelled.

"BOOM!!!" The miniature bomb she'd gotten from the gangster instantly detonated. In that same moment, Lou appeared at the top of the stairs, gun pointed downward, looking down on the monsters who had been sent diving for cover by the explosion.

The hem of the grim reaper's maid dress fluttered gently in the swirling gunsmoke.

"Bang, bang, bang." Her pitch-black eyes were like obsidian. Lou fired in rapid succession, precisely gunning down every monster who dared set foot on the stairs to get closer to her.

Miu was so moved it was on the verge of tears. In that moment, Lou seemed larger than life, a beacon of hope for their survival.

"How many more monsters are outside?" Lou asked. Her eyes had been pitch-black, in a constant scanning mode, ever since she entered the villa. It allowed her to distinguish monsters from ordinary people.

Of the seven vanguards who had entered the villa, five had been gunned down on the stairs. The remaining two, frightened by the bomb, had retreated outside.

While asking, Lou descended a few steps. The bodies of the monsters she had killed were scattered across the half-destroyed staircase. She picked up a fallen HK416 automatic rifle, checked the ammo, and retreated back to the second floor.

"Eight more have arrived at the front door. There are five at the back, including the two who just retreated. And on the west side, two are climbing the drainpipe, trying to get to the second floor from outside."

"I'm out of bombs," Lou said, checking the black case. Only interrogation tools remained; there was nothing left for combat.

"What do we do?" Miu asked.

"If I die, just pretend you're a brooch and find a chance to escape, you stupid crow." Lou closed the black case and kicked it aside, bantering with Miu as she always did. But this time, Miu couldn't laugh or even curse back.

"...Our abilities are too suppressed by 'Thus Have I Heard.' If only, if only..." Miu was immensely frustrated, feeling it had let Lou down. Because its true form was a crow, it had always worked exceptionally hard as a Guide. After its original partner's accidental death, few Sentinels were willing to pair with it, despite its excellence. Ultimately, it had been forced to take a temporary partnership with Lou, a Dark Sentinel who didn't even need a Guide.

It had always wanted to prove it could work perfectly with this notoriously difficult Sentinel and complete their missions. It never imagined it would be the one to put them in such a vulnerable position.

"Call me Papa, and I'll fight our way out," Lou said, taking the little rabbit charm off her phone and putting it in another pocket as she continued to tease Miu.

"Piss off!" The veins on the previously dejected Miu's forehead throbbed. "I'm in no mood for your jokes right now."

It knew that for a Guide on a mission, facing the myriad threats of the Tower Worlds, death could come in an instant. But it really didn't want to die yet.

Suddenly sensing something, Miu shouted, "They're about to throw tear gas up here!"

The words had barely left its beak when a small metal canister landed on the floor. Before the smoke could even begin to spread, Lou unhesitatingly raised her handgun and shot it. The impact of the bullet sent the smoking tear gas canister flying to the far end of the second-floor hallway.

"Fuck!" Lou heard one of the monsters downstairs yell.

Lou saw the canister was already smoking. Even though she'd knocked it far away and delayed the effects, the longer she stayed put, the more likely she was to be overcome by the gas.

Lou leaned out and tossed her smartphone down into the living room.

"Another phone bomb! Get back!" one of the monsters yelled. Thoroughly spooked by the last surprise phone bomb on the stairs, the monsters who had been about to charge immediately scattered and dove for cover.

Lou reappeared in their line of sight. Standing on the second-floor landing, she raised the automatic rifle and, with a calm expression, unleashed a precise spray of bullets on the monsters below as they scrambled to avoid her phone.

The Grim Reaper's scythe swung once more.

"Papa..." At that moment, tears streamed down Miu's face.

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