Taboo Mage - Chapter 210 - The Dark Energy on the Rooftop

I turned my head and looked at the tightly shut door. Inside, there were two people: a seemingly respectable gentleman and a benevolent-looking old lady.

But should I really trust what my eyes could see?

“Boss Gu! Come quickly!”

Suddenly, a loud shout came from within the room. I hurried over, pushed the door open, and what greeted me was the scene of Old Lady Xu tightly clutching Xu Benzhang’s arm, her dentures digging fiercely into his flesh, producing a gurgling sound from her throat.

It sounded like the warning growl of an angry dog.

I took a talisman paper out of my backpack and quickly walked over, pressing the talisman onto the old lady’s back.

Instantly, she fell silent. Zhou Qifang followed up, pulling Xu Benzhang out from under the old lady, then pressing the call button by the bedside.

About five minutes later, doctors and nurses from the sanatorium hurried in with a tray. Seizing the opportunity while everyone was distracted, I quietly removed the rune from Old Lady Xu’s back.

She immediately regained consciousness, struggled a bit, but was firmly pressed down by the nurses. The doctor then injected a sedative, and she quickly went limp and was asleep in the blink of an eye.

Seeing that the old lady was finally calm, I sighed in relief and signaled Zhou Qifang to come outside with me, while Xu Benzhang remained in the room, being treated for the bite wounds on his arm.

Once outside, Zhou Qifang asked what I had discovered.

I pointed him to the dark energy that had been lingering on the rooftop and noticed that it had transformed into the shape of a large, gaping dog head.

“Think about it. What did the dark energy look like when we first came in?” I asked, staring at the dark mass on the rooftop.

Zhou Qifang closed his eyes, considered for a moment, and replied, “It didn’t seem to have any shape.”

“Exactly! It had no shape earlier, but now that the old lady has bitten Xu Benzhang, the dark energy has taken on this dog-like appearance. What do you think-did the old lady bite first, or did that mass of dark energy change shape first?”

Zhou Qifang remained silent, squinting at the dark energy on the rooftop. After a while, he suddenly smirked and said, “Interesting. Looks like this trip wasn’t a waste after all.”

With that, Zhou Qifang quickly returned to the room, grabbed his backpack, and started climbing the stairs towards the top floor.

I quickly followed behind him. As I hurried up the stairs, I suddenly lost my footing and nearly tumbled down from the top.

Fortunately, I was agile enough. Just as my rear was about to hit the ground step, I quickly braced myself against the walls and railing, stabilizing my position in an instant.

“Phew… that was close…”

I exhaled deeply, slowly lowering my center of gravity. Seeing that Zhou Qifang’s figure had already vanished around the corner, I didn’t rush to catch up with him. After all, we were just heading to the rooftop; it wouldn’t make much difference if I took a moment.

I sat down on the steps to take a break. As I leaned my palms on the floor, I suddenly felt something sticky on my hands. Frowning, I looked down at my palms.

“What is this? So disgusting.”

There was a lump of something soft and gooey on my hand, resembling mucus. A wave of nausea washed over me, and I quickly wiped it against the wall beside me.

It wasn’t that I didn’t care about the public environment; it was just that the substance was too revolting for me to tolerate even for a second.

“What in the world is this! I’ve cleaned so many times already, and there’s still more!”

Suddenly, I heard a voice of complaint from above.

I peeked up to see a cleaner in a light blue uniform. She was using a mop to clean up the sticky substance on the floor.

I hurriedly stood up and stepped aside to let her pass. As she walked by, still complaining, she looked at me and said, “Be careful going up and down the stairs! I don’t know what’s going on, but there’s always this sticky stuff in this building. It never seems to come clean!”

I smiled and asked, “What exactly is it? I just stepped in it and almost fell down.”

The cleaner shrugged. “I have no idea. It’s never happened before; it’s only shown up recently.”

I nodded, ready to continue the conversation, when suddenly I heard Zhou Qifang’s voice from above.

“Gu Qingshu! Get up here! What are you dawdling for?”

“Sorry, my friend is calling me,” I replied hastily before rushing up the stairs. The building wasn’t very tall; being a sanatorium, it housed either elderly residents or those with disabilities, so it only had five floors.

Xu Benzhang’s mother just happened to live on the third floor. I had originally thought there were two more floors above.

To my surprise, when I reached the top, I found that while the fourth floor had some living quarters, the fifth floor was filled with several abandoned storage rooms, along with a few that had been set aside for doctors and nurses to rest.

There were no patients on the entire fifth floor.

The staircase leading to the rooftop was located in a corner of the fifth floor; there was no elevator, just the stairs.

Zhou Qifang was standing at the top of the stairs, waving at me. When I caught up, I noticed he had already made it to the rooftop, so I hurried to follow him.

Once I was on the rooftop, I could feel the dark energy up close.

To my surprise, the dark energy was tangible. When I reached out and poked it, my finger actually sunk into it.

“What’s going on?” I quickly pulled my hand back, looking at Zhou Qifang in astonishment.

Zhou Qifang shook his head and pulled out a bag of glutinous rice from his backpack. He then tossed some into the dark energy, and instantly, there was a sound of popping above us, reminiscent of firecrackers going off during New Year celebrations.

I covered my ears and saw that the dark energy, where the glutinous rice had landed, revealed a few small holes. However, the dark energy was too thick for the rice to penetrate further.

“It seems like this stuff is really sinister,” I said, frowning. “Should we call Jue Chi to take a look?”

“Are you planning to keep meddling in this?” Zhou Qifang raised an eyebrow, smiling at me.

I gave him a perplexed glance. “What’s wrong? Aren’t you going to stay involved?”

Zhou Qifang crossed his arms and found a chair on the rooftop to sit down in. “This matter isn’t really my concern.”

“But you just said that you thought this trip was worthwhile!” I protested.