280: Midsummer Is Fading

[Respawn point has been reset...]

When the Caramel Snail awoke, the weather was no longer so gloomy; the Violet Sun was rising, a gentle breeze was blowing, and the humidity characteristic of midsummer had dissipated.

"Ugh, I feel like I've wasted another day."

However, since it's already the end of the season, Caramel Snail has already accumulated enough experience and reached the level cap, so he's not in a hurry to increase his combat power. He's just treating this trip as an opportunity to have some fun and change his mood.

He left the room, Li Aoz had been waiting for him in the restaurant for a long time.

"You slept in late, huh?"

Li Aoz picked up the bone china cup and took a small sip of coffee.

"It's more accurate to say you got up quite early. Besides, I can't decide what time I get up..."

Caramel Snail complained.

The game requires a minimum sleep time of 8 hours. What can he do about it?

"You're up, let's have breakfast."

Li Aoz casually tapped the milkshake with a spoon, then unfolded the newspaper and began reading last night's news. "A large fire broke out in Suro City last night, thankfully no one was injured. Some residents claimed to have heard a disturbing noise that made it difficult to fall asleep..."

Smack! "Noise!"

Before Xia Beiluo could finish speaking, the man reflected in the shop window immediately burst into curses. "These priests with no taste actually call punk noise? Do they have any brains? If they had copied a few less lines of scripture, they wouldn't be so clueless about art!"

"Stop, stop, stop!"

Xia Beiluo quickly waved his hand. "This is a public place, aren't you afraid of being noticed and taken away by other spiritual mediums?"

"You don't need to make a scene; no one will notice you. As for me—why should I be afraid?"

Igor crossed his arms, walked out of the mirror on his own, sat down opposite her, and asked a question in return.

"Don't joke around! Last night you played music and incited people to set fires everywhere and dance in the streets. It almost caused a death!"

Xia Beiluo muttered.

"So it didn't cause any trouble, did it?"

Gore said innocently, "Don't be so quick to shift the blame to me. How do you know those people aren't secretly happy? Maybe they've been tormented by curfew for so long, they're just itching to go."

"That's nonsense! The church said the curfew is to protect people from being harmed by Wandering Souls."

"Yeah, I get it, I get it. They've been saying this since ancient times. At first, they arranged for people to take turns on duty, then it was a night watch system, and then as the scale grew, they found that standing guard and keeping watch couldn't solve the problem, so they simply banned people from going out at night—guess what happened next?"

Igor scoffed. "They'll take away your power step by step, until you have to ask the gods for permission to eat and drink—damn, the church is still the same old crooked thing. I know it all too well."

Xia Beiluo remained silent.

"Your meal."

The waiter casually tossed a bowl of oatmeal porridge and boiled potatoes onto her table. Xia Beiluo thanked him twice and wolfed down the food.

"Don't worry, no one's going to take your swill from you." Igor crossed his legs, put his hands behind his head, and looked carefree.

Xia Beiluo ignored him completely and focused on working hard.

Fourteen hours earlier, Igor had manipulated her body and used music to instigate an unprecedented riot.

As he played his guitar, people rushed into the streets, singing and dancing, blatantly defying the church's curfew order at the end of summer.

They threw torches at the church building, strangers freely put their arms around each other, drank and made merry, men kissed women, women kissed women, women kissed dogs, and dogs were thrown into the sewers.

At that moment, the air was filled with the taste of freedom, or rather, chaos.

Terrified, she fled the Suro City overnight with her luggage and guitar, fleeing in a panic until she arrived at this motel, where she could no longer hold on and took a break.

Xia Beiluo witnessed everything that happened and knew exactly how Igor had done it with that guitar—she glanced at the guitar case beside her and couldn't help but twitch her lips.

"Igor, who exactly are you?" she asked silently in her heart.

"Dead."

Igor said casually.

"I know you're dead... I mean, who were you before?"

Xia Beiluo asked earnestly.

Igor replied, "The poor, the workers, the musicians, the dead."

"... That's it?" Xia Beiluo asked in surprise, "Just... that's all?"

"What else do you want? A boring love history, a poor background, a chaotic upbringing, and a clichéd awakening to darkness? And then a resentful fall—damn, save your breath, that stuff was outdated in my day."

Igor Tsoi tried to touch the cigarette on the table, but his hand immediately turned into a puddle of shredded smoke as soon as he grabbed it.

"Damn, just how bad is your psychic ability? I can't even move an inch. I'm really unlucky to have fallen into your hands."

Xia Beiluo watched the other person cursing, but her mind calmed down. She recalled the contents of her textbook and tentatively asked, "Your body is not made of spiritual power... You are not a spirit?"

"Of course I'm not. If I were a spirit, I would have been captured long ago on this planet full of mediums and shamans."

As Igor finished speaking, he suddenly stood up and paced back and forth a few steps.

"How am I supposed to explain this to you? The process is complicated. There are many reasons why I've become like this. Fifty years ago, I did many earth-shattering things. But now, even if I play the music again, they won't remember that I was ever here... Damn, it's really pathetic to think that I've fallen so low as to be with a scavenger in a junkyard."

Igor stood with his hands on his hips, looking out the motel window at the view.

Xia Beiluo thought for a moment and said, "You mean, you must have been a big shot before?"

"Big shots? No, I'm a thorn in the side of those big shots. They think about getting rid of me every day, but people like me and believe in everything I've brought them, so they don't dare to get rid of me."

Igor sighed, "Then, I died in a car accident. It's ironic—those priests wanted to kill me but couldn't, but an out-of-control car did."

"A car accident can take your life—were you even a mortal in your past life?"

"Of course I am. I have been a mortal all my life."

As Igor spoke, Sunglasses, looked at Xia Beiluo, and then changed the subject. "But I am not now."

"Now, you are..."

"I don't know what I am right now."

Igor, wearing Sunglasses, paced back and forth in the restaurant, occasionally glancing at the billboards that looked exactly the same as they had fifty years ago.

"It allows one to walk in the sunlight for extended periods without consuming spiritual energy."

He stood in the sunlight, facing the purple sun, unharmed.

"Contact with living people will not take away their body temperature."

He casually brushed the passerby's shoulder, but the latter did not react at all.

"It won't be seen by anyone other than the guitar's owner."

He even plopped down on the bar counter, blocking the proprietress's view, while she remained focused on the silent film on the television.

"These places are absolutely unrelated to ordinary spirits."

"But I am certain that I have transcended the 'spiritualism' Worldview that limits the path of the 'mysterious' sect. Their idealistic understanding cannot comprehend my existence. Only a different Worldview and concept of knowledge can explain my existence."

"If I could, I'd also like to know what I am."