Heart of the Beast

"Sir, what happened? I think I just heard gunshots."

Outside the church stables, several constables had set up a cordon, keeping the curious onlookers from poking their heads in.

"The horses went mad, so we had no choice but to shoot them. The scene's a mess, nothing worth seeing. Hurry home!"

The constables impatiently drove the crowd away.

The busybodies began to chatter at the news. After lingering for a while and finding no spectacle to watch, they dispersed in twos and threes.

Of course, passersby still gathered from time to time, forcing the constables to repeat the same explanation over and over. Their tone grew increasingly impatient.

Inside the stables, Ning Xiuyuan stood in the yard, his face pale.

Horse-Head Tiger's attack had badly wounded him, making him cough up blood.

Fortunately, he had taken Disease Deceiver today. Although this extraordinary characteristic could not heal him, it had still strengthened his physique considerably.

Otherwise, Horse-Head Tiger's attack would have either killed or crippled him.

Bishop Byron, who had rushed over, knew his situation was unusual and had even given him a bottle of potion.

After taking the potion, his chest still felt swollen and painful, but he was no longer in serious danger. A few days of rest would suffice.

Beside Ning Xiuyuan, several senior church officials, including Bishop Byron, stood solemnly around Horse-Head Tiger's corpse without saying a word.

There was only one outsider at the scene, a Senior Inspector, who also wore a cold expression and remained silent.

A rustle of footsteps approached as several priests emerged from Groom Lynn's quarters carrying a body bag.

They set the body bag down in the yard. Their gazes unconsciously turned toward Ning Xiuyuan, filled with uncertainty and surprise, as though they had never expected this foreigner to kill the mutated Horse-Head Tiger.

At the sight of the body bag, Ning Xiuyuan's expression turned dazed. After a brief hesitation, he walked over.

At once, everyone's eyes fell on him.

Ning Xiuyuan stopped before the body bag, reached into his clothes, and took out a packet of pipe tobacco wrapped in kraft paper. He placed it on top.

Then he said to the priests carrying the body, "This was a gift I had prepared for Mr. Lynn. I never expected I would never get the chance to give it to him. Please, help me let it stay with Mr. Lynn forever."

The priests exchanged strange looks.

"He isn't Lynn."

Bishop Byron looked at the gift atop the body bag, his eyes shifting slightly.

"Huh?" Ning Xiuyuan froze. Embarrassment flickered across his face, but it could not hide the light in his eyes. "Lynn isn't... isn't dead?"

"He is dead," Bishop Byron sighed. "You killed him."

Ning Xiuyuan looked as if he had been struck by lightning. His body swayed instinctively as he suddenly looked at Horse-Head Tiger's corpse still lying in the yard, disbelief written across his face.

"Don't burden yourself with it. It was no longer Lynn, only a beast controlled by an extraordinary characteristic."

"This is the price of facing madness!"

With a trace of self-reproach in his eyes, Bishop Byron said:

"As a Beast Listener, he should have lived in the forest among beasts. He told me he felt he had nearly completed the integration, that staying with horses and occasionally visiting the circus would be no problem. I trusted him, so I agreed. I never expected..."

"Your Excellency the Bishop, this is not your fault. Lynn longed for the splendor of the city. This was the price!" Deacon Harry consoled him.

"He was not that sort of person. Otherwise, he would not have chosen to live in the stables." Bishop Byron did not want to deny Lynn's character.

"Even if he did not long for the splendor of the city, he was probably unable to bear the loneliness. When he chose his extraordinary characteristic, he should have considered that."

Deacon Harry still sounded somewhat displeased.

A diocese member had lost control, and not even during a mission. This indirectly proved that the Francis Diocese had misjudged his character.

For a clergyman eager to advance, this was undoubtedly a blemish on his record.

Bishop Byron fell silent and said no more.

People's hearts were hidden behind their ribs. Even a Dreamwalker could not peer into everyone's secrets, because people were fickle, and what they thought did not necessarily match what they showed.

No one could guarantee what Lynn's character had truly been like.

But he had failed to strictly follow the extraordinary ritual and lost control. At that point, many things naturally no longer mattered.

Listening to Bishop Byron and Deacon Harry's discussion, Ning Xiuyuan was deeply shaken. Along with his sorrow, a measure of wariness arose in his heart.

Beast Listener must have been Lynn's extraordinary characteristic.

Though he did not know exactly what abilities it possessed, from what they had said, the extraordinary ritual for wielding it seemed to require as much contact with beasts as possible.

But if he failed to interact with beasts, he would lose control? That... that was far too insane, wasn't it?

By that logic, would I also lose control if I stopped practicing medicine?

The thought made Ning Xiuyuan feel even more burdened.

It's bad enough that I can't heal myself. Do I also have to heal others? This extraordinary power has far too many restrictions!

"It's starting!"

Just then, a warning jolted everyone awake and interrupted Ning Xiuyuan's wild thoughts.

He turned to see Horse-Head Tiger's corpse suddenly begin to melt.

Before long, the enormous body had turned into a pool of blood. At its center swayed a wisp of something like green smoke.

Bishop Byron took out a glass bottle and walked over. Tilting its mouth toward the green smoke, he watched as the wisp slowly flowed inside.

A chain of tooth-ring symbols quietly appeared on the surface of the glass bottle.

"Praise be to our Lord. Everything went smoothly!" Deacon Harry breathed a sigh of relief.

"Praise be to our Lord!" Several senior officials also performed the Dawn Ceremony together.

To the church, extraordinary characteristics were like regulated firearms to the police department: strictly controlled items.

The former was even more serious than the latter, allowing no compromise whatsoever.

For them, seizing an extraordinary characteristic was a merit.

But if an extraordinary characteristic leaked out from the church, that was a sin.

That was the fundamental reason the Francis Diocese's senior officials had been so tense.

"The reason I kept you here was to give you some experience. Remember this: if an extraordinary characteristic goes too long without a host, it will either vanish completely or merge with something nearby and transform into an extraordinary item. So if you encounter an extraordinary characteristic, report it to the church immediately."

Bishop Byron walked over to explain this to Ning Xiuyuan.

As he spoke, he paused in thought, then took out a glass bottle from his robes and handed it over.

"This is a Bottle of Sealing. You will probably never need it, but keep it just in case."

Ning Xiuyuan hurriedly accepted it with both hands.

"You did well this time. As a newly awakened extraordinary, you had the courage and resolve to snipe an out-of-control creature and prevent the crisis from spreading. This merits a major commendation."

Bishop Byron's praise was not empty. A major commendation came with an immediate reward and might even affect the acquisition of extraordinary characteristics later on.

However, any extraordinary losing control was no trivial matter. The diocese needed to conduct a thorough investigation according to procedure, and only once the matter was conclusively settled would the reward be issued.

This was also to prevent rewards from being handed to the murderer.

After all, in the extraordinary world, all kinds of strange and treacherous abilities emerged endlessly. Death was not something that could be judged so simply.

"Your Excellency the Bishop overpraises me. All glory belongs to the God of Dawn," Ning Xiuyuan said gratefully.

The people present watched the scene with flickering eyes, both envious and jealous.

His Excellency the Bishop truly took care of this foreigner in every possible detail, didn't he?

Those who had this thought selectively forgot that when they themselves had entered the extraordinary world, Bishop Byron had also cared for them with such meticulous gentleness.

Of course, that was also a bishop's responsibility and duty.

As the highest-ranking clergyman of a diocese, a bishop was an apostle of dawn, a teacher of doctrine, an officiant of sacraments, and a shepherd of the church.

Naturally, the authority to promote extraordinary individuals rested with the bishop.

Back to the matter at hand.

After taking away the Beast Listener extraordinary characteristic left behind by Lynn, the Francis Diocese's senior officials had no reason to remain and departed one after another.

The vast stables returned to their usual calm.

After glancing at the pit eroded into the yard, Ning Xiuyuan was about to leave when a neigh suddenly sounded from the stables nearby.

His body stiffened.

After a long while, he still walked over.

Several fine horses stuck their heads out over the railing and moved close, snorting as if seeking comfort, or perhaps mourning Lynn.

Ning Xiuyuan pitifully stroked their heads, his mood low. Lynn, who had been able to communicate with them, was dead. They must have been the most heartbroken of all.

"Ah—"

As he was lamenting inwardly, Ning Xiuyuan suddenly cried out in pain and yanked his hand back.

But it was too late.

His right hand was dripping with blood, and the back of it bore a wound unlike the bite of any herbivore.

Looking up, he saw one of the fine horses part its blackened, bloodstained teeth as if smiling at him. A single tear clearly rolled down from its bright eye.

Ning Xiuyuan froze.

Blood streamed from his right hand, yet it did not fall. Instead, it transformed into countless blood-red vines that coiled around Ning Xiuyuan's right arm before finally sinking into his skin, as though they had never existed—along with the wound.

—The Beast Listener's gift: Heart of the Beast!

Ning Xiuyuan suddenly looked into the distance.

Through the Heart of the Beast, he could clearly feel the spiritual call of its giver, Lynn.

That direction was—the church basement!

"Could you possibly... not be dead?"

"Or are you trying to warn me about something?"

Ning Xiuyuan stood rooted where he was, listening to the horses' mournful cries. After a long silence, he finally turned and left.