Phantom in the Scarlet Mist

Time stretched and congealed within absolute darkness and deathly silence.

Lin Jie could clearly hear the heavy, suppressed thudding of his heart in his chest. The sound was especially jarring amid the silence, and he even worried it would expose the life hidden beneath his disguise.

That inhuman sense of being watched still shrouded him. The Jack the Ripper UMA had more patience than he had imagined. Like the harshest connoisseur, it carefully examined its prey, unwilling to overlook even the slightest flaw.

Lin Jie knew he was walking the line between life and death. He guarded his mind, relaxed every muscle in his body, and imitated the state of deep unconsciousness without changing even the rhythm of his breathing.

The cold gun grip was his only connection to the real world at that moment.

After an unknown amount of time, that suffocating gaze finally changed.

It was no longer a static inspection. It began to slowly approach Lin Jie.

The darkness grew thicker, and the smell of sulfur became distinctly perceptible.

Lin Jie could feel the temperature around him dropping at an unnatural rate, as though all the heat in the alley were being drawn away by the thing closing in.

He could hear a faint rustling, like silk scraping against a wall. The UMA was moving, a sign that it was preparing to attack.

Now!

Lin Jie roared inwardly like thunder, yet he continued to wait.

He waited for the perfect opportunity—the one unique instant when hunter and prey would switch places.

That thing was already within arm's reach.

Lin Jie could feel a chill brush against his cheek.

A tenth of a second before it launched its fatal strike, Lin Jie's eyes flew open!

Those eyes, which had gathered strength in the darkness for so long, held not the slightest trace of drunkenness or confusion. Only an edge of absolute calm remained!

"Bang!!!"

The Webley revolver hidden in his sleeve fired fiercely at almost point-blank range, straight toward the source of that chill!

The deafening gunshot exploded through the narrow alley. A huge flash instantly tore apart the despairing darkness, clearly illuminating the phantom lurking in the shadows!

It was not humanoid at all!

It looked more like a "three-dimensional shadow" that had been given life and could freely alter its shape.

When clinging to a wall, it could turn itself into a two-dimensional image. But now, before attacking, it had condensed into a twisted, unstable three-dimensional form.

Its main body was long, thin, and black, while its so-called "trench coat" and "top hat" were merely disguises simulated by the ever-churning mist along its edges.

Its limbs bent backward like those of an arthropod, ending in several bone spurs sharper than scalpels and gleaming with an obsidian luster.

This was the true form of Jack the Ripper!

The scorching muzzle flash and shrieking bullet had clearly exceeded the UMA's expectations.

It had never imagined that a lamb seemingly awaiting slaughter could conceal within itself a hungry wolf daring enough to bite back.

Its entire body trembled as it drifted backward in a manner that defied inertia, precisely evading the bullet's direct path.

Yet although the bullet missed, the alchemical power within it burst into a faint silver halo when it struck the wall behind it.

The glow seemed to inflict some kind of mental shock upon it, causing its "body" to scatter and destabilize for an instant.

Lin Jie did not hesitate in the slightest.

After missing with his first shot, he immediately rolled across the ground, widening the distance between himself and the UMA.

He knew perfectly well that with his marksmanship and the firing speed of this old revolver, trading shots head-on with such a swift monster would be no different from seeking death.

He needed to use the environment. He needed to create chaos. More than that, he needed a pair of "eyes" that could see it.

As he rolled, he pulled out another weapon he had prepared long ago—a small bag of extremely fine red pigment powder he had found in the print workshop.

It was a lead-based pigment used for printing colored illustrations in the nineteenth century, dry and easily dispersed.

After its brief shock, the UMA was utterly enraged by this "food's" insolence.

Its unstable form condensed once more, and a slit opened in its black body, resembling a mouth mocking him in silence.

It stopped sneaking about and instead transformed into a true black phantom, lunging straight at Lin Jie with a piercing rush of air!

Lin Jie calmly watched the approaching black shadow. The instant it was about to enter striking range, he violently flung the bag of pigment powder into the air before him!

"Whoosh—!"

The scarlet powder spread through the narrow alley in an instant, like an abrupt cloud of blood mist.

The move seemed meaningless, yet it was the greatest stake Lin Jie had placed in this desperate gamble.

He was betting that although this UMA could merge with shadows, its true body was still material.

It could deceive light, but it could not make tiny particles floating in the air pass directly through its body!

He had bet right!

As the black phantom charged into the scarlet mist, something marvelous happened.

The fine red pigment particles seemed to come alive, drawn by an invisible force and clinging to that once-indistinct outline.

The long, thin, twisted outline of a monster composed entirely of red particles was precisely "sketched" into view!

It was no longer an untargetable ghost, but an incomparably conspicuous moving scarlet target in the darkness!

"Hisss—!!!"

Mist Walker let out an enraged, terrified hiss.

It could not understand why its perfect camouflage had been so easily broken by such a mundane method.

It twisted its body frantically, trying to shake off the red powder clinging to it, but it was all in vain.

Perfect timing!

Lin Jie's eyes locked onto the scarlet outline darting and weaving through the darkness. He raised the Webley revolver again.

This time, he was no longer shooting by instinct. He had an unmistakably clear target.

"Bang! Bang!"

Calmly, he pulled the trigger twice in rapid succession, as fast as he possibly could.

The first bullet grazed Mist Walker's arm and struck the wall, scattering a shower of sparks.

Its speed was still astonishingly fast.

But after Lin Jie made a minute predictive adjustment using the chill from the gun grip that kept him absolutely focused, the second bullet finally hit!

The bullet struck precisely into the "chest" of that red outline.

The mysterious force contained within the Alchemy Bullet erupted again. Silver light exploded inside the monster's body, as if a tiny sun had been ignited in a pool of ink.

"Awooo—!!!"

A shriek so miserable it could tear through eardrums erupted from the monster's body.

Its shadow-made body rippled violently. Large amounts of red pigment fell from it, and its form became increasingly unstable, on the verge of completely collapsing.

It was hurt.

Badly hurt.

However, before Lin Jie could feel any joy, a deadly sense of danger surged from the depths of his heart.

The dying UMA gathered every last scrap of its power into its bone-spur-like claws.

In the places where its "eyes" had once been nothing but blackness, two blood-scarlet points of light ignited.

It abandoned all defense and evasion, transforming into a red-and-black bolt of lightning bent on mutual destruction as it launched one final, desperate attack at Lin Jie with speed beyond its limits!