Battle Royale?

"..."

"..."

"Once the mission is complete, won't anything change? Like a ray of white light descending from the sky and healing our injuries? To be honest, I'm a little hungry. Could it make me stop feeling hungry?"

Silence stretched on for ten seconds.

At last, Chu Chongtian had to break it, sounding somewhat awkward.

"We'll find out when the time comes. This isn't the moment to discuss it," Zhou Zhenguo said. "It looks like this man isn't Jack the Ripper."

"How could that be? He disappeared, then showed up again, and everything about him fits," Chu Chongtian said. "Could catching him be a hidden condition of our mission? Why is the mission so vague!"

He was getting worked up, unable to contain his indignation.

Zhou Zhenguo remained calm. "Missions have always been rather broad and vague. You'll get used to it."

"The address, the address."

Chu Chongtian looked down and found Green Bray's home address.

"Let's go catch him!" Chu Chongtian looked up at Zhou Zhenguo and Tang Luo.

"Calm down."

Zhou Zhenguo said, "I don't think it's necessarily him."

"Why not?" Chu Chongtian sucked in a sharp breath.

"It's simple," Zhou Zhenguo said. "If someone was taken away and subjected to cruel human experiments, then somehow survived, would he really stroll back into Small City like nothing had happened?"

"That..."

Chu Chongtian realized what he'd overlooked.

If it had happened to him—if he'd been taken away in one place and experimented on, then somehow survived—

Even if he chose to take revenge, he certainly wouldn't show himself so openly.

Wouldn't that be like asking to die faster?

"Jack the Ripper is more likely to be one of these people."

Zhou Zhenguo pointed at the dozen or so people who were still missing. "Master, what do you think?"

Tang Luo shook his head. "Amitabha Buddha. This humble monk wasn't thinking about that."

"Huh?"

Zhou Zhenguo and Chu Chongtian both froze.

What was going on?

Master, don't give up thinking!

You're our most important fighter—uh, though I suppose you can give up thinking too.

"This humble monk is just waiting for Jack the Ripper to show himself so I can beat him to death. You two can decide what to do next. I'll act alongside you," Tang Luo said.

"This feels just like the second night,"

Chu Chongtian muttered.

What had happened that second night?

He'd dressed as a woman to serve as bait, drawing out Hodge and Jack the Ripper.

The current situation seemed much the same.

The three of them were wandering around.

They were prey and hunters at the same time.

Thinking about it that way, perhaps all their strategizing wouldn't make much difference.

No wonder Master Xuanzang had simply stopped thinking—no, he'd just been too lazy to bother.

"Wait."

Chu Chongtian suddenly realized something. "Jack the Ripper's possession ability must have a range, right? It can't cover all of Small City!"

"You mean—"

Zhou Zhenguo caught on as well. "The map!"

The two of them grabbed the documents and headed downstairs together.

An ordinary small city wouldn't have a large supply of standardized maps for sale.

But Scotland Yard was a law enforcement agency, and its detectives had to go out on calls. They needed to know the addresses and streets well.

A hand-drawn map of Small City hung in the lobby downstairs.

It was there for the detectives to glance at as they came and went, so they'd have a rough sense of the place.

That way, they wouldn't embarrass themselves by getting lost in the middle of an investigation.

The map was old, probably several years out of date, and not very detailed.

But it was enough for Zhou Zhenguo and the others.

"The church, the inn, Hodge..."

They marked the locations where they'd encountered Jack the Ripper.

Next, they marked the addresses of people who had gone missing over the past few years.

Then they added the sites of the murders before the large-scale massacre.

Even if Jack had been following Tang Luo and the others ever since they arrived, he couldn't have been following them before that, could he?

Someone who had returned to his "homeland" and wanted to stay hidden would at least spend more time near his old home, wouldn't he?

And murder, too, had to have some sort of range.

For Scotland Yard, the area was too vast to narrow down.

But once they added the missing people's home addresses, things changed.

"The slums, yes. A place like that is perfect for hiding. Who'd pay attention to one more vagrant? These five!"

They picked out the five people most likely to be Jack the Ripper.

They also found the addresses of their former homes.

"Are we going to their houses?" Chu Chongtian asked. "Jack might not be hiding at home."

"No. We're going to look for evidence," Zhou Zhenguo said.

"Would he really leave any conclusive evidence at home?" Chu Chongtian asked.

"Maybe."

Zhou Zhenguo said, "Even if we don't find anything, we still need to go there and destroy those places."

"Hm?" Chu Chongtian was confused.

Now wasn't the time to take out his frustration on these people's homes.

Seeing Chu Chongtian's bewildered expression, Zhou Zhenguo explained, "Jack the Ripper is watching us, right? So... what do you think he'll do when he sees us destroy his house?"

"That'll draw him out? No, wait." Chu Chongtian's eyes lit up, then he lowered his voice. "If we destroy one of those houses and he ambushes us, that proves it's his house. Then we'll know which one of them is Jack the Ripper."

Zhou Zhenguo nodded, then added, "But there's also a chance we'll be attacked the whole way there, and won't be able to tell."

"Then how do we figure it out?" Chu Chongtian asked.

"We don't need to. We'll follow Master's approach and make Jack the Ripper show himself," Zhou Zhenguo said. "Everyone has a temper, don't they?"

By the time they finished talking, the three of them had already left Scotland Yard.

It was colder outside than when they had gone in.

Their breath emerged in clouds of white mist.

Chu Chongtian's glasses fogged up, then quickly cleared.

"We'll destroy his home and kill whoever he's possessing." Zhou Zhenguo's tone was resolute. "Draw him out and settle this in a fight to the death."

"Isn't it enough to figure out who he is?"

"No. I've got it all figured out now."

Zhou Zhenguo drew on his past experience. "There should be two ways to complete this mission. First, during Jack the Ripper's hidden phase, we uncover his true identity. Then the mission is complete."

"Second, in the current, second phase, we let things drag on until Jack becomes powerful enough to rule the city. By then, he might not keep hiding. So the way to complete the mission is probably to kill him."

"The mission's true core isn't set in stone."

"I see." Chu Chongtian suddenly understood. "But doesn't that mean we can't just lie low?"

The longer the mission went on, the stronger Jack the Ripper became.

How could they fight him by then?

Small City was a death trap. If they hid until the end, death would be their only option.

Or perhaps it would become "battle royale mode" again: they'd have to evade Jack's pursuit for several months, half a year, or even a whole year.

But by then, they'd have already failed the mission.

"Lying low until it's over was always unlikely," Zhou Zhenguo said. "Not counting this one, I've been through five missions."

He was being frank.

They'd face life and death together, and Chu Chongtian wasn't some treacherous villain. There was no need to hide this information.

"Two successes, two failures, and one that was neither a success nor a failure."

"But that time, someone as powerful as Master Xuanzang happened to complete the mission, so it didn't count as a failure."

"How often do you think we'll get that lucky?"

The middle-aged man, who'd spent years navigating society, delivered his flattery so smoothly and discreetly that Chu Chongtian was left in awe.

"True. A virtuous powerhouse like Master Xuanzang must be as rare as a phoenix feather or a unicorn's horn." Chu Chongtian would have to learn from that.

"Ahem."

Zhou Zhenguo cleared his throat, signaling that he'd had enough. "So, prepare for a fierce battle."

"Right."

Chu Chongtian nodded and patted himself down twice.

He made sure his weapons, including the ammunition pouch, were still there.

"Master, should we gather all the residents of Small City and go find Jack the Ripper together? We could even lure him out!"

After they'd gone a little farther, Chu Chongtian suddenly spoke up.

Until now, they'd been fighting alone.

If a fierce battle was likely, why not call on outside help?

Who cared if more effort meant better rewards? To hell with that!

The most important thing was completing the mission and surviving.

"We can try, but this humble monk doubts it'll work," Tang Luo said.

"Let's try!"

Chu Chongtian ran over to a nearby door and pounded on it, shouting, "Open up! We're detectives hired by Scotland Yard! We've found Jack the Ripper! Come with us and catch him! We have the papers! You can check them!"

He even pulled out the documents Scotland Yard had given them and shook them until they rustled loudly.

He'd even anticipated someone saying, "I don't believe you—show me proof!"

His voice echoed through the silent night.

Afterward, the surroundings remained just as quiet.

Not a single darkened window lit up. There were no footsteps, shouts, or sounds of windows or doors opening.

None of the reactions Chu Chongtian had hoped for came.

No—that wasn't quite right. There was no response at all.

Even a stone sinking into the sea would cause at least a ripple.

But now, aside from the faint hiss of snow falling, the silence was so complete that it felt like an empty city with only the three of them in it.

"Amitabha Buddha. You don't need to keep shouting, Chu. There shouldn't be anyone around here anymore."

Tang Luo stopped Chu Chongtian from shouting again.

"No one?"

"Layman Zhou said this was a race against Jack the Ripper," Tang Luo said. "This humble monk agrees. Jack is racing too. We're searching for him, while he keeps killing people and growing stronger."

In other words, the area around them—and perhaps a much wider area—had already become a dead zone.

"Then what are we waiting for? Let's go!"

Chu Chongtian was nowhere near as composed as Tang Luo, who could still smile serenely after learning that their enemy grew stronger every moment.

He started running through the snow.

Suddenly, he felt that this "detective mission" had turned into a battle royale—a fight to survive.

At least, that was what it had become for him.