Detective Agency of the Bizarre
Chapter 699 - 699 218

699: 218.

Rope of Descent 699: 218.

Rope of Descent Anna returned to the clifftop with news of the Ghost Prison’s latest changes.

Evil spirits, wardens, Rope of Descent.

Anna did the right thing by not easily believing what the other party said, yet time was indeed running short.

Lu Li opened a little wooden box containing decayed flesh; no nauseating odor escaped from the tiny wooden box, it was closer to a Homogeneous Item, capable of attracting messengers.

Perhaps because Belfast had become ruins, crows were slower to arrive than before.

“Go call the merchant,” Lu Li said to the crow.

The crow’s dark eyes reflected everything from the refuge point, lowered its head to tear and swallow the decayed flesh, then spread its wings and flew out of the cave.

Twenty minutes later, the merchant entered the cave and stood silently in front of Lu Li, waiting to begin the trade.

“Tell me information about the Ghost Prison warden.”

“1000 investigative points,” a low offer resounded from behind the worn brown scarf.

More expensive than expected—could it be because this evil spirit was the warden?

“We already know some information about an evil spirit named Rope of Descent, for instance, its entity is a rope,” Anna said as she walked up to Lu Li’s side.

There was a slight pause before the merchant spoke: “700 investigative points.”

The price remained high, but it was unlikely to go any lower.

Lu Li nodded, “Please speak.”

The merchant unslung a heavily worn backpack from his back, as Lu Li slightly tilted his head, watching the merchant pull out a roll of parchment from the dark interior.

Was it already there, or did it appear there after the transaction?

The merchant didn’t provide Lu Li with much time to ponder, slung the backpack over his shoulder again, and handed over the parchment.

After the trade was over, the merchant left the cave, and Lu Li holding an oil lamp, moved back to the desk and unrolled the parchment.

[Rope of Descent]

[Ritual: The victim will suffer manipulation as if by fate.

Any far-fetched, unreasonable, dramatized occurrences might happen.

The victim is like a puppet on a stage, being manipulated at will.]

[Escape Method: It does not harm humans.]

It’s somewhat like The Shadow of Puppetry, the difference being it apparently doesn’t harm humans, which aligns with the whisper Anna encountered.

But could a spirit completely corrupted by the Inner World still possess self-awareness?

The parchment was nearly filled, with much more written on it, like the backstory of the Rope of Descent.

Miklos Blevins was the oldest employee at the Rustan Theater.

Or rather, from the moment Ovra Rustan, the owner of Rustan Theater, was born, Miklos had been watching him grow up.

From when Ovra learned to walk, talk to people, learned etiquette, sprouted soft hairs at the corners of his mouth, met a girl for the first time, transformed from green to mature, and established a family and career.

Although Ovra Rustan no longer followed behind, calling Miklos “Uncle Miklos” as he did when he was a child, he still held a deep respect for Miklos Blevins, who watched him grow up.

When factory owners spurned the elderly Miklos Blevins, sweeping him out the door, Ovra invited him into his view.

Because of this, Rustan Theater was born, and Miklos Blevins became the theater’s first employee.

Just as a wife often transitions into a mother with the birth of a child, Miklos Blevins poured his love for Rustan into the theater.

Although he was old and could not perform on stage with great passion like the actors, he could only watch from behind the scenes with satisfaction during performances.

Nevertheless, Miklos Blevins still gave his all for the theater, doing everything within his power, such as sweeping floors lightly and checking the props.

And everyone at the theater knew the old man who had accompanied both the owner Rustan and the theater all his life.

They affectionately called him Old Miklos.

Old Miklos’s favorite mechanism was known as “Mechanical Deity Descent,” the only way he could participate in performances.

When the theater’s drama was stuck in a deadlock, he would pull the lever, activate the mechanism, and then lower down the actor, who played Divinity, attached to the rope, to solve the characters’ dilemmas.

This made Old Miklos feel content, as if the problem was resolved because of him.

Even though the plot device “Mechanical Deity Descent” was heavily criticized, with detractors deeming it an unwise act to resolve a story with such an unreasonable method, Old Miklos’s affection for it was not hindered.

So, from the birth, to the growth, and finally to the decline of Rustan Theater, Old Miklos was there with Ovra Rustan, with Rustan Theater, with Mechanical Deity Descent.

Old Miklos also grew older day by day, his back no longer straight, his face full of wrinkles, his hair white.

Even the lever he once easily pulled required all his strength to yank down now.

Ovra Rustan, who used to come to the theater frequently, began visiting less often due to business.

Later, due to poor management, he stopped appearing altogether.

All Old Miklos could do was to help Ovra take good care of the theater.

Then, bad news arrived.

In a storm during a cargo transport, Ovra Rustan, along with his wife, children, and goods, perished at sea.

According to local law, Ovra Rustan’s remaining assets would be liquidated and turned over to the royal household.

As a result, Rustan Theater was dissolved, leaving only Old Miklos, without a wife or children, having lost everything.

At an age where he would be out of breath just from walking a few steps, Old Miklos leaned his whole body on the wooden lever to slide open the plank and lower the rope.

He walked to the stage, trembling, faced the empty auditorium, slipped the rope around his neck, and ended his life.

But just like what Old Miklos did every day, pulling the mechanism, lowering Divinity to solve all that was unreasonable and abrupt, Old Miklos came back to life in a manner akin to Mechanical Deity Descent, using the rope of Mechanical Deity Descent that ended his life.

He says he hardly remembers his experiences during that time, only that he seemed to have become the Divinity beneath the mechanism, resolving the theater’s ghostly dramas in a manner that appeared to be haunting.

However, to the audience, it was merely a part of the drama.

Who would have known that the old man tied to the rope playing “Divinity” was actually a resentful spirit?

Hence, the Exorcist Association came, and after their investigation, they took away the “Divinity” that had terrified the theater’s owner and actors.

The story of Old Miklos in the Exorcist Association was skimmed over quickly, mentioning that, over a decade later, a new evil spirit called “Rope of Descent” emerged in the association.

As a ghost who became an evil spirit, Miklos no longer had a body—more precisely, the evil spirit’s body would be transferred to something related to it.

It’s usually a corpse, but after Exorcist Association dug up Old Miklos’s skeleton and discovered it was not it, they ascertained that its true body was the hemp rope that had hung him, used for Mechanical Deity Descent.

Clearly still siding with humanity, Old Miklos, now the Rope of Descent, was trusted by the investigators’ association: after the establishment of Ghost Prison, he was appointed as the warden, charged with overseeing the prisoners.

His ritual “Rope of Descent” suited handling unruly ghosts perfectly.