Genshin Impact: The Road to Reversal

Chapter 561 Seeking Help (Part 2)

"Me?" Sirius stared blankly for a moment, then leaned back in his chair. "Forget about me. Although it sounds interesting, I just want to rest right now."

Zixuan shook her head helplessly: "In that case, I'll trouble you to tell them when Mo Yan and the others come back."

"No problem~" Sirius stretched and said lazily.

……

Claire, along with Zixuan and Zhao Heng, followed Captain Hawke out of the kitchen. Only Sirius remained, continuing to enjoy his cake, looking quite content with his leisure.

After passing through several solemn corridors, they arrived at the Knights' encampment. The atmosphere here was even more solemn than in the training camp; knights hurried by, bowing respectfully to Clementine whenever they saw her.

In a simple but clean single room, they met the person seeking help. He was a man who looked to be in his forties, with a haggard face, dressed plainly, like a small business owner. He was sitting uneasily on the edge of the bed, his fingers unconsciously twisting together. When he saw Claire enter, his eyes immediately lit up.

"Lady Clementine! You've finally arrived!" He stood up quickly, his voice tinged with urgency.

"Don't be nervous, please sit down." Clementine's voice was gentle. "Could you tell me more about what happened to you? Don't leave out any details."

With Claire's gentle guidance, the man calmed down a bit and began to speak intermittently.

His name was Glenn, and he ran a small grocery store on the edge of a glacier. About a week ago, he used his savings to buy a cheap shack somewhere, and since then, strange things have been happening one after another.

"At first, I would only hear faint wind sounds late at night. I didn't pay much attention to it. But later, the sound became clearer and clearer, like someone whispering in my ear, but I couldn't make out what they were saying."

"Then, the things in the room started to 'come alive'. The oil lamp would go out and light up on its own, small items on the shelves would appear in inexplicable places the next morning, and once I even saw a broom move on the floor by itself."

"What terrifies me most is that sometimes in the dark, I feel something gently touching the back of my hand, but I can't see anything!"

Glenn held his head and spoke, while Clementine looked at Hawke beside him.

Seeing this, Hawke nodded and explained, "That's right. When we first heard him say that, we didn't dare to take it lightly either. The Knights checked it several times, not only using elemental detection and checking the building structure, but also asking priests to purify it, but all of them came up empty-handed. We had no choice but to ask you to help us."

"Please, Lady Clementine, you must help me!" Glenn's voice was choked with sobs.

After listening, Clementine lowered her head and pondered, "It does sound tricky. Alright, I will investigate this matter thoroughly, and please rest assured. Also, Captain Hawke, you can have him stay at the Knights' Order for the next few days, so that we can take care of each other."

“Yes, I understand.” Hawke nodded.

Clementine pondered for a moment, then turned her gaze to Zixuan and Zhao Heng: "It seems we need to go to that room and see for ourselves. How about it, want to go on an 'adventure' together?"

Zi Xuan's face darkened: "Uh, this doesn't sound like a good job..."

“But we have nothing else to do right now,” Zhao Heng said calmly.

"That's true." Although she said that, Zixuan still sighed.

Clementine smiled gently: "Don't worry, I'm here. Even if they are real undead, I will protect you."

"Is that so...then I'll leave it to Miss Clover." Zixuan said with a forced smile.

Zhao Heng turned to look at her: "It's rare to see someone like you who's afraid of something."

Zixuan put her hands on her hips and deliberately dragged out her words: "Isn't this normal!"

"Hmph, let's go then," Claire said with a smile.

……

Led by Captain Hawke, the group left the Knights' headquarters and headed to Glenn's residence in a small town on the edge of the glacier.

Glenn's house is located in a rather secluded corner of the town. It's an old-looking two-story stone and wood structure, with withered vines climbing its exterior walls. There aren't many neighbors around, making it quite quiet.

“This is it.” Hawke turned around.

Claire stood in front of the house, looking up at the somewhat lonely building. The air was thick with the smell of decay, and the house seemed to carry an indescribable gloom.

"Hmm... From the outside, there is indeed no obvious elemental fluctuation or undead aura."

“The Knights’ inspection should be thorough.” Zhao Heng observed the surroundings. “If they didn’t find anything, either the problem is deeply hidden, or…”

“Or maybe it’s not the work of ‘undead’ or ‘monsters’ in the traditional sense at all,” Zixuan replied, her analytical skills still sharp despite feeling a little uneasy.

Clementine nodded. "That makes sense. Let's go in and take a look, everyone be careful."

Captain Hawke took out his key and opened the somewhat heavy wooden door. The hinges creaked softly, and instantly, a faint, mixed chill swept over him.

Clementine took a step forward, but stopped abruptly the instant she crossed the threshold.

Zixuan noticed her unusual behavior and asked softly, "Miss Clementine, what's wrong?"

"It's nothing." Clementine paused for two seconds, then shook her head. "I just have this strange feeling. Maybe I'm just overthinking it."

Then she turned around and said, "Everyone be careful, something's weird here, though it's just a feeling..."

Zi Xuan and Zhao Heng exchanged a glance and nodded.

The interior was simply furnished. The first floor consisted of a living room that doubled as a shop and a small kitchen, while the second floor was a bedroom. As Glenn described, the items were somewhat cluttered, but there were no obvious signs of damage or unusual movement. The windows were closed, yet a faint draft could be seen through them.

Hawke lit the oil lamp on the wall, and the dim yellow light slightly expanded the visible area.

“We’ve checked inside and out many times—the walls, the floors, the ceilings—but there are no secret passages, no hidden compartments. Elemental detection shows that the magical level here is even lower than outside,” he explained.

Zhao Heng walked to the window and inspected the seams between the window frame and the wall.

"Since the problem isn't with the building structure, could it be interference affecting the 'senses' or 'mental' level? Like some kind of hallucinogenic gas, or low-frequency sound waves?"

“The Knights’ inspection included air sample analysis and acoustic detection,” Hawke shook his head, “and found nothing unusual.”

“Then the scope is even smaller.” Zixuan looked around, her focused thinking seemingly replacing her fear. “Could it be that Mr. Glenn… is hallucinating? Or is he under too much psychological pressure?”

Hawke shook his head: "We considered that possibility at first, but Glenn is an honest man with no history of mental illness, and the phenomena he described were too specific and consistent to be a simple delusion."

After listening to the explanations from the others, Clementine remained silent. As soon as she stepped across the threshold, she clearly felt a surge of hostility, but it quickly disappeared without a trace.

"Is it an illusion...? No."

With that thought in mind, she walked straight to the stairwell.