Chapter 339 - 332: Screening the Deceased

Chapter 339: Chapter 332: Screening the Deceased

On April 5th, the Qingming Festival in Hua Country, Hua Country—a member of the World Alliance—officially sent a notice to the other member nations. It was a warning about the special awakening of the Ghost Spirit Type, which could have a significant domestic impact.

Partial data, using Sun Xiaoran as a case study, was disclosed to the other five nations, proving that the Ghost Souls and Ghosts of this world could, to a certain extent, be communicated with.

Beyond the public eye, a massive investigation into the recently deceased was launched simultaneously across all World Alliance nations just three days later.

For any suspicious deaths within the last three months involving individuals with surviving family, a two-person team would conduct a phone screening. If any red flags were raised, a case file would be opened, and a decision would be made on whether to conduct an in-person investigation.

But the number of people who die each month is enormous; screening them one by one would naturally be too tedious and time-consuming.

Based on the First Law of Evolution regarding peak physical potential, the primary targets were identified as unnatural deaths among adolescents, young adults, and those in the prime of their life.

The investigation proceeded on this basis. Other cases of natural death were to be monitored with caution but not actively investigated.

Even so, this remained an extremely arduous task.

Fortunately, the Six Nations of the World Alliance had already established a highly efficient response mechanism. A command protocol, which used their special departments as the primary conduit, had become tacitly understood and accepted by other national agencies, allowing them to achieve some results in a short amount of time.

Leads didn’t just come from death certificates and official records, but also from the internet. Multi-source intelligence gathering had already become a cornerstone of the World Alliance’s operations.

...

On Twitter, a girl with the handle LOVE360° shared a post.

"My neighbor, Cantabor, is a thirty-year-old construction worker who lives with his wife, Martha. Last week, I was reading the newspaper and saw there was an accident at a construction site, and his name was on the list of fatalities! But last night, I looked through my window and saw him come home. His wife opened the Door for him! I don’t know why, but I was so scared, even though it’s probably just someone with the same name..."

The replies to her post were all over the place. Many treated it as the start of a ghost story, with some users even asking the OP to write a sequel.

Of course, some commenters said it gave them goosebumps and that she should try to confirm what she saw. Others said she never should have posted it at all.

After all, if it wasn’t just someone with the same name, and her neighbor saw the post, something terrible could happen.

But while the poster was fretting, agents from a special department were already on their way to her neighbor’s home the very next day to verify the information.

"DING-DONG~ DING-DONG~"

The doorbell rang, and Martha, looking a little pale, hurried to get the Door.

Two men stood outside. One was a tall man in a suit.

The other man’s attire was more eccentric: he wore a trench coat with the collar turned up, a military-style cap, and a pair of sunglasses. The lower half of his face, from the nose down, was wrapped in black cloth, partially obscured by the high collar.

"Who are you?"

The man in the suit presented his credentials.

"Central Intelligence Agency."

Martha carefully examined his credentials, then warily asked their reason for being there.

"Is there a problem?"

The two men didn’t answer right away, instead taking a moment to carefully observe the interior of the house.

All the curtains were drawn, leaving the room dim and gloomy despite it being daytime.

The man in the trench coat sniffed the air lightly. A faint, chilling aura emanated from inside, and as a Fire Power User, Ben was especially sensitive to it.

"He’s in here!"

"Who? What are you talking about? I’m the only one home!"

There was something off about Martha’s tone; it was hard to tell if it was panic or agitation.

The man in the suit looked at her.

"You’re right, ma’am. You are the only person here. But we’re not here looking for a person!"

With that, he nodded to his partner. Before Martha could react, the other man had already slipped inside the house, too quickly for her to stop him.

"Cantabor! In accordance with the Ghost Soul Management Regulations, all newly manifested undead in the United States are required to report to the Nineteenth Division within fifteen days for a threat assessment and to undergo basic training."

Martha, held back at the doorway by the agent, screamed at the man inside.

"What are you talking about? What ’undead’? My husband isn’t here! He died in that construction accident! You’re desecrating his memory!"

"Ma’am, not all Ghost Souls can retain their humanity from when they were alive. Their thought processes and emotional responses are vastly different from those of the living. You need to calm down!"

Seeing that she was only getting more agitated, the agent took out his phone and showed her two sets of photos.

She fell silent the moment she saw them.

The photos were from cases in Hua Country, the United States, and Russia. One showed the gruesome death of Xiaoliu; another depicted an innocent driver who had refused to give a ride to a strange "person"—his intestines had been pulled out.

There were also photos of several people a certain Ghost Soul had despised in life; all of them had died of sheer terror, their faces pale and their expressions frozen in horror.

The agent didn’t explain the context or the causes, of course. The images themselves were impactful enough.

"Ma’am, this is what happens when these situations aren’t handled promptly. Since your husband returned, has he lost many of his memories? Has his thinking seemed less logical? Please, don’t ignore these signs!"

At that, Martha stopped struggling.

Ben pulled down the black cloth covering his face, revealing a neck and chin that were slightly reddish and dotted with tiny, reflective points.

"Cantabor, what my colleague just said was for your benefit, too. Please, come with us. Otherwise, I have the authority to consider this as resisting arrest and will be forced to use my enforcement powers!"

"HSSS~~"

A spray of sparks erupted from his nostrils, briefly illuminating the dark room.

Ben cracked a grin, revealing two rows of sharp teeth.

"Besides, a Ghost Soul’s invisibility is useless against us. At least, a rookie like you doesn’t have the power to pull it off. I’m just giving you a chance!"

As he spoke, he slowly turned his head toward the living room sofa. Behind his sunglasses, his eyes emitted a faint, red, magma-like heat.

Ben wasn’t joking. In his line of sight, a tense, pale man was sitting bolt upright on the sofa. The caved-in section of his chest was presumably the cause of death.

The moment Ben’s gaze fell on him, the figure visibly stiffened. The oppressive presence of the powerful Evolver was so intense it nearly paralyzed the Ghost Soul, creating the illusion that it was unable to move.

"I’ll go with you."

Hearing this, Ben pulled the black cloth back up to his lips and nodded, his voice low and raspy as he replied.

"Wise choice. We’ll also look into the matter of your compensation. You didn’t receive the full amount from your company because your death was due to a safety violation. We’ll intervene. The rest of the payment will be in your wife’s account within two days. All right, let’s go."

As Martha watched with a complex expression, the husband she had lost and found again was leaving once more. His eyes, too, were filled with reluctance.

The vehicle was just outside. Before leading the Ghost Soul to the car, the agent in the suit remained at the door to ask Martha a few things.

"Ma’am, since your husband’s return, have you... been intimate?"

The question made Martha awkward, but it was a critical line of inquiry that couldn’t be avoided. Ghost Souls were capable of physical contact with the living, and this was the only known case so far within the World Alliance nations involving a married couple where the Ghost Soul had returned home.

"N-no!"

The agent watched her with a neutral expression, observing her facial tics and body language, but didn’t press further. The rest could be confirmed with Cantabor himself.

"Very well, ma’am. Thank you for your cooperation."

With that, he returned to the vehicle, and it drove away.

Though the locations and exact times differed, similar events were happening in roughly the same timeframe.

Within two weeks, the World Alliance nations had identified a total of 10 such cases: 3 in Hua Country, 2 in the United States, 2 in Russia, 1 in Wu Country, and none in France or the United Kingdom.

While the numbers weren’t high, they were enough to suggest that the probability of Ghost Souls appearing was significant, especially in populous nations.

This brought the World Alliance back to a major point of contention: whether or not to release this information to the public.

In the current global community, many nations had long been aware of the series of incidents occurring. They had engaged in limited exchanges, but the unspoken policy for the vast majority was to handle and research these matters covertly.

Some of these nations simply lacked the capability to detect these phenomena. Others failed to grasp their significance due to flawed investigative approaches.

The nations that had experienced massive turmoil, faced unsolvable crises, or dealt with high-risk anomalous events were, by and large, the Six Nations of the World Alliance.

The initial Class-1 event, the "Rafflesia Incident," served as the foundational bond. The subsequent appearance and resolution of high-risk events—like the Flame Demon Incident, the Kyoto Soul-Devouring Demon Incident, the discovery of the underwater Secret Place in France, and the Death Illusion Barrier—all jointly led to the formation of the World Alliance.

The question of full public disclosure to the international community had been debated many times within the World Alliance. But as things stood, the member nations could ensure their operations remained orderly and clandestine. If they truly went public, could they maintain that control?

’Besides, our nations have been through so much. We’ve invested vast resources, fought so many difficult battles, and spent so long establishing contact with the Guardian forces. We fumbled through the fog, painstakingly accumulating an information advantage, and now that we finally have something to show for it... we’re just supposed to share it freely?’

’Admittedly, luck played a part. But as a nation responsible for its own affairs, if you can’t even discover and recognize the severity of these problems on your own, we have every right to doubt your operational capability and your commitment to secrecy.’

De Yi Country and Japan were now sensing that something was amiss. They were actively approaching major powers to discuss certain "special incidents" and express their concerns, which was a perfect illustration of this principle.

Therefore, regarding the emergence of true Ghost Souls in the world, the World Alliance member nations, after much deliberation, decided to use their own diplomatic back channels. They passed the information directly to the special departments of certain countries as a private exchange, using the opportunity to once again urge them to be vigilant about abnormal events within their own borders.

Whether those other nations took it seriously was their own problem.

Meanwhile, the World Alliance nations established their own targeted Ghost Soul management protocols, as well as specialized internal research and training programs within their respective special agencies.

PS: First Chapter for Monday.