A comic book, but a librarian

"You don't have much time to rest. We may have to race against time with the Metropolitan Police Department."

"What do you mean? The police have this ability?" Hikigaya widened his eyes. He had lived for almost twenty years, and this was the first time he heard that the Japanese police seemed to be able to take action, and it was from the mouth of Uesugi Sumiya, a young master from the noble family.

"Maybe. No matter what, we have to speed up. I don't want you to become a potential mental patient if you are a step slower. God knows what will happen to a person whose soul is missing a piece for a long time."

"I'm starting to panic when you say that... When are you planning on leaving?"

When Hikigaya Hachiman heard the word "mental patient", he instantly perked up. He didn't want to end up in a mental hospital and become a burden to his family.

"How about the day after tomorrow? But we can leave anytime tomorrow. I have to go back and prepare now. At least I need to prepare more props, otherwise our safety cannot be guaranteed."

Uesugi Sumire handed Hikigaya Hachiman a glass of water.

"This is pure underground well water from the UK. After drinking it, lie down and rest for the night, and think about something."

"Is there anything I can do?"

"You should think about how to leave the hospital without being discovered. After all, you are a patient now."

Hikigaya choked for a moment and realized that this problem was indeed very serious. After all, if he was discovered and escaped from the hospital again in his current condition, there was no doubt that he would have to eat his parents' mixed doubles game again after a long absence.

"Come to think of it, I seem to have said that I haven't been to a fireworks display yet. It looks like I won't have the chance this year..."

Uesugi Cheng sighed, and after saying goodbye to Hikigaya, he returned to his apartment, which still looked as clean as new. With Himegami Sakura's help in housework, he saved a lot of effort.

"Sakura, now I need you to come over and help me make something."

"Oh, here we come."

Chapter 86: Disappearance at the Unknown Station

The next day, Uesugi Cheng carried a backpack that he never used on weekdays, and looked like a student preparing for a trip.

"So how did you get out? How could you actually get past the doctors and nurses?" Uesugi Sumiko couldn't help but ask as he looked at Hikigaya, who had the bandage on his head removed and was standing in front of him ready to go.

"Don't ask. I asked Komachi to help me... Although I guess she herself doesn't know that I got here thanks to her, so we must make this happen quickly this time, otherwise I'm afraid my family will beat me to death."

Hikigaya coughed twice. His face was still a little pale, but his voice was very powerful. It was obvious that the loss of a part of his soul had not affected his vitality, or it had not affected his body so far.

"You might be disappointed, because we can't really tell what's inside. But this time we're just trying to get back a part of your soul, so we don't need to be so clear about it. It's enough to complete the goal."

"That's right. Let's make it quick. This is the first time I've heard you say this. Shall we go to the station first?"

"Ah, just take the same route you did then, you remember?"

Uesugi Cheng said that the high temperature of summer is gradually approaching, and the fierce sun is mercilessly scorching the pedestrians who are still walking on the street, but on the contrary, several meters underground, people can still enjoy the cool breeze brought by the ventilation system and central air-conditioning.

Uesugi Sumire and Hikigaya looked a little strange sitting in the subway. One of them had a bulging bag on his back and the other one didn't look well. A few years ago, someone would have secretly informed the subway driver that another subway terrorist attack might happen.

"Does this bus go all the way to such a remote place? This road seems to lead to the suburbs, so why do all these things seem to be in the suburbs?"

Uesugi Cheng looked at the subway route list. The subway here only provided the station names and routes along the way. He had to open the map in his mobile phone to confirm the subway stations and the direction they were going.

"Well, Uesugi, my head is a little dizzy... You're right, something is calling me, I heard it."

Hikigaya Hachiman covered his head and lowered his head, causing the people around him to silently take a few steps back. Fortunately, the subway was not crowded at this time. The people in the car looked at the duo with some strangeness, as if they were hesitating about what route to choose if they needed to escape later.

Uesugi Sumire didn't feel anything. He frowned silently. The power of his consciousness was enough for him to explore the vicinity of the subway, but he found nothing. Even when Yotsuya Miko was attracted by the mountain god, he could feel the connection between the mountain god and Miko. But now, he suddenly found that he could not feel what Hikigaya Hachiman was attracted to.

"Dear passengers, this station is the terminal of this subway train. Please take your belongings away before getting off the train. Thank you for your cooperation."

The electronic sound in the car rang out, and Hikigaya seemed to have recovered a little, shaking his head at Uesugi Sumire.

"I didn't hear anything. It was strange. When I parked the car, the noise disappeared instantly."

Uesugi Sumire and Hikigaya Hachiman looked out of the car window. The site logo was clearly written outside, and there were even various advertising banners and scroll bars. It looked like a normal site.

"Then let's get off the car first. We really need to figure out how to enter that door." Uesugi Sumire nodded and got off the car with Hikigaya Hachiman.

However, just after they got off the train, something strange happened. After the subway door closed, the train rushed forward into the bottomless darkness without looking back, under the surprised gazes of the two people.

"Oh my god... Hachiman, I remember there is not only no next stop ahead, but it's not even a transfer station, right?"

The train disappeared into the darkness in the upward direction without any sign of turning back. Uesugi Sumire turned around and asked Hikigaya Hachiman, who was so shocked that he could hardly speak.

"This is the terminal. The bus should have turned back here... I heard it again. Wait, someone is calling me. It's in there."

Hikigaya Hachiman himself was surprised that he would point his finger into the seemingly bottomless darkness.

"Ah, that's right... We've missed the express train ticket, so we can only walk in. I don't know if this is a good thing or a bad thing."

Uesugi Cheng smiled bitterly and shook his head. He still didn't quite understand what was going on here. Perhaps he could only get the answer by actually entering the tunnel.

"Are we really going in? I'm a little worried that a car might come up behind us and kill both of us."

Hikigaya Hachiman held Uesugi Sumiya's hand and staggered down the platform. The track stretched all the way into the darkness, looking like a carpet laid out to invite them.

"Don't worry, normal vehicles won't drive forward. They will only turn back at the platform. Besides, the path we're walking on is the reserved space of the subway. It won't be dangerous if we don't walk around randomly."

Uesugi Cheng had done his homework in advance. He touched his backpack and took out two high-power flashlights.

"It's fully charged, enough for us to use for at least three hours. If we really feel that time is confused, we can use this as a basis for timing."

So the two of them walked along the railroad tracks, one in front and one behind, into the space that was completely shrouded in darkness.

"There's actually a road here, and the advertising facilities aren't even here, and it doesn't even seem to have electricity."

Hikigaya Hachiman used a flashlight to shone the surroundings to confirm the situation, Uesugi Sumire was responsible for clearing the way while he was responsible for paying attention to the surrounding environment.

“I see…I see.”

"What?" Hikigaya looked at Uesugi Sumire, and hearing his tone of sudden enlightenment, he felt as if he didn't understand anything.

"Listen carefully, Hikigaya... is coming."

"What...what"

A fierce white light suddenly lit up from the front of the train, and Hikigaya felt his heart skip a beat. A ghostly train appeared in front of him and rushed towards him without slowing down at all.

"Ah...ah..." He had a dull look in his eyes and was held back by Uesugi Cheng so that he did not fall down.

"Nothing happened, Hikigaya. No matter what happens next, don't believe it. Follow the direction of your heart. Close your eyes and hold my hand."

Hikigaya Hachiman did as he was told, and almost at the moment he closed his eyes, he felt as if someone was showing him the way from afar.

Chapter 87: The Case of the Disappearance at the Unknown Station

"What was that just now?" Hikigaya Hachiman was afraid, but Uesugi Sumiya asked him not to open his eyes, so he could only ask with his eyes closed.

"A train, perhaps a remnant of the mountain behind. There are many people wearing early white surgical gowns on the train. White surgical gowns should have been eliminated in the last century... I don't even want to think about how long ago this place was built."

"No matter how long it has been, it's not as long as the doll disappearance case. After all, it started almost a hundred years ago." Hikigaya Hachiman tried to liven up the atmosphere. The whispers in his ears became clearer and clearer, but he just couldn't understand what was saying. This made him a little irritated and uneasy.

"No, Hikigaya, you don't understand what I mean. If the incident with the Hinashiro dolls was caused by chance, then there is no doubt that the supernatural phenomena here originated from human malice... Open your eyes, we have seen part of the truth."

Hikigaya Hachiman was stunned for a moment and did not do it immediately. He clearly remembered that Uesugi Sumiya once said that evil spirits would use various methods to lure people to do what they wanted, so he suddenly became a little nervous because he clearly felt that he had not reached his destination.

"Don't worry, you have successfully completed the 'compass' mission. You can open your eyes now. This road is now a one-way street."

Hikigaya's shoulder was patted by Uesugi Sumire, and then he felt Uesugi Sumire's two fingers tapping his neck. That was the secret signal he and Uesugi Sumire agreed upon. When they were unable to confirm, they would use this method to distinguish the truth from the false.

So he opened his eyes and was shocked by the scene in front of him.

There was a corpse lying in front of him. It was a man who looked quite old. He was wearing the same old white surgical gown that Uesugi Cheng had described. His chest and abdomen seemed to be soaked in an ominous red blood color.

"From the stiffness and temperature of the body, he has been dead for a long time... But there is no decay and no smell, and the amount of dust on the body does not match the time of his death at all."

Hikigaya was stunned by Uesugi Sumire's words.

"When did you learn to do autopsies?"

"I didn't learn anything about autopsy. These are just some basic knowledge. When I was chatting with my sister, I asked her to help me get some information to broaden my horizons."

Uesugi Cheng naturally would not say that he had seen some detailed research reports on corpses when he was looking up information at Silent Bookstore.

"Do all Chinese people have such unique tastes... What about the cause of his death?"

"To be honest, the cause of death is hard to verify. You know I only learned some trivial things, but the real problem with this corpse is..."

Uesugi Sumire did something that Hikigaya didn't expect. He lifted up the white surgical gown. Hikigaya felt a little nauseous when he saw the huge bloody hole. It seemed that the inside of the body had been hollowed out after it was cut open.

"Could it be... a criminal group that sells organs?"

"I don't know, but I think if that kind of criminal gang exists, they might have become part of these corpses. After all, this place looks much more mysterious than the territory of violent criminal gangs."

"Keep going, we are on the right track."

"This place is really rotten." Hikigaya said helplessly.

"Yeah, it's awful. It should have been a wonderful summer vacation, but the two of us are here in the cold wind and encountering such a crappy thing." Uesugi Sumire said as he looked at Hikigaya Hachiman beside him. There was only a dark road ahead in the endless empty tunnel, and even the sound of the wind blowing through the tunnel sounded like a miserable wail.

"So, after Hikigaya gets out, I will start tutoring you right away. Next time you encounter something like this, even if you can't run away, you won't be easily confused and sent to the hospital or even not have the chance."

"It's so troublesome..." Although Hikigaya complained about the trouble, he still agreed to Uesugi Sumire's request very honestly.

Sure enough, after they walked forward while chatting for about ten minutes, they saw an old station that looked like no one had been there for a long time. Hikigaya Hachiman even saw the shoe prints left by his shoes two days ago on the thick dust on the floor.

"Right here... I feel like something is wrong, my chest feels a little tight..."

Hikigaya Hachiman touched his chest, and the feeling of being pulled in his mind became more and more profound.

"That's right... Do you recognize this shoe print?"

Uesugi Sumire pointed at a mark that suddenly made Hikigaya feel creepy. It was a pair of shoe prints that did not match his feet at all and extended all the way to the edge of the platform. It looked as if someone got off here like Hikigaya Hachiman, but Hikigaya Hachiman's shoe prints went to the edge of the platform, while this pair of shoe prints continued to extend out of the platform at a constant speed.

"The distance between the steps and the force are exactly the same. I think the way this person walks is probably similar to that of a puppet." Uesugi Sumiya swallowed his saliva. They might get some unexpected gains or surprises on this trip, such as a real insider.

“This road…seems to be inside.”

Hikigaya Hachiman looked at a path that looked abandoned. The path was completely different from all the facilities in this abandoned but basically intact station. It looked like the construction and renovation had been suddenly abandoned halfway through.

The two of them walked slowly forward along the footprints. Hikigaya Hachiman seemed to hear the voices of countless people talking. It was no longer someone calling him, but countless people whispering in his ears.

"Where...is this place?"

At the end of the path is a vast area. This is not what shocked the two of them. In this vast space, there are more tombstones lined up than what Hikigaya has seen in ordinary cemeteries. This is a huge underground cemetery. The tombstones piled up with stones silently symbolize the last information left by the people they record in this world.

"A tombstone from the Showa era... could it be a place like a human experiment site?" Hikigaya Hachiman looked a little angry, perhaps for those who died tragically here like that corpse.

"I don't know... The dead here don't seem to be as peaceful as we thought. Hikigaya, be careful... There's still a long way to go, don't fall behind."

Hikigaya suddenly looked up and seemed to see something flashing in the passage ahead.

Chapter 88: Disappearance at the Unknown Station

"Hey, Uesugi, I just saw something flash by over there, could it be..."

"Can it be removed? Do you see any other living people here?" Uesugi Cheng's soul began to become restless. There seemed to be something closely related to the soul here that was emitting an influence, so that Uesugi Cheng felt a little dazed.

"Should we continue moving forward?"

"Do you think there's any benefit in turning back now? You don't plan to develop dementia in a few years and end up in a mental hospital, do you? And did you see that footprint? God knows if someone else was lured in there. What if the person who died in there blames us for not going in to save him, and then comes out to harass us?"

Hikigaya blinked when he heard what Uesugi Sumire said, feeling a little unbelievable.

"Wait, this kind of thing actually exists... Well, there are quite a few living people like this in reality, not to mention the dead."

Hikigaya Hachiman patted his head. He felt that the feeling of his soul being pulled was getting stronger and stronger, as if someone was pulling him forward.

"So let's set off quickly. If we're lucky, we might be able to save one more person alive. If we're unlucky, we might just be able to collect a body." Uesugi Sumiya didn't tell Hikigaya that he took a closer look at the tombstones. The format on the tombstones didn't look like a cemetery. Instead, it looked like a graveyard where bodies were hastily buried. There were only names and dates of birth and death, and many names were even replaced by numbers.

"Although the road seems to have been abandoned halfway through construction, these facilities seem as if they have been built for quite some time...Who!" Uesugi Sumiya suddenly turned around, staring at the end of the corridor with burning eyes. Hikigaya was frightened by him. The undisguised murderous intent made Hikigaya's heart tighten. Uesugi Sumiya looked as if he would attack without hesitation in the next second.

A not-so-obvious light gradually lit up in Uesugi Cheng's eyes and clenched palms. Uesugi Cheng's learning of lighting techniques was not limited to purifying evil spirits.

"Young man, what a coincidence! I accidentally got lost here after buying a horse racing ticket."

Uesugi Sumire was stunned for a moment, while Hikigaya Hachiman beside him scratched his ears speechlessly to make sure he had not heard wrongly what the middle-aged woman in front of him said. It did seem that she had a horse ticket in her hand, but Hikigaya Hachiman did not say anything. Anyone who could appear here, no matter if he was a human or not, was not someone an ordinary nobody like him could afford to offend.

"Captain Inudo...wait, how come the Japanese police are so fast? Why haven't I seen the Metropolitan Police Department work so fast before? Why don't you just tell me the truth about what kind of facility this is?"

"Ah, can't you just think I'm just passing by?"

Inudo Ranko's eyes met Uesugi Sumire's and she seemed to want to say something, but when she really looked into Uesugi Sumire's eyes she was stunned.

She couldn't describe what she saw, but her heart was inexplicably warning her not to act rashly. Even the so-called 'Fox Fairy' that was offered by the fragment of the Killing Stone she dealt with last time didn't give her this feeling.

"Of course not. After all, if someone can get lost here, then I really don't know what I have been searching for these past few days."

Uesugi Sumiko did not lower his guard. This was not the first or second time that the Metropolitan Police Department of Japan had behaved in a dishonest manner. Moreover, what he found this time were obviously some secrets that the authorities might not be willing to disclose.

"Well, it doesn't matter if I tell you, young Uesugi. This was once an experimental site of an organization... They used it to conduct experiments on the soul, but with the end of the war, this place was completely abandoned in a hurry, but the things left behind were not handled well, so this situation happened today."