Nightmares

Celestial Being - 2

The city was by now shrouded in darkness, a misty fog filling the empty streets with a damp chill that stung to the bone. The air was damp and cold in the seaside city, and now that it was nightfall, the darkness pressed in on the homeless like a pervasive demon.　　

Hawthrone breathed into his hands and was about to find a place to get through the long, cold night ahead of him.　　

Just then, several police cars burst out of the road and surrounded the area. A large group of police officers rushed down, armed and ready with guns in hand, their blackened guns pointed at the unarmed Hawthrone.　　

"Hands in the air!" The policeman in charge yelled, "Don't advance any further!"　　

A cold wind blew, a little chilly indeed for the thinly dressed Hawthrone, and he couldn't help but shiver. He raised his eyes and sized up the officer in charge.　　

He wore a dark heavy trench coat and a pair of spectacles and looked to be in his forties or fifties, with a sharp gaze, biting air and an extraordinarily spirited appearance, the fearlessness of a young man and the composure of a middle-aged man simultaneously manifesting themselves in his body without the slightest contradiction.　　

He carries a rather long strip of sanity on his head, longer, visually, than the two unlucky men just now put together.　　

[Sanity Value 100/100, Pollution Level: 0%]　　

Hawthrone brightened up as if he had found a high-scoring exam paper in a pile of failing papers, and immediately took a not-so-subtle interest in the officer.

One hundred points of sanity ...... is quite good, should he find a way to make a believer out of him?　　

Seeing no reaction from him, Chief James Wright's grip on his gun tightened and he yelled again, "Hands in the air!"　　

Hawthrone glanced around at the blackened muzzles of the guns and at the panicked walkers running around the streets, and after a moment of contemplation.

He gave up resistance decisively and raised his hands.　　

James was relieved to see that Hawthrone was cooperating. The seemingly harmless youth in front of him had done something terrible that other citizens might not understand, but he knew all about it.

The crime scenes of his cases were so bizarre, bloody and horrific that even in a place as dirty as -----------, they could be called horrific. All those he targeted were dead and mad, destroying their bodies as if they had lost their minds - banging them against walls, tearing their flesh, even destroying their senses and shoving their fists down their throats ......　　

There is nothing you can't think of that they can't do, and some of them even defy the rules of physics and are theoretically impossible to achieve, but they do succeed.　　

In a world where supernatural forces exist, this can only mean one thing...　　

This citizen, Dylan Hawthrone, is truly a bit of a monster.　　　

"You're involved in a major ...... murder case," James said, pausing to say "murder".　　

The case Hawthrone was involved in didn't seem to be a homicide, technically speaking, because all the victims had committed suicide.　　

Even if they had committed suicide in a bizarre, strange, unscientific manner, they had indeed gone mad and committed suicide.　　

So James changed his tone and said, "...... a major case, please cooperate with the police investigation."　　

Hawthrone slowly raised one eyebrow.　　

Just as James was ready for a great battle with the madman, Hawthrone said, "Yes, officer."