"No!" The man stared at him as if afraid that Murphy would sneak into the village at any moment. "Since the Black Death appeared outside, my grandmother and I have been guarding here! It's been a week, and we haven't let a single person in!"
"A week?"
Murphy was puzzled. A week seemed odd, wasn't it supposed to be a hundred years?
Could it be that time flowed differently here compared to the outside world? And, wasn't Celica supposed to have entered from here?
"Young man, take off your mask..."
The old woman approached, trying to pull off Murphy's protective suit.
Murphy didn't wait for her to get close; he drew his Glock from his waist and shot at the old lady's arm.
"Bang!"
The bullet broke the old lady's arm, which had a piece of bone sticking out, but she seemed to feel no pain and only after a while looked at her severed arm, seemingly unable to comprehend what had just happened.
The arm was broken off without a drop of blood, and the muscles inside had fibrotized, looking like long-placed, blackened hemp rope.
A blue, glowing arm was revealed in place of the severed limb.
Just as suspected!
Having confirmed that he was dealing with a dead person, Murphy didn't hesitate to shoot the old lady's head twice.
He then turned the gun and took down the young man who was trying to run away with three shots.
After watching the direction the man ran to, Murphy understood his intention.
Next to the grandparents' small house stood a pole with a bell on it. The man probably wanted to ring the bell to alert the village of an intruder.
But Murphy had no intention of hiding his presence.
Watching the two zombies shakily rise again, Murphy threw two blazing flames at them, turning them into torches.
He observed for a while until both zombies were burned to ashes and could no longer get up. Only then was he satisfied.
Zombies are weak to fire, true to the saying.
After killing the two zombies, Murphy reloaded his magazine, picked up the notebook that had fallen to the side, and opened it.
The notebook was empty, a few pages seemed to have been torn off, but he still found the imprint of Celica's signature on the adjacent blank page.
These two old liars, Celica had indeed been here.
Murphy moved to the entrance of the village and found that there was indeed a wall behind him, but the passage he came through was gone. He touched it, but his hand didn't pass through; it felt like a real wall.
"Bone to Ashes!"
The wall remained unscathed.
"Thunderbolt Explosion!"
Still no effect, this wall must have been cast with a very powerful protective spell.
Was Celica unable to leave because of this? First, he tried Illusory Shift and found that he could only move within the village. As soon as he set the destination outside the village, it didn't work.
Murphy then tried the prepared Door Key, to no avail.
What about flying?
Murphy waved his wand, and he shot up into the sky, but soon, it felt like he was moving through water. The resistance to flying upward became greater and greater, and after a certain distance, the air around seemed to turn into glue, making it impossible to fly further.
He tried throwing some objects out of the village, which seemed to have no significant impact. Turning a piece of paper into a paper crane and letting it fly out met no obstruction.
However, when he summoned a bird and tried to let it fly out, it encountered the same issue as Murphy.
It seemed the barrier affected living beings, probably intended to "prevent the plague from leaving the village."
Being unable to leave was expected, so Murphy wasn't too disappointed. He descended from the air, opened his suitcase, and took out a bunch of equipment.
There were Petri dishes with Dittany added to target bacteria – to determine the bacterial content of the air, as well as fluorescent reagents and microscopes for detecting the plague bacillus.
Since he was prepared for not being able to leave the village, Murphy's suitcase was fully equipped with detection devices, and with a diesel generator, he could complete the detection and analysis of most common epidemics right inside the suitcase.
Soon, the results were out.
Apart from a small amount of plague bacillus in the water and soil, the overall environment of the village was quite good. The bacterial content in the air was less than 500 CFU/cubic meter, which was already a very good level.
Murphy took off his protective suit, which was heavy and uncomfortable to wear, and hindered his movement and vision. Besides, he had already injected specific T-cells, gaining immunity against the plague bacillus, so he didn't need to continue wearing it.
But he kept the gas mask on.
Not only for protection, but the cold, ruthless, unblinking killer look was also quite cool.
After doing all this, Murphy pondered for a while and decided to find Celica first to ask about her situation.
He took out a miniature model-like object from his suitcase, which was a Jeep Gladiator shrunk by a shrinking spell.
He placed the Gladiator on the ground, restored it to its original size with an enlargement spell, took out a megaphone, connected it to the car's power, set it up on the roof, and pointed it towards the village.
"Celica, Celica, meet at the village entrance! Repeat, meet at the small bridge at the village entrance! Daddy's here to pick you up!"
After a while, there was no response.
So he shouted two more times, and just as he was about to call out a third time, Celica appeared in front of the car, her face flushed red.
"Yo, Celica, you're still alive."
"You, you, didn't you say not to let you in?"
Murphy ignored her, got out of the car, and carefully examined her. He first took out a flashlight and shone it in front of Celica's eyes, then took out a stethoscope and was about to place it on Celica's chest.
"What are you doing?"
"Don't move, I need to check if you're a zombie."
Celica dodged, skeptical. "Can you use a stethoscope with a mask on?"
Murphy withdrew his hand grudgingly. "Fine, I have to take you away dead or alive anyway, no need to check. Come here, get in this suitcase, let's see if I can get you out."
Celica looked at Murphy's suitcase.
What kind of play is this?
Murphy was serious, though. He wanted to try stuffing a person into a seamless expandable box and then throwing the box out to see if it would work.
In fact, he had even thought about turning Celica into a stone or something to throw out.
Unfortunately, transforming a person into an object is an absolutely forbidden act, never taught in school, and he had never tried it. If he accidentally killed Celica, it would defeat the purpose.
"I won't go." Celica looked distressed. "I don't want to leave!"
"Hmm?"
Murphy understood. "The Heart of Mind?"
Celica nodded.
She didn't know how she was cursed, but it seemed as long as the plague still existed in the village, she couldn't leave. She would uncontrollably fear spreading the plague outside.
Her symptoms were like those with claustrophobia or agoraphobia; even though she logically knew the environment wasn't dangerous, she still felt an overwhelming fear.
This proved that the Heart of Mind could indeed implant a thought completely.
Even if the idea or feeling was logically unsound, the person implanted with the thought still couldn't resist it.
A perfect thought branding!
How wonderful!
But it wasn't without flaws.
"The Heart of Mind only makes you not want to leave, right?" Murphy said. "What happens if you're forcibly taken away?"
"I might be in a lot of pain..."
"Oh..."
"So, if you can't feel it, it's okay, right?"
Saying this, Murphy pulled out his wand.
"Stupefy!"
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