Chapter 4 The murderer turned out to be myself

To bury their mother's body, they had to sell some of their belongings.

Otherwise, they would be forced to dispose of the corpse in the river under the cover of night.

It was an emotionally unbearable prospect.

Hannah, the older sister, adjusted the kerosene lamp to make it brighter.

The flickering light illuminated the idol of a demon in the corner of the attic.

The metal patches on the statue's waist glowed coldly in the dim light.

These were traces of Miryam's repairs using coal ash, now resembling a gruesome wound.

This was the only valuable item left in the house.

"The entire Rust District is searching for that man known as the Ripper. Police and patrolmen are everywhere. Last week, they burned three old women in the East District simply because their steam spirits sang folk songs."

Hannah's fingertips traced the mysterious hieroglyphic inscriptions carved into the base of the statue.

"If we're found with this, we'll definitely be sent to the stake!"

Her father's rough palm brushed over the statue's embedded metal beard, grinding it against his lips with a faint sound.

"Old Hawk bought half a magic doll's core last month for 15 shillings."

He glanced at Edrick, the man who had been loading cargo at the docks for twenty years, his eyes now gleaming with desperation.

"I'll take it to the general store before dawn tomorrow."

In the end, the two men of the household decided to sell the idol of the evil god.

For families like theirs, every penny counted.

In this cold season, failing to pay rent meant being evicted.

Failing to pay taxes meant being arrested.

Both were certain paths to ruin.

Every day, people died prematurely for various reasons.

But ultimately, it all boiled down to poverty.

Edrick stared at the empty eye sockets of the statue and suddenly remembered the scene three months ago.

At that time, Miryam knelt in front of it.

The little girl used scraps of cloth to sew a cloak for the stone statue, saying, "The deity will only appear when it is warm."

Now the cloak still hung on the statue's shoulders, but it had become the stake they were about to gamble away.

Hannah's protests sounded like rusty gears grinding in her ears, but they couldn't drown out her father's calculations:

"Ten shillings can buy half a ton of coal. Fifteen shillings can buy twenty pounds of beef!"

"I'll go," Edrick said. "Your knees aren't fit for such a long walk in the morning."

Miryam immediately raised her hand: "I'll go too!"

Before Edrick could object, she continued, "Taking me along won't arouse suspicion."

The three adults exchanged glances. Miryam was speaking the truth.

First, the likelihood of a child being a heretic was low.

Second, even if the child had been abducted, it wasn't the patroler's responsibility—that was the police's job.

"The patroller would rather kick over a beggar's coal bucket than bend down to question a snotty-nosed kid."

The father's knees creaked in the morning mist, like rusty gears turning forcefully.

Edrick stared at the old man's knuckles gripping the coal cart handle.

Old scars from the dock crane's steel cables still lingered there, now turning purple from the dampness.

After sending Edrick and Miryam out of Grayrat Alley, his father pushed the coal cart toward the dock.

Every day's wages were crucial to the family.

The brother and sister walked through the early morning streets.

They reached the riverbank when they were suddenly stopped by a shout.

"Stop!"

"Yes, sir!"

Edrick died there, like an insignificant rat.

He lay on a dirty street in the rust-stained district.

When he opened his eyes again, his fingertips were no longer digging into cold stone slabs.

They were digging into the sticky coal dust by the canal.

Miryam's tears fell onto his wrist.

The warm sensation sent a shiver down his spine.

The wounds on this body were healing at a visible pace.

The shattered skull emitted a dull pain like gears grinding together, but it couldn't drown out the sound of a human heart beating once more in his chest.

"Brother... you..." Miryam's voice was like a rusty spring, ready to snap at any moment.

Edrick struggled to sit up.

He discovered that his palm was still clutching a metal fragment from the statue.

The jagged edges had cut through his skin, but there was no blood.

Instead, the wound glowed faintly, as if countless tiny gears were turning beneath the surface.

"Let's go home first."

Edrick looked around. People were already starting to come out onto the streets.

He pulled Miryam toward their home.

He was in a hurry to get home for two reasons.

First, the speed at which his wounds were healing was too strange to ignore, making it hard not to think of some kind of demonic intervention.

Second, the words the patroller had spoken were weighing heavily on his mind.

It was clear that their mission had been reported.

The second reason was that his head was splitting with pain.

On the way home, Edrick absentmindedly comforted his sister.

He endured the excruciating pain of the fusion of souls in his mind.

Edrick's original soul was undoubtedly dead, but the Transmigrator had inherited Edrick's body and memories.

However, those memories were fragmented and incomplete.

They gave the Transmigrator a strong sense of alienation and made it very clear to him that these memories did not belong to him.

He merely had the right to view them.

As a history major, the Transmigrator thought this was a good thing.

Just as history determines the soul of a country, a person's memories determine the soul of that person.

If the Transmigrator had completely inherited Edrick's memories, he would surely have fallen into a vortex of self-doubt.

Moreover, just inheriting these fragments of memory had already caused him unprecedented pain.

God only knew how painful it would be if these memories were truly fused together.

This was also a highly inconvenient situation.

The fragmented memories needed to be organized and understood.

He must even relearn many basic facts about this world to continue living as Edrick.

After all, as a statue, his perspective was severely limited.

The transmigrator's consciousness could still return to that dilapidated temple on the mountain top.

The temple had undergone some changes.

The originally broken plaque gradually became clear, revealing the Chinese characters "Sanctum of the Village Deity."

It was fortunate that he had studied in China for seven years and was able to recognize these ancient characters.

Those three characters symbolized an Eastern deity, a guardian god of a village of low rank.

This was somewhat disappointing to the Transmigrator.

Since he had traveled through time, he naturally hoped to have a powerful golden finger.

But how did he end up as a low-level deity?

However, as a doctor of agriculture and forestry with a thesis titled "Feasibility Study of the Twenty-Four Solar Terms in Intelligent Irrigation Systems," the Transmigrator had a natural affinity for agricultural deities such as the Land God.

Another change was the television.

He could tune the TV to the third channel.

It was a library listing the Chinese names of various books.

However, he could only read a few of these books.

He had to pay Faith Essence to unlock them.

The ones he could read for free were magical but seemed rather useless in the transmigrator's memory.

Rainmaking Spell,Sprout Spell, Soil Fertilization Spell, Cat Control Spell, Mind Cleansing Spell and even Childbestowal Blessing Spell!

Could there be anything useful?

Moreover, the prices listed at the back of each book were very unreasonable.

The cheapest, "Cat Control Spell," cost 1,000 Faith Essence!

The most expensive, "Soil Fertilization Spell," cost a whopping 10,000 Faith Essence!

He had only accumulated 1,800 Faith Essence in six months through the hard work and devotion of little Miryam, and he had already used 1,000 to revive himself!

Then he remembered that this was the Sanctum of the Village Deity, which protected farmers and the land.

As expected of the god of the land, the skills of the guardian deity of agricultural civilization were simple and unpretentious.

At the same time, the character status on channel 2 also changed to:

Character: Edrick Croft

Race: Human

Occupation: Village Deity (Apprentice)

Age: 100 days

Lifespan: 9 months

Icon: None

Symbol: None

Manifestation: None

Talent 1: Faith Essence Offering

Talent 2: Faith Perception

Faith Essence Value: 1000

Character Status: Injured (healing), Angry

Skill 1: Ripper. Proficiency: Senior (very skilled with sharp knives, very skilled)

Skill 2: Third Set of Low-Level Civil Servant Broadcast Exercises from the Celestial Theodome. Proficiency: Novice (This is a mandatory exercise routine for low-level civil servants in the Celestial Court system, designed to strengthen the body. It is recommended to perform it for fifteen minutes twice daily.)

Ripper? What kind of skill is that? Why is his proficiency so high?

And what is the Heavenly Palace Broadcast Calisthenics? Heavenly Palace? Could it be... the Heavenly Palace where gods live in a certain Eastern legend? The Eastern pantheon?

Obtaining Edrick's body was undoubtedly a good thing for the transmigrator, but it was not good news for the Croft family, because the real Edrick was in fact dead.

The transmigrator had mixed feelings about this little sister, because Edrick's fragmented memories had merged with some of his emotions and were influencing his thoughts.

Moreover, now that he had obtained Edrick's body, he had to live on as Edrick.

He discovered that this parasitic resurrection had consumed an entire candle, and whether it was an accident or fate, he owed the little girl a favor.

The scraping sound of a rusty crowbar against the wooden door echoed down the alley.

As Edrick turned the corner, he just happened to see a stranger's copper-buckled belt collide with the laundry room door.

This thug, who was always rummaging through gears in the dockyard trash, was using his greasy fingers to hook Hannah's apron string, trying to pull her out through the door crack.

The steam whistle of Bella, the alarm, sounded sharply inside the door.

Edrick was in a bad state.

He strained to recall who the man in front of him was while trying to make sense of the scene.

That was Grif, a gangster.

Good, very good, with enough effort, he would be able to remember.

As the Transmigrator rejoiced, some memories he hadn't intended to recall also flooded into his mind.

These memories were about Edrick himself.

"Damn, I don't want to see these memories..."

The Transmigrator helplessly discovered that his new body was actually that of a serial killer—the Rust District Ripper!