Shining Through the Chaos with My Bulldog
Matthew suddenly felt a surge of energy. But Jarvis clearly wasn't sharing his enthusiasm. Everyone in the camp was dead—no signs of life anywhere. His chest tightened, heart racing. He was scared he wouldn't find Zyrell, but even more afraid of finding him among corpses. That made his hands slower than Matthew's. Matthew, quick and nimble, slowed after digging through a few tents. It was freezing. Standing in the snow while digging made his whole body ache. Even with gloves, his fingers were numb. He ran back to Jarvis and asked meekly, "Jarvis, maybe you could use your tracking technique again, narrow it down, and then we dig there?" Jarvis frowned. "I can't. My tracking technique only gives a general direction." Matthew's face fell. "But this camp is huge! How long are we gonna—" Before he finished, Jarvis snapped, "Keep digging! Find the human, find the corpses!" Matthew rolled his eyes in secret. What a dumb foreigner! It's supposed to be, "Find the living, find the dead." Jarvis couldn't even get a simple phrase right, yet he kept yelling. Matthew didn't dare speak up. Jarvis usually had a reasonable temper, but it flipped fast. Once he lost it, he became a completely different person—yelling, raging, even threatening to kill himself. Not just himself, but Matthew too. Matthew jogged back to his spot and kept digging.Jarvis lowered his head and accelerated his pace. The cold was brutal. If they stayed out here any longer, they'd really freeze to death. But Jarvis wouldn't stop until he checked every single tent, making sure Zyrell wasn't lying among the dead before he could relax. Sadly, Matthew brought bad news soon. "Jarvis! I found him in this tent!" Jarvis lifted his head stiffly and opened his mouth, but he couldn't say anything. Thinking Jarvis hadn't heard, Matthew spoke louder and called out several more times. Finally, Jarvis stumbled forward. "Jarvis, look—medium-skinned, short, pockmarked face. Is that him?" Matthew kept talking nonstop. "I've been digging them out one by one. Medium-skinned are rare, so it won't take long—" Before he could finish, the usually quiet Jarvis collapsed onto the snow and screamed in Borduric. Matthew jumped in shock. Then it hit him—that was really Zyrell's corpse. He understood what Jarvis had yelled. It meant "my brother" in Borduric. Matthew froze, unsure how to comfort his grieving companion. He was an orphan. He'd never lost family before—he didn't even know what his family looked like. After a long pause, he finally managed to say, "Your brother's eyes are big." The crying stopped abruptly. Jarvis snapped out of his grief. Everyone else's eyes were closed. How could Zyrell's be open? He jumped to his feet and rushed over to Zyrell, examining him closely.Then, his expression darkened. "He wasn't frozen. He was stabbed!" "Huh?" Matthew hurried over. "It's true!" Carefully, Jarvis melted the frost from Zyrell's chest and studied the wound. After a moment, he said, "This was a bayonet stab." "A bayonet?" Matthew immediately thought of Borduria. "You mean Borduria's enemies did this?" Jarvis shook his head slightly. "Not a normal bayonet. It's a triangular one. It stabs and drains at the same time. Damage is doubled." He paused, eyes darkening as he looked at Matthew. "It's a Drakorian weapon." Matthew shivered under the gaze. "Don't look at me like that! I had nothing to do with this. I'm just some poor office guy barely surviving." Jarvis lowered his gaze. Looking at Zyrell with pain, he gently touched his face. "I know." Of course, Matthew had no part in it. The killer was a pro, striking precisely at Zyrell's heart with a fatal move. He held Zyrell's body. Of course, Matthew had no part in it. Only when Matthew's teeth started chattering from the cold did he bark, "Search!" Matthew was stunned. "Search for what?" Jarvis frowned. "Suspicious shoes!" "Shoes? Why—" Matthew stopped mid-sentence, finally catching on. "You mean suspicious clues?" Jarvis grunted. "Yeah, that's what I mean." Matthew's mouth twitched, then he looked troubled. "With all this snow, everything has already been buried in it. How are we supposed to find anything?"
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