Blessed By A Yandere Goddess

Chapter 25: A Wanted Hunter

The apartment was silent except for the faint hum of the old refrigerator, its bent hinge groaning softly every few seconds like a dying metronome.

Ronan sat in the creaking wooden chair, his head still in his hands, the weight of seven deaths settling into his shoulders.

He wasn’t processing it properly. His mind had learned to compartmentalize during forty-seven days of watching people die, and old habits didn’t break just because the bodies were human instead of monster.

Sarael’s shadows curled around his ankles, hesitant and apologetic.

[Are you... angry?]

"No. I’m not angry."

[You’re not?]

"I should be. I know I should be."

He lifted his head and stared at the boarded window.

"But I’m just... tired. And we need to figure out what’s happening outside before they figure out where we are."

His eyes drifted to the bed. His phone was still there, forgotten since the day he’d left for the expedition. Phones didn’t get signal inside gates, there was never any point in bringing one. The real question was whether it still had any battery left.

He moved to stand, but the shadows got there first, lifting the phone and carrying it to his waiting hand.

"Thanks."

A faint smirk crossed his face.

He couldn’t stay angry at her.

Not when he owed her his life. Not when she’d saved him in that shrine and fought beside him. Seven people were dead because of her, but he’d be dead without her.

Maybe that math didn’t make things right, but it made things... balanced. A debt repaid, whether he’d asked for it or not.

Even if it meant his life on Earth was over.

He turned on the device, and surprisingly, it was on fifteen percent.

His face was already everywhere. News sites, video platforms, social feeds, and discussion boards. To most, he was a villain. To some of the edgier corners of the internet, he was a misunderstood hero.

’Typical.’

Sarael, however, seemed to respond warmly to those edgy sites, a pleased hum resonating through the apartment every time Ronan scrolled past one.

After a few more minutes, he moved to pocket the phone and stopped; he had no pockets. He’d been so distracted, he hadn’t even noticed the Association had left him with nothing but hospital rags.

But that was barely the most of his problems.

"Well, that settles it," he muttered. "I’m a wanted man."

***

The Association was in complete meltdown. Seven dead, and the one responsible was a D-Rank porter who’d walked out of a gate he claimed had left no other survivors.

Nobody could keep a level head with information like that. At best, he’d gotten lucky, killed some high-level beast and triggered a massive level spike. At worst, he’d been corrupted in the gate and gained something unnatural.

But either way, the survivor was a murderer. And he’d escaped the crime scene without breaking any doors, without passing any guards in the hallway, without leaving a single trace of his exit route.

They were dealing with a hunter who could either teleport or phase through walls.

FLASH!

FLASH!

The barrage of camera shutters hit the moment the lead investigator stepped outside. Journalists had swarmed the building’s perimeter, and they surged toward him the second he cleared the doors.

"Sir Tristan! You issued the containment order, correct? How is the Association responding to this unprecedented breach?"

"Sir! Any comments on the incident? Do you have a statement?"

Tristan pushed through the crowd, his scar tugging at the corner of his mouth. Silver and blue hair caught the camera flashes, but his expression stayed. An A-Rank hunter famous for his command over lightning, and right now, every reporter in the city wanted a piece of that reputation.

"No comment."

He shoved past the last of them and reached the car waiting at the curb.

THUD!

The door slammed shut, and the vehicle pulled away, leaving the shouting journalists behind.

"Damn vultures," he muttered. "Can’t give me a single break."

"Well, it is your fault."

Yeula Howard lounged in the opposite seat, one leg crossed over the other, her phone in her hand. Blonde hair and gold eyes. Every feature calibrated to make her a star, and she knew it. A-Rank hunter, part-time Internet idol.

"I’m already exhausted," he said flatly. "I don’t need to hear it from you."

Yeula didn’t look up from her phone. Her thumb scrolled lazily across the screen.

"Exhausted? You’ve been on this case for two hours. I’ve been fielding calls from the media division since the bodies were discovered."

She finally lifted her gaze, gold eyes glinting.

"You know what they’re calling him online?"

"I don’t care." fɾeeweɓnѳveɭ.com

"The Shadow Porter. Catchy, right? Very mysterious."

"Seven people are dead, Yeula."

"Seven people who had a D-Rank porter strapped to a chair in a black-site interrogation room with no legal counsel, no charges filed, and no official record of his detention."

She tilted her head.

"I’m not saying he’s innocent. I’m saying we handed him a defense before he even asked for one." freeωebnovēl.c૦m

The car hit a pothole, and the suspension groaned. Tristan stared out the window at the city blurring past.

"You think he’s dangerous?"

"No doubt about it."

Tristan’s fingers drummed against his knee.

The car turned onto a quieter street, the flashing lights of the Association headquarters receding in the rearview mirror. Tristan pulled out his own phone and stared at the image on the screen.

Ronan Night.

The photo was two years old, pulled from his porter license. A younger man with tired eyes and hollow cheeks. Nothing about the face suggested a killer.

But the footage from the interrogation room told a different story.

He’d watched it three times already. The moment the lights went out, the moment the straitjacket tore like paper, the moment the door slid open and the cameras caught Ronan Night standing in the observation room surrounded by bodies.

And the audio.

The audio was the worst part.

Someone had been laughing. A woman’s voice, high and sweet and completely unhinged, echoing through the speakers.

"Who is she?" Tristan asked.

"No idea. Voice print doesn’t match anyone in our database. The analysts think it might be a skill manifestation, some kind of psychic echo or something."

"Do you believe that?"

"A little."