The headless body quickly pooled blood beneath it.
But in the blink of an eye—whether it was the corpse, the blood, or the scattered fragments of bone on the ground—everything vanished without a trace.
Su Fan, who had watched the entire scene unfold, narrowed his eyes slightly.
This was the demon Malthus’s provocation directed at him.
And just then, his phone suddenly rang.
“Mr. Su Fan, we’ve got something on that matter you asked us to look into.”
The caller was one of the agents he’d parted ways with not long ago.
Adam and Davis had temporarily requisitioned a computer in the hospital using their agent credentials.
On the screen, a surveillance clip sent over from the police precinct was playing.
The priest, who had been walking toward the church, was suddenly sent flying as if struck by something invisible, crashing heavily onto the ground.
The doll he had been carrying in his arms fell to the side.
Not long after, a woman dressed in white picked it up and carried it away.
The eerie part was—this woman never once moved her feet during the entire process. She seemed to glide through the air as if floating.
“The one who took the doll is a woman in white. According to the attachment sent by the police department, her identity is AnnaBelle Higgins, who was supposed to have died by suicide.”
The moment Adam uttered that name, he and Davis noticed something chilling—on the surveillance footage playing on the screen, the woman had stopped in her tracks. She actually lifted her head and looked straight toward the surveillance camera!
In that instant, the apparition in the woman’s form seemed to pierce through the screen and time itself, fixing her gaze directly upon them!
Adam and Davis felt an icy chill run through their entire bodies. That gaze was overflowing with malice.
It was as if an invisible, ice-cold hand had reached through their skin, muscles, and bones, and clenched tightly around their hearts!
Davis reacted quickly and immediately slammed the computer’s power button.
Only when the screen went dark did they both return to normal.
Everything had happened in the span of a single heartbeat—but to them, it had felt like an eternity.
After catching their breath, Adam finally spoke again.
“After the woman took the doll, it somehow ended up at a doll shop in the neighboring district.”
“Then it was bought by an elderly woman and mailed to a certain studio lot in Los Angeles—XXX Studio.”
“The movie currently being filmed there is the sequel to the previously hit film The Princess Diaries.”
After listening to the agents’ brief summary, Su Fan hung up.
Anne Hathaway.
That actress he hadn’t contacted in quite a while had been chosen as the prey.
Why was that?
Was it because of the close contact he’d had with Anne Hathaway during the Freddy murder incident?
Or was it because of Anne’s Catholic faith and her former aspiration to become a nun?
Su Fan didn’t have time to ponder this in depth.
The studio lot wasn’t too far from the hospital—less than ten minutes by car.
The question was: could Anne hold out against the evil’s assault during that time?
Sensing the shift in Su Fan’s demeanor, Teresa guessed that he already knew where the doll was.
Without a word, she followed him to the car, quickly opened the door, tossed the suitcase onto the back seat, and settled into the passenger seat.
The easygoing atmosphere they’d had on the way here was gone. For the first few minutes after leaving the hospital, the only sound inside the cabin was the roar of the engine—not a single word was exchanged.
“What’s the name of the demon we’re going to face?”
After a while, Teresa broke the silence first.
“Malthus. 38th in the ranking of Solomon’s seventy-two demons.”
“Is it powerful?”
Teresa asked.
“Hard to say. The ranking of the seventy-two demons is based on the order in which they responded to Solomon’s first summons, not their actual power. But it’s probably no pushover.”
Su Fan answered briefly.
“If things look bad later, don’t try to join in the exorcism with your cross.”
“I understand.”
Teresa nodded.
She had heard similar stories during her exorcism training.
There was once a priest who lacked sufficient strength but insisted on performing an exorcism anyway.
His fingers, one by one, were snapped while gripping the cross—and then both his body and the cross burst into flames, burning until nothing but ash remained.
Bathsheba had been difficult enough to deal with, and she’d only received a blessing from a demon lord.
Teresa couldn’t even begin to imagine just how powerful the demon lord they were about to face might be.
“…Two months ago, the convent told me my father had died.”
Suddenly, Teresa spoke again, her voice soft.
“After my mother passed away, he sank into despair. He strictly forbade me from ever mentioning my ability to see strange visions.”
“He also dumped all the household chores on me.”
“Even after I entered the convent, he would still show up from time to time, asking me for money.”
“When I heard the news of his death, I felt sad—but in some corner of my heart, there was also a faint sense of relief and release.”
“When I realized that, I was horrified and consumed by guilt.”
“As someone who spent every day listening to the Church’s teachings, I shouldn’t have felt that way.”
“I couldn’t help but wonder—was I actually glad that my own father had died?”
Teresa’s voice was so quiet that it was almost drowned out by the engine’s growl.
“How sinful of me.”
“Because of that, I knelt before the cross again and again, begging for God’s forgiveness.”
“It wasn’t until just before I set out on this journey that I finally felt a little better.”
“As a daughter, I hadn’t been able to comfort my father in his grief over losing my mother—instead, I saw him as nothing more than a shackle binding me down.
Even after I devoted myself to God, I still couldn’t change the way I thought…”
She stopped talking, waiting for the young man beside her to respond.
Su Fan kept his eyes fixed on the road ahead, as if he hadn’t heard a word she’d said.
But after a moment, his calm voice sounded beside the nun.
“Why are you telling me all this? Are you looking for me to condemn your sin?”
“No. I just wanted to speak aloud the darkness I’ve been hiding inside.”
Teresa shook her head.
“Demons exploit people’s guilt and pain to create illusions and break down their will.”
“I probably won’t be much help in the actual exorcism later. But at the very least, I don’t want to become a burden to you.”
“I understand your feelings perfectly well.”
Su Fan nodded slightly.
“I actually have a bit of my own take on this. Want to hear it?”
“Yes.”
“My take is this—you hold yourself to too high a moral standard. That’s not right. It only causes you suffering.”
A flicker of confusion passed through Teresa’s eyes.
“Must sound strange, doesn’t it? How could having high moral standards be a bad thing?”
“Compassion and universal love—even toward those who harbor hostility and murderous intent toward you, you’re expected to forgive them and pray for them.”
“In your doctrine, the number of people who can actually achieve that can be counted on one hand—aside from Jesus himself, only the most renowned saints come close.”
“You’re just a novice nun. Holding yourself to the same standard as Christ and the saints—isn’t that another form of arrogance in itself?”
“Setting the bar too high is arrogance. Setting it too low makes you a sinner.”
“So the balance is something you’ll have to figure out for yourself.”
“To sum it up in plain terms… good enough is good enough.”
Before Teresa had time to fully digest Su Fan’s words—
The car came to a sudden, sharp stop.
“We’re here.”
