Chapter 55: The Butterfly (End)

It was the fourth day after the press conference when several uninvited guests arrived at Everly’s home.

“Good afternoon, Mr. John Brenton. We’re investigators from the Federal Bureau of Special Affairs Investigation (SAI). My name is Gregory, and this is my colleague, Remia.”

A low-profile black sedan pulled up at the gas station. From it stepped a tall, well-built, handsome man in a tailored suit, and a young woman in a women’s suit with the hem slightly flipped out, giving her a somewhat careless impression.

They were clearly not there to refuel. After getting out of the car, they ignored the large dog, Buddy, glaring at them from behind the fence, and walked straight up to Old John. Producing their credentials, they began speaking with the wary old man.

It happened to be Sunday, and Everly was home for the day.

Hearing the commotion downstairs, she stepped onto the balcony, carefully avoiding the animal traps on the floor. Gripping the railing, she peered down just as the black-haired young woman looked up. Their eyes met briefly. The woman smiled at Everly without any guile, looking a bit silly.

Who were they? What were they here for…?

Everly’s doubts were quickly answered.

After Old John cautiously verified their credentials, he invited the two inside. Following a brief conversation, his voice called up from downstairs: “Everly, come down for a moment.”

They were actually here to see her.

After a simple introduction, the suited man named Gregory got straight to the point:

“Hello, Miss Everly. We’ve come to reopen the investigation into the ‘Megan Clinic’ case that occurred in Micano City three years ago. According to the case files, you were a direct witness to the incident and the first person to notice that something was wrong. So you were the first person we sought out.”

At the mention of “Megan Clinic,” Everly’s heart stirred.

Micano was just a small, unremarkable city. A case from three years ago shouldn’t have attracted investigators from an agency like the SAI—unless there was something unusual about it.

For example… if it was connected to the current nationwide wave of s

cides.

“Please, go ahead and ask. My grandfather and I suffered greatly because of that clinic. We also hope the mastermind behind it can be caught as soon as possible.” Everly was exceptionally cooperative.

“Alright. First, could you describe your experience?” The female investigator, Remia, opened her notebook and began the questioning.

“Of course. At the time, one of my upper left canine teeth hadn’t come in for a long while, so I went to the dental clinic…”

What had happened at Megan Clinic was like a thorn lodged in Everly’s heart. Even after three years, every detail remained vivid. She recounted the entire sequence of events meticulously, leaving out nothing—including the origin of the dried toad charm. The only thing she concealed was her own ability to sense danger. Because the lie was woven carefully, the investigators showed no suspicion.

Their focus centered on the “promotional video” that had been played at the clinic, and on the tooth Everly had pulled from her gum.

Gregory asked her to describe the video again in precise detail—frame by frame, the more detailed the better—while Remia requested the tooth from Everly and held it in her hand, closing her eyes.

Seeing Remia adopt that familiar posture, Everly immediately concluded that she was a psychic.

Sure enough, about ten minutes later, Remia opened her eyes, drenched in sweat and breathing heavily. She subtly nodded toward Gregory across from her.

“Miss Everly, Mr. John—would it be alright if we take this tooth as evidence?”

Everly nodded. “Of course. It’s of no use to us.”

Old John had no objection either.

The two investigators then asked a few more questions, mainly about Megan Clinic. However, since Old John and Everly had only been there once, they could not provide much additional information.

“Thank you both for your cooperation. If we need anything further, we’ll be in touch.”

With that, Gregory stood first and shook hands with Old John and Everly.

The female investigator was half a beat slower and rose to her feet as well. When it was her turn to shake hands with Everly, their hands—one large, one small—met. Everly was still wondering why Remia’s hand felt so cold when the woman suddenly reacted as if struck by electricity. Her soft body stiffened abruptly, and the focus drained from her eyes. Her gaze fixed vacantly in midair, as though something invisible had seized her mind.

Clatter.

Startled out of her daze, the notebook in Remia’s hand slipped and dropped onto the coffee table. Several sheets of paper tucked inside slid out and scattered across the tabletop.

Everly instinctively lowered her head and saw that they were photographs—and a report.

Though taken at different times and from different angles, the photos all featured the same subject. The person in the pictures had sun-bright golden hair and clear, melancholy green eyes. She lay quietly on an autopsy table. Even though her entire body bore the bluish pallor of a corpse, and from the neck down her body had been cut open and held apart with surgical instruments—exposing a shocking blur of red and white—the dead woman was still breathtakingly beautiful, so beautiful that one’s gaze could not help but linger on her again and again.

If she wasn’t the singer Seradiya, whose face had been flooding every major news outlet lately, then who else could it be?

Those were actually Seradiya’s autopsy photos.

Forcing herself to look away, Everly shifted her attention to the report. It matched the photographs—it was an autopsy report.

[…]

[…May 30, 09:12:01 — A sample was taken from the cells of the esophageal lining. The number of cancerous cells has further decreased, now approaching zero…]

[…June 1 — The cancerous cells have completely disappeared… Brainstem reflex observed. Faint brainwave activity detected…]

[…June 2 — Brainwave activity has grown increasingly frequent. Damage to the occipital region and internal organs has begun self-repair… Incredible. This corpse is reviving…]

Before Everly could finish reading the report, a hand suddenly reached in from the side and swiftly gathered up the scattered photos and papers.

She looked up and met Gregory’s stern expression. “My apologies. Remia is new. She spaced out for a moment.”

“Oh, it’s alright.” Everly shook her head, subtly putting strength into her hand and pulling it free from Remia’s palm.

She had been so focused on sneaking a glance at the report that she had almost forgotten—psychics could glimpse fragments of a person’s experiences through physical contact. (Everly had tested this before; they could only see experiences from this lifetime, not her previous one.) Although she had nothing to hide, having one’s privacy exposed still wasn’t a pleasant feeling.

Sure enough, the moment her hand was withdrawn, it was as if a machine had suddenly lost power. Remia shuddered, and the vacant look in her eyes instantly cleared.

“I’m sorry… I’m sorry. I’m always this clumsy.” She apologized hurriedly. When she lifted her head, she cast Everly a subtle, searching glance.

What had she seen?

Everly didn’t know.

That night, however, she dreamed—after a long time—of her banshee mother. In the dream, her mother grew a fish tail and swam freely through the vast ocean together with Lamia, their laughter echoing everywhere beneath the sea…

After waking, Everly took out the still-dull eyeball and turned it over between her fingers for a long while.

…

The investigators stayed in Micano for some time before leaving.

Because the case was classified at a high level of confidentiality, Everly had no way of knowing what they had uncovered. However, about a week after the investigators departed, a rumor began circulating online: that Seradiya hadn’t died at all, but had been secretly detained by the authorities.

The rumor originated from a private forum called “Butterfly Cemetery.” All of its members were die-hard fans of Seradiya. More than half of them had already “turned into boxes,” and the remaining members vaguely rallied around the forum’s second administrator—since the first administrator had also died.

The one claiming that Seradiya wasn’t dead was that second administrator.

He spoke with absolute certainty, declaring that Seradiya had felt everyone’s love and had returned from the underworld, transformed into a newborn, immortal goddess. However, because this goddess had only just been born, she was still very weak and required even more faith and love from her believers. Yet the U.S. authorities had forcibly severed the medium through which she connected with her followers—the video she had posted—and imprisoned her, even conducting countless cruel experiments on her.

The second administrator called on all believers to rise up and wrest their goddess back from the hands of the American government.

To uninformed outsiders, such claims sounded no different from the ravings of a lunatic in a psychiatric hospital. It would be easy to assume the second administrator had become too lost in fantasy and lost his mind. But Everly had seen the investigators’ documents beforehand. The autopsy records clearly showed that the cancer cells in Seradiya’s corpse had been decreasing, and that the previously dead brain had begun exhibiting brainstem reflexes again—she was unmistakably in the process of reviving.

Could that “Number Two” actually be someone in the know?

So… was Seradiya’s death video created to manufacture a god?

Facing terminal cancer and unwilling to accept such an ending, had she collaborated with the Megan Medical Group, using the company’s special technology so that viewers of the video would, unconsciously, revere her as a new deity—even offer up their lives as sacrifices? And thus, through the convergence of countless strands of faith, had she finally begun to show signs of resurrection…?

Whoa. That was horrifying.

The “truth” Everly pieced together sent a tingling numbness across her scalp and raised goosebumps along her back.

If the technology of the Megan Medical Group continued to advance, who knew when some random video encountered online might contain elements tied to religion or malevolent gods—causing people to fall into it without even realizing it.

Fortunately, what Everly had worried about had clearly already occurred to the authorities.

In July, a small column—no bigger than a block of tofu—quietly appeared in newspapers across the country: Megan Medical Group had been indicted by the U.S. Department of Justice on suspicion of medical fraud. The company’s relevant executives had all been detained. Only the founder’s descendant, Grant Megan, was missing.

The crimes committed by the Megan Group were obviously far more than simple medical fraud. The authorities were likely using that charge as a pretext to clean house. Although someone had escaped, the company would probably be forced to lie low for quite some time from now on…

With that thought in mind, Everly opened Chatter and typed “Cursed Witch” into the search bar, then hit Enter.

At the very top of the search results was an account with a child mannequin as its profile picture.

The bio read: “Erasing your resentment.” The account had been registered two months ago. It had never posted anything and followed no one—yet it had a large number of followers. Looking through related search results, Everly frequently saw posts from victims of school bullying sharing their stories and tagging this account at the end, expressing pleas for help or gratitude.

Everly: “…”

There was no doubt about it—that account had to belong to the Cursed Witch, Natalie.

The first time Everly heard classmates mention the account, she had been drinking soda. She had nearly sprayed it out in shock.

At first, she thought it might just be someone with the same name. But after seeing the profile picture… well, case closed.

Apparently, it wasn’t only fringe cults keeping up with the times—even witches were staying current.

Maybe she really should spend less time online in the future.

The internet was just too dangerous.