“Those people…” Elsa, with her braided hair, sensed the heavy atmosphere and couldn’t help but ask.
“Don’t get into conflicts with them. We’re investigators, not here to fight. If there’s trouble, prioritize retreat and report it. Naturally, more capable people will handle them,” Roy reminded the team.
For some reason, Ashley felt a gaze from among the black-robed figures fixed on her.
It was probably just her imagination. She shook her head.
The Seventh Squad took a different path from the black-robed people, following the cobblestone road toward the town center.
They discovered that the town was eerily quiet, with few people lingering outside. Pairs of eyes watched them from behind windows.
At one intersection, a few children were kicking a ball made from a pig’s bladder. When they spotted the strangers, they immediately picked it up and ran, glancing back with vigilant eyes.
No matter how she looked at it, this didn’t seem like a normal town.
However, the expected scenes of filth everywhere and flies buzzing around didn’t appear. Surprisingly clean, the walls and roads looked as if they’d been washed.
Due to Bull Town’s exclusionary environment, Roy temporarily changed the plan from posing as travelers for covert investigation to directly meeting the Boothslot Family’s spokesperson.
Here, every move was under surveillance, so it was better to show their cards openly and add some deterrence.
Unlike other landed nobles who fancied hunting with falcons and hounds, this family didn’t even have a manor or hunting grounds. They lived in a villa between two large Breeding Farms.
The Breeding Farms’ walls were very high. Looking inside from the entrance revealed maze-like partitions, layer upon layer, with watchtowers and patrolling guards on rotation.
The wide avenue leading to the villa was half-occupied by bales of compressed fodder, along with piles of bean feed stuffed into burlap sacks. A few lean workers used cantilever hooks to move them.
The gatekeeper went in to report, and soon a middle-aged man emerged, dressed in a dark red silk vest with a bushy beard.
Sidney Boothslot, the eldest son of the family.
As he descended from the second floor, he repeatedly smoothed his hair slicked with pomade, then let it fall, rubbing his hands together in front of his chest.
Ashley watched and couldn’t help thinking the gesture resembled a fly rubbing its forelegs.
After mutual introductions, Sidney led them into the parlor of the side hall.
Four long sofas crammed into a room less than thirty square meters, with a tea table in the middle, leaving almost no space to step.
The sofas’ leather was deep brown, thick and soft. Ashley pinched it; the thickness was about two or three centimeters, and she couldn’t immediately tell the material.
The silk-matte redwood paneling on the walls held a large oil painting, depicting with heavy, vivid strokes a scene of bloodless bones and flesh meticulously arranged—like the back kitchen of a barbecue shop.
“Investigation… We’re willing to cooperate…” Sidney drawled. “You can move freely around the town. Just notify us before entering the slaughterhouse workshops—mainly for disinfection and protective gear to prevent bacterial contamination.”
The request was reasonable.
Though in the Isolated Lands, they were nominally under Union City’s jurisdiction. The local snakes knew full well that elimination was far easier than management, so they tried not to provoke Union City’s wrath.
Roy nodded in agreement.
“Esteemed investigators, did you arrive on the Hades Train? The journey is long; you must not have eaten for a while. I’ll have the servants prepare dinner right away…”
Sidney’s attitude was respectful, beyond reproach.
“No need. We’re just minor figures. We can grab something casual outside. If we’re mistaken for freeloading, it would tarnish the Tribunal’s reputation.”
Roy politely declined. From the moment they entered the town, his instincts had warned him that something was off here.
Since he’d put it that way, Sidney had no choice but to see them out.
Leaving the Boothslot residence, everyone simultaneously breathed a sigh of relief.
But after circling the town, they found no inns. As dusk fell, they had to lodge with a local family.
The family had a warehouse they were willing to rent out, with dry straw on the floor—enough for ten people to sleep on, and they had sleeping bags anyway.
Though primitive, the investigators had no complaints. It was work.
“You’re eating this?” Roy asked dubiously.
The oil lamp hanging from the beam cast a dim yellow glow. On the table, grass cakes with a pungent herbal stench stewed in a pot, boiled into a murky dark green sludge like offal hotpot. A couple and their two children sat at the table, devouring the mushy grass cakes without a hint of discomfort.
Hearing Roy’s question, the man paused, then understood and explained:
“Our Bull Town slaughterhouse workers have to inject a gene-modification agent. Only eating grass brings pleasure—even sucking grease off a finger makes them nauseous. Otherwise, those crafty workers would sneak fatty meats, causing losses for the masters.”
“So, even if you can’t eat meat, you still work for the Boothslot Family?” Roy grew more curious.
“Eating grass isn’t bad. This isn’t ordinary grass—it’s dug from the stomachs of slaughtered cattle and sheep, repeatedly chewed and fermented to break down cellulose, mixed with plenty of bean feed. Nutritious enough to build strong muscles.”
The man flexed his massive, sharply defined biceps and triceps, rock-hard when tensed.
“I can easily lift a three-hundred-pound feed sack. Not many are stronger than me,” he added.
From his tone, the man felt genuine pride and satisfaction.
“So, everyone in town is a slaughterhouse worker’s family?” Roy realized something.
“That’s what Bull Town does.”
The man rolled down his sleeve and drained the thick green broth.
Roy thought to himself, no wonder it’s so exclusionary—no inns. They’d turned it into an ironclad operation.
The investigation squad didn’t want the suspicious meat or the offal grass fodder. They were stumped.
Ashley had no intention of sharing her bentos with the team—enough for everyone for one meal, but she chose to share only with Amber for two days.
This immediately drew criticism, especially from Elsa and Claire, who called it selfish, undermining unity, and said they’d note it in the work report.
But Ashley had read “Boule de Suif.” She knew they’d only feel fuller, not grateful. A cold, mocking smile played on her lips.
“Can you really swallow it in front of your starving teammates?” Elsa asked, pained.
“Of course. Watch this—I just downed this shiny frozen chicken, this plump smoked sausage, and this honey-glazed char siu the size of my face…” Ashley ate like she was mukbanging, narrating as she went.
The braided girl turned green with anger.
After eating her fill, Ashley said it was time for a stroll and left the warehouse.
At the alley’s end under the dim streetlamp, a small figure in black robes had been waiting.
“You’ve been tailing me since the station. Who are you?” Ashley asked coldly.
“Chichi…” A familiar laugh came from behind the mask.
“Huh? How’d you end up with that group? What are you doing?” Ashley asked in surprise.
“I only know it’s a feast of flesh, a Secret Alliance gathering. I bought the qualification from a food critic.”
Chloe extended a small hand from her black robe, her delicate fingers clutching a slender, lustrous ram horn, silver-wrapped at the base with anti-slip texture, the tip engraved with the Boothslot Family’s Cracked Pomegranate Crest—dense pomegranate seeds like eyeballs squeezed from the split fruit.
“It’s a token. I checked—it’s a utensil specially for eating meat,” Chloe gestured with her small hand, explaining: “See, you can stab it into ripened meat to smell and judge fermentation, shred tender flesh, use it as a fork, or even scoop marrow…”
Ashley snatched the Silver Ram Horn. “You’re not joining the party. I’ll go for you.”
“Hey, I need to report the news…”
“It’s dangerous here. Leave now.”
From the Blue-Haired Loli’s tone, Chloe sensed the gravity. Her eyes darted, then she said: “Fine… After this, let me write the exclusive.”
“Got it. Leave, the sooner the better.”
