CHAPTER 837: CHAPTER 7: THE DEATH OF FISHER

"Wake up! Wake up!"

"How on earth did this guy manage to survive a night lying in the Northern Realm’s snow without freezing to death? He’s nearly frozen solid..."

The sky over the Northern Realm, where it’s snowing, is remarkably bright.

In a daze, the Death Lord, whose consciousness was a blur, heard a woman’s voice calling him. He wanted to respond, but his head throbbed with pain, as if a steel spike had been driven into his skull and was being twisted around, causing him to gasp several times. He then tried to clutch his head and curl up, only to find his body had stiffened. It took quite a struggle before he could separate his frozen clothes.

Where am I?

He thought groggily as he opened his eyes to see three figures in Northern attire standing in the snow, which was already blanketed in white. The one leading them was an older woman who squatted down with a slight frown. She waved at the Death Lord, and it seemed she was the one who had just asked him something.

Now that she saw the Death Lord fully awake, she asked again,

"Sir, have you seen a thin, black-haired Nali person coming from the south, from the Healing Corruption Church? If you can provide us any information on him, we will reward you handsomely..."

Nali person?

The Death Lord clutched his head, trying to recall the image the woman described, and instinctively, a name popped out,

"Wait, are you talking about... Fisher?"

"Kexie Ning, he’s seen Mr. Fisher!"

The two men behind the woman exclaimed immediately as the woman they called "Kexie Ning" also moved closer, her expression changing slightly as she asked sternly,

"You know Fisher? Where is he now? He was supposed to meet us in McDowell yesterday. Where did you see him?"

"I... where did I see him... Ugh, my head hurts..."

The Death Lord’s mind was still foggy, partly from drinking too much the day before. It seemed he had met with Fisher following an order from the Cardinal of Fate, but afterward, he forgot to give him contact information, or was going to look for him... Wait, did he give him the contact information, or didn’t he... and then...

As his awareness gradually sharpened, he suddenly stood up, panic-stricken, and looked towards the distant woods, shouting urgently,

"Ah, right! Damn, it was the Witch Research Association! Yesterday, Fisher got into trouble with them because of a woman! Damn it, he was so weak, and they were fully armed bastards! I was just about to help him and... Quick! Quickly, come with me to find him; he’s very important to me!"

With his face turning pale, the Death Lord, recalling everything, no longer cared for his frozen, rigid body. He hurriedly got up and dashed towards the woods where the conflict had occurred yesterday. The two Slimes behind him looked at his retreating figure with some skepticism and one of them asked Kexie Ning,

"Do you think he’s telling the truth? Could Fisher’s disappearance be related to him?"

Kexie Ning thought for a second, then shook his head and decided to follow the Death Lord, adding,

"Taking risks for women has always been his way; otherwise, Miss Valentina wouldn’t... Anyway, let’s go and check first since we don’t have any other leads now. This morning, the Nali Overseas Secret Bureau in the McDowell area mobilized towards the Healing Corruption Church. Queen Elizabeth values him highly; I wonder how she’d feel if she saw Fisher in his current weak state..."

The three Slimes had already noticed the movement of the Nali Secret Bureau in McDowell this morning. Coupled with Fisher not appearing yesterday as agreed, they had come to look for him, only to find the Death Lord nearly frozen to death in the snow.

In the woods, what was once a tense standoff now only had two frozen corpses, evidently those of the two former elders of the Witch Research Association who had been chasing Renie yesterday. Bound and unable to move, they had been frozen alive in the frigid Northern night.

"No, Fisher’s not here. There’s no way he could have taken on so many people yesterday. He probably escaped, but those Witch Research Association people wouldn’t have let them go..."

The Death Lord’s expression changed drastically as he started running again. Kexie Ning looked at the two corpses, frozen to death, his face grim. From McDowell to Luxiang Castle, the only other nearby places to rest were those cities and the Healing Corruption Church, but Fisher hadn’t gone there and had gotten into conflict with the Witch Research Association. Given his current state...

The Death Lord continued jogging ahead, moving deeper into the forest as the snowy path led into the mountains. The deeper they went, the scarcer human presence became, until after nearly half an hour of searching, they finally saw a dilapidated hunter’s cabin halfway up the mountain. The sight before that cabin further dampened Kexie Ning and the Slimes’ spirits.

In the stunned gaze of the Death Lord, dried blood trails extended from the cabin, with traces of Middle Ages-era magic scattered everywhere, along with several discarded robes of the Witch Research Association. Most crucially, Fisher’s iconic white shirt was there, riddled with tears and bloodstains, unmistakably indicating that its owner had suffered serious gunshot and stab wounds last night...