Something was off.
Watching the robbers talk to Supervisor Gale over the phone, Lynn frowned.
One moment, they were demanding the mayor's presence; the next, they wanted lawyers and negotiators.
It was clearly a stalling tactic.
Logically, the longer they delayed, the worse it would be for them.
Yet they kept dragging things out—unless they were absolutely confident they could escape.
With that thought, golden light flickered in Lynn's eyes as he activated his Phantom Spirit ability.
A mindless wraith appeared before him.
The Phantom Spirit could be used to command wraiths in battle—or to turn them into his "eyes."
Lynn willed the wraith forward, sending it drifting silently across the street toward the bank.
Inside the building, the glass doors were shut tight, and all security cameras had been cut.
More than thirty hostages and bank employees lay on the ground, trembling.
Three robbers, each armed, hid within the bank's blind spots—clearly wary of sniper fire.
After confirming the robbers' positions, Lynn felt a growing sense of unease.
What kind of bank robbers ignored the vault and safety deposit boxes, choosing instead to stay in the main hall to watch the hostages?
He directed the wraith to continue its search deeper into the building.
Sure enough, things were exactly as he suspected—there were more than just three robbers.
Inside the vault, three masked men were busily stacking gold bars into pre-prepared crates.
Nearby, two others worked feverishly with specialized tools, prying open safety deposit boxes one after another.
They filled the crates with diamonds, jewelry, and other valuables, completely ignoring any documents or photos.
One by one, they lowered the full crates down ropes into a hole cut into the floor.
Beneath the vault lay New York's tangled network of underground pipes.
Down there, three more robbers were loading the crates of gold and jewels onto kayaks.
Seeing everything through the wraith's eyes, Lynn raised an eyebrow.
As expected, the three in the lobby were just a distraction to buy time.
But what caught his attention most was a red gemstone one of the robbers had just placed into a crate.
The gem looked ordinary, yet it pulsed with a vast Power of Death.
For Lynn, it was an overwhelming temptation.
This was far faster than absorbing the Power of Death from helping a wraith fulfill its obsession.
No—he had to get that gem. Even if it ended up being returned to its rightful owner, he would still claim the Power of Death within it.
As time went on, major outlets like Fox began reporting live from the scene.
Shoot to thrill, play to kill
Too many women with too many pills, yeah~~♫
"Hmm..? Who's playing music right now?"
Shoot to thrill, play to kill
I got my gun at the ready, gonna fire at will, yeah~~♪
Then, with a roar of repulsors, a gold-and-red armored suit descended from the sky, landing in a perfectly dramatic pose.
"Wow, what a crowd," Tony Stark said, his faceplate sliding open as he smirked. "Gale, looks like you guys are in quite a mess."
The onlookers on the street broke into cheers the moment they saw him.
Even Supervisor Gale exhaled in relief, stepping forward to greet his "old acquaintance." "Stark, good thing you showed up."
After quickly explaining the situation, Tony ordered Jarvis to scan the bank's interior.
At the same time, a small drone detached from his armor and zipped through a narrow gap into the building.
Lynn ignored all of it, keeping his focus on the wraith as it silently followed the jewelry box radiating that dark, irresistible Power of Death.
He chatted idly with George Stacy as they waited.
"You've been played," Tony Stark announced a few minutes later, his tone half amused, half exasperated.
After scanning the entire building with Jarvis, he quickly laid out exactly what was happening inside the bank.
With Tony on the scene, the situation was resolved almost effortlessly.
Lynn didn't bother paying much attention to the cleanup—once Tony used his tech to subdue the three robbers, the FBI agents immediately stormed in to secure the area.
His attention, however, stayed fixed on that red gemstone.
More than once, Tony seemed to glance in Lynn's direction, as if sensing something unusual.
After marking the gem's location through the wraith, Lynn and George Stacy returned to the precinct once everything wrapped up.
"A strong start and a weak finish," George said as he parked the car by the curb. He bought two hamburgers and a couple of colas from a nearby stand before continuing, "But honestly, I like it that way. If we can solve things without firing a single shot, it means no one on our side gets hurt."
Lynn took a bite of his burger, leaned back in the passenger seat, and let out a long yawn.
"George, I'm gonna take a quick nap. When we get back to the precinct, could you return the submachine gun and vest to logistics for me?"
With that, Lynn closed his eyes and pretended to sleep—but his consciousness was still linked to the wraith, keeping watch over the red gemstone.
Through the wraith's eyes, he saw Citibank staff return the red gem to the safety deposit box it had come from, the one opened earlier using a special device.
After securing it, the staff contacted the box's owner to explain the situation.
Something like this couldn't be covered up, so whether the item stayed in Citibank's vault or was retrieved was left entirely to the owner's discretion.
From this so-called "strong start, weak finish" operation, Lynn had gained two things.
The first was the knowledge of that red gemstone.
The second was the wraith with a red-level obsession still hovering beside Supervisor Gale.
And Lynn had no intention of letting either slip away.
When they returned to the precinct, he reclined his seat and continued to feign sleep in the car.
At that moment, through the wraith's vision, he saw an elderly man arrive at Citibank and retrieve the red gem from the safety deposit box.
As the old man got into a car, Lynn directed the wraith to tail him.
The vehicle drove all the way to a villa in the Upper East Side, where the old man finally got out and entered an opulent mansion.
The old man didn't store the gem in a home safe. Instead, he opened a hidden door and stepped into a secret chamber.
Inside, he removed a painting from the wall, revealing an electronic password lock underneath.
After entering a series of dark web access codes, the center of the room split open, revealing an underground lift.
He took the lift down roughly ten meters, then walked through a narrow passage nearly a hundred meters long—until Lynn saw what lay at the end: a massive underground castle, hollowed out beneath the city.
As the old man entered, his demeanor grew reverent.
In the castle's vast hall, dozens of vampires with gleaming fangs mingled casually, wine glasses in hand.
On the round table before them lay a young girl—her neck marked with twin puncture wounds, her body cold and lifeless, her face frozen in terror.
It was clear the blood filling the vampires' glasses came from her.
Seeing this through the wraith's eyes, Lynn's expression tightened in surprise.
Not because vampires were hiding in New York—but because surrounding them were more than thirty female wraiths, each bound by their obsessions, glaring at the vampires with eyes full of vengeance.
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What? You guys thought his life would go back to solving ordinary murder cases? Oh hell nah~
Supernatural Detective baby!
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(づ￣ 3￣)づ
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