Reincarnated as an Energy with a System

Chapter 1930: Revisiting the Murder

Ning transformed into his giant bat form above the roof and flew across New Limaro, moving slowly enough that people below could recognize Blackfang as he passed rather than mistake him for some enormous creature attacking the city.

He had no specific destination in mind.

For the next several hours, he simply moved from one part of the city to another, listening to police channels, watching the streets below, and helping whenever he noticed someone in trouble.

He stopped a delivery vehicle after its brakes failed on a steep road, grabbing the front of the vehicle and allowing it to push him backward until its momentum vanished.

He caught a construction worker who fell from the upper floors of a building, bringing the screaming Dwarf safely to the ground before the man had fully understood that he was no longer falling.

Later, he found a young goblin crying beside a crowded street after becoming separated from his family.

Ning brought the goblin to a nearby officer and waited until the family arrived.

The work was simple.

None of it came close to threatening him, but the gratitude of the people he helped made the time pass faster.

As the afternoon became evening, Ning returned to human form and made his way toward the location Larissa had sent.

The house was located in an older district of New Limaro, where the buildings had been constructed close together and the streets were narrow enough that Centaurs and larger Beastmen would have difficulty moving through them.

Ning arrived first.

The building was a three-story home made from dark bricks, with a short metal fence around the front and several flowerpots hanging beneath the windows.

It did not resemble the house from the photographs Ning had studied.

The exterior had been repainted, the front steps had been replaced, and an additional room appeared to have been built onto the side.

Only its general shape remained familiar.

Larissa arrived several minutes later in her van.

She stepped out and remained beside the vehicle, staring at the building without approaching it.

Ning waited.

"This is it," she finally said.

"You used to live here?"

"Until my father died," Larissa said. "Afterward, I stayed with a friend’s family until social services found somewhere for me."

She walked toward the gate, and Ning followed behind her.

Larissa rang the doorbell, and they heard hurried footsteps moving from somewhere inside.

The door opened to reveal a short, elderly Gnome with a thick gray beard and a pair of round spectacles that enlarged his eyes.

He looked at Ning first, then toward Larissa. Recognition appeared almost immediately.

"Larissa?"

She gave him a small smile. "Hello, Mr. Gannis."

The Gnome opened the door wider.

His wife appeared behind him, another elderly Gnome with silver hair tied behind her head, and she reacted with the same surprise upon seeing Larissa.

The two had apparently met her years ago when they purchased the building, and Larissa had returned several times to collect belongings that had remained after her father’s death.

She explained that she needed to see the old study.

Neither Gnome questioned why. Mr. Gannis stepped aside and allowed them to enter.

The interior had changed even more than the outside.

The furniture was smaller to accommodate the Gnomes, new decorations covered the walls, and several family photographs stood on shelves that had once carried Larissa’s childhood belongings.

Larissa moved through the house slowly, remembering a version of the place that no longer existed.

She stopped before a door at the end of the hallway.

The Gnomes had turned her father’s old study into a storage room, filling it with boxes, unused furniture, and shelves of tools.

Mr. Gannis offered to clear some space, but Larissa told him it was unnecessary.

She and Ning entered, and once the Gnomes left them alone, Larissa closed the door.

For a moment, she did nothing. Ning could hear her heartbeat growing faster as her eyes moved around the room, attempting to match what she saw with memories from her childhood.

"The desk was there," she said, pointing toward a stack of boxes. "The shelves covered that wall. He spent most of his time in here."

Ning stepped closer to her.

"You don’t have to do this tonight."

Larissa shook her head. "I do."

She held out her hand, and Ning took it. Then she closed her eyes and activated her power.

The world around them flickered.

The boxes vanished and returned repeatedly as images from the past began moving backward through their minds.

Furniture shifted through different positions. Objects rose from the floor and returned to shelves. The walls changed colors as years of repairs and decorations reversed themselves.

People walked backward through the room, appearing and disappearing in flashes as Larissa pushed the vision further into the past.

The Gnomes became younger and then vanished entirely.

The room returned to the study Ning had seen in the crime-scene photographs.

Police officers moved backward through it, returning objects to the floor before lifting them again, while forensic investigators walked in reverse with cameras flashing.

Larissa slowed the vision.

Her father’s body appeared in the middle of the room.

Even though she had seen the photographs hundreds of times, the sight of him lying there caused her grip on Ning’s hand to tighten.

"This is it," she said quietly and pushed the vision backward one final time.

The police officers disappeared.

The blood returned to her father’s body, the broken shelf repaired itself, and the overturned objects flew back into place.

Then Larissa’s father stood.

He was alive.

Larissa stopped the vision and let it play normally.

The Imp sat behind his desk, his dark-red skin illuminated by the light of a lamp beside him, while two black horns curved backward from his forehead and leathery wings remained folded behind his chair.

He looked younger than Ning had imagined.

Not young, exactly, but filled with a life that had been absent from every photograph Larissa kept of the crime scene.

Larissa stared at him without breathing.

Her father had no idea his daughter was watching him from only a few steps away.

He sat alone in the house, reading through a journal that lay open before him.