The flickering flashlight flickered for a few seconds before returning to normal. When Richard moved a step, the flashlight began flickering again.
As one might imagine, in the space where Richard stood, there was an object moving in the corresponding location within The Upside Down.
"Based on human social psychology, when people choose a place to inhabit, they always tend toward familiar places. So, if Henry Creel really is in The Upside Down, it wouldn't be surprising if he treated his home there as his base of operations," Richard thought to himself.
He hadn't been entirely sure if the Henry Creel he had in mind was the same person as the eldest son of the family reported in the newspapers last night, but now, it seemed basically certain.
Henry Creel was the evil seed who had murdered his own family back then, the big boss behind the scenes acting from within The Upside Down. He was also Number 01, the one who had once gone on a rampage and bathed The Lab in blood, fought a massive battle against a powered-up young Eleven but was unfortunately defeated, and finally vanished mysteriously.
After returning home from the party last night, Richard had specifically read through all the files from The Lab before going to sleep. From them, he learned a lot of inside information that many people didn't know, including current members of The Lab.
Of course, it was normal for them not to know. After all, after 01 bathed The Lab in blood in 1979, Dr. Brennan gave The Lab a complete overhaul. In other words, laboratory members who joined after '79 certainly wouldn't know about this incident at all.
It was also because of that massive outburst of power that the young Eleven lost her memory and most of her language functions, only slowly recovering and relearning the basic abilities of a normal person after escaping from The Lab this year.
Richard watched the flickering light of the flashlight. After hesitating for a brief moment, he chose to follow the footsteps of Henry moving in The Upside Down; he wanted to see exactly where the other party was going.
Passing through the hallway and going up the stairs, he finally arrived at the domed attic. The flashlight's light stabilized into a steady flicker in the very center of the attic room.
"What is he doing, stopping here?" Richard was quite suspicious, then guessed with alarm, "Could he be casting a spell?"
He had seen Henry's files. The other party possessed powers similar to Eleven's, which was one of the reasons why Dr. Brennan valued Eleven so much—because Henry served as the template.
The reason Dr. Brennan ultimately chose Eleven instead of choosing to cultivate Henry, a ready-made and powerful natural psychic, was according to the reports because even Dr. Brennan could not suppress Henry's dangerous dark side. Dr. Brennan wasn't a total madman; he knew that if he really disregarded everything for the experiment and cultivated Henry, he wouldn't be able to clean up the mess for all of humanity. A more powerful 01 would only become more unscrupulous in releasing his dark side.
However, Dr. Brennan had his own special kind of "mercy." Henry's powerful talent meant that even when he found Eleven, a very suitable replacement, he didn't choose to eliminate Henry. Instead, he just kept using a control chip to suppress Henry's superpowers, while also using it to suppress the other's dark side.
Unfortunately, in the end, the young Eleven misplaced her trust and released the demon Henry, leading to the tragedy at Hawkins National Laboratory in '79.
Since Henry had abilities similar to Eleven's, that meant he should also be able to perform extrasensory perception like Eleven. Only that state of ability would cause the body to remain motionless.
"So... like Eleven, is he spying on the world on the other side?" Richard shuddered. His current spatial position was extremely close to the other party, which meant that if the other party really wanted to sense the real world, the first person he would definitely sense would be Richard himself, who was in a state of space-time displacement with him.
Just as the thought arose, Richard whipped his head around. His keen five senses indeed allowed him to perceive the feeling of being watched. He saw only an empty space behind him, but for a split second, Richard saw the afterimage of a skin-deformed being covered in green vines. The owner of that afterimage was staring straight at him.
"You really are watching," Richard said loudly. He knew his voice could reach The Upside Down. With a cold sneer on his face, he asked, "Should I call you Henry Creel, or should I call you 01?"
Buzz—
Richard felt a surge of demonic sound flooding his brain. His brain trembled for a moment, and his vision blurred slightly. Immediately afterward, a humanoid creature appeared before him. It was entirely green, with plant-like organs growing on its body. A pair of indifferent eyes opened on a face that seemed to be tightly bound by countless small, fissioning green vines.
"Powerful." Henry sized Richard up, as if examining a piece of pork with a peculiar texture. "Your spirit is even harder to invade than I imagined."
Richard scanned the other party with the same gaze: "Is there a possibility that it's just because your current power is too weak?"
Henry narrowed his eyes slightly. "I feel tension from your spirit, but you don't seem to be afraid."
"I don't know if you've ever read DC Comics, but I feel like your image is very similar to a character in there named Swamp Thing. I seriously suspect you've plagiarized someone else's character." With every breath Richard took, his heartbeat became steadier and more rhythmic. He said calmly, "Perhaps it's precisely because your image feels so familiar that I don't feel much fear toward you."
"You should feel fear," Henry said indifferently, lightly raising a hand.
An invisible force slammed into him like a moving truck. Richard felt his body lose control and was instantly sent flying. As his body flew backward, the surrounding scene also rapidly distorted. Houses shattered, blood covered the sky, red clouds drifted, and deep red lightning struck continuously on the muddy ground filled with jagged rocks.
Boom!
Richard was pushed against a stone pillar. The dark green vines of The Upside Down tightly entwined his limbs and neck, pinning his body closely against the stone wall.
The treelike Henry walked slowly toward Richard, saying unhurriedly, "You are the strangest person I have ever seen. I cannot read your mind, and you possess unparalleled growth potential. I need you to give up your mental resistance now, let me invade your consciousness, and then be my servant..."
He stood before Richard, his hook-like claws hovering over the contours of Richard's face. That large hand, which almost covered his entire face, was only about two or three centimeters away from Richard. He said in a low voice, "Otherwise, you will die a miserable death."
"I don't think so." Richard gritted his teeth with effort. A powerful force exploded from his body, and he actually tore the incredibly flexible vines apart directly. In the moment Henry was stunned with surprise, Richard had already landed a punch on Henry's face.
Henry was instantly sent flying. Suddenly, the space shattered, and Richard also broke free from the conscious space and returned to reality. He found himself still in the domed attic of the Haunted House, and the flashlight's light was still flickering incessantly.
Without any hesitation, Richard turned and went downstairs, then broke through a window in a room on the second floor and jumped out of the building.
He didn't know if the punch he had given the other party in the conscious world just now had hurt him, thus making the other party afraid to chase him closely.
He currently had four A-rank skills. Although they provided a lot of physical constitution bonuses, they also gave a significant boost to his mental aspects. In particular, the A-rank Programming skill had taught him a more rational way of thinking and simultaneously brought a more powerful mental pressure resistance. This was also the reason he was able to break free from Henry's restraints in the conscious space and launch a counterattack.
Richard brushed the dust off his clothes. Seeing the strangulation marks on his wrists and feeling the burning sensation on his ankles and neck, his gaze changed slightly. Then, he left the Haunted House area without looking back.
Although this experience was dangerous, Richard had also obtained some information about Henry.
Henry had indeed been blasted into The Upside Down by the rampaging Eleven back then. Perhaps he had some fortuitous encounter in The Upside Down that turned him into the neither-human-nor-ghost form he was now. He was able to attack through conscious space, and the damage inflicted on a spiritual body could be synchronized to the physical body in reality.
"But with such a powerful ability, he still has to send his minions one by one... sending creatures from The Upside Down to attack the real world. It seems the range of this ability is limited, and the area he can move in is also limited. If not, then he must be a complete idiot," Richard thought. He naturally leaned more toward the idea that the other party had some unavoidable reason for being bound to a certain place, so his power couldn't spread out.
Halfway there, Richard seemed to have suddenly figured something out. He looked back at the Haunted House, his mouth curling into a bright, sunny smile: "Oh, so you can't just move around as you please. Well, then I have plenty of ways to mess with you."
...That same day, Richard went to the supermarket and bought a large quantity of light bulbs, and borrowed more than a dozen speakers from Eddie and his bandmates.