Chapter 77 And when I saw those people lying behind...

The place Chen Aiguo went to was the largest and most luxurious hotel in Liuping Town.

Although it's called a hotel, it's actually a restaurant, inn, tea house, and banquet hall all rolled into one. It offers the town's most luxurious rooms, affordable budget rooms, and even hourly rooms for a break of an hour or two, only available outside the city. Many nearby truck drivers and business owners prefer this place for dining and resting.

When Li Chengcai was in high school, he'd lived in the hotel's most expensive and luxurious room for extended periods. When he returned to school this time, his father had once again arranged for him to stay in the hotel's nicest, quietest, and most luxurious room. This was no secret throughout Liuping Town. Furthermore, ever since Li Chengcai arrived, his car had been parked in the hotel's most conspicuous parking space. Even without asking, everyone had heard and seen this.

After running to the hotel, Chen Aiguo did not rush in rashly.

He first peered through the hotel's iron fence and carefully surveyed the open-air parking lot. When he saw no sign of Li Chengcai's black car, he pulled a pack of Yellow Crane Tower cigarettes from his trouser pocket and approached the two security guards at the front door. He'd bought them specifically for business, a pack costing fifteen yuan. They were the best cigarettes available here, aside from Zhonghua.

"Brothers, I want to ask you something. Is the young master of the Li family who drives the jeep in the hotel now?" No matter how awkward Chen Aiguo felt, he called him that, because outside everyone called Li Chengcai the Young Master of the Li family and the Young Master of the Li family.

Seeing him approach late at night, the two security guards were initially wary. But when they saw the cigarette in his hand and realized he owned the bakery and grain and oil company upstairs, and had been there before to sell their wares, they relaxed and reached out to take the obviously higher-end cigarettes from him.

"Brother, are you here to curry favor with him to do business? You came too late today and it's not the right time. The two brothers went home yesterday at noon and drove to the city. They also have a mansion in the city." said the security guard.

"Really? Did he really leave?" Chen Aiguo was a little unconvinced. He confirmed again and took out a few more cigarettes for the two of them.

Another security guard took the cigarettes and shared them with his companions. "Of course it's true. They have exams for Sixth Middle School these past two days, and it's the weekend, so they had nothing to do here. They left yesterday at noon. If you want to chat him up and do business with his factory, come back tomorrow or the day after tomorrow. And to be honest, his factory is in Qingshui Village, Chenjia Town, which is quite far from here. I heard they don't provide meals, do they?

Anyway, even if you want to do business with them, you should find out in advance whether they provide meals for their employees and whether they have a staff cafeteria. Don't go to great lengths to curry favor with them, only to find out they don't need your flour or cooking oil at all.

The two security guards with excellent memories only remembered that he ran a pancake shop in the middle of the town, and also did some wholesale flour and cooking oil business, but they had no idea that he was also from Qingshui Village.

The two men took a few cigarettes from him and reminded him in a very loyal manner that even if he was doing business, he should get things clear in advance.

After learning that the Li brothers had left Liuping Town yesterday, Chen Aiguo's heart, which had been hanging in the air, suddenly relaxed a little. "I know, I know. Thank you for reminding me. I'll go back and think about it. After I understand the situation, I'll consider whether to block him."

After thanking the two people, Chen Aiguo immediately went to a nearby house.

The last time Panpan was on the school bus, he pointed to a house over there and told him that it was their squad leader's house. Chen Aiguo now went there based on his rough memory.

While Chen Aiguo was asking around from house to house, searching for Chen Pan's monitor's house, while Grandma Chen was visiting several of Chen Pan's friends' homes, while Chen Laoshi was visiting all the nearby shops, restaurants, and groceries, while Second Grandma Chen was visiting Chen Pan's school to ask the boarding students, Qin Yang, who had gone to a friend's party, finally returned home.

After learning everything from his mother and Xu Yanni, and understanding their general arrangement for finding someone, Qin Yang immediately said, "Then I'll go look near Panpan's home. I suspect she fell asleep in that room at home, or fainted suddenly in the warehouse at home like before."

"Maybe it's true!" Thinking of the last time Chen Pan suddenly fainted, Qin Guihua immediately nodded in agreement.

"I've heard about this. My aunt's key is in the store. Brother Qin, please go check it out. I should have gone with you, but I have to guard the store after all." The most important thing is that Chen Yanni didn't dare to go to the innermost part of the town with a boy she had only known for half a year. Thinking of the intimacy of Grandma Chen delivering sesame cakes to the Qin family today and jiaotuan to them tomorrow, Xu Chunni didn't hesitate at this time. After finding a key that Grandma Chen had left here, she handed it to the other party without hesitation.

"Okay, then you just wait. Don't worry, Panpan's family has a phone. If I find Panpan, I will definitely call you as soon as possible. Even if I don't find her, I will call you as soon as possible before coming back."

Seeing the worry in his mother's eyes, Qin Yang said something softly to his mother, then took the key in his hand and rushed directly to Chen's Company at the innermost part of the village.

There is a precedent of Chen Pan fainting in public.

So at that moment, Qin Yang seriously suspected that she might have fainted from hypoglycemia somewhere after returning home. It could have been in a corner of her kitchen, in her warehouse, or in the empty staff dormitory. She might even have fainted in the stinking, dry ditch in front of her house.

Thinking back to the time when there was a drunk man in their village who had fallen asleep in a drainage ditch full of garbage and weeds, and everyone had been searching for him all night before they found him, Qin Yang ran forward and made that the first place he would look for.

At this moment, Qin Yang also thought of Li Chengcai, who had troubled Chen Pan a while ago. But when he thought of his age and his arrogant but sunny face, Qin Yang quickly put the idea out of his mind.

When Qin Yang ran to Chen's house, Chen Pan was already staggering towards home step by step.

She didn't know when the bleeding from the back of her head stopped.

All the pain from before seemed to have turned into numbness now. At this time, Chen Pan only felt waves of nausea and dizziness.

Holding onto the poplar tree beside the narrow mountain path, Chen Pan walked forward step by step.

When he was about to walk out of the canal area, Chen Pan couldn't help but look back.

The canal there still shimmered, its surface still emitting a beautiful, soft glow. There were no more ripples from when she pushed the motionless Li Chengcai down, nor the huge, chaotic mass of water created when she pushed the other man's motorcycle down as well.

Chen Pan turned his head and stared motionlessly, his cheeks, neck and back covered with dried blood. Finally, he turned around and continued to walk down step by step, holding on to the tree beside him.

Maybe she would faint and die on the way home.

Maybe she would be found by the Li family as soon as she got home.

Maybe if she managed to get home, she would alarm others and her family, and then be arrested by the police.

Maybe after she returns home, her grandparents can secretly take care of the aftermath for her, and then after a while, when someone finds Li Chengcai's body and motorcycle, the police will come to find her and arrest her.

Maybe she should go to the police station and turn herself in now, which might reduce her sentence a little and get her a life sentence.

If she didn't die tonight, she should probably secretly take some money from home and choose to escape. But if that were the case -

Countless thoughts appeared in Chen Pan's mind.

After realizing that he could still walk and think, Chen Pan felt that he was very lucky.

"Maybe it's a last gasp of hope. No matter what, I have to go home. After I see my grandparents, I'll decide whether to flee or turn myself in."

Chen Pan was thinking this in his heart, and at this moment, a huge lightning suddenly appeared in the distant sky, followed by a huge rumbling sound. As soon as the sound landed, several small lights appeared in the sky, followed by a series of dense rumbling sounds, smaller than the previous ones.

Looking at the lightning and thunder that suddenly appeared in the distance, Chen Pan first looked ahead in a daze for a moment, and then she laughed loudly in the dark night.

That night, Chen Pan found it at 11:30 pm among a pile of tiles and old wood debris at the base of the wall in her backyard.

Qin Yang returned and searched the Qin family's house, but couldn't find him. He called Grandpa Chen and the others downstairs to let them know. They reunited at the Chen family's house and continued their search inside and in the stinking ditch outside. Suddenly, they heard unusual knocking noises outside and discovered Chen Pan collapsed among the waste construction materials.

That spot was the back wall of Chen Pan's house. Besides scrap bricks, tiles, and wood from the previous owner's house, there were also several bags of gravel and sand left over from their previous house building. Those things had been placed against the wall. Aside from the two or three square meters of space they'd used to store their belongings, the rest was covered in endless rows of tall corn.

Except in winter, when Grandma Chen and Grandpa Chen would occasionally come here to look for burnable waste wood, there was no one here at all at other times.

So when everyone was looking for someone in the rain just now, they focused on the stinking ditch inside the house and in front of the courtyard gate.

They had searched everywhere but couldn't find anyone, so in the end they could only believe Qin Yang's words that Chen Pan might have suddenly fainted somewhere in the house or in the grass in the ditch outside.

They even searched Qin Yang's factory and a vegetable field belonging to someone else outside, but they never thought of looking behind the house.

So when there was a faint knocking sound at the back, and the dog that had been barking at home suddenly moved its nose and suddenly barked at the back wall of the house, everyone was delighted and ran to the back in unison.

When she saw Panpan lying in the pile of construction material garbage at the back, hitting the bricks next to her with a tile repeatedly, and seemed to be seriously injured, Grandma Chen yelled and rushed to her side.