Chapter 123 A Shattered Dream

The police station was brightly lit, and Li Ran stared at the computer screen, his eyes sore and swollen.

After unzipping the compressed file sent by Lu Yao, hundreds of video files were found coiled up in the folder like venomous snakes.

She clicked on the first one, and Zhang Weijie's greasy smiling face immediately filled the screen.

Li Ran abruptly pressed pause, took a few deep breaths, and then continued.

She had to memorize every face—those terrified, numb, tearful faces.

The more I watched, the more my heart sank. In all the videos, there was only Zhang Weijie; the real buyers remained hidden off-camera.

"You cunning beast!" Li Ran gritted his teeth.

In the interrogation room, the dim yellow light shone flickeringly on Zhang Weijie.

He leaned back in his chair, crossed his arms over his chest, and kept his mouth tightly shut, determined to keep all his secrets to himself.

The one-way mirror reflected Zhang Weijie's slanted figure. He leaned lazily against the interrogation chair, a faint, cold smile playing on his lips.

His mouth was tightly shut, as if it were welded shut with an iron lock.

He knew that if he didn't confess, those people might secretly work to get him a shorter sentence.

But if we tell everything...

"Accidents" in prison are never really unexpected.

In the monitoring room, the captain slammed his fist on the table: "He's waiting for someone outside to bail him out!"

Li Ran had anticipated this, and calmly said, "Let's start with the victims."

When Li Ran knocked on the door of the third house, she was greeted by splashed vegetable washing water.

"Get out!" The old woman with a full head of white hair brandished a broom, her withered arms bursting with astonishing strength. "My granddaughter still has a marriage prospect! Do you jinxes have to make this a public spectacle before you're satisfied?"

Li Ran wiped the water droplets from his face and, through the gap in the swaying curtains, saw the girl's frightened eyes.

"Grandma, we can protect Xiaohua..."

"Protect?" The old woman slammed her broom against the doorframe. "The moment you leave, the whole village will be pointing fingers and cursing you behind your backs!"

Tears welled in her cloudy eyes. "A sixteen-year-old girl, how will she live after her reputation is ruined? Will her father still be able to hold his head up at the construction site?"

Another bright red cross appeared on the visit record book as Li Ran stood on the edge of the field looking back.

In a place where a bride price can save a family, a girl's innocence is more important than life itself, and more urgent than debt.

The case has stalled.

Until Ji Nian'an appeared with Guo Lingling.

Through the mottled wooden door, Xiaohua's voice was barely audible: "Lingling, you should go... I can't let anyone know..."

Guo Lingling pressed her face against the crack in the door, "Why doesn't Teacher Zhang need to be chaste?"

She was genuinely curious about this question: Why did no one in the village say that Teacher Zhang was dirty after he had been with so many girls?

There was a long silence inside the door.

“Because…” Xiaohua’s voice trembled, “he is a man.”

Ji Nian'an squatted down, his gaze level with the crack in the door: "Xiao Hua, have you ever thought about it? Why is the word 'chastity' only associated with girls?"

The breathing behind the wooden door became rapid.

“They’re bad…” Xiaohua finally choked up and said, “But I’m even more afraid of being talked about behind my back every time I go out.”

“Then let’s leave here.” Ji Nian’an’s fingers gently pressed against the door. “The further into the city you go, the less people care about these outdated things.”

"How am I supposed to get there?" came the sound of fingernails scratching at wood shavings from under the door. "I don't even have enough money for a bus ticket to the county town..."

“Reading.” Ji Nian’an pulled out a stack of documents from her bag. “There are boarding schools in the city that specifically subsidize victimized girls.”

A registration form was slowly pushed under the door.

That day, Li Ran's voice recorder finally captured the first complete testimony.

Shortly afterward, a number of people were apprehended.

Zhang Weijie sat with his legs crossed in his cell, thinking that his "friends" outside should come to bail him out.

He even made a list in his mind: Director Zhao's secretary should have already taken care of the arrangements, and Boss Li's lawyer was probably preparing bail documents.

It wasn't until that day, during his exercise time, that he saw several familiar figures being escorted in.

Vice Mayor Zhao, dressed in an orange prison uniform, with disheveled hair, had long lost his former imposing manner.

Mr. Li, handcuffed and pale-faced, looked like a stray dog.

As they passed each other, Zhang Weijie's legs went weak, and he almost knelt on the ground.

"How could this be..." He gripped the iron railing, his fingernails digging until they turned white.

The prison guard sneered, "Stop looking. Your friends are your cellmates now."

Zhang Weijie slumped onto the cement floor.

His dream came to an end.

...

When Lu Yao returned to Jinglan Mountain in the twilight, the chill of Duanhun Ridge still clung to her clothes.

That thousand-year-old monument to broken love is now nothing but rubble.

Before she could even cast her spell on Broken Soul Ridge, Ji Nian'an appeared before her by sheer chance.

It was probably as her spiritual power recovered that those entanglements spanning nine lifetimes finally brought them together again.

Before the tragedy occurred, she found Ji Nian'an and prevented everything from happening.

Therefore, Ji Nian'an did not think of her.

That's good.

Perhaps it's best to leave those lonely and painful memories buried in the past.

The curse of being destined to be alone has finally ended in this lifetime.

As night deepened, Lu Yao's live stream room was illuminated with soft light.

Her fingertips slid lightly across the screen, passing over countless IDs seeking fortune telling.

Suddenly, his fingers paused.

"May flowers bloom and wealth abound." She softly read out the ID, "Please connect with me."

The scene changes, and a haggard face appears on the screen.

The middle-aged woman's eyes were red and swollen, with dark circles under them, indicating that she had been crying for a long time.

"Master! Please save my son!" she cried out in a hoarse voice.

Lu Yao's eyes darkened slightly; she already knew the answer in her heart, but she still calmly asked, "Who is your son?"

"His name is Yu Liao, he's a doctor, the pride of our whole family, with a bright future ahead of him." Tears welled up in the woman's eyes again. "But now..."

She choked up, barely able to continue, "He suddenly became mentally impaired!"

They've arrived.

Lu Yao lowered her eyes, the copper coin spinning in a cold arc between her fingers.

Of course she remembered Yu Liao, the psychiatric director whose white coat was always spotless.

Back when she was still in the Fifth Mental Hospital, she discovered that Yu Liao had driven his girlfriend Hao Zhelan insane, removed her brain lobe, and placed her in the Fifth Mental Hospital, becoming the perfect boyfriend that everyone envied.

She used her magic to bring Hao Zhelan back to consciousness.

Hao Zhelan did not proclaim her sobriety, but continued to feign ignorance, patiently waiting for an opportunity to take revenge.

It seems she finally made her move.

“Don’t rush,” Lu Yao smiled, “Tell me slowly.”