(two)
The police officers who had just arrived took Zhou Ziqiu and Wen Su to the crime scene. Wen Su looked thoughtfully at the houses of the surrounding villagers. It was nine o'clock at night, but all the villagers had their doors tightly closed, and even the windows were tightly shut.
The deceased's home is located in the southeast of Changnan Village. It is a standard rural bungalow that looks very new after being renovated by the owner. There is a small courtyard, which is now surrounded by yellow police tape, and two or three police officers responsible for collecting evidence are going in and out.
The police handed Zhou Ziqiu and Wen Su two pairs of rubber gloves and gestured for them to put them on. After they put them on, the police led them into the bungalow. But as soon as they entered the house, Zhou Ziqiu felt a strong sense of discomfort, as if something was pressing down on him and preventing him from using his full strength.
He frowned, suppressing his discomfort.
Wen Su noticed Zhou Ziqiu's unusual behavior and assumed he was not used to the smell of blood in the air, so he asked in a low voice, "Are you alright?"
Zhou Ziqiu shook his head and walked to the scene of the crime, which was the bedroom.
The deceased's home had two bedrooms. One of them was the room where the couple lived. Because they were expecting a new baby, they had converted the original storage room into a nursery.
The pink decor of the nursery and the handmade wooden crib clearly show how much this couple is looking forward to their child.
But who could have imagined that such a bloody tragedy would occur?
It's likely that until the moment of her death, the woman never imagined that her loving husband would do such a thing.
Zhou Ziqiu watched as the woman sitting in the bedroom, reading a prenatal education book and softly talking to the baby in her womb, walked past her. A gloomy man walked by, holding a kitchen knife, heading straight for the woman. The woman heard the footsteps, looked up, and her smiling face met the man's gleaming silver knife.
"husband?"
The woman exclaimed in surprise, not understanding why her husband had suddenly grabbed a kitchen knife.
Upon hearing the woman's voice, the man blinked, then suddenly raised the kitchen knife in his hand and slashed at the woman—
"No!"
Hearing the sound, Wen Su turned around in surprise and saw Zhou Ziqiu trembling as he squatted down, leaning against the door frame. He quickly put down the lamp in his hand, went to Zhou Ziqiu's side, and helped him up.
"What's wrong?"
As his consciousness gradually returned, Zhou Ziqiu opened his dazed eyes. When his pupils focused, he saw Wen Su's worried gaze. He smiled and shook his head: "It's nothing. I saw something."
"Did you see how that person died?"
Wen Su was not surprised that Zhou Ziqiu could see some things; there were other people in the world who had the same ability as Zhou Ziqiu.
Zhou Ziqiu nodded: "He's being controlled by something."
Wen Su paused slightly, but quickly recovered: "Oh? That's interesting."
Once outside the crime scene, Zhou Ziqiu felt much better and could breathe more easily.
"Let's go check on the body; maybe we can find something." The two headed towards the van where the body was parked, but ran into the fat man and the man with glasses.
"Is this your task?" Wen Su glanced at the machines in their hands. They were dark and their purpose was unknown. Various instruments of different sizes were scattered around their feet.
Glasses exclaimed "Ah!" and realized what Wen Su meant. He smiled and said, "These are machines that Chairman Cui imported from abroad. He wants us to try them out."
Knowing that Cui Yongle liked to tinker with these things, Zhou Ziqiu walked to the body bag, reached out and slightly pulled down the zipper. What he saw was the dead man's wide-open eyes. The dead man's expression was terrified, his mouth was wide open, his face was distorted, and his eyes were wide open, almost bulging out.
Meanwhile, the bespectacled man was enthusiastically explaining the device in his hand to Wen Su: "This is called an EMF reader; it can detect ghosts..."
Wen Su took the remote-like object handed to him by the glasses-wearing man and listened casually. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Zhou Ziqiu's actions and casually stuck a talisman on the female corpse's face.
Zhou Ziqiu: "...What's wrong?" He was about to take a closer look at the yin energy on the female corpse when Wen Su's talisman blocked his view.
"Aren't you afraid of the corpse turning into a zombie?" Wen Su explained. Corpses that have been touched by human breath are most prone to turning into zombies. They need to be kept under something to suppress them. Another thing to be careful about is not letting cats get close to the corpses, as they can also turn into zombies.
Wen Su's action was correct. It's unclear whether Cui Yongle was negligent or not, but the corpse was left lying there. Zhou Ziqiu had just glanced at it and noticed a wisp of yin energy gathering on the female corpse's forehead. If it were left like that, it might really turn into a zombie. After Wen Su stuck the talisman on it, the yin energy dissipated by seven or eight tenths, making it much safer.
As they were talking, Cui Yongle returned, and everyone gathered around the van containing the corpses.
"Chairman Cui, what's going on?" the fat man asked. Cui Yongle had brought them here and then left, and no one knew what he was doing.
Cui Yongle first swore, then answered the fat man's question: "I just went to find the villagers to ask if I could stay here for a while."
"And then?" Zhou Ziqiu asked.
Thinking of the villagers' faces just now, Cui Yongle got angry: "And then they were rejected! Damn it, when Lao Ding and the others went to ask in the afternoon, they were rejected. After that, when they asked them about the deceased's family, they wouldn't say anything. I didn't believe it, so I went to ask around again, and not a single one agreed."
After saying that, Cui Yongle sighed again: "There's nothing we can do. Most of Lao Ding's men have retreated back, and the rest are living in their vehicles. Some of our men also retreated this afternoon. Let's live in our vehicles too. We'll see how things go tomorrow. If it's really not working out, I'll have them bring a few tents over."
We'll have to sleep like this for the rest of the night. Luckily, Cui Yongle brought a seven-seater SUV today, so we can make do with it and no one is complaining about the conditions.
Why aren't you going to sleep?
Wen Su leaned against the car door, arms crossed, smiling as he watched Zhou Ziqiu get out of the car. The car where they slept had been moved and parked next to the van that was carrying the corpse. To prevent the corpse from turning into a zombie or being attacked by a ghost in the middle of the night, Wen Su volunteered to stay and keep watch.
"Not sleepy."
Zhou Ziqiu moved a small stool over and sat down next to Wen Su. He looked up at the full moon in the sky through the trees in the mountains. There were no clouds tonight, and the twinkling stars and moon were clearly visible.
The night breeze in the mountains was cool. Wen Su glanced at Zhou Ziqiu's top, which, although high-necked, looked very thin. He shifted his body, took off his coat, and covered Zhou Ziqiu with it. The young man's black coat was very large, covering the boy's entire body. Wen Su squatted down, zipped it up to the top, and half of the boy's face was covered, only revealing his dark and bright eyes.
“...Thank you.” Zhou Ziqiu’s voice was muffled by the clothes, but he could smell a pleasant fragrance on Wen Su’s coat. It didn’t smell like laundry detergent or perfume, but rather like the scent of someone who burns incense regularly. He liked the smell, but he hesitated when he saw the thin vest that Wen Su had revealed after taking off his coat. “Aren’t you...aren’t you cold? Why don’t you keep wearing it? I’m not cold.”
“Just wear it, I’m not cold.” Wen Su said, flexing his biceps. The young man’s body was very sturdy, and you could even see his chest muscles through the thin vest. He did seem to be more resistant to the cold than Zhou Ziqiu, who was thin. Zhou Ziqiu was silent for a moment, then thanked him and said nothing more.
“Those villagers are very xenophobic.” After a moment of silence, Wen Su spoke up.
"I can see that; it's unavoidable here because it's remote." The more isolated a place is from the world, the more rigid and entrenched it becomes.
"The deceased moved here from the city probably because they liked the remoteness of the place." The information stated that the deceased couple were both city dwellers. They bought this house in Changnan Village because the woman was pregnant and wanted to find a quiet and clean place to rest. However, they never expected to suffer such a tragedy and lose their lives. "The villagers here must know something, but they are xenophobic and did not tell the deceased."
This wasn't just idle talk, because Zhou Ziqiu had previously said that the murderer was controlled by something. If there really was something dangerous here, there must have been subtle signs beforehand, and the local inhabitants would certainly know something about it.
"But they won't tell us, so we have to investigate little by little."
At this point, the conversation stalled again. Wen Su took out a cigarette case from his pocket and asked, "Do you mind?"
Zhou Ziqiu shook his head, and Wen Su took out a cigarette and put it in his mouth, but he couldn't find a lighter after searching through his pockets. Zhou Ziqiu then touched his coat and, sure enough, pulled out a silver lighter.
Unfortunately, Wen Su pressed the lighter a few times but it didn't even light up, and he raised an eyebrow in annoyance.
Just when Zhou Ziqiu thought Wen Su was about to give up, he saw him reach for the small pouch hanging loosely at his waist, take out a yellow talisman, and start burning as soon as it was taken out. Judging from the flames, it was a powerful karmic fire talisman, but Wen Su used this excellent karmic fire talisman to light a cigarette.
Zhou Ziqiu couldn't help but chuckle.
"What are you laughing at?" Wen Su, with a cigarette dangling from his lips, had a roguish air about him, especially since he didn't even stand properly, which contrasted sharply with Zhou Ziqiu, who was sitting upright. That was exactly what Zhou Ziqiu was laughing at. "Nothing, I just suddenly remembered that you were just like this when I first met you half a month ago... carefree and irresponsible."
Upon hearing this, Wen Su recalled what he had said back then—"Hey, we're one short for mahjong, wanna join me?"
He couldn't help but chuckle. "I remember, you were so annoyed with me back then."
Zhou Ziqiu nodded: "I haven't told you yet, but thank you for helping me back then."
"No problem."
Wen Su waved his hand.
"Where are you from? Who did you study under?" Once the conversation started, Zhou Ziqiu asked a question he had been wanting to ask for a long time, because Wen Su seemed to be very proficient in magic and talismans, unlike most of the Taoists in the Green Lantern Village who were without a sect and whose strength varied greatly.
Wen Su actually pondered this question for a moment, "Houcheng, the family has declined."
So Zhou Ziqiu stopped asking questions and started talking about other things. It wasn't until the middle of the night when Cui Yongle woke up and handed things over to Wen Su that Zhou Ziqiu went into the car to sleep.
18:56:14
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