Chapter 12
The Taoist priest was a middle-aged man wearing a dark blue Taoist robe.
He had a long beard, was of medium height and had a rather upright appearance; at first glance, he had a somewhat otherworldly air about him.
At this moment, he was stroking his gray beard and humming softly:
"Namo Ratna Trayaya...Namo Araya..."
Bai Nan's lips twitched involuntarily upon hearing this. This charlatan...
Turning his head again, he saw Xu Xin listening intently, and was speechless.
She crept up behind him and whispered in his ear, "This is the Great Compassion Mantra, a Buddhist scripture."
Seeing that he still hadn't reacted, he moved even closer and continued to explain: "He's wearing a Taoist robe but chanting Buddhist scriptures. He's definitely a fake Taoist priest, a real charlatan!"
Perhaps feeling a little embarrassed after realizing what had happened, Xu Xin awkwardly moved a bit further away.
Bai Nan didn't notice his actions and felt a surge of anxiety.
This guy is obviously a con artist; he probably has nothing to do with Master Zong's death.
"I have already comprehended the secrets of heaven, but these secrets must not be revealed."
He flicked his whisk.
Bai Nan now viewed him with the mindset that he was a liar, so she didn't believe a word he said.
"How can we know?"
Xu Xin, that idiot, actually fell for it!
She knew without even thinking that the scammer's next sentence would definitely involve money!
“Once the secrets of heaven are revealed, lifespan will surely be shortened. However, considering your sincerity, I have a method that can be used.”
He had a calm and collected expression on his face, waiting for them to continue asking questions.
"What method?" Xu Xin took the bait as expected.
Bai Nan closed his eyes, waiting for him to swindle money.
The swindler said, "Gold wards off evil spirits. Just prepare five gold ingots and you can reveal a sliver of heavenly secrets. How wonderful!"
Bai Nan couldn't stand this nonsense that was neither humane nor Buddhist.
She grabbed Xu Xin's arm and tried to lead him away.
All of this stemmed from the death of Li Laokou.
If she first finds out the specific cause of his death from the Li family, and then combines the body and medical examination report, she can find out whether his death was related to supernatural forces or strange phenomena.
Listening to this liar's nonsense is a complete waste of time!
"Wait!"
He suddenly opened his eyes wide and fixed his gaze on Bai Nan.
Bai Nan was startled by his sudden voice and subconsciously looked at his wide eyes.
His eyes were two-thirds dark, with only a small amount of white showing a bluish tint, making them look very strange.
Something's not right...
He slowly walked up to her, his dark eyes scanning her entire body from head to toe.
Bai Nan froze in place, her hands and feet moving as she was stared at by his dark eyes, and the hand she was holding, Xu Xin's, gradually grew cold.
Xu Xin also realized something was wrong and tried to pull her away, but found that the two of them remained standing in the same spot, unable to move.
This person wasn't a fraud after all!
Thinking about it this way, Bai Nan wasn't so afraid anymore.
Perhaps he really can resolve her and Bai Di's issues.
"Why do you...have two souls in your body?" the Taoist priest asked.
Two souls? What does that mean? Shouldn't it be something like 'separation of spirit and body'?
She specifically searched for it yesterday, and it says that this phenomenon is called 'soul-body separation' or 'soul swapping'.
"No, neither of these two souls are yours!"
The Taoist priest suddenly shouted, then closed his eyes and began chanting scriptures incessantly.
Bai Nan couldn't understand these few sentences; they weren't Buddhist at all.
She and Xu Xin were completely encased in a transparent barrier, unable to move any part of their bodies except their eyes.
The two could only communicate with their eyes. She asked Xu Xin what to do, and he gave her a look that said, "Take it easy."
After a long time, the Taoist priest finally opened his eyes.
The transparent barrier surrounding them also dissipated, and Bai Nan immediately pulled him away and fled.
"Come, I can help you."
Bai Nan was left behind alone.
"We don't need gold ingots anymore?"
"Fake charges bring peace of mind. But genuine charges are rare and hard to come by, so they should be given away for free to accumulate merit."
This old Taoist priest is surprisingly professional.
“Sit on this cushion, then close your eyes and meditate.”
Meditation? Bai Nan sat cross-legged, then, like a cultivator in a TV series, closed his eyes, sat in meditation, and made hand seals.
"Smack!"
"Don't make any hand seals." The old Taoist slapped her hand away: "Don't think about anything, stay in the state before falling asleep."
Bai Nan acted in accordance with the instructions.
The entire space then fell into an unusually quiet atmosphere.
Time slowly passed, and Bai Nan's breathing gradually became long and even, as if she might fall asleep at any moment with each inhale and exhale.
Just as her consciousness began to blur and her limbs began to weaken, the Taoist priest took action.
From the moment Bai Nan began meditating, he kept chanting scriptures and occasionally waved the whisk in his hand.
At this moment, he swung the whisk even more forcefully, and his movements became more and more exaggerated, but Bai Nan seemed completely unaffected, and his breathing became more and more even.
She felt a strong gust of wind coming towards her, and her body instinctively tried to dodge, but she found that she could no longer move her body.
She floated lightly in the air, like a soul detached from its body.
My body grew lighter and lighter until the last connection was severed.
She had become a complete ghost, and the world in her eyes had become distorted and chaotic. Gray was the main color of this world, while she was a bright yellow.
She subconsciously looked around for the Taoist priest and Xu Xin, only to find that the gray world was not a place she could freely roam.
She skirted around some deep, dark voids, places that seemed like black holes and filled her with dread.
She didn't know how long she had been drifting when she finally saw a second bright yellow color, brighter and larger than hers.
She quickly floated over, but just as she was about to make contact, a sudden coolness washed over her.
"Aaaaaahh ...
Taoist priest? Bai Nan instantly regained consciousness, his soul returned to its body, and he opened his eyes.
The scene before my eyes could only be described as horrifying.
The Taoist priest was strangled to death by his own whisk, and blood flowed continuously from all seven orifices.
The entire space was a glaring red, the stench of rust filled the nostrils, and thick blood was gushing out.
The prayer mat was also covered in scarlet blood, which pooled beneath her.
She raised her hand blankly and brushed it across her itchy cheek.
In my field of vision, a few drops of blood slowly slid down a pale finger...
"Aaaaaahh ...
The police cars arrived quickly, and the man with a stubble beard at the head of the group directed his subordinates to set up a long cordon.
It encompasses the entire Bai family compound, including the distant cemetery.
"Underage?" the bearded man asked, puffing on his cigarette.
"Yes, one of the parties involved is seventeen years old, and the other two are fifteen years old."
"Call Xiao Yan here."
"Yes, boss!"
When the police arrived, they kicked out all the unrelated people.
Now, only Bai Nan, Bai Lu, and Xu Xin are in the mourning hall, along with the Taoist priest and Bai Zong, who have already passed away.
Old Li's coffin was also next to the two corpses.
"Hello, I am Wang Yan, a technical consultant from the Municipal Criminal Investigation Brigade. You can call me Sister Xiao Yan."
A woman who looked very gentle walked up to the three of them, squatted down, and greeted them in a kind tone.
"Which of you is Bai Lu? Can you come with me for a moment?"
Bai Lu, still grieving the loss of his grandfather, was the first to be taken away.
Next was Xu Xin, and finally Bai Nan.
"Hello, may I ask you a few simple questions?"
Sister Xiaoyan pulled her to sit down on a stone bench in the courtyard, gently holding her hand throughout.
Where were you when Bai Zong died?
"...beside the tombstone."
Where were you when Huang Qi died?
"...beside him..."
Mentioning the Taoist priest's death, Bai Nan couldn't help but tremble; the scene was a nightmare.
Do you remember when each of the two events occurred?
Bai Nan nodded and told him the time in detail.
"Bai Di, can you tell Sister Xiao Yan your truest feelings? I promise I won't tell anyone."
She held her hand, her eyes fixed on Bai Nan.
In fact, Bai Nan had no idea how pale she was. She was shivering all over, and her lips were trembling as she spoke.
His eyes were very vacant, and even when answering questions, he seemed to be in a daze.
This is one manifestation of PTSD (Post-traumatic Stress Disorder), and if left untreated, it can significantly hinder one's normal life.
"Blood... there's red blood everywhere..."
She spoke slowly, a long, crimson scene flashing through her mind, the entire space stained red with blood.
"He...he told me to close my eyes...and when I opened them again, I saw..."
"Red blood, everywhere...he's dead, he bled a lot..."
"I...I'm covered in...blood...lots of it..."
Bai Nan recounted the scene in fits and starts. Although his expression was not very fluent, the listener could easily deduce the course of events from these fragmented words.
Sister Xiaoyan hugged Bai Nan and gently comforted her for a long time before her emotions gradually calmed down.
"Boss, something's not right with him."
Sister Xiaoyan returned to the side of the bearded man, her gaze fixed on Bai Nan as she spoke.
Bai Nan had returned to the mourning hall and casually sat down on a prayer mat, her expression numb, as if she hadn't come to her senses yet.
"Tell me about it."
"His memory was so precise, his feelings so logical, and his emotions..." Wang Yan tried to use more precise words to describe this feeling:
"Too...perfect."
"You mean, he's acting?"
Wang Yan had a sudden inspiration: "That's right! Boss, you're amazing, it's all acting."
"Watching him is like watching a movie; everything he does serves the character he is playing."
Their conversation went unheard.
But Bai Nan had a gut feeling that they were talking about her, about her performance just now.
Yes, a performance.
She tried her best to completely immerse herself in the role of seventeen-year-old Bai Nan, but she still couldn't do it.
The moment 27-year-old Bai Nan opened her eyes, she had replaced the fragile and timid 17-year-old Bai Nan.
Seventeen-year-old Bai Nan's emotions are easy to capture. The two share a memory and a brain, so their logic in acting and expressing themselves is naturally completely consistent.
But she had already experienced this memory, and ten years had long since smoothed out the sharp edges of her pain.
She is a calm adult, and even if she tries her best to imitate a naive and fragile teenager, she is like an actor wearing a layer of skin.
However, even if they have doubts, it will not affect the final trial of this case.
Because facts cannot be changed, and the truth cannot be buried.
Bai Zong and Huang Qi, one died in an accident, the other by suicide.
This was the final verdict from that year.
"Bai Di, I'd like to talk to you alone."
Xu Xin came to her side, said those words, and then turned and left.
Bai Nan followed behind him, and the two arrived at a corner of the mourning hall. The heavy curtains effectively concealed their figures.
The police officer in charge of watching them glanced at the leader, and seeing that the leader didn't say anything, he didn't stop them either.
"You are not her."
"What?"
"You are not Bai Nan."
"What are you talking about, Xu Xin? Who else could I be but Bai Nan?"
"You're not Bai Di either, so who are you?"
Xu Xin frowned, a hint of anger hidden beneath his cold expression.
"Of course I'm Bai Nan! Who exactly are you—"
"Shut up!"
Xu Xin leaned close to her, suppressing her anger and gritting her teeth as she said, "You have absolutely no sense of what it means to be Bai Nan. Do you think your performance is flawless and that you can fool us all?"
He bent down, and the distance between the two suddenly became very close, so close that their noses touched, and he could clearly see the red blood vessels in the other's pupils.
"If you were Bai Nan, her heart wouldn't be beating so violently right now."
He slowly gripped her neck, his hand tightening gradually.
Bai Nan could clearly feel the blood vessels in his neck being forcefully blocked, and his heartbeat becoming stronger.
"I don't understand...cough cough cough, what are you... saying..."
Gradually, she went from having difficulty breathing to being unable to breathe at all, and the intense feeling of suffocation made her want to vomit.
Listen carefully.
They were so close it was as if they were kissing; their long eyelashes touched as they blinked, and their warm breaths mingled in their breathing.
"Bai Nan doesn't like me right now."
His words struck Bai Nan like a thunderbolt, making her already rapid breathing even more erratic, and the pressure on her blood vessels became even stronger.
"Hehehe..."
Her throat felt as if it had been crushed; she could only manage to gasp for breath.
She gradually realized that,
Xu Xin really wanted to kill himself.
If he didn't speak up soon, he would kill Bai Nan, who 'liked him,' without hesitation.
Why? We are clearly one person!
In fact, I was the one who loved you! And she was the one who pushed you away, causing us to be separated for ten years!
Why? ! ! !
She struggled desperately, trying to shout and explain everything, but he stared at her with a very cold gaze the whole time.
He looked at her like she was a complete stranger, as if her love was worthless, utter garbage!
He didn't even want to hear her voice anymore; his hands, like iron clamps, gripped her throat, as if he wanted to crush it.
Crushing her dignity
Crushing her love...
I give up, Xu Xin.
She allowed the consciousness of seventeen-year-old Bai Nan to overwhelm her own, completely surrendering her body.
"Xu, Xin..."
Xu Xin looked into those familiar eyes and abruptly let go of her hand.
He hugged her tightly. "Bai Nan, you're back."
Upon hearing the sobbing in his voice, Bai Nan could no longer hold back and burst into tears.
She saw everything.
The self that instigated her to kill Bai Di, the self that occasionally exuded a chilling aura, the self...
What I will be like ten years from now.
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