The sky was grim, the wind soughed. Gao Fang and Gao Yuan watched Ji Xun’s back disappear up the mountain path.
Gao Fang suddenly said, “How many minutes does it take for an idol to be shattered?”
Gao Yuan looked down at his phone. “Ten minutes.”
The twins looked at each other, sharing a moment of commiseration. However, since they had promised, there was nothing to be done. They simply played on their phones while waiting for Ji Xun to come down.
In the van, Zeng Peng was silent, leaning against the window and looking out. He wasn’t staring brazenly out the window; instead, he had pulled the window curtains almost shut, leaving only a slit. His eyes were hidden behind the slit, secretly observing the outside.
Gao Fang occasionally glanced at him and sneered, “Still playing the serious lookout? Look at yourself. Every single person out there is more law-abiding than you.”
Zeng Peng still did not reply.
Time ticked by. About an hour after Ji Xun had gone up the mountain, Zeng Peng suddenly said, “A lot of the people in the village are gone.”
The two police officers, engrossed in their mobile games, were a bit impatient. “Gone where? Aren’t they all outside?”
Zeng Peng insisted, “There are only women outside. I could hear the loud voices of men before, but now there’s nothing. In the last five minutes, there was always a man or two passing by, but not anymore.”
Gao Fang and Gao Yuan lifted their heads and looked out of the van. After a moment, Gao Yuan said, “I’ll go check. you stay here.”
Gao Fang nodded. “Don’t go too far.”
Gao Yuan didn’t go far. He was cautious, getting out of the van and taking a stroll through the village. It took less than five minutes in total. When he got back in the van, he met Gao Fang’s gaze, nodded, and confirmed Zeng Peng’s words. “A good number of the men are indeed missing.”
With this confirmation, the two police officers looked at each other again, then at the village outside the van.
It was getting late. The sun had set, and the dark night sky pressed down, blurring the road they had come on. The bustling city became a distant phantom, suddenly dim and indistinct. Before them was only the isolated small village, embraced by mountains, with a few scattered points of light.
The village was quiet, not even a dog barked. The silence was unsettling.
“What’s Brother Ji’s phone number?” someone in the van suddenly asked.
Gao Fang and Gao Yuan didn’t have it. They both looked at Zeng Peng. Zeng Peng was dumbfounded.
“Why are you looking at me? How would I have a police officer’s phone number?”
The Second Criminal Investigation Unit was as busy as usual that day, but amidst the hustle, everyone was a bit more relaxed. In any case, the suspect for the Xi Lei and Tang Jinglong cases had been confirmed. Although he hadn’t been officially apprehended yet, in a modern society with such advanced surveillance cameras and travel controls, it was only a matter of time.
Tan Mingjiu was busy on the landline, coordinating the manhunt with various units. His loud voice hadn’t stopped all afternoon. Everyone walking by had become numb to hearing the name “Lu Ping,” until suddenly, “Ji Xun” popped out.
“Ji Xun? What about Ji Xun? Is he with you? Then hurry up and let him answer the phone. This time I’m going to give him a good roasting, hehehe. We’ve had a breakthrough, a major breakthrough! The light of hope is just ahead. This time there’s no room for his ‘common sense’ to play a role—” Tan Mingjiu was blurry with excitement.
Wen Yangyang, who was passing by, perked up her ears.
Wen Yangyang was 25 years old this year, not tall, just a little over 1.6 meters. She was fair-skinned with a round face and a great figure. With a high ponytail, she could pass for a high school student—and it was because of this special appearance that she had sent a three-digit number of perverts to the slammer to cool off. At least two-thirds of them had turned over a new leaf after their “cooling off” period and kept a respectful distance from young female students thereafter. As a result, she had secretly earned the nickname “Pervert Terminator” at the police station.
She hadn’t joined the force when Ji Xun resigned, so he was a distant figure to her. But she couldn’t escape Tan Mingjiu’s social media feed, which was flooded with 10 posts one day and 20 the next, all gushing about his daily life like a waterfall.
It was under these circumstances that she got to know Ji Xun and even shipped his and the captain’s little video clips.
“What, you want Ji Xun’s number? Ji Xun isn’t with you right now?” Tan Mingjiu’s enthusiasm plummeted. “The number is useless even if you have it. That guy is ridiculously pretentious. He won’t answer your call if he knows you’re a cop.”
The person on the other end described the situation.
Tan Mingjiu continued, “Ji Xun is alone on the mountain, you can’t contact him, and the village might be a bit strange… Do you need to call for backup? No? You have your guns? True, if you call for backup in this situation and nothing happens, you’ll be writing reports until you puke. In that case, stay alert, maintain contact with the bureau. I’ll give you Ji Xun’s number. If the situation becomes urgent, you can request backup from him in reverse. I’m sure he won’t leave you to die—let’s just hope the pretentious brat answers your call.”
Tan Mingjiu hung up the phone. Wen Yangyang sidled over. “Sounds like the situation over there is a bit dangerous.”
Tan Mingjiu: “The two officers both have guns, and Ji Xun is there. There’s also a car. The on-site officers’ assessment is that the atmosphere is tense, but the possibility of something happening is low. Let’s trust them. Besides, the situation is unclear, it’s not good to call for backup.”
Wen Yangyang: “Going through the proper channels is of course troublesome, but if you go check it out privately after work to help, no one can say anything.”
Tan Mingjiu was stunned. “…When did you and Ji Xun get so close? You have a crush on him? Don’t. It’s hopeless.”
Wen Yangyang’s voice dropped an octave. “Not me. I’m saying, should we tell Captain Huo about this?”
“You’ve gone crazy at such a young age. Of all the things to ship, you had to ship your own boss.” Tan Mingjiu sucked in a cold breath and pointed at himself. “A cautionary tale. Learn from my mistake. You want to be like me, working overtime for five days and five nights straight?”
“Five days and five nights? It was just four extra hours of work,” Wen Yangyang couldn’t help but roll her eyes. “Besides, weren’t you the one who started shipping them?”
“What about four hours? Isn’t four hours something?” Tan Mingjiu was heartbroken. “Besides, was I shipping them? I was stating facts! And anyway, Captain Huo left early today. Are you going to call him directly to tell him about Ji Xun?”
It was one thing to mention something casually in person, but calling specifically to talk about it felt strange.
Wen Yangyang also lost half her nerve, but seeing Tan Mingjiu craning his neck to look around, she couldn’t help but say, “Since Captain Huo already left, what are you still looking for?”
“Don’t you know what I’m looking for? Our Captain Huo appears and disappears like a ghost. When he and Captain Yuan came to the office today, I was almost caught slacking off. I’m just worried he’ll suddenly reappear and catch me talking about weird things with you again,” Tan Mingjiu muttered, then remembered the scene from two hours ago when Huo Ranyin came by…
He suddenly said, “Speaking of which, I overheard a bit back then. He mentioned Ji Xun when he was chatting with Captain Yuan.”
Time rewound two hours.
Tan Mingjiu had just pulled out his phone to watch a funny video when Huo Ranyin’s voice came from behind him without warning. “What are you doing?”
Tan Mingjiu was so startled he almost dropped his phone. A second later, he put on a show of being serious. “Nothing, nothing at all. I was contacting other units to release information for tracking the fugitive Lu Ping.”
Huo Ranyin glanced at Tan Mingjiu, too lazy to say more. He went into the office, grabbed a file, and came out again, saying to Yuan Yue who was waiting outside, “Alright, Captain Yuan, let’s go.”
They walked side by side towards the bureau chief’s office. There had been a critical breakthrough in the case, and they needed to report it to the chief. In the hallway, Yuan Yue asked Huo Ranyin, “Have you told Ji Xun about the progress in the case?”
“Not yet.” Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t. We’ve deleted each other.
“Then I’ll tell him later.”
“To report this good news to him?” Huo Ranyin said.
“Yes,” Yuan Yue smiled. “And on the other hand, to discuss it with him again, let him look at it from an outsider’s perspective to see if there are any omissions.”
“True. Although the DNA match for Tang Jinglong in Lu Ping’s house was successful,” Huo Ranyin said thoughtfully, “the person hasn’t been caught, the confession hasn’t been obtained, and the chain of evidence isn’t complete. It’s hard to be completely at ease.”
At this point, a question suddenly flashed through Huo Ranyin’s mind:
Although Ji Xun doesn’t want to exchange case information with Yuan Yue, if it’s just about receiving information, would he rather get it from me, or from Yuan Yue?
…Probably Yuan Yue.
The two had already reached the bureau chief’s office. Huo Ranyin picked up a cup of tea and, while drinking thoughtfully, looked at Yuan Yue several times, making Yuan Yue a bit baffled.
After all, it’s a secret crush.
Actually, with Ji Xun’s flirting skills, if he put in some effort, he might be able to turn a straight man and make his secret crush a reality.
In winter, the sky darkens early. The surroundings were already dark, but not completely. The entire mountain was immersed in a damp, cold, and eerie charm. The overgrown trees and the intermittently visible branches were the dark guardians of this eerie atmosphere.
A miscalculation.
Ji Xun used his phone’s built-in flashlight to illuminate the path ahead, thinking to himself.
If he had known it would come to this, he would have brought more equipment: a handheld searchlight for starters, then a backpack with insect repellent for snakes, bugs, and rodents; another bottle of mineral water for when he got thirsty; three packs of compressed biscuits, one for each meal; and… forget it, that’s it. Any more and he could camp on the mountain for a day or two.
He glanced at the battery level on his phone screen. It showed 20%.
Danger.
He had first gone up the mountain to find Xi Lei’s grave. It wasn’t hard to find; he found it within ten minutes of starting his ascent. For the remaining hour and a half to two hours, he had been circling outwards with Xi Lei’s grave as the center.
If things are as I imagine, if there really is something on the mountain, then it must be buried in the ground. The soil there would definitely be different from elsewhere, and there wouldn’t be any plants growing on it…
He walked, he looked, he searched.
Searching without a clear endpoint consumes several times more energy than usual. He walked a bit further, and his phone battery dropped directly from 20% to 15%. A full-blown crisis. Just when he thought he probably wouldn’t find anything today, his shoe stepped on a patch of empty ground.
The soil in this patch was different from elsewhere. Elsewhere was looser, this patch was more compacted. Elsewhere had some weeds and withered branches, this patch didn’t have a single weed. And there was something else very strange.
Ji Xun squatted down.
He shone his phone’s flashlight on the ground, pressed the soil bit by bit with his fingers, and when he lifted them, his fingers were coated with a layer of oil.
There were oil stains on the ground, and they had accumulated over years.
And—
The thin beam of the flashlight illuminated more.
There was also wax. Wax dripped from incense candles.
His gaze followed the oil stains and wax upwards, stopping on the ground a little further ahead. Then he found a sharp stone and started digging. After just a dozen scrapes, a thin layer of topsoil was removed, and Ji Xun saw something.
A sharp, tiny thing, reaching towards the sky like a tender sprout…
An infant’s finger bone.
His hand stopped moving. He paused for a long time, dropped the stone, and used his fingers to brush away the remaining soil. As the soil was cleared, more was revealed. It was a round, small skeletal skull, smaller than an adult’s palm. The skull was facing down, most of its ghastly white facial bones still buried in the earth. Only a small part of its empty eye sockets was exposed, as if it were peeking at the outside world from under the soil.
Just as Ji Xun’s fingers touched this skull, a huge beam of light suddenly hit his back from behind.
He turned around hastily and saw the villagers.
A group of men, holding flashlights, illuminating the dark mountain so brightly it was like daylight. And they were all hidden behind the light, their faces ashen, ghost-like, staring at him grimly.
