Translator-Rhapsodite
Editor- Koneko, Proofreader-Ghostie
This particular area was very desolate. Now, being midsummer when the vegetation was lush, the overgrown weeds were almost knee-high level. It would not be easy to walk in this location in the daytime, let alone on such a starless and moonless night.
The two police officers who led the way had already visited the area several times within the recent days, and were fairly familiar with the road conditions.
However, they felt that the three foreign helpers that were trailing behind them were new arrivals, and just from looking at them, there was no need to expect anything in terms of physical strength and skill from any of them. Their appearances provided little assurance with what laid ahead; a bearded man who seemingly looked like an “private agent”, Bei Quan, who was as handsome and white as a jade carving, and A’Liu, a young female student who in their eyes looked like she was from the Republic of China.
Therefore, the two police officers kept repeating their orders of telling everyone to pay attention to their feet when they were walking, for fear that they would accidentally step into a grass nest and sprain themselves.
The three walked in the dark wilderness of the mountains for around ten minutes, then came to a relatively open wasteland.
It seemed like a relatively open space due to the weeds being sparser and not as compressed as the area they had originally travelled by. Bei Quan used a flashlight to look around and found that the grass and soil was not of poor quality in this particular area, there were taller grass stems, but they were crushed and trampled into the ground.
This showed that there were a lot of people who had visited the area recently.
“This is where we found Wang Baotai’s body.”
The police officer who was leading the team spoke.
Each person within his presence followed his instructions and looked down. Sure enough, they saw a shallow, narrow ravine about one and a half metres deep and three metres wide, right in front of them.
Because of the severity of this case, more people than normal attended the scene, from the local police to the task force dispatched by the county itself. Several waves of different people trampled on the surrounding grounds repeatedly. Most of the weeds and shrubs in the ravine were trampled down, and some dead branches and leaves were sampled and taken away to be examined.
Under the strong light of the military flashlight, Bei Quan and the others could only see a dirty, muddy trench, with some reflective markings that had been left from the forensic team.
“We’ve checked over this place carefully many times now.”
Another younger officer flashed at the bottom of the trench with the light of his torch.
“We made sure there’s not even a piece of cloth left.”
The message being conveyed was that– “although it’s appropriate for you to come to the scene, you can also see that we’ve checked the place over and over again, unable to find any more clues.”
Bei Quan smiled and suddenly asked.
“Apart from the body, what else did you find?”
The documents the police officer showed them in the car included photos of the scene.
In the photo, Wang Baotai’s body was wrapped in a tarpaulin, revealing only a bloody head, face, and one hand– nothing else could be seen.
“For example, do you still have his clothes and shoes?”
One officer replied.
“No. Wang Baotai was skinned and was just wrapped up in a tarpaulin with only his flesh and bones left, then was dumped into the ravine.”
He shook his head.
“We didn’t find any of his belongings.”
The officer paused, as if emphasizing.
“Not a single one.”
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
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Dfl Hejc rwlifv jcv cbvvfv, “Xba la.”
Hlcuhte aegcfv jcv jrxfv Dfl Hejc, “Qtja jgf sbe ublcu ab vb?”
Bei Quan closed his eyes and stood still and in complete silence for a short time.
“That person is not there.”
Two minutes later, he opened his eyes.
“I’ll try to see if I can find ‘him’.”
Qingzhu understood what Bei Quan intended to do.
“Are you sure?”
Bei Quan hummed in contentment, then replied, “I will have to try.”
He paused and added.
“But this is not the first scene, I guess the possibility that ‘he’ is still here is very low, we have to change location.”
When the two talked, they deliberately did not lower their voices. The two police officers who were beside them heard the conversation clearly, and instantly felt confused.
Just when the younger of the two officers was eager to ask a question, Bei Quan suddenly handed the torch over to his hand.
“Please hold it up for me.”
Comrade police officer: “???”
He suppressed his curiosity and held the torch, gripping it tightly with his hand. He followed Bei Quan’s request, and shone the light downwards into the ravine, waiting and wanting to see what this guy was up to.
To his surprise, Bei Quan opened up his black suitcase and took out a roll of ordinary red thread.
Police Officer, “What are you going to do?”
Bei Quan smiled faintly, “I’m going to make a mark.”
After replying to the officer, he stopped talking. He tied the end of the thread to the root of a nearby bush, and jumped down with ease into the shallow ditch.
Under the astonished gaze of the two police officers, Bei Quan tied the red thread in several different places within the trench. From an overhead perspective, the threads appeared to be crisscrossed, resembling a game of String Figure, commonly played by children.
After completing this, Bei Quan gently cut his fingertip, squeezed out two drops of blood, and traced them along the red threaded lines.
“That’ll do.”
Bei Quan sharply tumbled out of the shallow ditch again and smiled at the two officers, saying.
“Next, we need to trouble you to take us to Wang Baotai’s old home.”
The two officers were even more surprised by the request, and couldn’t help but speak in unison, “Now? Why?”
Bei Quan smiled.
“Because, I need some of his belongings, and preferably the blood of a family member of his.”
The police officers: “……”
“The demands of you people are really hard to predict!”
—————————-
Saturday, August 7, 2:25 a.m.
In the village at the foot of Yue Ling Mountain, Wei Fuyuan woke up suddenly from a light sleep.
In front of him was a mass of snow-white fluff– the little fox, Guan Hu Su Ying, was playing with the tip of his nose with his claws.
Although Wei Fuyuan had opened his Eyes of Heaven, he still couldn’t understand Guan Hu Su Ying’s “words” like Bei Quan could. However, the little fox’s body movements couldn’t have been more clear, it was clearly telling him that the couple next door were in a situation and needed help!
Wei Fuyuan jumped up from the bed and kicked Jiang Nan’an who was lying on the floor next to him.
The two didn’t bother turning on the lights, nor did they speak. They only communicated with their eyes, from the dim street light reflection that shone through from the window, making an appointment with each other——
[Coming?]
[Coming!]
Wei Fuyuan and Jiang Nan’an were like two shadows and slipped out of the room in a silent manner.
The whole house was quiet, not a sound could be heard.
Cai Mingjian and Su Lan were asleep and hadn’t noticed the abnormality surrounding them.
Wei Fuyuan’s Eyes of Heaven was not so powerful yet that it could probe through walls, so he had to hold the door handle and twist it gently, to open the door as quietly as he could.
The door opened. For some reason, the couple had not locked their door.
The room itself was not completely dark– after a whole month of being tormented by the dark shadows that followed them, it was hard to be in complete darkness. A warm golden night-light was switched on, enough to illuminate every corner of the bedroom clearly.
Even the strongest-minded of people would become hesitant to sleep in utter darkness, and wish to use any forms necessary to keep their surroundings brighter.
For Wei Fuyuan and Jiang Nan’an, what they wanted to “see” did not rely on light or illumination.
This time, both males clearly saw a dark shadow that crouched on the bedside table near Su Lan’s side of the bed.
——Finally, we’ve found the main culprit!
Wei Fuyuan and Jiang Nan’an were immediately surprised by the shadow and its presence.
At the same time, the black shadow also spotted the uninvited guests from outside the bedroom door.
It reacted quickly.
It did not intend to confront Wei Fuyuan and Jiang Nan’an head-on, instead, the figure turned its head, jumped down from the bedside table and passed through the closed window, as it disappeared in front of the two of them completely.
“What the hell?!”
Wei Fuyuan cursed.
“It’s getting away!”
The two had been at the village for a day, and finally caught sight of the master mind. Naturally, they couldn’t let it get away!
At this moment, Wei Fuyuan was not concerned about concealing his presence in the room, and he rushed inside with a single stride. He opened the window with his left hand, and stepped out onto the window-sill with his right foot.
This movement naturally woke up the couple that were laying sound asleep in their bed, Cai Mingjian and Su Lan.
They jumped up from their bed and stared fearfully at Wei Fuyuan and Jiang Nan’an who had just entered their room unannounced, shouting in a panicked alarm, “Y-you, what are you doing??”
As the couple screamed in shock at what was happening around them, Wei Fuyuan had already scaled the window frame and ventured outside. Jiang Nan’an remembered to say one more thing.
“There’s no time to explain!”
He shouted at Cai Mingjian and Su Lan.
“We’ll be right back!”
After saying that, he followed his companion and also jumped out of the window.
Cai Mingjian, who was dumbfounded and rested on the bed, was shocked and shouted, “This is the second floor!!”, while he jolted up towards the window. When he looked out, he saw both Wei Fuyuan and Jiang Nan’an running through the courtyard, before disappearing into the mountains and forests.
“This, this ……”
Cai Mingjian’s legs went limp and his buttocks slammed onto the floor as he remained sat down in shock, muttering to himself, “Wh-what the hell just happened here?!”
The black shadow moved quickly, and after leaving Cai Mingjian and Su Lan’s house, it ran straight towards the back of the mountain.
Wei Fuyuan and Jiang Nan’an trailed behind, not daring to relax for a second.
As they raced, the two opened the Eyes of Heaven.
From their “perspective”, the fleeing shadow was indeed in the form of a human. The shape of the head, torso, and limbs were very distinct, but the figure did not look like an adult, it looked more like a child who was around seven or eight years old.
With their Eyes of Heaven, they could see that the black figure exuded a sombre greyish-black aura.
This particular colour indicated that the other party was very heavy in Yin, which was definitely not a good sign.
However, Wei Fuyuan also noticed that there was still a faint layer of purple shroud that surrounded the shadowy figure– he saw this color on Bei Quan when he practised opening his Eyes of Heaven before.
Wei Fuyuan, while running and gathering his thoughts, carefully “looked” again.
Although the purple light was faint, it was not his illusion and was clearly there.
For some reason, Wei Fuyuan’s heart suddenly jumped– he felt as if something wasn’t quite right, but he couldn’t think about it right now. Time was running out.
Wei Fuyuan and Jiang Nan’an were physically very fit and ran fast. In the chase, they were getting closer and closer to the shadow.
Sensing that something was wrong, the shadow suddenly jumped up and plunged into the basil grass.
“Where are you running to!?”
Jiang Nan’an shouted,taking something out from the sleeve of his arms, and threw it at the grass.
With a flash of red light, accompanied by a loud gust of wind, Jiang Nan’an threw the “hidden weapon” into the grass.
The disappearing shadow suddenly sprang up like a disturbed grasshopper and rolled around on the ground.
——If it’s not the right moment, then what else is?!
Wei Fuyuan and Jiang Nan’an rushed up without uttering a single word to each other, and immediately both males swung their fists and feet, as they greeted the fallen shadow figure!
Thank you for the chapter, I look forwards to see what happens next!
Brute force taoism