NB Chapter81

My leg recovered faster than I had expected; although it wasn’t fully healed, moving around had already become much easier.

During these many days living in Maplewood Bay, every day has been mundane. Just as Zhang Mingsheng said, Hong Kong has remained calm with neither wind nor rain.

But I know in my heart that the dates on the calendar are slowly creeping toward the moment the first victim of the police murder case appeared in my memory.

Uncertainty breeds fear. I have hijacked Zhang Mingsheng’s former plan, hoping to use the present to deduce and understand the details of the past, thereby preventing it from happening again and catching the killer. Yet, even as I observe the process unfolding, I remain terrified, constantly fearing a sudden turn of events.

There are three victims in total. Morally speaking, I’m willing to see them die. I’ve even considered that if the killer doesn’t actually kill anyone, it may be impossible to convict him.

But this utilitarian thought lingered in my mind for only a few seconds before I quickly brushed it away.

Intervening in the middle of the act is the best way.

The action has to feel natural, a logical continuation of what has already happened.

I once scouted several of the crime scenes on-site and still remember their approximate locations. They are far from the bustling areas; all tucked away in secluded spots that no one ever visits.

It seems necessary to contact the patrol officers in those vicinities.

I think of the front-line officers who were later inexplicably dragged into this. I wonder if they stumbled upon the killer or noticed something suspicious, which led to their sudden deaths.

Or perhaps the killer derived pleasure from the slaughter.

A thrill from plundering the lives of others.

A thrill that led him to believe he had finally reclaimed control over his own life.

Despite all the conjectures in my heart, I still hold onto the hope that the killer is merely a hired assassin.

I hope it is not my mentor standing there amidst the clouds of suspicion.

Li Yi told me that my mentor has been visiting the hospital frequently lately, even staying overnight on occasion, though Shimu rarely speaks to him. The rest of the time, he was constantly on the move with a grave expression, meeting Zhang Yaonian.

Brother Gao said that the reason he hasn’t been able to record their conversations isn’t out of fear, but because he truly cannot break into those sprawling estates. Most of Zhang Yaonian’s properties are fortified with high perimeter walls, and getting to the inner rooms requires navigating a labyrinth of paths; it is nearly impossible to infiltrate.

Consequently, I have no way of knowing what role my mentor is playing in all of this either.

Either “suicide” or surrender.

That was the choice Zhang Mingsheng gave to those three men.

Human nature cannot withstand such a test; if one person surrenders, they will inevitably drag everyone else down with them. That is why they sat together to discuss a counterstrategy. But back then, Zhang Mingsheng didn’t know that my mentor was also involved.

After all, Jin Shunfa had left the police station early and never received any assistance from Zhang Yaonian.

Teacher, what exactly did you do, and what are you planning now?

I was so lost in thought that I accidentally bit my finger hard enough to break the skin.

There are some things for which you will never have an answer unless you hear them directly from the person involved.

At this point, Brother Gao called it a day. He had fulfilled the assistance Sister Azhu promised me, and after one last round of drinks with Ah Hai, he departed. Before leaving, he went as far as to snap his SIM card in half right in front of me to show that there would be no further ties. Watching his style of operation made me wonder: if I were to spend five years in Southeast Asia, what kind of person would I be forged into?

From today on, I am on my own.

I organized all the documents, put them into a paper bag, and locked them in a drawer. A glance at the clock showed it was already eleven; I couldn’t afford to stay up any longer. After a quick wash, I went to bed.

Sometimes I doubt whether the Heavens are truly kind enough to grant me a second life. But since I’ve regained a healthy body, I cherish it deeply. Were it not for my leg injury, I’d be out every day practicing boxing and running; that way, even if the apocalypse came tomorrow, I could outrun zombies from every corner of the earth. With these thoughts in mind, I solemnly closed my eyes.

Who knew that a few hours later, I would truly experience a “zombie” pinning me to the bed.

I dreamed I was lying on a lush green meadow with my limbs relaxed and utterly comfortable. Suddenly, a massive boulder fell from the sky, crushing my chest and making it impossible to breathe.

I struggled in the dream for a long time, and just as I was about to scream, the dream shattered. The room was dark; even after my eyes adjusted for a few seconds, I could only make out the silhouettes of the furniture, along with the silhouette of the person pinned on top of me.

At the same time, I caught the faint scent of blood.

My brain snapped into full alertness. I shouted and raised my hands to push him off, but the person firmly pinned my wrists and covered my mouth.

“Don’t move,” the person’s voice was raspy. “I’ll leave right away.”

It’s Zhang Mingsheng.

I was surprised, but it was a surprise I had experienced so many times that I adapted quickly.

He was a bit more terrifying than a zombie, yet safer than any other stranger. At the very least, I had already experienced his methods one by one.

Seeing that I was no longer struggling, Zhang Mingsheng released me. He rolled onto his side and pulled me into his arms.

“Are you bleeding?” I fumbled on the nightstand, trying to switch on the lamp. “What happened?”

“I ran into a bit of friction on the road,” he murmured, leaning against me with his head buried in the crook of my neck, his warm breath falling against my skin. “This time, I crawled out on my own.”

It seems to be a car accident.

Who was he playing a game of chase with so late at night?

“…Did someone tamper with things?” I hesitated for a moment before slowly resting my hand on his back.

“It wasn’t tampering; it was a trigger finger,” Zhang Mingsheng chuckled, nudging my shoulder. “What have you been up to lately? Have you been getting enough rest?”

“Don’t tell me there isn’t surveillance here?” I countered.

“I haven’t had the chance yet.” He replied.

“Then I’ve done nothing at all.”

“Good.” Zhang Mingsheng said, still holding me, his voice muffled.

For some reason, he had developed a streak of childishness as if on purpose. Did he realize that his younger self was more to my liking?

I stroked the ends of his hair and asked, “Did you already know some things about my mentor and just chose not to tell me?”

Zhang Mingsheng said nothing.

“I know that for you, every one of them is an accomplice in the murder of your parents. To you, the details are a kind of…” Before I could finish, Zhang Mingsheng tightened his arms as if trying to press through skin and muscle to lock our skeletons together.

I stared blankly at the chandelier, which shimmered faintly in the gloom, and whispered the two words I hadn’t finished: “…torture.”

In the unlit room, we lay in the same bed for the first time in a long while.

“I know you’re going to leave me,” Zhang Mingsheng said. “Up until now, I haven’t been able to think of any other way besides repeating the same mistakes.”

“Then stop thinking about it, Zhang Mingsheng. We should both have new lives, do you understand? In all these years, we have never truly been apart; aren’t you curious about what life is like beyond this?”

I am not what you are truly missing, and you are not someone I must possess either.

Emotions should not be forced, and this entanglement should have ended long ago. If I had a choice, I would never choose a life where I loved and hated him while being tortured.

I would rather that after those fireworks ended, we had never seen each other again.

Another stretch of silence followed.

By the time my eyelashes had flickered forty-five times in trepidation, Zhang Mingsheng spoke, “What do you want to do after we part ways?”

I answered, “Nothing in particular. Just live.”

“Go to sleep,” he said. “I’ll leave once you’re asleep.”

“If you want me to sleep well, don’t go bursting in suddenly.” I closed my eyes. “At the very least, you should knock.”

“If you knew it was me, would you still open the door?”

“……”

“I didn’t knock because I already knew the answer.”

I fell silent.

The relationship between Zhang Mingsheng and me now exists somewhere between the most intimate and the most estranged. He knows exactly which way I intend to step.

His body rose and fell with his breathing as if he had fallen asleep. It made it impossible for me to ask where else he was headed.

In truth, I didn’t want to ask. As long as he doesn’t die; as long as he doesn’t deliver himself to a prison cell or to hell, wherever he goes has nothing to do with me. I could go forever without seeing him again.

“Zhang Mingsheng.” I called out.

“En.”

“Don’t die.”

He didn’t say a word.

“Keke hasn’t been born yet, has she?” I asked.

I spoke softly, “If neither of us can find her, she will be abandoned in some corner, growing up lonely just like you and me.”

“Or perhaps she won’t grow up at all.”

Staring up into the void of the darkness, my eyes grew damp.

Keke’s health had always been poor when she was small. If we hadn’t been so obsessed with demanding the doctors treat her, she might have been reincarnated into someone else’s family long ago.

Without her, what would our family; this monstrous, vortex-like family, have become?

I let the dampness in my eyes slowly overflow, murmuring:

“She loves you very much. Children are truly so foolish; if you are good to them, they will depend on you and believe you are the person closest to them in the entire world. You should remember that she wasn’t tricked or coerced into being your daughter. You just happened to find her, and the moment she opened her eyes, you were already her father.”

“Mingsheng, she gave us a chance. A chance for you, for me, and for Xiao Yuan… an opportunity to learn how to care for and cherish someone else without needing to form a ‘real’ family. And in return, we received her unconditional love.”

“I can’t be with you for now, Mingsheng. I still have feelings for you; I don’t think I’ll ever feel this deeply for anyone else in my life. That’s why I hope you don’t die. We still have so much to do.”

“Keke taught me certain things, and I have to go teach them to Xiao Yuan. I want him to live without fear or restraint. I want him to understand that there is a place in this world that belongs entirely to him, where he can sleep in peace.”

“And what about you?” Zhang Mingsheng asked. “Have you been sleeping well these past few days?”

“I… I’m grown up now. I should be able to sleep anywhere. Believe me, soon, very soon, you will be able to sleep well too.”

“Do you want me to tell you where she is?” Zhang Mingsheng seemed to suddenly snap back to life, leaning in to press a kiss against me. He appeared to have skipped shaving, his cheek feeling damp and cool.

“If you don’t tell me, I’ll look for her anyway. I’ll never stop looking.”

“You’ve already found Xiao Yuan ahead of time,” he said. “Between the two kids, I can’t let you win over both of them first.”

I was speechless, and my tears receded.

It wasn’t a military arms race or a treasure hunt; there was absolutely no reason to be competitive about it.

I said, “You really shouldn’t die. You should endure a bit more torture… just like I once did.”

“I have my retribution,” Zhang Mingsheng whispered in my ear. “I’ve seen doctors, I’ve had checkups. No one can figure out why I get angina pectoris from time to time.”

“Is it genuine, is it physical pain?” I had always suspected Zhang Mingsheng of being prone to romanticized exaggeration when he described it.

He laughed and said, “It’s real. I break into a cold sweat, my hands start shaking, and my mind goes completely blank. It feels almost identical to what my body experienced when I heard those gunshots.”

I leaned against him and spoke softly, “Are we living in a hell created for your punishment?”

“Then who have you turned into? The Ox-Head or the Horse-Face?” Zhang Mingsheng suddenly pinched my face. “Hey, Underworld Officer, even though they are both officers, but I don’t like sleeping with an ox.”

“Are you still leaving?” I didn’t want to acknowledge his joke; it was stiff and boring like something learned from a television drama.

“It seems you don’t want me to go sleep in the room next door.” He spoke.

“When you sent those threatening letters back then, didn’t you send anyone to monitor them?” I shifted the subject once more.

“I didn’t have time.”

“There was a three-month gap between the first victim and the second and third. You mean to tell me you weren’t suspicious?”

Zhang Mingsheng did not answer.

I reached back to switch on the light, pushed him away with force, and sat up in bed.

In the warm yellow glow of the lamp, I saw massive bloodstains on Zhang Mingsheng’s shirt.

He sat up slowly and looked toward me.

“Are you telling me you were the one who killed them after all?” I asked.

He remained silent.

I pressed him further. “If it wasn’t you, three months would’ve been enough time to accomplish a lot. Even if you initially believed the first case was a suicide, wasn’t the fact that the others didn’t follow suit enough to raise your suspicions?”

“In three months.” Zhang Mingsheng finally spoke.

His gaze drifted away.

“If I hadn’t escaped today, then starting from now… in three months,” Zhang Mingsheng said. “I would have been staying in a psychiatric hospital. For much longer than three months.”

I was stunned.

It turned out that Zhang Yaonian hadn’t accepted Zhang Mingsheng’s return to the family without conditions.

He had still exacted a punishment.

Zhang Mingsheng had never told me any of this. Whenever that period of time came up, he was always evasive.

“Do you know why Zhang Yaonian turned a blind eye to me robbing our family’s jewelry store? Because he could always send me back there to be strapped to a bed, given electroshock, forced to take medication every day. As long as I was willing to nod and obey from then on, it would all stop.”

Zhang Mingsheng smiled thinly. “Fortunately, by then, Ah Hai and Ah Shan had already contacted my aunt, and I had more men at my disposal. At the very least, I didn’t have to worry about being dragged away by him in the middle of the night anymore.”

“And Zhang Yaonian didn’t expect one thing,” he said, feigning an air of indifference. “I met you, Officer Yu. We even got married.”

I tried desperately to remember. “So, he didn’t know at first. He truly believed I was the daughter of the Yu family.”

Zhang Mingsheng said, “Exactly. That’s why he didn’t dare move against me recklessly. Later, when someone tipped him off, he must have been overjoyed; it was just one more reason to send me back to the asylum.”

“But he didn’t expect…”

Zhang Mingsheng continued, “He didn’t expect you to just kill me. Actually, I didn’t expect it either. I had originally planned to send you and the kids to my aunt’s place. Keke had already gone ahead, but for some reason, Xiao Yuan suddenly came back; Ah Hai failed to keep a proper eye on him.”

“The paternity test,” I said, looking into Zhang Mingsheng’s eyes. “Did Zhan Weiqing give it to him?”

“He must have left it in the car at some point; I had told Ah Hai to drive him home,” he said. “Who would have thought Xiao Yuan would find it? Ah Hai had been with you for so long that his heart had grown soft; the boy made up some excuse, and Ah Hai actually let him run back.”

“During the days I was hospitalized, most of the people around me; except for Ah Hai and Ah Shan, were quietly ‘dealt with’.”

So that was why Li Yi and Jin Shunfa were able to barge in that day without meeting any resistance.

Zhang Mingsheng remarked, “To be honest, that feng shui master wasn’t entirely wrong either; Ke Ke is a lucky star, the lucky star of the Zhang family. With her, the Zhang lineage finally comes to a dead end.”

“He also said I’d be dead this year.” I rolled my eyes at him and flopped back down. “Go to sleep!”

Snap. The light went out.

Before long, Zhang Mingsheng pulled me into his arms again.

Just as I was drifting off, his voice drifted through the dark once more, “I truly thought they had all committed suicide. While I was watching TV in the hospital, I even wondered: why are you police officers even opening a case for this?”

“And you didn’t look into it further after you got out. Truly audacious. Weren’t you afraid the killer would find out it was you who threatened them?”

“He didn’t know it was me at first, and I didn’t know it was him either. I think… he quite enjoys that feeling.”

“Why?”

“Just a feeling.”

“Do perverts have a mutual appreciation for one another?”

“Besides, I had met you by then,” Zhang Mingsheng said. “You were much more interesting.”

“Pleasure-seeking saps the will!” I condemned him with my eyes closed.

“Isn’t it more like being blinded by lust?” Zhang Mingsheng countered.