YBCB: V4C10 + Epilogue

And that’s the end of this volume! I definitely did not expect the twist, but maybe there are some that saw it coming?

Translated by: TaffyGirl13

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Chapter Ten

Yu Tong hung up the phone and glanced at his twin standing next to him.

“What did Ah Yin say?” Yu Xia, who had just pulled an all-nighter, was drinking a cup of canned coffee from the vending machine as he yawned. Sitting next to him was Li Zi Hong, who had run over early in the morning for some reason. It had prevented Yu Xia from catching even just half an hour of sleep.

They were in the resting room, and the table was covered with different types of breakfast foods.

“…He mentioned something terrible.” Yu Tong’s head was starting to spin; he hadn’t imagined that they would overlook such a thing.

“You mean the photos?” Li Zi Hong unexpectedly spoke up from his seat. “I saw the photos you brought over yesterday, and also discovered something strange.” He had spent most of the evening studying those pictures until he had deduced a somewhat unexpected conclusion.

“You mean those photos with Xu Ru Xian and Lai Qi Lin?” Yesterday when Yu Tong had been searching through his computer, he had sent a copy of them to Li Zi Hong first.

“Yes, and I’m sure we are thinking the same thing.” Li Zi Hong pulled out the copies from his work bag and glanced at the similar faces in the photo. “Xu Ru Xian doesn’t have any sort of smile when she looks at Xie Jun Wei. And based on the previous questionings, I think her target probably isn’t Xie Jun Wei…”

“It’s Lai Qi Lin.” Yu Tong sighed as he finished the conclusion.

They had overlooked something off from the interrogations. The colleagues of both Lai Qi Lin and Xu Ru Xian had mentioned it. If they thought about the answers from this perspective, nearly everything fishy made sense.

Yu Xia quickly caught onto what they were getting at and grabbed the photos to take a look.

“I’m thinking that it was a one-sided affection. After all, Lai Qi Lin and Xie Jun Wei were already engaged. Moreover, based on the testimonies from her colleagues and friends, it would be unlikely for Lai Qi Lin to accept another person, especially since they were the same sex. The dispute that happened later was probably because of this reason.” Li Zi Hong calmly continued to state, “Perhaps she had originally only wanted to teach Lai Qi Lin a lesson. She likely knew of Lai Qi Lin’s allergy, but hadn’t realised it was so serious.”

Everyone fell silent.

Yu Xia put the copies back onto the table. His coffee had already started to turn cold. “So Lai Qi Lin probably realised something was wrong after eating the weight loss pills, and called Xie Jun Wei…”

“It’s very possible that after Xie Jun Wei came back and discovered his girlfriend had died, he chased after Xu Ru Xian before she had gotten very far, and then accidentally killed her,” Yu Tong continued the thought and sighed again.

Their opinions were more or less the same.

Li Zi Hong was quiet for another while before he stood up. “We’ll just leave it at that for now. If anything else happens, let me know. I have some other matters I need to sort out on my end.”

“Alright.”

After escorting Li Zi Hong out, Yu Tong returned to the resting room and discovered that Yu Xia had at some point laid down horizontally on the chairs and fallen asleep.

He finally got tired…After all, Yu Xia didn’t only have one job on his hands. The cases had increased more and more recently. There hadn’t been many major cases in the past, but now the number seemed to keep growing. Sometimes, it really felt like they couldn’t even catch their breaths.

Especially his twin brother, who always had to attend to things personally.

Just as he was planning to walk back out and let his brother rest, a certain noise suddenly shattered the silence of the room. Yu Xia, whose eyes had been shut just now, instantly flipped up and grabbed his cellphone.

After listening for a bit, he immediately hung up with furrowed brows.

“Did something happen?” Yu Tong asked, having noticed his strange expression.

“The hospital just said that Xie Jun Wei briefly woke up this morning. He confessed to the officers there that he had accidentally killed Xu Ru Xian. While she was struggling to fight back, he forced his ring down her throat…after saying that, he lost conscious again and is currently undergoing emergency treatment. His situation doesn’t look very hopeful.” Yu Xia stood up and stowed his phone away. “I’m going to make a trip to the hospital.”

Although the matter had more or less been resolved, there were still a few suspicious points that he needed to ask that person directly.

It was also possible that he wouldn’t be able to.

“I’ll go with you.”

“Ok.”

9

After passing on Fang Yi Xun’s thoughts to the two people still at the station, Yu Yin hung up and returned to the living room.

“How was it? I can’t promise that it’s right, I’m just guessing.” Fang Yi Xun, who was eating the pancakes with Yu, spoke up as soon as she saw Yu Yin walk in.

“Don’t worry, the police will confirm themselves whether it’s right or not.”

Actually, after Fang Yi Xun had explained, Yu Yin felt like it was the truth as well; she hadn’t been mistaken at all.

“That’s good then.”

“I’m going to head out in a bit. You two should just stay at home and properly do homework; don’t go wandering off.” Yu Yin quickly finished eating his portion of breakfast, discovering that it wactually asn’t bad-tasting. It even changed his opinion of the girl very slightly. However, he was still a bit afraid of her.

He just had this nagging feeling that this Fang Yi Xun girl was nowhere near as simple as her appearance.

“Are you going back to that haunted building?” She asked in curiosity, her large eyes focused on Yu Yin.

Yu Yin immediately turned to look at Yu. They were the only two that should’ve known about the matter. The latter person turned his face away, ignoring the silent question. That brat…

“Can I come along?” Fang Yi Xun had an expectant expression on her face. She then turned to tug at Yu as well. “Ah Yu wants to go too. It’s not like you can just abandon me here alone in this foreign environment, right?”

Actually, Yu Yin felt that even if he ditched her in a tomb, she would probably be able to walk out by herself without any issues at all.

“You want to go too?” Yu Yin furrowed his brows as he asked Yu, who was quietly eating pancakes.

Yu slowly nodded as he continued to eat his breakfast.

“I can get a ticket for having three people on the motorbike at one time.” Moreover, he couldn’t really drive well, and didn’t dare to touch the car that Uncle left at home.

“We can just walk there. It’s not like it’s very far, and youths should exercise more to counter aging!” Fang Yi Xun happily answered.

“Great, the two of us can ride, and you can walk.” The motorbike can only take two people maximum, after all.

“Ah Yu’s Gēgē, have you never heard of the phrase ‘Ladies first’ before?”

“I’ve only heard that youths should exercise more.”

“…Tsk.”

They quickly finished their breakfast. Obviously, Yu Yin wouldn’t actually let her walk over alone, so after she finished packing up her things, the three of them began to head out towards their objective that wasn’t too far nor too close.

The entire time, he was contemplating: What exactly do those two children want?

Based on what his uncle had said, those two children had disappeared back when something had happened to the family…

Judging from the current circumstances, they had probably died. The parents’ bodies had been found at sea, while the sole survivor had been heavily affected mentally, and could not answer any questions even now.

What happened back then?

It was impossible to guess based on the clues the neighbors supplied. All he knew was that they would occasionally discipline their children because the children would drop things from the balcony.

“Anyways, it was pretty coincidental last time that we just happened to bump into the mom from the ninth floor the last time we were passing by. That was how we managed to ask her some questions about the matter. I wonder if we’ll be able to bump into her again today,” Fang Yi Xun happily chatted with Yu as they followed behind Yu Yin. Although it was mostly just her talking, Yu would reply on occasion.

They continued walking like this for a while, with one leading and two following behind. Eventually, the alleyway and the building appeared before them.

The inside of the alley was still in the same arrangement as it had been yesterday.

Yu Yin stopped. Because Yu Xia had been tumbling around all over the place, the junk inside was completely scattered everywhere. Some of the items had even broken. Everything was an absolute mess.

He did not see the thing that had originally been crouched over the junk. There was no trace of it now, perhaps because it had been severely frightened, or it had run away because its possession had already been taken.

The iron wires were still swaying back and forth inside the empty alley.

Because something had fallen down, the alley had a certain level of danger to it. As a result, either the nearby residents or the police had drawn a ‘Do Not Enter’ line a distance away, afraid that someone would accidentally walk in and get cut by an iron wire or some glass.

There were a few reporters taking photos from outside.

After passing by these things, they quickly turned the next corner to arrive directly before the building.

Probably since it was daytime, around 10 AM, the building did not seem as sinister as it did in the afternoon. However, the stairwell was still completely dark. This might have been because of the building design; there was no way for the sun’s rays to be reflected inside, so electricity was required.

The elevator had stopped at some random floor with its indicator light constantly glowing.

After nearing the building, Fang Yi Xun’s talking clearly ceased as well.

“Mm, there are more people today, so it shouldn’t be a problem.”

She latched onto Yu’s arm and pushed Yu Yin. “Oi, let’s hurry up and go to the fourth floor!”

Yu Yin rolled his eyes in annoyance. “Typically, the one who says that kind of thing should be bravely running ahead to be the first one there!”

Just because she’s afraid, I can’t be afraid? This building is too shady, I’d never enter for no reason!

“I’m a girl, after all. You two should go first,” Fang Yi Xun said, then swallowed hard as she raised her head to look up at the empty fourth floor.

Since neither of the other two people seemed to want to head up first, Yu pulled his arm free and directly stepped inside.

“Ah, wait for me!” Fang Yi Xun chased after him.

After seeing the two younger ones run inside, Yu Yin sighed and also lifted his head to look up.

The glass on the fourth floor reflected the shadows of two children standing there.

The children were, without a question, waiting for them.

***

They still took the stairs up to the fourth floor. As soon as they arrived, Yu Yin saw Fang Yi Xun surveying the iron door. Since nobody had the keys, it was impossible to enter immediately.

“Why did you two walk so quickly without waiting for me?” Yu Yin grumbled as he looked at the bright sky outside and turned on the building lights.

“Because we’re young and physically strong. We don’t need to take our time walking up,” Fang Yi Xun shot back in reply. Her gaze stopped on the peephole. “Ah Yin-Gē, it might just be my imagination but…”

“There’s someone watching us from the peephole.” Yu Yin ad also noticed the black shadow behind the peephole. He suddenly felt surprised at himself for being somewhat used to it.

He walked over and knocked the metal door. The banging sounds echoed back down the stairwell.

Like a replay of what happened last time, a sort of clicking sound rang out from the other side after a while. The door handle was then lightly pressed down, the lock opened.

Fang Yi Xun watched the entire scene unfold with wide eyes, completely terrified.

In contrast, Yu Yin and Yu did not have very shocked expressions, having already experienced this last time.

After pushing open the door, the first thing Yu Yin noticed was that the layout of the home was identical to how it had been before. The only addition was new footprints on the floor. Most of them were from their last time here.

A small shadow disappeared in the corner of the room.

“That, that’s…an automatic door?”

Fang Yi Xun gulped as she looked at the deserted, empty home, not quite daring to walk in. Since nobody was there, logically speaking, nobody could have unlocked the door from this side…

“Who cares…”

Yu Yin stepped inside, first heading over to open the balcony door to let the sunlight and fresh air flow inside. As soon as the air flow changed, the home cleared up significantly.

He heard the faint sound of footsteps walking back and forth around them. However, it was too quiet for him to figure out where it came from. He couldn’t see a shadow either.

…Don’t tell me it plans on dragging on until nighttime! There’s absolutely no way!

Yu suddenly patted him from where he stood by his side.

“What’s wrong?” Yu Yin asked as he turned to look at him in confusion.

Yu took out his cellphone to write something down. He surveyed their surroundings with a suspicious expression. “Compared to the seventh floor, this place is a bit small.”

Now that he mentioned it, Yu Yin noticed it too. Because last time was their first visit, they hadn’t sensed any differences. However, after going to both the seventh and sixth floors, they could tell that the structures of the two were pretty much the same. But after coming back to the fourth floor, they suddenly realised that the fourth floor living room was a bit narrow.

Typically speaking, the living room should be the largest room. Moreover, it still had a shrine table.

“The walls seem a bit thick.” Fang Yi Xun looked around the space and said, “Especially the one next to the shrine table.”

The three of them simultaneously looked at the papered wall next to the shrine table. No matter how they stared at it, there didn’t seem to be anything strange.

“You two back off a bit.” Yu Yin walked over to the wall and took a deep breath. He then stretched his hand out to heavily pound on the wall a few times. The bangs disappeared on the other side.

The air suddenly fell silent.

All they could hear were the sounds of their careful breathings.

“Doesn’t seem like anything—”

Before Fang Yi Xun could finish her sentence, the sound of loud hammering abruptly erupted from the other side of the wall. The noise echoed back through the room, and the force behind the knocks was so great that even the balcony door frame was shaking

Fang Yi Xun quietly let out a sharp yelp and immediately darted to hide behind Yu Yin.

Having also been startled by the noise, Yu Yin was staring at the wall with wide eyes.

As he was concentrating his focus on it, the pattern on the wallpaper seemed to twist and turn, slowly forming the face of a child.

“He” opened his mouth in an anguished wail, with ink from the design falling from his eyes.

Yu Yin knit his brows together as he realised that Fang Yi Xun and Yu had not apparently seen this scene, as neither of them reacted at all. The face on the wall had also only appeared for a few short seconds.

He then felt a gaze on him. He turned around and saw two, pale-faced children standing behind the shrine table, their grey eyes locked onto him. There was a sense of longing on their faces, as if they had waited for a very long time. Then, they slowly disappeared behind the shrine table.

“There’s something inside the wall.” Yu Yin stared at the wallpaper, with a vague idea of what was there. He had the two back off towards the front door, and then forcefully tore the wallpaper off.

The wallpaper had already begun to peel a bit, so a strong pull was enough to cause a huge chunk to immediately fall off. Yu Yin then began to rip off the wallpaper from the other walls around them. The instant Yu saw what was behind the walls, he immediately turned his head away.

“Oh my god!” Fang Yi Xun clapped her hands over her mouth to just barely keep from shouting.

Aside from the first wall, the original appearance of the walls on the other sides were revealed after the wallpaper was destroyed as being mottled with traces of black and red stains.

The unnatural dark marks were clearly not the color of paint.

“Those can’t be…” Fang Yi Xun said while staring at the unnatural traces that had been covered by the tattered wallpaper. She then abruptly shut her mouth.

“Don’t know.” Yu Yin took out Li Zi Hong’s name card to dial his number. He then remembered that this place seemed to have signal interference that made it impossible to use cellphones.

Just as he was about to hang up, the line unexpectedly connected.

Yu Yin asked the other person to immediately come over, and he quickly hung up. “Let’s retreat from here first.” Since something was behind the wallpaper, they had to wait for the police to arrive for them to continue tearing it down.

He also knew what Fang Yi Xun’s unspoken words were.

No matter how one looked at it, those marks were clearly old bloodstains.

***

By the time Li Zi Hong rushed over, the other three had already waited quite a while.

“How did you all open the door?”

He furrowed his brows. According to his memory, only the landlord had the keys to this place. How had they opened the door?

Yu Yin shrugged. “The landlord probably forgot to shut it last time.”

It wasn’t like he could straight out say a ghost had helped him open it. He just felt like the prosecutor in front of him definitely would not believe that.

Li Zi Hong gave him a look before stepping inside. The first thing he noticed were the black and red stains on the walls.

“Bloodstains.”

“I figured.” Yu Yin leaned against the door and sighed. “They were originally covered by the wallpaper, and probably wouldn’t have been noticed without tearing the paper off first. My guess is that the wallpaper had originally been stuck on in a rush, so it wasn’t attached properly. A single rip was enough to pull down an entire chunk. It just goes to show how rushed the person must have been.”

“The only people that could change the wallpaper in here would be the residents.” Li Zi Hong took out his cellphone to contact the police. After hanging up, he pulled out a digital camera to first take photos of the surroundings.

Yu Yin neared him and very quietly said, “If I said…that the children here brought us in, would you believe me?”

Li Zi Hong stopped what he was doing to look at Yu Yin.

“I believe you. But if we need to re-investigate, your words cannot be used.” What they needed was evidence, not guidance from another world.

“I know, so if someone asks about how the door was opened, please cover for us.” Yu Yin coughed and said, “After all, it’s not exactly legal for us to just run in on our own. Although the thing inside here helped us open it, please help cover for us if the issue is pursued.” The one that had come looking for him in the first place was this prosecutor, so he didn’t think the request was excessive. It was just a minor cover-up of the truth.

Li Zi Hong studied him for a bit. Just as Yu Yin thought he would insist on acting according to the official principles, he slowly nodded. “Just this once.”

“No problem!” If it really happens again, I’ll figure it out then!

After circling around and getting all his photos, Li Zi Hong stopped in front of the particularly thick wall.

“There was noise coming from inside there just now.” Still afraid, Fang Yi Xun was tightly clutching Yu, who was stubbornly standing outside the residence, unwilling to step back in.

“Noise?”

“There was the noise of someone knocking the wall from inside earlier.” Yu Yin then added on, “But don’t worry, I can swear that it definitely wasn’t an ordinary human knocking.” A human wouldn’t possibly be able to knock like that while trapped inside a wall. They would just directly die, unable to ever come back out.

Li Zi Hong narrowed his eyes at the wall. After a few seconds of silence, he began to start looking around for something.

“What are you looking for?” Yu Yin asked in confusion after watching his actions.

Li Zi Hong did not reply and quickly found what he was looking for. He pulled off a dust cloth in the corner of the living room to reveal the toolbox behind it. As soon as he opened it, he grabbed the hammer inside.

“Excuse me.”

Yu Yin stepped over to one side, and the prosecutor swung the hammer down onto the wall with all his strength.

A loud bang split through the air, and a small crack appeared on the wall.

Not quite satisfied, Li Zi Hong forcefully hammered it another few times until chunks of the wall began to fall off.

Yu Yin was watching Li Zi Hong’s somewhat rough actions in shock, and some terror. He rushed forwards to help sweep down the broken chunks. The hammering and knocking repeated on the other side until a large section of cement was chucked off. Then, the thing hidden inside slowly revealed its colors.

It was a small piece of cloth. The bright yellow color showed itself through the hole broken into the wall.

As the wall continued to be destroyed, the thing wrapped inside the cloth also became visible.

In that instant, Yu Yin finally knew why they had come looking for him.

If nobody had discovered them, they probably would have remained trapped inside here forever, until the building itself broke down.

Yu Yin was absolutely sure of his thoughts as he stared at the two small skeletons lying inside the wall.

“The cement sealing off the walls appear to be relatively new. It was probably built later.” Li Zi Hong inspected the two differently colored layers and several matters quickly flashed through his mind.

He had recently accepted this case, so he had just finished reviewing the files.

“Can I ask you…if there hadn’t been anything inside the walls after knocking them down, what would you have done?” Yu Yin slowly turned his head away from the immature skeletons and at the slightly panting prosecutor.

Li Zi Hong dropped the hammer in his hands and patted the cement off of his hands. “I believed I would find it.”

“That’s a lot of self-confidence…”

“No, after looking through the report from back then, I had more or less figured it out. The male owner of this home back then had bought a bunch of cement half a year before his death to allegedly fix the house. However, the cement was nowhere to be found after he died, and there were no traces of the house having been fixed. The report originally noted that he might have used it somewhere else.” But after seeing the photos of the site, the room had always bothered him up until he had heard Yu Yin’s words earlier.

“That’s it?”

“Yes, that is it.”

“…” Yu Yin’s head was starting to hurt. It turned out that this person was just as straightforward as his uncle, directly grabbing a hammer to break down a wall. If this person really had not found anything after destroying it, he definitely would have been sued.

Then, Yu Yin heard sirens from outside the balcony, as well as some alarmed shouts and clamour from the residents upstairs running down.

The old case that had been lying around untouched for so long had finally been cracked.

***

After rushing over and discovering there were skeletons in the residence, the police immediately sealed off the area with yellow tape.

Because it really wasn’t a suitable sight for a girl, Li Zi Hong had one of the officers bring Fang Yi Xun back to the station first, and then get her testimony after.

“Yu Yin!” Yu Xia roared as soon as he entered, ducking under the yellow tape. He had just received the news while at the hospital and had instantly rushed over.

Yu Yin immediately hid behind Li Zi Hong and frantically tried to give an excuse. “Let me speak first! I was called over here too! In this world…”

“World, my ass! You stinking brat!” Yu Xia interrupted him. He nodded at Li Zi Hong and greeted him first before mercilessly dragging the other person out from behind. “You’re just purposely looking for trouble, aren’t you? And you just had to come over here to dig up some bones?” If he loved digging up bones so much, Yu Xia would definitely make sure he was able to dig them up as much as he wanted one day.

“Eh, at least some were dug up…” And honestly speaking, these two skeletons weren’t dug up by me, but by your colleague! That prosecutor! He grabbed a hammer and smashed the wall without any hesitation!

Yu Yin definitely would never dare to do so.

“I apologise, the wall was destroyed by me,” Li Zi Hong said with a cough.

Yu Xia turned around and looked at him in disbelief. Then he grabbed his family’s son by the collar and berated, “Don’t lead others astray!” It was bad enough with Yu following him and running around all over the place, and now there was another?

“I didn’t…” He couldn’t be bothered to try explaining anymore.

“We got it out!” One of the officers helping out shouted and interrupted their conversation. After knocking down the walls, the two skeletons of the deceased were carefully retrieved out and reassembled on the ground.

They were children’s bodies. There was a total of two sets, and no more.

“The two missing children, huh…” Yu Xia looked down at the tattered clothes on the bodies and quietly murmured, “So they were put here.”

The investigation officer knelt down to examine the bones. He then raised his head to inform them, “There are a few injuries to the bones. It appears that the two children had been violently handled before. However, the details cannot be clarified until they are sent back to the lab.”

The fact that the injuries had affected the bones indicated that they were pretty heavy. In addition, both children sported them…Yu Xia narrowed his eyes as he began to suspect it as a case of domestic abuse.

“The marks on the wall have been confirmed to be bloodstains. Based on position and shape, the blood should be splatters,” the investigator informed them.

After completely clearing away the wallpaper, the things on the walls became clearer. There were even small, black handprints in the corner that had seemingly dragged down the wall while struggling.

As Yu Yin watched them handle the matter, he retreated back outside the home where Yu was standing and observing as well.

In the stairwell behind them, several people were crammed together and whispering amongst each other. He was certain that it wouldn’t be long before the media also barged over. Tomorrow’s report would definitely be the discovery of the bones…No, it will make tonight’s news even.

“Mama, what are they doing over here?” A child in the stairwell innocently asked.

Yu Yin glanced over and saw a young woman with a child. The child holding her hands was lifting its small face up to her while asking this question.

“The police uncles are working on a case, so lower your voice a bit.” The woman patted the child’s hands and just happened to notice Yu Yin looking in her direction. She politely smiled and said, “I’m the resident on the ninth floor here.”

“Oh…huh?” Ninth floor?

Yu Yin was stunned for a moment. “You live on the ninth floor?”

The woman showed a puzzled expression as she answered, “Yes, we live on the ninth floor with my husband. This is our child, she just started attending preschool this year.”

“Wait, does your family have an auntie around the age of forty?” Yu Yin described the woman he had bumped into last time. His eyelid began to twitch as he had a bad premonition about the matter.

After hearing his description, the woman shook her head. “No, our family only has me, my husband, and my child. I do not know the person you described, nor have I seen her around before. We only just moved in a bit over a year ago, so we are not very familiar with this place.”

After thanking her, Yu Yin watched her lead her child into the elevator.

Thus, he finally realised what had been out of place that day.

Why would a person living on the ninth floor take the stairs, especially while carrying a grocery basket? Even if she had come up to take a look after hearing the noise, she should have taken the elevator to the fourth floor. It definitely would be the appropriate choice for the residents on the upper floors, especially compared to the dark and sinister stairwell.

Then, who was that woman from that day?

Yu tugged at the corner of his clothes, clearly also thinking of this question.

“Ah Yin, come over here for a minute.” Yu Xia walked out of the residence with a photo in his hand. “Were these the children you saw?”

He looked at it. It was a family portrait with both parents and three children, with two of them being the ones that had been standing next to the shrine table earlier. But what made Yu Yin start in shock was the mother.

“Uncle, this woman…”

Yu Xia raised his finger to his mouth to signal him to shush.

His uncle had also noticed. The woman in the photo was completely identical to the one they had bumped into that day.

A child giggled next to his foot.

Yu Yin turned around and saw the woman standing on top of the stairwell looking at them. There was a smile on her white face, and two children were running around her. Then, they vanished from the staircase.

With a muffled noise, the lights blacked out, and the staircase was once again immersed in the realm of darkness.

He saw the woman disappear the instant light and shadow intertwined.

“Looks like this case will be re-investigated,” Yu Xia said from next to him.

Thus, the cases ended together and another one was revived.

Yu Xia stuffed the photo into the hands of his family’s son before turning around to re-enter the room and loudly clap his hands.

“Ok! From this point on, make sure you don’t miss out on a single clue!”

---

Epilogue

The cases ended.

Based on the police’s investigations and a statement from the criminal named Xie, the XX Building’s cases were declared as closed.

According to their understanding, the deceased named Xu had swapped out weight loss pills while visiting her friend, causing her friend named Lai to suffer from a severe allergic reaction that died after not being sent to the hospital in time.

The deceased named Lai made a call before her death, which lead to the criminal named Xie to accidentally kill the woman named Xu…

The TV did not report the matter regarding Xie Ru Xian’s adoration towards her friend.

The ziploc bag was later tested to reveal tons of fingerprints. The weight loss pills that had not yet been eaten by the ants had also shown up positive for Lai Qi Lin’s fingerprints. They said that Lai Qi Lin had probably put them down briefly before eating them and temporarily left to go do something else before Xu Ru Xian replaced them.

Whether it was just supposed to be a warning or whether she had really wanted to kill her friend was something that nobody would ever know.

As Yu Yin was watching the news online after waking up a bit past five in the morning, he thought to himself: Maybe this will become an eternal secret! Sometimes, it was better not to say such things. Otherwise, the media would incite more trouble than one could ever imagine.

It was a holiday, and for once, his dad and uncle were off work. Yesterday, everyone had agreed to go watch a movie together. Although he felt that four adult males going out to watch a movie together was rather strange, doing it once in a while wasn’t bad either.

After six, he walked down the stairs and immediately discovered someone already in the living room.

“The one you rescued from the sixth floor died.” This was the first sentence to pierce through his mind after entering the living room.

He looked at the person in shock. Yu Xia was on the sofa, having clearly not slept last night.

Yu Xia checked his watch briefly before looking back on the screen of his laptop. “They performed emergency treatment on him at 3 AM. Originally, his condition stabilised, but he suddenly fell back down to a dangerous level again, and the hospital called at 3:16 to report his death.” After receiving the call, his mood fell to an all-time low, so he had sat there until morning. “The staff said he had absolutely no desire to live, so he died very quickly. They had already tried their best. The family members will go over in a bit to claim the body back.”

“I see…” Yu Yin could only spit out these two words as he felt something twist in his heart. He then walked into the kitchen with heavy steps to get both himself and the person outside in the living room some coffee.

They had originally planned on going out to play, but it seemed like they wouldn’t truly enjoy it even if they did.

He could not understand. He could not understand any of the people in this case at all.

They did not value life. Killing others, committing suicide, everything just seemed so simple. The tiniest flaw or false thought was enough for someone to die.

The children buried in the walls had also longed to leave that place. They had struggled before, wanting to continue living.

Killing was simple. Just a small action was all it took.

Even when he thought back to that day outside the iron door—Lai Qi Lin had written the words “Let him die”. Had she wanted him to give up his life to join her?

It was impossible for him to comprehend the thoughts and actions of these people.

After a while, he finally stepped out of the kitchen and saw his dad had at some point come downstairs and was leaning against the sofa.

Yu Tong patted the shoulder of his twin brother, having heard the news just now after coming down. He softly said, “This is not your fault…”

“Our people were walking in and out of there that time, yet we didn’t notice…”

“Don’t think about it too much. Nobody would have known that he would go back and commit suicide.”

Yu Yin did not take his second step, instead retreating back into the kitchen. With his back against the wall, he quietly drank the coffee he was holding that had already started to cool.

This was not the first time.

So he could only stay there and wait.

After a while, a sound came from his side. He turned around just in time to see Yu Tong walk into the kitchen.

“Breakfast is soon. Don’t drink so much coffee, or else your stomach will hurt,” Yu Tong said simply without saying much else. He took out the drinks from the fridge.

Yu Yin looked down to discover that he had unknowingly drank both cups of coffee down to their bottoms.

A noise came from the staircase as Yu, who had woken early, walked down while yawning. He stepped into the living room and sat down next to Yu Xia to turn on the TV. On the screen were some really old national clips of people performing classic Taiwanese comedies with exaggerated movements.

As Yu Tong finished preparing breakfast and was just about to call someone over to help bring it out, the doorbell rang early in the morning.

“Who is it this early?” Yu Yin, who had also sat down in the living room to watch the national clips, climbed up to open the door. The guest standing outside the opened door was someone that was completely beyond his expectations.

Li Zi Hong stood outside and politely nodded. “Morning.”

“Ah, morning.” Yu Yin noticed that he was not wearing a suit and was instead wearing a lightweight shirt and jeans. Presumably, this person had also had today off as well.

But what did he come here for?

“May I enter?” Li Zi Hong asked, his expression as cold and cool as usual.

“Ah! Please, come in!” Yu Yin hurriedly stepped aside to let him inside the house.

When Yu Xia saw the person step into the living room, he also stood up. “Why did you run over here?”

Li Zi Hong lifted his hands to show the large paper bag he was holding as he expressionlessly said, “I felt that playing this thing would be more interesting with two people.”

Yu Yin peered into the paper bag and saw a PS2 and some game discs inside.

He fell silent.

So the new prosecutor is also someone that just always does things their way?

“Hmph, how old are you? Still playing games…” Yu Xia muttered.

“If we really play, you will lose to me. Yan Si has never won once.” It was because he felt that playing with Yan Si was too boring that he had run over here. After all, he was a newcomer and didn’t really know anyone else.

That statement was enough to provoke Yu Xia’s blazing competitive spirit.

“Let’s play now!”

Yu Tong walked out of the kitchen and helplessly looked at the two already setting up the console. “All of you must finish eating breakfast first before touching that console!”

Are they planning on using this hard to come by break to stay at home and fight to the death?

Yu was studying the console with a rare expression of interest on his face.

“That’s right, there was a letter in our mailbox.” Li Zi Hong passed over the letter with Yu Xia’s name written on it. “But it did not have an address.”

Yu Xia accepted the letter and thanked him.

A letter without an address of origin could only mean one thing.

“Hurry up and come eat!”

“Okay, fine.”

***

It was morning that day. The tide of people downtown was gradually growing as it neared noontime.

Wearing pretty clothes and carrying a large bag, Fang Yi Xun stopped in front of a desserts shop. In the time span of around ten minutes, four people she did not know came over to hit on her. She rejected every one of them with a smile.

She was waiting for the person that had arranged the meeting.

She checked her watch. Right at the arranged time, someone stopped next to her.

“Long time no see. You have grown quite a bit.” A calm male voice rang out as the footsteps stopped. The person with blue eyes caused all the girls nearby to turn towards him with starstruck expressions.

“Auntie said that you do high interest loans now. I was also very surprised!” Fang Yi Xun laughed and turned around to look at the tall man.

Teng Qi was standing in front of her wearing a well-ironed suit. He gave a perfect, professional smile and answered, “It is not exactly high interest loans.” He amalgamated liabilities.

“Oh, whatever! Why did you suddenly call me?” She had originally arranged to go out with her family, but the call had interrupted along the way.

“You have already come into contact with Shaodi Yu, no?” Teng Qi looked at the beautiful girl in front of him and maintained his calm tone. “I heard that you took a small part in the cases at that building this time.”

Fang Yi Xun flipped her short hair and crossed her arms without showing any change in expression. “That’s right, although I didn’t really want to go, it was pretty interesting. That Yu Yin can see quite a few things…I didn’t even have leeway to show off. All I could do was pretend to be an ordinary girl.” Which is pretty annoying to do.

“You are indeed a normal girl though.”

Fang Yi Xun chuckled and then pulled at his arm. “Since you already know that I’m just a normal girl, you should treat me. If you arrange to meet in front of a desserts shop, you have to be the one to pay.”

“Of course, you can eat however much you would like,” Teng Qi’s expression did not change as he was dragged into the exquisite, high-class dessert house. “If you are not afraid of gaining weight.”

“Don’t worry, my greatest strength is not really gaining weight no matter what I eat.”

After the server led them to their seats, Fang Yi Xun ordered five different desserts, then put the large bag on the empty seat next to her.

“What kind of bag is that?” Teng Qi asked in curiosity as he studied the item that was quite large in size.

“It’s for storing my little friend,” Fang Yi Xun replied with a wink.

Teng Qi shrugged, unable to comprehend her words and choosing to drop the topic instead. “What do you think of the Yu family and Shaodi Yu?” He leaned to one side to allow the server to set down the drinks and desserts.

“The only person I’ve met in the Yu family is Yu Yin, who is a pretty good guy. He’s very good at inviting trouble to himself; he always runs around all over the place, so I could only give messed up hints as a result. But the matter was finally dealt with in the end.” Fang Yi Xun picked up her small spoon and happily looked at the ice cream brought over; it was five scoops of ice cream with various toppings she had ordered. She was nearly drooling at the sight, so she directly went at it with her spoon without holding back. “Ah Yu, without a doubt, has the bloodline of the Shaodi family…didn’t you go looking for the Yu adults?”

“Mm…but Officer Yu refuses to yield since he does not know who we are,” Teng Qi slowly said with his arms crossed as he watched the young girl in front of him take large bites of the extremely sweet dessert.

“If they knew, they would be very surprised.”

Fang Yi Xun licked her spoon before happily taking another bite.

“I think they would be. Before then, we will just have to continue slowly observing them first.”

“I know.”

On the street, people began to gather due to the holiday.

Every second on every corner could possibly be the start of a new story, a new case. Perhaps a burglary, a snatch theft, or maybe even a fatal incident.

Before that moment, people would continue living their normal lives at their usual pace, happily spending their holiday.

Up until the day their lives came to an end.

“Cousin, I want to get another one.”

“…Are you trying to eat my wallet away?”

---

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