Chapter 18#

I hid behind the door. In the pitch darkness, the only thing I could see was the doorknob right in front of me. Someone outside was trying to open the door. Because it was locked, the doorknob could only turn within a limited range. It twisted left and right like a mechanical insect on the verge of death, kicking its legs.

I gripped the baseball bat, my fingers trembling uncontrollably. One minute felt like ten thousand years.

The faint noises outside the door vanished again.

I took a painful, deep breath.

Was everyone like this—like an ant, struggling desperately in the chaotic torrent of life, hoping to find a piece of driftwood in the vast ocean, or longing for a giant tree to sprout from the seabed? Money, love, law, morality, religion—no matter what people believed in, as long as they had something to rely on, their lives seemed stable. I was no exception.

I knew I had always been seeking a stable life. Since I had been abandoned and no one needed me, I would rush to fulfill others’ needs, deriving satisfaction from that.

The pillar of my life before I turned twenty-five was the oath I swore on my first day as a police officer. Now, it was gone.

What did I have left?

Maybe I was going to die.

Maybe I really was going to die.

Just then, a voice broke the dead silence. Someone was calling me.

“A Yu.”

My body relaxed. Sweat had already soaked through my back. I couldn’t see anything. But I knew it was him.

It was Zhang Mingsheng.

The person I would never forget, even in death. The voice I would remember even in my dreams. The footsteps I had once deeply feared.

As a police officer, I knew well how Stockholm syndrome formed and how it could destroy a person’s mind. But at that moment, hearing Zhang Mingsheng’s voice, I felt saved.

Through the door, I finally began to breathe deeply again.

Zhang Mingsheng said, “Open the door.”

I was still holding the baseball bat, but I freed my other hand and clumsily, tremblingly, turned the lock inside the door.

As soon as I cracked the door open, a beam of white light slipped in, swept across my face, and then probed deeper into the bedroom.

I guessed it was A Shan. Only he would be so rash. He stood beside Zhang Mingsheng, shining a flashlight inside.

Zhang Mingsheng pushed the light down. “They should be in the bathroom. Go take them away.”

I didn’t say a word. Zhang Mingsheng had guessed immediately where the children were hiding. If he could guess it, so could the pervert who was like him. Although the space was limited and I hadn’t come up with a perfect plan in that short time, I still felt a lingering fear.

A Shan sidestepped past me. The bathroom light was on, and Keke and Xiaoyuan recognized him instantly. I heard their joyful cries, and my body relaxed considerably, but my fierce heartbeat was still racing, pounding loudly, refusing to slow down.

Zhang Mingsheng still stood outside the door.

Only after A Shan had carried both children out did he step forward and enter the room.

The door clicked softly shut, and I smelled a strong stench of blood.

In the darkness, he stood by the door, and I sat in the wheelchair. For a moment, neither of us spoke.

Zhang Mingsheng had bright eyes. Even in the dark, he seemed to see more than others. Suddenly, he walked over leisurely and sat down on Zhang Xiaoyuan’s bed.

As he came closer, besides the blood, I caught that faint, indifferent fragrance on him—faint threads hidden deep within the scent of blood.

His hand fumbled inside his clothes, making a rustling sound. Finally, he found it, followed by a crisp metallic ding. He flicked open the lighter with his thumb. With a whoosh, a flame shot up, illuminating one side of his face.

He lit a cigarette for himself.

In that brief flash of firelight, I saw his left cheek, tinged pale orange, dotted with thick, crimson beads of blood. Some had already dripped down from gravity, dragging long, wet streaks along his jaw and neck. He was handsome, and with the blood, he had a fierce, heroic sharpness. The flame died, and his face vanished again, leaving only the orange ember at the tip of the cigarette. He took a deep drag, exhaled, and the air was suddenly filled with the pungent smell of tobacco.

Zhang Mingsheng spoke slowly: “Thirteen years ago, March fourteenth, four in the morning. In Shexi District, a homeless man found the body of a cooked boy in a trash can.”

The Shexi boy-cooking case.

I immediately understood.

He was referring to a horrifying murder case in Hong Kong back then.

I hadn’t officially become a police officer yet, but I believed that no one in the city—except for children too young to remember—would dare to say they had no memory of this case.

Given the severity of the crime and the subsequent disappearances of several children, the case was taken over by the Major Crimes Unit, with the Child Abuse Investigation Unit assisting. My mentor had also participated in this case. But the investigation hadn’t been particularly complicated. Within a week, the police had identified the targets.

The perpetrators were twin brothers, both nineteen years old. They had inherited their parents’ fish stall and worked as fishmongers at the dock. According to their customers, the brothers were not talkative and didn’t like to look people in the eye, but they were quick and efficient at killing and cleaning fish. Some fellow vendors said they were extremely bold—whatever they caught at sea, even a shark, they’d kill it in a few swift moves, throw it on the boat, and bring it home, whether to sell or eat themselves.

This showed that their composure far exceeded that of ordinary people.

When the frontline officers burst through the door, a narrow, fish-stinking rental apartment was blasting a fast-paced pop song. The twin brothers surnamed Li were sitting in front of the TV watching the news. In the corner, a four-year-old girl, tied up tightly, was crying silently. Her mouth was covered with black tape, her hair had been cut off, and her braids lay on the floor.

The brothers had kidnapped three children in total—two dead, one injured.

In the trial videos released by the authorities, the criminals showed no remorse. They calmly confessed to their crimes, only showing a kind of animal-like bewilderment in their eyes when the judge slammed the gavel and sentenced them to death.

Some psychologists analyzed their motives, saying they were typical antisocial personalities—lacking emotions, unable to perceive others’ pain, so killing people was as easy as killing fish. Others said they hated children because they were infertile. Still others claimed their mother had died in childbirth, so they loathed all young life.

Society is never short of novelists who fabricate tragic backgrounds for heinous criminals, nor of speakers who delve into the criminal psyche, trying to take a different angle to attract young followers who want to be unconventional.

But regardless, with two gunshots, the criminals were dead.

For a moment, I briefly believed in religion, hoping that the innocent souls who had ascended to heaven could find peace now that the sinners had finally fallen into hell. I didn’t want any child to suffer.

Why was Zhang Mingsheng bringing up an old case?

Thinking it over, I cautiously spoke, trying to extract more information: “That case was closed thirteen years ago.”

“Yeah, it even made the newspapers, so I remember what the killers looked like,” Zhang Mingsheng said calmly. “Today, I saw them again. Funny thing—I killed his brother, and he rushed over in a panic to cause trouble for you.”

My heart jolted. I frowned and retorted, staring at the ember of the cigarette, “Impossible. They were executed by firing squad.”

“It’s the twenty-first century. Privacy matters. Even if you execute criminals, you don’t do it in the street,” Zhang Mingsheng said nonchalantly.

“…That’s impossible,” I said, but even as I denied it, I felt Zhang Mingsheng had no reason to lie to me about this. Torn between contradiction, my voice gradually faded.

Who could possibly tamper with death-row prisoners?

“Some people don’t want to get their hands dirty, so they train hyenas,” Zhang Mingsheng said. “Officer Yu, not everyone is like me—daring to act and taking responsibility personally.”

“Didn’t the police notice anything?”

“Officer Yu, that’s why I always say you cops are useless,” Zhang Mingsheng laughed. “If I had captured those two alive and handed them to Li Yi, he might have gotten another promotion. But if he tried to thoroughly investigate the case back then, I dare say he wouldn’t have lasted the month. Your police department is just a decoration now.”

“I don’t know why you look down on the police so much.”

“I told you, because they’re useless.”

“Many of our colleagues die in the line of duty every year.”

“Yeah, see? You know it too. They’re all dead.”

He said it with utter contempt.

Zhang Mingsheng exhaled another puff of smoke. As soon as I smelled it, my throat itched faintly, and I coughed lightly. As soon as I finished coughing, the ember vanished into the darkness.

He had stubbed out the cigarette.

Then he said, “Don’t forget, Officer Yu. You’re dead too.”

In an instant, I felt as if I had sunk tens of millions of meters to the bottom of the sea. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move. I strained to open my eyes, only to see a deep blue, silent death.

I didn’t know what to say. I fell silent.

“I think you must have noticed. In that case back then, the last three officers who died were completely different from the first victim. I believe they were all good cops.”

“But they’re all dead.”

My breath quickened. I couldn’t speak.

“Your colleagues—some get promoted and rich, others die tragically. What a stark difference. I guess, if you hadn’t disappeared, if Li Yi hadn’t been so fixated on your matter, with his intelligence, maybe…”

“Li Yi isn’t that kind of person,” I blurted out.

Zhang Mingsheng said, “How do you know? What makes you so sure he isn’t that kind of person?”

I didn’t reply.

“A Yu, sometimes I really don’t know what you’re thinking. What is your brain made of? Your stubbornness is like that Jingwei bird trying to fill the sea. You trust so many people. Why do you trust them?” When I didn’t respond, Zhang Mingsheng sighed, as if he felt helpless. “But today, I only learned one lesson—”

He stood up and walked closer to me: “Never regret. If I hadn’t locked your legs today, you—still holding that baseball bat—would have been able to escape easily. Luckily, luckily, I’m always lucky at critical moments. I can always raise my gun first, and I can always arrive in time.”

Zhang Mingsheng reached out, took my hand, and with a slight effort, snatched away my only weapon. He said, “Next time, don’t pick up something so heavy.”

A dull thud. The baseball bat fell to the floor and rolled clatter into the corner.

In the room, Zhang Mingsheng’s voice sounded again: “Alright, it’s over. But we might need to move soon.”

I could feel him crouching down. In the faint light, I could even see him gazing into my eyes.

Zhang Mingsheng let out a laugh. “You don’t want to live in a murder house, do you, darling?”