Bu Wei was like white algae swaying at the bottom of the river. After a long while, she finally stepped into the ward and closed the door with her backhand. Then she walked toward the bed and sat down straight.
This angle made her and Jiang Ting look at each other face to face — as if some curse in the underworld was silently lifted, finally breaking free from the bottom to the top.
She asked: "What do you want me to answer?"
"Although it happened the night before, I don't think the police had time to tell you." Jiang Ting paused and said, "Wang Xingye is dead."
Bu Wei's face was blank as if she hadn't had time to think about what emotions to fill on the whiteboard, and after a few seconds, surprise, shock, and a trace of fear slowly surfaced: "…Wh…what?"
"He fell from the roof of a residential building in Gongzhou. The body was found early the next morning, and the police initially determined that it was suicide because of fear of punishment."
Jiang Ting's upper body was leaning on the back of the armchair. His posture was natural and calm, which was the opposite of the girl's stiff and somewhat deliberately upright sitting posture. After a long time, Bu Wei seemed to have barely digested the bad news that couldn't be called sad. She trembled and said hoarsely: "…It's too sudden, I didn't expect…"
"Really?"
Bu Wei's voice froze and she looked at Jiang Ting, who repeated it in her line of sight: "You really didn't expect it?"
"…I don't understand what you mean."
"I thought you had expected Wang Xingye to die when you said the words 'the kidnapper is my uncle' in front of Yan Xie." Jiang Ting said slowly, "—Or earlier when you heard Yan Xie and the others discussing privately that the chances of Shen Xiaoqi waking up was very high, and you decided to take the lead to throw Wang Xingye to divert their attention…"
"I don't understand what you're talking about?" Bu Wei's sharp voice interrupted Jiang Ting: "It was the kidnappers who forced me to push Shen Xiaoqi down. What's wrong with me telling the truth?"
"There is nothing wrong."
"..."
"But the only one who can prove this, Wang Xingye, is dead." a smile appeared under Jiang Ting's eyes, but there was no friendliness and kindness in it: "That is to say, no one can prove that whether you were coerced into the killing, actively cooperated, was an accomplice, or even… from the very beginning, actively asked to kill Shen Xiaoqi."
Bu Wei's expression was a bit strange, like two opposite expressions of fierce staring and weak innocence infiltrating from inside and out, intertwining together so that when she spoke, her voice was a little distorted: "Uncle police officer, I'm just a poor student. Have I offended you?"
"Don't think too much. It's just normal logical speculation from the perspective of the criminal investigation." Jiang Ting's expression was much blander: "By the way, maybe they forgot to tell you that you are not the first victim — In one of Wang Xingye's hiding places, we found a notebook or an archive to be exact, which recorded the first two girls Teng Wenyan and Li Yuxi. Have you heard of these two names?"
Bu Wei shook her head vigilantly: "…I don't know."
"I guess you probably don't know. Teng Wenyan was discovered by Wang Xingye in Lingzhou five years ago. In mid-July two years ago, she was kidnapped and killed together with another teenager named Li Rui. Li Yuxin was discovered by Wang Xingye four years ago in Jiangyang County. In mid-July last year, she and another boy named He Liang were kidnapped. He Liang was subsequently killed, and Li Yuxin suffered from severe PTSD. Similarly, you also encountered this kind of thing after being adopted for three years. It seems three years is like a shelf life. Once the freshness wears off and the shelf life is over, they become worthless."
Saying that, Jiang Ting seemed to find it very interesting, so he looked at Bu Wei and smiled slightly.
But Bu Wei's white and tender face suddenly became ugly when she heard that there were two other girls, and with Jiang Ting's last few words, it even became faintly blue.
"Oh, yes. Teng Wenyan was a shampoo girl in Lingzhou City, and Li Yuxin was a county girl who went out to 'socialize' with her drug-abusing biological mother." The smile in Jiang Ting's eyes became more and more meaningful: "—So you see, there's nothing to be sad about. At least you're not so… how to say, unique."
At the same time, inside the speeding Phaeton.
"Once the shelf life is over, they become worthless… At least you're not so unique."
The car's Bluetooth synchronously played Jiang Ting's voice. Han Xiaomei frowned suspiciously. She looked at Yan Xie secretly several times, and couldn't help asking: "Captain… Captain Yan?"
Yan Xie turned on the indicator and changed lanes. His eyes were fixed on the front of the car, and he nodded his head to signal her.
"That…why did Consultant Lu say that both Teng Wenyan and Li Yuxin had been discovered for three years? It wasn't written in the notebook you found in Wang Xingye's house?"
Yan Xie said: "To break the other party's psychological defense."
"Huh?"
"Bu Wei's calmness stems from a certain confidence in her heart. Although we don't know the source, it must be related to some characteristics of her. Your Consultant Lu deliberately distorted the description of the first two victims, and blurred and unified all the uniqueness of Bu Wei in an all-round way, which is a method of targeting her psychological defense."
Han Xiaomei, who understood but also did not understand, took note of these words in her mind and pondered on them over and over.
——Indeed, Bu Wei had a kind of dexterity, softness, and pitifulness that was very incompatible with her age. This unique temperament was rarely seen in many experienced adult women.
But these unique features suddenly became extremely fragile and difficult to maintain when she faced Jiang Ting. The seemingly invincible weapon met her natural nemesis.
"Uncle Wang is usually out of town, and I don't know what did he do." Bu Wei lowered her eyes and stared at her thin white hand on her thigh: "I don't know what you want to say, Uncle Police. Are you going to arrest me? Can I hire a lawyer?"
"No one wants to arrest you. Didn't I say I just want you to cooperate in answering the question." Jiang Ting was still sitting in a very comfortable position, pressing the picture book on his thigh with his left hand and tucking his right into his trousers pocket. Suddenly his words changed: "—Do you know why the mastermind behind the scenes planned three kidnappings for three years in a row?"
Bu Wei's voice was soft: "I already told Uncle Officer Yan, I thought Uncle Wang just wanted money."
"If he wanted money, he wouldn't have supported you for three years first all by himself."
Bu Wei said nothing.
The sunlight was reflecting into the ward from the glass window behind her. Even when it was against the light, her hair was soft and shiny like satin, and her skin was crystal white and seemed to be glowing slightly. She just sat there in her nightgown, and her whole body revealed an invisible delicacy, elegance, and fragrance.
No matter how young a woman was or how superior her natural capital was, this kind of artistic elegance could not be entirely derived from innate. Day after day, countless money and resources must have been spent on details that were invisible to the human eye.
"Wang Xingye is just a broker," Jiang Ting said lightly, "There is also a mastermind behind him. A person who really enjoys writing scripts and performing plots, and only a kidnapping can satisfy his inner desires. You are his actor, but you are not the 'only' one."
Bu Wei sat upright on the side of the hospital bed as if there was a stick supporting her spine: "…I don't know what behind the scenes masterminds you are talking about."
Maybe the air was too stagnant, or maybe she was stimulated by Jiang Ting's excessively relaxed posture under this stalemate, a few seconds later, Bu Wei finally couldn't help but look up provocatively again:
"But even if the kidnappings are just a play, is there really a so-called 'only' actor?"
"Of course there is." Jiang Ting's attitude was still very dull as if he didn't feel the little needle in the girl's voice at all: "Things have come to this point, do you still have to pretend that you don't know anything, little girl?"
"..."
Jiang Ting gently threw the picture book titled "Starry Sky Art" on the bedside table: "You usually study astrology very much."
The picture book belonged to Bu Wei, and as the corner of the book hit the bedside table, it made a "Bang!" and the girl's heart suddenly plunged into the abyss.
"I'm different. I hate astrology and constellations, which are both unrealistic and unreasonable. If someone dares to show me off with this unreliable knowledge, they will basically be snubbed or even ignored." Jiang Ting smiled and said, "Look, this is the difference between me and you."
Downstairs in a residential area, the Phaeton quickly stopped. Yan Xie stepped out of the car wearing a headset and suddenly stopped.
Seeing this, Han Xiaomei and Ma Xiang stopped behind him, their anxious eyes focused on Yan Xie. Then they saw him press the synchronous monitor headset with one hand, and he murmured suspiciously after a long while:
"…Astrology?"
The ward was filled with the suffocating smell of disinfectant. The ceiling and walls were white, reflecting the hazy and unheated light.
If it was said that Bu Wei's expression wasn't good-looking just now, now it was enough to call it cold and gloomy. After an unknown amount of time, she twisted her neck like a rusty machine, and stared at Jiang Ting: "So what?"
"..."
"So what do you want to do now, Consultant Lu? Ask me?"
Jiang Ting finally took out his right hand, which had been in his trousers pocket from the very beginning — a miniature synchronous monitor was pinched between his fingers. He casually found a pen, swiped the tip of the pen and opened the cover behind the monitor, then removed the battery and swung it in front of Bu Wei.
——Several kilometers away, the voice in the headset suddenly disappeared. Yan Xie was stunned, but then his phone vibrated with a new message.
The message came from Jiang Ting: [No battery.]
"..." Yan Xie was a little uncertain in his heart. He hesitated for two seconds and then typed: [Should I send someone to the hospital immediately? ]
The dialog box shows typing, which disappeared after a few seconds, and then it appeared again.
But Jiang Ting's reply that followed was only one word:
[Okay.]
"It's about half an hour before the police arrive." In the ward, Jiang Ting put his cell phone back into his trouser pocket: "Want to chat, little girl?"
Bu Wei, who was always warm and gentle, suddenly spouted a cold and hard sentence: "Don't you know what my name is?"
"I do."
"Then why do you always call me little girl?"
Jiang Ting looked at her with great interest: "Because a name is a code for a person as an independent individual, with special meaning, hope, and uniqueness; but you are obviously just a mass-produced marionette. You're not the first, and you're not the last. There will be no shortcomings in this world because of your departure. As far as I'm concerned, you're just a shadow. So what's your name have to do with me?"
Bu Wei's hand on her thigh was suddenly clenched, and the veins on the back of her hand burst out!
"Let me guess." Jiang Ting didn't seem to see her eyes flashing with cold flames, and said lazily: "You met that person three years ago, didn't you?"
Bu Wei raised her head slightly. Her face was full of "I want to see how much you know" look.
"You grew up with your parents taking drugs, so your family was poor and was living in embarrassment, and you might be beaten frequently for various trivial matters. When you were eleven or twelve years old, both of your parents died of drug driving, which made your unhappy childhood even worse. You would probably be sent to an orphanage, or be under someone's house. But no matter what, that kind of experience was enough to make a child taste the warmth and coldness of the world prematurely. You thought this hopeless and unfair life would continue into adulthood, but you didn't expect to soon usher into an unexpected turn of events that you never dreamed of — At the age of thirteen, you met a grown man who was very rich, polite, and maybe a little so-called gentleman, who let you live the life of a little princess in a fairy tale."
"Naturally, as you reached the age of falling in love, you fell for him."
Jiang Ting was personable and his palms were spread out on the armrests on both sides.
But Bu Wei bit her lower lip tightly, her ten fingers were convulsively twisted together.
"Extraordinary good looks, excessive precociousness, all kinds of family shadows in childhood, and blind worship of cruelty, violence, criminal power, and other negative things, have created your overly sensitive and extreme character. So when you found out that you were just a shadow — you probably didn't think you were the only shadow at the time — instead of succumbing to self-pity and becoming a pitiful piece of trash, you decided to take the initiative to seize fate and strike back, so you found Fan Zhengyuan."
Jiang Ting's upper body leaned forward slightly, staring at Bu Wei's trembling eyes: "If you were older, you might have come into contact with more intractable elite killers, who were cold-blooded, cruel, expensive, and well-trained. But you were still too young. At your age and identity, Fan Zhengyuan was already the highest limit you could get in touch with, although in the eyes of us adults, he was too clumsy and vulnerable. But you did not expect things to get exposed."
"…So what?" Bu Wei involuntarily leaned forward, forcing herself to stand firmly against Jiang Ting's gaze: "It's just my bad luck that it came to light. I'll learn the lesson next time, and will make progress, Uncle—Lu."
Jiang Ting didn't care about her address, "One daring act is enough for you to be punished, where is the next time?"
"What kind of punishment? I have no idea what you are talking about——"
"You know, little girl." Jiang Ting leaned back in the armchair, his expression unhappy: "Otherwise, why did the two kidnappings of Teng Wenyan and Li Yuxin happen in the middle of July, and yours was the only one at the end of June? "
Bu Wei didn't know why, but after all, she was a girl with a sharp mind and a very high IQ. Jiang Ting's words made her instinctively feel something very bad.
"…What about the end of June?"
"The so-called ritual, or that person's test of you little girls, only happens in the middle of July every year. Because all this commemorates a day in the middle of July many years ago. The story begins at 8:09 the moment the sun sets."
"You think that as long as you perfectly reproduce every detail and every dialogue that happened in that year, you can pass this test and change from a poor shadow to a true master? — No, what you have experienced is not a test but a punishment. It was an insignificant rehearsal performance marionettes perform backstage before the official drama begins every year."
Jiang Ting's calm and hoarse voice was very nice to hear, but to Bu Wei's ears, it was more terrifying than the most vicious curse:
"…I don't believe…"
"8:09." Jiang Ting jokingly said, and the smile on his lips deepened: "If it is placed in midsummer in July, it will be the end of the day and the beginning of the long night, which means that the carefree youth is being replaced by the dark and long punishment. But what is at the end of June? It's already dark, and the person who wrote this script is already gone. Do you really think he cares how much effort you put in to pass this so-called 'test'? The test is not meant for you, you are already an exiled pawn."
"I'm not exiled! No way!" Bu Wei suddenly stood up, but the improvement in her physical position did not give her the upper hand. On the contrary, she seemed to be rapidly falling into the icy abyss: "Don't talk nonsense, what are you?! You're just a…"
Jiang Ting pinned the neurotic girl in her place with a single sentence:
"Then why haven't you received any orders from that person again since you were found by the police and hospitalized?"
"..." Bu Wei's eyes widened, and the blood on her face faded.
"He ignored you, you are abandoned." Jiang Ting looked at her with a smile and seemed to have a little pity: "This is the punishment for the substitute's vain attempt to obliterate the true master."
...…
The dilapidated and rusty security door was pushed open, and the air with a strong smell of gray mold rushed out.
"Be careful, we don't have a warrant." Yan Xie pulled Han Xiaomei aside, "Ma Xiang is guarding outside. If we find something, go back to the bureau and get a search warrant."
This was a typical old-fashioned layout. In the house, on the left side of the entrance was the kitchen full of miscellaneous goods; across the small entrance was the small dining room and toilet, and then across the wooden door was the hall with a wire bed. The steel wire bed was enough for an adult to curl up and sleep. It was probably the place where Bu Wei used to sleep when she was a child. The east side of the hall was connected to the adult's bedroom; an old desk, a wooden bed, a large wardrobe with peeling paint, and several wedding photos with poor background of an almost a decade-old photo studio were hanging on the walls. The background colors had faded, and the faces of the newlyweds had been painted in a mess with watercolor brushes. The sharp and messy brush strokes were clearly showing the child's hatred.
"This place… it should be Bu Wei's parents' house when she was a child. It seems that no one has lived in it for a long time." Han Xiaomei lowered her head and carefully passed through the bedroom door, squinting her eyes and looking left and right: "Strange, why did she still carry the keys with herself?"
Yan Xie's voice sounded from the outside: "Because she came back recently."
"Huh?"
Han Xiaomei came out of the house, only to see Yan Xie crouching in front of the video projector in the hall.
——Everything in the hall was covered with dust, only the projector was slightly new, and there were obvious signs of being wiped. Yan Xie turned on the power, and the screen suddenly flashed fluorescent light, followed by a buzzing sound from the disc drive, which automatically ejected the disc that was not taken out before the last power outage.
"What is this?" Han Xiaomei asked curiously.
Yan Xie didn't answer, but inserted the disc back into the projector and pressed the play button while wearing survey gloves.
The lighting in the old house was not good. The house was old and dark, and only the faint fluorescent light on the screen reflected Yan Xie's face obscurely. The first thing that came out was the snowflakes and color bands produced by the digital quantization of the inferior CD. Then the picture flashed, and the fingers that were enlarged to the whole screen appeared in front of Yan Xie and Han Xiaomei.
"Is it working?" someone said on the screen.
"It's not easy to use."
"I can't hold the buttons, it's too hard…" The screen kept shaking, and then the focus was zoomed away.
The background turned out to be an office of a public security bureau. A young man in a light blue shirt, epaulets, ties, and cuffs casually rolled up to his elbows, was sitting behind a spacious desk. He raised his head sharply when the camera swept over, and then reached out to block half of his handsome face.
"Let's go, Captain Jiang!" Someone shouted behind the screen: "The car is waiting for us downstairs!"
The young man sorted out the case files, got up, and picked up the police uniform jacket on the back of the chair. It may be because of his well-ironed uniform trousers, but his legs were looking very long as he walked forward. He frowned slightly when he passed by the camera. At that moment, his white cheeks, his black sideburns, and even his frowns appear thicker and clear on the screen:
"Close it first, start the operation and then shoot."
Han Xiaomei opened her mouth, unable to speak, and stumbled down on the sofa.
On the other hand, Yan Xie stared at the screen, and clenched his teeth, as if he opened his mouth a little, his violently pounding heart would jump out of his throat——
This video was a law enforcement record of the Gongzhou Division back then.
Bu Wei once hid in this dilapidated old house, watching Jiang Ting, imitating the actions and demeanor of the younger man over and over again!