The sky grew darker, the night descending like a vast black curtain, slowly and inexorably falling.
The rendezvous point we had agreed upon was a desolate, uninhabited road, its stillness broken only by the occasional whistle of the wind.
The vehicle Xu Ze drove was an older model of an off-road car, now quietly parked at the roadside.
We sat together in the car, holding our breath, silently awaiting the arrival.
Though I struggled to remain composed, to say I was completely calm would be a lie; my hands trembled uncontrollably, betraying my nerves.
Gradually, a small black dot appeared in the distance, growing larger with every passing moment, until it became clear: it was the local motorcycle taxi.
The driver, already bought off by us, hastily urged the man in the back seat to disembark as soon as the car came to a stop. Without a second glance, he hit the gas pedal and sped off.
The man who got out of the car, carrying a bag, was none other than my ex-husband.
In the desolate, eerily silent path, only our old off-road vehicle remained, like a lurking hunter, patiently waiting for him.
"Turn on the hazard lights," I murmured to Xu Ze.
No sooner had the words left my lips than the car's hazard lights began to blink in rhythmic pulses, the flickering beams standing out in the dimming light of dusk.
Seeing the blinking lights, my ex-husband hesitated for a moment, raised his hand in a half-hearted wave, and cautiously approached us.
What he could not possibly foresee was that this seemingly ordinary road would soon become the site of a nightmare he would never escape.
On one side of the road, there was a deep pit, its darkness unfathomable.
I saw my ex-husband's gaze flicker toward the pit, uncertainty and unease written across his face.
Once, before I was buried alive, I had felt this same panic, questioning endlessly: what was this pit for?
Adjacent to the pit was a patch of earth, its soil clearly disturbed, as though something had recently been buried there—something about the size of an adult.
Indeed, it was there that Qin Yao, that dead woman, lay buried.
At this moment, my ex-husband was no more than a few meters away from this chilling place.
Xu Ze's car continued to flash its hazard lights, casting an eerie, pulsating glow in the oppressive silence that enveloped us.
Finally, my ex-husband sensed something was amiss. His steps faltered, and he froze, frantically pulling out his phone and dialing my number.
Since the beginning of this nightmare, this was the first time I had answered his call.
"Qin Yao, get out of the car. Let me see you."
His voice, crackling through the speaker, was shaky with breathless panic, filled with raw fear.
We were now close enough. I said nothing, but reached out, slowly opened the car door, and stepped out with steady strides.
The moment he looked up and saw me, his expression froze. It was as though he had seen a ghost in broad daylight, his face contorted with abject terror.
"It's been a long time," I said, my lips curling into a faint, almost serene smile as I calmly met his gaze.
He trembled violently, the phone slipping from his hand with a sharp crack, and then, in sheer panic, he turned and bolted down the road, running in frenzied haste.
The sky darkened further, the thick, oppressive clouds threatening to crush the entire expanse of the heavens. In this moment of despair, there was no escape for him.