Otherworldly Merchant

I mimicked the teenager’s mouthing as I said to Yin Xinyue, “Officer Li.” 

Yin Xinyue was bewildered and stared at me. “Officer Li… what do you mean?”

I inhaled deeply and pulled Yin Xinyue into the bedroom. “She meant, Officer Li killed Wang Leng, didn’t she?” 

Yin Xinyue exhaled roughly before laughing. “Are you kidding? If Officer Li were the murderer, why would he put so much effort into a case like this?” 

“Do you think the little girl was just talking nonsense then?” I asked her. 

Yin Xinyue was surprised, looking at me and pondering for a long time. 

"What’s Officer Li’s last name? It’s Li. What’s Crown Prince Yide’s last name? Also Li. What if, Officer Li is a descendant of Crown Prince Yide, and since Wang Leng raided Officer Li’s ancestor’s tomb, Officer Li wanted to kill him to take revenge?” I asked. 

Yin Xinyue said nothing, she just looked at me, worry evident in her expression. 

“Officer Li might not have any evidence of Wang Leng raiding the tomb. However, even if he did, Wang Leng wouldn’t be in jail for more than several years. So, Officer Li killed him to stop him from disclosing things. And, at the same time, he set the scene as if Wang Leng had run away from his crime. No one would ever know the truth…”

“But, he didn’t think that even a large net is difficult to escape from. Perhaps Wang Leng’s resentful soul is still waiting for us to discover the truth. Or, that teenage girl and her cats really do have a psychic ability, and they witnessed Officer Li’s horrible crime.”

I patiently analyzed the situation, using all kinds of clues to prove that Officer Li was the murderer. 

Yin Xinyue’s jaw dropped in shock when she heard my conclusion. She couldn’t pull herself together for quite a long time. 

“So, the murderous painting is fake. Officer Li just wanted to get Wang Leng involved to fabricate the story of him running away from the crime?” asked Yin Xinyue. 

I shook my head. “I’m not sure about this because that ancient painting really is an otherworldly item. If Officer Li is the one standing behind all of this, I can only say that he’s a cunning and malicious person with a great criminal mind. You can imagine how much harm he could do to this country if he got power in his hands.”

“Would he kill us?” Yin Xinyue was terrified. “No matter what, we know so many things. If we know the real cause of Wang Leng’s death, with his working style, would he let us run free?” 

I forced a smile. “That’s also what I’m worried about. How about this? Wang Leng killed your bestie and ran away. Officer Li isn’t involved in this.” 

With my sincere and earnest words, I looked at Yin Xinyue. The two of us shouldn’t get involved in this any further. If we did, our lives would be in danger. To us, there wasn’t anything good that could come out of all of this.

I wasn’t a heroic character with a sense of justice. I just wanted to live a low-key life. I didn’t want to get involved in such a mess. 

Yin Xinyue looked at me in surprise. “You just want to stand by and see that worm nibbling and harming the society?”

I shrugged. “You’re too naïve. I can’t control this sort of thing, and neither can you. In the end, we’ll just be courting trouble to ourselves.”

Yin Xinyue was silent for quite a long time. Eventually, she nodded. “Good, I’ll listen to you.”

Now that we’d decided what to do, I exhaled in relief. 

Early the next morning, I called Officer Li and told him that Wang Leng had probably fled. And, at the same time, the resentment from that ancient painting had seemed to vanish. It wouldn’t affect the owner anymore. So, I thought that this case could be closed. I had no other options. 

Officer Li persistently asked me to investigate further, and that the police couldn’t just conclude the case like that. However, I denied him. I knew that he just wanted me to stay to make his cover firmer.

Eventually, Officer Li couldn’t persuade me, so he had to agree with my conclusion. 

The case was closed shortly afterward. Wang Leng had to bear all crimes. The result was exactly what I had expected. Officer Li even invited me out for dinner to thank me. He even gave me the murderous ancient painting. 

Although I didn’t want it, to show that I didn’t have any other idea about the case, I frankly received the painting. 

However, several nights later, I couldn’t sleep well. As soon as I closed my eyes, I saw Wang Leng. Wang Leng was beheaded by a sturdy executioner. Then, his head was thrown into the brazier to be burned. His head smiled at me. Eventually, the flames burned so fiercely that his eyeballs popped and his skull exploded, splashing his brain onto my face. 

Every night, I had the same nightmare and woke up covered in sweat. Deep in my heart, I blamed myself. I knew that it was a sinister case, but I’d let it go. 

I thought that time would help me forget this. However, several days later, bad things happened…

At that night, I had plenty of free time and was thinking about finding a new owner for the ancient painting. All of a sudden, Yin Xinyue called me. 

She was panting and screaming for help. I hurriedly asked her what had happened. Yin Xinyue told me that a headless executioner was running after her inside the woods. I must come to rescue her fast. She couldn’t run anymore. 

After listening to her, I was stunned. A headless executioner? What headless executioner? The executioner from the ancient painting? 

I took a deep breath, then hurried to unfold the ancient painting. Looking at it, I was scared to see the red clothes of the executioner had faded away, and some curved lines were also paler. It felt like he was hiding in the crowd. 

Not good! I bolted up. Taking the ancient painting, I got in the car and hastily drove toward the woods. 

Near our place there was only one forest, which was the one behind Wang Leng’s apartment building. 

I suddenly recalled what the disabled girl had told me. After Officer Li had killed Wang Leng, he’d burned his head in the brazier and buried his body in the woods. 

Yin Xinyue mentioned the headless executioner. Would it be Wang Leng’s corpse? It was late at night, so why had Yin Xinyue come to such a remote place? Perhaps she wasn’t pleased with her friend dying so unjustly. That was why she’d come here to find Wang Leng’s corpse to bring Officer Li to justice. 

Along the way, I stopped by Li Mazi’s house to storm in and grab him. Li Mazi was having dinner with his son. Seeing me, he was surprised. “What are you doing?”

As I pulled him out the door, he unhappily protested by clutching the doorframe. When I told him that Yin Xinyue’s life was in danger, Li Mazi immediately relaxed his grip. 

I stomped on the accelerator, crossing many red lights. Eventually, we reached the woods. 

Turning off the car’s engine, I carefully listened to the commotion around. However, except for the crazy wind through the trees, I was afraid I couldn’t hear if someone even one hundred meters away was calling for help. 

There was nobody inside the woods. We couldn’t see a speck of light. Even the moonlight couldn’t pierce through the thick layer of leaves. Deep inside, it was a vast mass of darkness. 

Li Mazi and I grabbed a flashlight, directly heading to the center of the woods. The center of a forest was always a good place to kill someone and bury the corpse. 

My head couldn’t help but think about many things. At the thought of Yin Xinyue being full of fear, my tears couldn’t help but roll down my cheeks. 

No matter what, she was just an ordinary secretary in a city. 

How difficult it would be to find Yin Xinyue in this thick and vast forest? However, while couldn’t find Yin Xinyue, we could find the headless executioner… 

Since the headless executioner belonged to the ‘otherworldly item’ class, I would use the method of finding otherworldly items to find him! 

My mind cleared, I called Li Mazi over and captured a frog. I broke three out of its four legs, leaving only one front leg. 

At first, the frog painfully crawled around. Blood from its legs oozed out, streaming on the ground. Slowly, the frog’s blood created a circle on the ground. 

Shortly after, it began to struggle out of the circle, crawling in a specific direction. 

I grabbed the frog in my hand, not bothering to care about its dirty skin. Following the direction it had been heading in, I crazily dashed forward!

Every so often, I would use the frog to check the direction. After changing directions several times, I finally got a clue. 

I saw Yin Xinyue’s necklace on a tree branch. She must’ve left it to show us the way. 

Touching the necklace, I found that it was still warm. It meant she would be around this area. 

But, why was this place was dead silent? Yin Xinyue… could’ve encountered something really bad!  

I immediately reminded Li Mazi, asking him to watch out since something was strange here. 

Li Mazi and I stood back to back, searching our surroundings. 

A gust of wind rushed toward us, and we both heard a rattling noise above our heads. It wasn’t the collision of tree branches. Startled, I lifted my head to watch. 

A shiny ghost sword sparkled in the moonlight as a person wearing red clothes jumped off the tree!