The farmwoman said, “The villagers also hope it’s a coincidence — at least that way we wouldn’t all be living in such fear. Ah!”

Now that the group understood why every household in Foggy Hollow Village had bolted its doors, they turned their attention back to the actual purpose of their visit. The self-mutilation incidents among the villagers were not why they had come.

“Sister, how many hunters are there in your village?” Shi Ting asked.

The farmwoman answered without hesitation. “We have only one hunter in this village — Zhu San, who lives at the western end.”

“Can you tell us something about this Zhu San?”

“Zhu San? Nothing particularly remarkable about him. He served as a soldier when he was young, fought in a war, but before the fighting was over he was wounded — a bullet passed clean through his abdomen. He survived by luck, but he could no longer return to the battlefield. When he left the army, he came back to the village and used his military rifle to hunt, then took the game into the county seat to sell.”

“Is he originally from Foggy Hollow Village?”

“No. From what he says, his unit left him behind, and he found his way here on his own. He settled here after that.”

“Does he normally drive a jeep?”

“A jeep?” The farmwoman shook her head. “No one in our village has a motor vehicle. Zhu San has a pedal-powered three-wheeled cart. He rides it to the county seat when he goes to sell wild game.”

“Are you certain? Even when he first arrived in Foggy Hollow Village, he had no vehicle?”

“I’ve never laid eyes on an automobile in my entire life.”

The group exchanged uncertain looks.

Zhu San’s background largely matched what they had gathered during their investigation in Wenshan County, but Bai Jin had theorized that the killer possessed a military jeep — and this Zhu San clearly had no such vehicle.

In a tiny village like Foggy Hollow, a motor vehicle would be as rare and notable as gold jewelry. If one had ever appeared here, everyone would have known about it.

“Sister, could you point us in the right direction? We’d like to pay this hunter a visit.”

The farmwoman, finding the group well-spoken and thoroughly polite, said warmly, “Go out and head west. When you see a house with a green gate, turn right. Go around the threshing yard of that house and keep heading west until you reach the end. There’s a small tile-roofed house with three rooms, and a tiger skin hanging like a flag on the pole outside the door. That’s Zhu San’s home.”

The group thanked the farmwoman and left the small courtyard. The woman’s child had woken up just then, and she bustled off to tend to it.

By now the sun had dropped toward the west, though the sky had not gone fully dark. The evening village, shrouded in mist, gave off a distinctly unsettling air.

Bai Jin shivered. “This village is genuinely strange.”

“Chief, have you ever come across a case like this — someone hacking themselves to death?” E’Yuan said, still unable to shake the farmwoman’s account from his mind. He couldn’t comprehend how a person could be brutal enough to do such a thing to themselves. “And aimed right at the neck, no less.”

Yan Qing said, “There are many ways people choose to end their own lives — not only cleaver attacks. There are those who bind their own hands and feet, tie stones to their bodies, and jump into rivers. There was an elderly man in the late stages of a terminal illness who used chopsticks to pierce through the roof of his own mouth, driving them into his brain.”

As Yan Qing spoke of these things, the others listened as though hearing a story told.

Shi Ting found himself glancing at the young woman speaking so matter-of-factly. Whenever she talked about case-related matters, something in her eyes would come alive and glow.

“Ordinary people typically choose more common methods. Those who go to such extremes are usually patients with psychiatric disorders.”

“But the village chief’s son didn’t seem to be mentally ill.”

“Whether he had any psychiatric condition can only be determined after an investigation.” Yan Qing glanced at the sky, which was darkening. In the thick fog, it was nearly impossible to tell day from night.

From the moment she had entered this village, she had sensed something wrong. Her instincts of this kind had never failed her — perhaps because she had witnessed so many scenes of crime that over time a kind of perception had formed within her, like a field that hummed with awareness.

“That’s the green gate,” Bai Jin said. “Zhu San’s house can’t be far now.”

Turning right at the green gate, they could see a wide threshing yard. In autumn, farmers used such yards to process the crops they had harvested — shucking corn, husking millet.

Past the threshing yard, continuing west, through the gradually thinning fog, the shape of a striped tiger skin began to emerge.

The skin had been stretched out to its full extent, forelegs and hindlegs spread wide, and hung outside on a flagpole like a banner.

“This must be Zhu San’s home.”

Zheng Yun, with his keen sense of smell, caught something before they had even drawn close. His nostrils flared slightly. “Do you smell anything?”

Yan Qing immediately looked toward Shi Ting — she herself smelled nothing, as the fog was far too saturated with moisture.

“Something roasting,” Shi Ting said.

“Yes, roasting meat. Rabbit, I’d say.” Zheng Yun was certain.

Bai Jin had barely opened his mouth to question this when a scream erupted from inside Zhu San’s courtyard — then a second, then a third.

In the fog-wrapped village, those sudden screams rose sharp and piercing, like the wail of something inhuman, and every person in the group felt the chill of it run through them.

The group froze for a moment, then Zheng Yun and Bai Jin were already sprinting toward Zhu San’s gate.

“Be careful,” Shi Ting called out sharply.

For safety, Bai Jin motioned Zheng Yun to cover the rear while he himself, nimble as a monkey, scrambled up and over the courtyard wall in a matter of seconds.

The fog inside the yard was thick, but Bai Jin could still make out a figure moving through it. The figure suddenly lurched toward him — almost directly below his line of sight from the wall.

The person’s hand swung a kitchen cleaver, the sharp blade driving toward his own neck. Where the blade fell, blood erupted like a fountain.

Bai Jin had seen all manner of grim scenes, but watching a man furiously hack at his own throat — blood nearly spraying onto his own face — was a shock that nearly sent him tumbling off the wall.

But an officer’s training overcame the fear. Without hesitation, he dropped into the courtyard.

Bai Jin tried to stop Zhu San from continuing, but he was already half a step too late. By the time he sprinted over, Zhu San had collapsed to the ground, his head attached to his body by little more than a thin layer of skin.

Blood welled steadily from the gash in his neck. The severed vessels and muscle tissue were clearly visible.

Bai Jin stood frozen where he was.

At the gate, Zheng Yun threw his weight against it — only to find it had been bolted from the inside. Without pause, he stepped back and kicked it open with a single blow.

With a crash, the gate swung wide, and the horror within was laid bare before the group.

A man whose head was barely still attached to his body lay in a pool of blood, a blood-soaked kitchen cleaver still clutched in his hand. Bai Jin stood at his side, his expression rigid.

Murong saw such a sight for the first time in his life. Even with a strong constitution, he couldn’t stop himself from stumbling to one side and retching.

“Seal off the scene,” Shi Ting said. “It seems the ‘curse’ of Foggy Hollow Village’s fifteenth of the fourth month has come around again.”

The screams earlier had drawn a crowd of villagers, and when they caught sight of the body on the ground, expressions of fear and shock swept across their faces.

“The mountain spirit has come down from the mountain to take a life — the curse has come true.”

“Someone always dies on the fifteenth of the fourth month. Heaven help us — could we be next?”

Amid the noise, Bai Jin and Zheng Yun had already strung up the crime scene tape and laid out available materials as investigation boards across the courtyard.

Yan Qing and E’Yuan moved to the body and conducted a brief preliminary examination of the remains.

“Only the deceased’s footprints in the scene — no trace of a third person.” Bai Jin walked to the base of the courtyard wall and looked upward.

The wall stood about two meters high, and just outside it grew a scholar tree, one of whose branches reached over the wall and partially obscured half of a window on the house.

Shi Ting was drawn to a small stove in the middle of the courtyard. It was a simple open-mouthed brazier with charcoal inside, a wire grill set over it. The charcoal had burned down almost entirely, leaving behind a mound of ash.

On the grill sat a rabbit. From the gray fur of the hide hanging to one side, it was clearly a wild hare — it had been recently skinned and dressed and placed on the grill. The rabbit was fully cooked, golden-brown, its edges glistening with appealing dripping fat.

“The smell we caught earlier — that was this roasting rabbit.” Shi Ting said, “The deceased had eaten only a small piece before he died.”

Zheng Yun came over and crouched beside him. “Is Seven suggesting the deceased did not kill himself?”

“Would a man planning to take his own life carefully skin a rabbit, rinse it thoroughly with clean water, and roast it to a perfect golden color?” Shi Ting thought for a moment. “If this isn’t a homicide, then the deceased must have been a psychiatric patient who suffered a sudden episode right when the rabbit finished cooking, and hacked himself to death in that state.”

“Zheng Shi Zhi, come give me a hand,” Bai Jin called from across the yard. He had climbed up into the scholar tree and was searching for clues.

Zheng Yun strode over and stood beneath the tree. “Found something?”

“A branch — a small section of branch has snapped.” Bai Jin pointed to the tree. “The break is fresh, very recent. Come up and have a look.”

“I’ll stay down here. I don’t think this tree can hold two people.”

“What do you mean by that?” Bai Jin’s expression flipped immediately. “Are you saying I’m fat?”

Zheng Yun said nothing.

Bai Jin peered down from the tree. “Zheng Shi Zhi, have you always thought I was fat? I’ll have you know my figure is far better than yours. According to the books, I have a golden-ratio physique.”

“What’s wrong with you? Who called you fat?”

“Don’t deny it — you’ve always been jealous of me.” Bai Jin’s voice had risen loud enough to reach Shi Ting and Yan Qing. “Don’t think that just because you’ve been with Seven longer, your seniority outranks mine. When I was already out solving cases, you were still playing house with little girls.”

“Bai Jian Chuan, have you lost your mind?” Zheng Yun, seeing that he wasn’t joking, felt his own temper flare. “I only said the tree isn’t sturdy. You’re the one reading ill intent into plain words.”

“Me, ill intent? Do you have any idea how petty you’ve been, Zheng Shi Zhi? How much credit have you stolen from me over the years? Have I ever said a single word against you?” Bai Jin leaped down from the tree and advanced on Zheng Yun with force.

Zheng Yun squared off against him. “You want to fight?”

“You’re absolutely right, I do. I’ve wanted to settle things with you for a long time. Aren’t you always so impressive? Don’t you always call yourself the top fighter in the military police? Come on then — let’s go a few rounds.”

Bai Jin stepped forward and grabbed Zheng Yun by the collar.

“Enough.” Shi Ting rose to his feet, his expression cold. “Bai Jian Chuan. Stand down.”

Shi Ting’s voice cut through the air like a blade, and Bai Jin’s grip on Zheng Yun’s collar loosened instinctively.

—