Reverend Yan had waited a long time, and how could he let slip such a rare opportunity? Seeing Fu Zixiao probe him about Deng Guizhuang, seemingly on purpose yet also carelessly, he secretly guessed that Fu Zixiao had grown suspicious because of Yang and Xu’s deaths, and that his suspicion had landed on Deng Guizhuang.

He himself had already meant to spar with Fu Zixiao. After sitting down, he occasionally let slip a hint or two, dangling bait to pique the other man’s curiosity.

The two of them talked for a full quarter hour. Because Fu Zixiao was too guarded, Reverend Yan never found an opening, and fearing that a failed attempt would ruin everything, he decided to wait for a better chance later.

Who could have known that just then, the noodle shop’s waiter, bringing over the soup, accidentally spilled some broth on Fu Zixiao’s hand. Fu Zixiao, ever since becoming wealthy, most loved to put on a refined air in front of others, but his hooligan nature at the core always showed through at critical moments.

While Fu Zixiao was busy cursing out the waiter, Reverend Yan seized the moment to slip the drug he’d prepared in advance into Fu Zixiao’s noodle soup, but fearing that Fu Zixiao might have a reaction right there in the noodle shop and arouse suspicion, he didn’t use the full dose.

Sure enough, after finishing half a bowl of noodles, Fu Zixiao showed no reaction, and simply called the waiter over to pay the bill. Seeing Fu Zixiao about to leave, Reverend Yan said that his home was nearby, and that his leg was acting up — could Mr. Fu give him a ride?

Fu Zixiao normally would not have bothered with this old man, but since he intended to secretly deal with Deng Guizhuang, anyone close to Deng Guizhuang could prove useful someday, so he pretended enthusiasm and agreed.

Reverend Yan got into Fu Zixiao’s car. Before long the drug took effect, and Fu Zixiao grew drowsy and began to nod off. Reverend Yan, fearing he might not be able to handle Fu Zixiao on his own, quickly grabbed the steering wheel and stopped the car, then used a handkerchief soaked in ether to cover Fu Zixiao’s mouth. Once Fu Zixiao was completely unconscious, he got out from the other side, pushed Fu Zixiao into the passenger seat, and drove straight to St. John’s, the place he knew best.

Running into Fu Zixiao that night had been pure chance. Reverend Yan knew that the most decisive method would be to simply strangle Fu Zixiao right there in the car and be done with it, but since Fu Zixiao was the chief culprit, he could not bring himself to kill him so lightly. He remembered that the run-down classroom by the back gate of St. John’s had long been abandoned, with few students passing by in the evenings, so he drove the car in through the back gate.

Who could have expected that Fu Zixiao, being strong and healthy, showed signs of waking before Reverend Yan could hoist him onto the roof beam. Fearing Fu Zixiao might make noise and attract attention, Reverend Yan hurriedly covered his mouth with the handkerchief.

Fu Zixiao recognized Reverend Yan and glared fixedly at him.

Reverend Yan, his voice thick with hatred, told Fu Zixiao that he was the father of that girl surnamed Ding from years ago, and told him to look closely at his face, so he wouldn’t die without understanding why. Fu Zixiao, whose nature was utterly cold and hardened, was only briefly startled upon hearing this, and immediately began struggling for his life with everything he had. Had it not been for the ether on the handkerchief, not only would Reverend Yan have failed to harm Fu Zixiao, he himself would have been harmed by Fu Zixiao instead.

The old professor poured all his concentration into subduing Fu Zixiao, and only after Fu Zixiao had finally lost consciousness again did he, while wiping the sweat from his brow, notice the sound of footsteps outside.

Reverend Yan was secretly alarmed, unsure how much the person outside might have heard. He hurriedly opened the door and chased after them. Fortunately, that person was not far outside the door — without time to think it through, he knocked them unconscious in the dark.

He knew there was no way he could properly stage the scene tonight. Before the person outside could wake, he resolutely went back into the classroom and strangled Fu Zixiao to death, then carried the unconscious person from outside the classroom into his car.

Only when he turned on the light did he discover that the person he had drugged unconscious was, in fact, his own student, Hongdou.

Reverend Yan’s mind was instantly thrown into chaos.

He knew that ever since Yang Yutian and Xu Yishan had died, not only had Wang Bide been brought in by the inspector to investigate the matter, but Deng Guizhuang had also grown suspicious — not only had he borrowed reference books he’d once borrowed himself, but he had also been deliberately asking around about who Ding Qi’s parents were.

He suspected that Deng Guizhuang would soon realize he was Ding Qi’s father, and would soon guess that he was the one investigating the events of years past.

The day before, Deng Guizhuang had deliberately brought those reference books to see him, and being so distracted when he left, he hadn’t even noticed he’d left the books behind. Fearing complications the longer this dragged on, the next morning he returned the books to the library himself, under Deng Guizhuang’s name.

Who could have known that that afternoon, Deng Guizhuang came looking for him, saying that a very important item had been tucked inside one of the books — nothing else but the one and only photograph he and his girlfriend had ever taken together, years ago. Reverend Yan was shocked, and hurried to the library to find the book, only to discover that in the span of a single afternoon, the book had already been borrowed by Gu Yun.

The case had originally been introduced to Wang Bide by Gu Yun, and now this girl had borrowed the reference book too — if combined with that photograph, given Inspector Wang’s capabilities, it would sooner or later lead back to him.

He was not afraid of death, but he still had two enemies left to deal with, and he could not bear to give up halfway. He hurried to the large lecture hall of the education department to find Gu Yun. Fortunately, although Gu Yun had borrowed the book, she had not yet had time to look through it. He waited until the classroom had few people left, then knocked her unconscious and retrieved the photograph from inside the book.

Who could have known that that very night, while dealing with Fu Zixiao, he would once again accidentally be discovered — this time by Hongdou.

Both were his students, and ever since he’d discovered, during his investigation, that Miss Pan was Hongdou’s aunt, he had felt a special tenderness and pity toward Hongdou. Even when grading Hongdou’s schoolwork day to day, he put more effort into it than he did for others.

Hongdou happened to be exceptionally intelligent as well. Listening to Hongdou’s witty, quick responses in class, Reverend Yan would often think sorrowfully that his own daughter had been just as clever and quick-witted as Hongdou back then — that if she had not been murdered, she would have gone on the following year to be admitted smoothly to university, and surely would have been just as much a favorite of her professors in class as Hongdou was now.

Distracted, he drove for several dozen minutes. Since it had rained that night, and fearing Hongdou might catch a chill, he covered her with his own coat. Later, estimating that Hongdou would soon wake, and thinking it likely no harm would come from simply leaving her there, he stopped the car and got out.

He knew Hongdou was extremely observant, and that if she compared notes with Gu Yun, they might very quickly deduce that he was the murderer. So he knew he had to hurry to deal with Bai Fengfei. But just before he went to find Bai Fengfei, Deng Guizhuang came to see him, his face full of remorse, saying he knew Reverend Yan was Ding Qi’s father — that the reason he had deliberately left the photograph in the book was to test Reverend Yan’s reaction, to see whether he was investigating the cause of his daughter’s death.

Reverend Yan at first ignored Deng Guizhuang, and only after a long while said one sentence: his daughter had indeed died under mysterious, unclear circumstances.

As it happened, he still had many things from years ago he wanted to clarify, so he said he would come to see Deng Guizhuang that evening — since the matter was too sensitive and important, it would be best if no one else were present at his home.

Ever since Ding Qi’s death, Deng Guizhuang had lived eleven years steeped in guilt. After Reverend Yan’s hints, he had already grown suspicious about the truth of Ding Qi’s death back then, but he could not, and would not, believe that Ding Qi had been murdered because of him.

That evening, Reverend Yan came to see Deng Guizhuang. After sitting down, he first thoroughly questioned him about what had happened among the five of them at Chunying Li that year, then asked about how his daughter and Deng Guizhuang had fallen in love, how exactly the rift between them had formed, and why his daughter had gone to find Deng Guizhuang the night she was killed — striving to leave no detail unclarified, working through everything one by one. The two of them talked the entire night, endlessly organizing, speculating, reconstructing — piecing the truth together bit by bit, while Reverend Yan’s heart shattered into ever finer fragments.

By the time dawn broke the next morning, Deng Guizhuang was weeping bitterly, kneeling before Reverend Yan and refusing to rise. It turned out that everything his Ding Qi had said back then had been exactly right — the company he had kept back then had been nothing short of monstrous. What pierced him most to the core was that on the night she came to find him, he hadn’t even let her finish speaking before storming off in anger. If Fu Zixiao and the others were the primary culprits, then he himself was undeniably an accomplice. Whatever suffering Ding Qi had endured back then, he deserved to bear it all himself in turn.

He then hanged himself in his study.

By the time Hongdou and the others heard this part of the story, tears were streaming down their faces — weeping both for this pair of star-crossed young fools who had paid life for life, and for the aunt and Ding Qi, both of whom had died in the prime of their youth. Most of all, they grieved for Reverend Yan, who had endured so many years of suffering — even having turned to murder like a man possessed by demons, he had still retained a measure of the compassion and moral boundaries of a fundamentally good man.

Yu Chongyi, a grown man, wept until he could barely speak, saying to Hongdou and He Yunqin: “My aunt died so tragically, and Reverend Yan died in a way that wasn’t worth it either. Even if these people paid with their lives, what does it matter — no one else will ever know the evil they did back then. We must bring the truth of what happened to light.”

Author’s note: There’s something I have to get off my chest. This author has written four books, and readers have different tastes — some like this book, some like that one, I understand completely. But could people please not, on chapters with red packets, say ‘so good, so exciting,’ and on chapters without red packets, say ‘not as good as Lumen Song’ or ‘not as good as Pingya’? It happens so often I couldn’t forget this particular reader even if I tried. This author has feelings too, and it stings a little.