The night returned to calm.

Daytime arrived quickly.

When the blood moon disappeared and sunlight once again bathed the land, Bai Youwei couldn’t wait to push open her door.

Shen Mo opened his door at almost the same moment.

The two exchanged a glance. Neither spoke. In perfect tacit understanding, they ran together toward the direction from which the agonized screams had come the night before.

The scene of the incident was not far from the fountain pool at the village center. By the time Bai Youwei and Shen Mo arrived, a considerable crowd had already gathered.

The sight was horrific — the only word for it was carnage. Flesh separated from bone, as though something had been mauled by a wild beast, torn apart, gutted — nothing remained but pulpy remains and a pool of crimson water.

This was no mere attack. This was torment. This was torture. This was the venting of rage pushed beyond all control.

Hans, Molin, and Breil stood at the edge of the fountain pool, their faces ashen.

The villagers crowded in from all sides, buzzing with murmurs.

Bai Youwei silently swept her gaze around the scene and understood — it was the man called Dim who had met his end.

It seems the werewolf chose the house with the fewest nails.

She was still thinking this when Hans began to move — slowly, step by deliberate step — toward the house where Dim had stayed the previous night.

He stared at a dark smear of bloodstain on the door panel and said, “This is not Dim’s blood.”

He paused, then added, “Nor is it the werewolf’s blood.”

Bai Youwei was startled. There were no instruments here — could he really distinguish blood types with the naked eye?

Hans suddenly raised his voice: “Dim was murdered by a person! All the other bloodstains are the same color — only this blood on the door is different! Dark, nearly black! It was obviously smeared here on purpose, before anything happened to Dim!”

The crowd erupted in louder murmurs.

The village chief stepped forward and said with practiced indifference, “This is truly most unfortunate. Werewolves are indeed quite sensitive to the scent of blood. You brave warriors are new here — you may not have known. You’ll need to be more careful from now on…”

Hans shot him a cold glance, then looked again at the devastation on the ground.

“The trail is still there — perhaps the werewolf who has turned back into a human is hiding at home, washing up right now!” He charged through the crowd, following the trail of blood on the ground, and called out loudly, “Let’s go!”

Molin and Breil immediately followed.

The other villagers fell in behind them, talking amongst themselves:

“What are they doing? Can he really find the werewolf?”

“If he can find them, that would be wonderful! A monster like that who goes berserk — they’d be better off all dead!”

“What’s the point of finding last night’s werewolf? I say it would be better to find out who will transform tonight — then we wouldn’t have to live in fear.”

“Yes, if only we could find out who tonight’s werewolf will be…”

They spoke all at once, voices overlapping. Bai Youwei and Shen Mo followed in the crowd and caught every word without missing a single one.

Then the trail of blood vanished, and Hans stopped in his tracks.

The villagers assumed he would be at a loss, but Hans thrust his arm into the air and shouted, “The werewolf is hiding in the houses right before us! Search them!”

At this point, nearly the entire village had gathered here to watch. If anyone’s house still had someone inside, that person was unquestionably a suspect — for only a werewolf would need to hide.

The villagers were in an uproar. Bai Youwei and Shen Mo waited silently for the outcome.

Before long, Molin dragged a woman out of one of the houses and flung her violently onto the ground before the crowd.

“She’s the werewolf! When I went in, she was wiping the bloodstained floor!” Molin kicked her hard. “Bastard! She’s the one who killed Dim!”

The woman tumbled across the ground from the kick, her face streaked with tears, utterly disheveled.

She crawled on her knees to the village chief’s feet, weeping and begging, “It wasn’t me! I’m not a werewolf! I’m truly not a werewolf!”

“And still you argue?!” Breil yanked a half-burned bedsheet from inside the house and threw it on top of the woman. “The sheet is soaked in blood! And there are scraps of flesh!”

“Good heavens! She really is a werewolf!” came a cry of shock from the crowd.

“Burn her! Burn this monster!”

The villagers broke into a chorus of curses.

Bai Youwei’s heart clenched…

She recognized the woman on the ground. It was the little girl’s mother.