Yan Tuo’s shock was no less than Nie Jiuluo’s.
He stared at Gou Ya for a good while before asking, “What happened to your eye?”
Gou Ya stammered, “I accidentally… poked it last night. Like this, my head… my head is spinning…”
With such a severe injury, the pain on his face couldn’t be faked. Yan Tuo released his grip: “How did you poke it?”
Like a weak patient, Gou Ya slowly curled back into the suitcase, mumbling incoherently, “Just an accident… my head hurts…”
Yan Tuo said, “You’re full of shit.”
After these words, the room fell silent for several seconds. Gou Ya stopped whimpering, and the faucet dripped slowly.
Yan Tuo finally spoke again: “There are no dangerous items in the hotel room. If you got hurt in here, why didn’t you make a sound? Did you go out last night?”
Gou Ya panicked: “No, no, I just wasn’t careful, it was the toothbrush, the toothbrush poked me…”
Before he could finish speaking, everything started spinning. Then, with a loud bang, his whole body crashed to the ground, seeing stars—Yan Tuo had flipped over the suitcase with one hand.
Before Nie Jiuluo could react, Yan Tuo had already stepped on Gou Ya’s back, shifting his entire body weight onto that leg. Gou Ya could barely breathe. But that wasn’t all—he drew his gun from his lower back and pressed the muzzle against Gou Ya’s skull with great force, squashing his ugly face almost flat against the ground.
“Not telling the truth—think I’m stupid? Madam Lin said if you behave, I’m here to pick someone up; if you don’t, I’m here to transport a corpse.”
Gou Ya turned into a complete coward, his voice high and thin, nearly crying: “I’ll tell you, I’ll tell you! Last night you called me useless and said that a woman near Sun Zhou’s place saw me and drew my picture for the police. I got angry and… and wanted to settle scores with her…”
Yan Tuo froze, his grip loosening slightly as he inadvertently glanced at Nie Jiuluo.
Nie Jiuluo maintained an innocent expression while cursing internally.
“I climbed out the window, don’t know exactly where, but my foot slipped, and there was a wire on the window that stabbed right into my eye socket… I was afraid you’d find out, so I didn’t say anything.”
Nie Jiuluo’s heart pounded, but she could still make quick judgments.
—These two were working together.
—Yan Tuo could control Gou Ya, but Gou Ya had his agenda, hiding things from Yan Tuo.
—Above these two, there was someone called “Madam Lin.”
The room fell silent again for several seconds. Yan Tuo removed his foot from Gou Ya’s back. Gou Ya squeezed out a long relieved sigh from his throat and scrambled back into the suitcase. The case wobbled unsteadily as he clambered in, like a small boat tossed by waves.
After a while, he finally managed to stuff himself back in and pulled the lid closed, though not completely—it remained propped open about a finger’s width.
His single eye peered warily through this gap, seeing Yan Tuo’s boots with their cold bronze-colored rivets, and in the corner by the water pipe, a woman with her hands tied behind her back, also wearing boots with clearly visible anti-slip treads.
He didn’t recognize Nie Jiuluo because he had never seen her in the light, only encountering her pencil thrust in the darkness—the pencil tip had been so sharp that in that instant, he hadn’t even felt the pain.
“Did you understand everything I just explained?”
Just explained? Gou Ya was confused for a moment before responding: “Clear. You said you’re going out for a while and want me to watch Sun Zhou and this woman.”
“Just watch them, don’t touch them.”
Gou Ya quickly agreed.
The scene was too bizarre, making Nie Jiuluo’s scalp tingle: Why weren’t either Yan Tuo or Gou Ya mentioning bandaging the wound? This was a blinded eye!
All necessary instructions had been given, but Yan Tuo still felt somewhat uneasy. He inspected the bathroom for a while, trying to identify any oversights or potential risks.
Finally, his gaze fell on Nie Jiuluo.
She was it—the biggest risk.
He grabbed a roll of wide tape, walked to Nie Jiuluo’s front, and with a sharp rip, tore off a long strip before crouching down.
Nie Jiuluo instinctively turned her head away: “I won’t scream. This hotel has no guests, and you’ve left someone to watch. I’m not that stupid.”
Yan Tuo wasn’t buying it: “Miss Nie, you’re quite eloquent. Gou Ya isn’t sharp enough to resist your sweet talk, better to seal it.”
Nie Jiuluo cursed his blindness internally: he still thought Gou Ya was trustworthy and worried about her manipulating him. He had already been fooled by Gou Ya.
But thinking it over, she held back: let evil fight evil—she was content to play deaf and dumb and watch them fight like dogs.
Instead, she made another request: “Could I eat something first?”
She hadn’t eaten lunch while visiting the temple, and being tied up prevented dinner—she’d missed two meals already. Others might lose their appetite in captivity, but not her—she needed to eat well to have the energy to deal with these villains.
Yan Tuo acted as if he hadn’t heard, directly taping her mouth shut. To prevent it from coming loose, he pressed firmly on both sides with his palms.
Nie Jiuluo had sensitive skin; when he pressed and released with such force, her face flushed pink as blood returned.
Before leaving, Yan Tuo answered her question.
He said: “You look like you can handle going hungry. Missing a few meals won’t kill you.”
***
Leaving the hotel, Yan Tuo opened his navigation and headed straight for Ban Ya Village.
One couldn’t let themselves be plotted against without understanding the whole story.
…
He didn’t dare drive the car into the village, parking far away and proceeding on foot, each step cautious, fearing his presence would be detected.
Passing through the small grove from earlier that day, in the moonlight, he spotted a figure approaching from the opposite direction. Yan Tuo quickly ducked into the woods.
The person remained completely unaware, continuing to walk unhurriedly in this direction. Before the person arrived, their voice drifted over first.
“The Eight-Nation Alliance has already reached the village entrance, they’ve taken all our pigs. I feel we really can’t count on the Empress Dowager anymore.”
It was Ma Hanzi, holding a soup ladle, “making a phone call” and reporting to an imaginary superior: “Commander, we’ve already increased manpower, patrolling day and night. We absolutely, cannot let the foreign devils enter Ban Ya.”
Yan Tuo was speechless.
After the commotion earlier that day, he was basically certain this Ma Hanzi was truly an idiot, and quite a busy one—fighting devils during the day and battling foreigners at night.
Ma Hanzi continued talking, passing by Yan Tuo with a worried expression: “Yes, yes, I’ll contact the Boxers as soon as possible…”
Watching him walk away, Yan Tuo emerged from the woods and quickly headed into the village.
***
At night, with lights as landmarks, everything was clearer: the entire village had only one place lit up.
The lit place was familiar—the single-story house in the east of the village. Both inner and outer rooms were brightly lit, windows half-open. Before Yan Tuo got close, he could hear the clacking of mahjong tiles.
He crouched down and first approached the inner room, peering through the window.
It was the woman who had tricked him into moving the pickle jar earlier that day. She was using a lighter to light incense sticks. A voice called from the outer room: “Sister Hua, hurry up, we’re waiting for you to start!”
The woman was Sister Hua. She put down the lighter and blew on the incense tip until it glowed: “Coming, coming, just let me offer some incense to Rain Master.”
As she spoke, she turned toward a shrine on one side.
Yan Tuo also looked at the shrine. Honestly, while shrines might house Lord Guan or Guanyin Bodhisattva, he had never heard of any Rain Master or Wind Master—when he got a clear look, he was even more confused.
The shrine housed a bronze ding, only the size of a kettle. Judging by its appearance, it wasn’t authentic, most likely from the Yiwu small commodities market.
Sister Hua bowed three times with the incense, mumbling: “Rain Master, please bless us, keep peace inside and outside, let the green soil sprout, bloom, and bear fruit.”
After paying respects, eager to play mahjong, she hastily stuck in the incense and rushed to the outer room in quick steps.
Yan Tuo moved quietly to the outer room’s window, and at first glance, his heart jumped: most people in this room were “familiar faces.”
There was a mahjong table missing one player, waiting only for Sister Hua. Behind the table was a wooden bed, its bamboo mat still not put away.
Shan Qiang sat on the bed, cross-legged against the wall, his head wrapped in bandages like a Sikh’s turban. His face was expressionless, neither moving nor speaking. If it weren’t for his small eyes occasionally glancing at the mahjong table, Yan Tuo would have thought the lame old man’s staff had knocked him senseless.
Of the three at the mahjong table, two were familiar. One was the lame old man with his cane, which lay diagonally across his legs. His arm, injured by the car door, was in a sling, and he was shuffling cards with just one hand. The other was the big-headed man, who truly loved cucumber with sauce—beside him was a plate of cut cucumbers with a large dollop of chili sauce at the edge.
The third…
Yan Tuo stared at the remaining woman. She was the only one in the room he had never encountered before.
She was a woman in her thirties with long wavy hair, voluptuous and beautiful, or rather, approaching sensuous: she wore a vintage-style apricot-colored matte silk dress with a deep V-neck, the V revealing snow-white skin that invited endless imagination. Her features were as delicate as a painting, her eyes rippling with charm that seemed capable of flowing into one’s heart and reaching out to tickle you at any moment.
While arranging her tiles, without looking up, she called to Sister Hua: “Hurry up, we’re just waiting for you.”
Sister Hua ran to her seat, habitually wiped both hands on her clothes, and was about to touch the tiles when she stopped: “Are we… just going to play like this?”
The woman gave her a sidelong glance: “How else do you want to play? Want me to get you an accompanist?”
“No, I mean…” Sister Hua anxiously glanced toward the half-open window, “what if that person… comes back for revenge?”
Yan Tuo’s heart tightened—the “that person” Sister Hua mentioned was most likely referring to him.
The woman responded carelessly: “That would be best, I was worried he wouldn’t come. Came back too late today, missed it.”
After a pause, she added: “You’re all really useless, four people couldn’t stop one.”
Big Head glanced sideways: “Who are you talking about?”
As he spoke, he picked up a piece of cucumber, dipped it in sauce, and sent it to his mouth, biting down with a vindictive crunch.
The lame old man arranged the tiles into walls with one hand, clearly annoyed, making the tiles clack loudly: “Que Cha, stop eating ash and talking big. Even if you were here, you couldn’t have stopped him.”
Que Cha snorted, her lips curling in disdain.
Shan Qiang weakly tried to mediate: “Alright, stop fighting among ourselves. The more I think about it, the more I feel this isn’t simple. Sister Cha, why don’t you tell Uncle Jiang?”
“Old Jiang is busy with important business outside. Is this tiny matter worth bothering him about?”
“Tiny matter?” Shan Qiang got excited, forgetting he was supposed to be weak, his voice rising eight octaves, “Sister Cha, think carefully, is this really a tiny matter? What did Uncle Jiang go out for this time?”
In his words, Que Cha also became uncertain. She held the dice in her hand, not rushing to start the game. After a while, she turned to Big Head: “Big Head, are you sure it was that smell?”
Sister Hua chimed in from the side: “Did the sauce smell confuse your nose?”
Big Head sneered: “That car full of stink—how could I mistake it?”
He pointed at his greasy nose: “Even if you don’t trust me, you should trust this dog nose, right?”
A car full of stink?
Yan Tuo was lost in confusion. He had good hygiene habits; his car was clean with no odd smells.
Que Cha threw the dice, counted the points, and grabbed a wall: “That is strange. Did anyone get his license plate number?”
Shan Qiang spoke weakly: “I had it memorized, but after Lame Dad’s hit the order… I’m not sure anymore.”
Big Head spoke oddly: “What use would it be even if we had it? We barely have enough people to watch the place, how could we chase after him?”
Que Cha glanced at him: “What’s the rush? Check the plate, check his whole family. People can’t fly, right? When Old Jiang returns, we can block his door and settle accounts then.”
Sister Hua still couldn’t settle down: “But… but what if he comes back for revenge before Old Jiang returns?”
Que Cha looked at her with contempt: “Then we’ll talk with him. What in this world can’t be resolved through talking? He came with goods—maybe he wants to join us.”
From everyone’s tone and attitude, Yan Tuo guessed this woman called Que Cha must be some kind of minor manager.
***
Perhaps because everyone felt uneasy, the mahjong game wasn’t enjoyable, and they disbanded just after ten. Except for Sister Hua, everyone returned to their own homes.
Ban Ya Village had no streetlights. Walking at night required either a flashlight or phone light. Four people, four directions, their flashlights like thin fish swimming into the vast darkness.
Yan Tuo followed behind Que Cha like a shadow.
The mountain village at midnight was eerily quiet. Que Cha wore apricot-colored high heels, walking with swaying grace, her heels clicking against the ground.
However, women are inherently sensitive. As she walked, she suddenly stopped, alertly shining her flashlight behind her while shouting: “Who’s there?”
Yan Tuo had already stepped into a dark corner, watching her intently.
After several seconds, seeing no movement around, Que Cha dismissed it as paranoia and let out a long sigh of relief, muttering: “This haunted place—I’m never coming back.”