In the afternoon, Nie Jiuluo waited for her pickup car but didn’t get to see the conclusion of the rural romance scandal—the situation had taken another unexpected turn.
When the husband found the adulterer, he and his companions beat him up. The man fell to his knees begging for mercy and revealed another twist: that night, they had indeed arranged to meet, but he waited and waited without seeing the woman. She wouldn’t answer his calls either. He hadn’t thought much of it, assuming she had family matters and changed plans at the last minute.
In short, the adultery case showed signs of evolving into a missing persons case.
As for where the missing person case would lead, Nie Jiuluo didn’t follow up—she maintained “moderate curiosity and appropriate restraint” toward both people and events. Like an entertaining novel or good movie, if it was presented to her she would watch, but if it stopped halfway through, she wouldn’t dwell on it much.
The newly assigned driver was called Old Qian, around forty years old. On the way back, he repeatedly apologized on behalf of the travel agency.
Since this was Sun Zhou’s behavior, Nie Jiuluo had no intention of taking it out on uninvolved parties. “Has anyone gotten in touch with Sun Zhou?”
Old Qian replied awkwardly, “No, his phone’s working, but he’s not answering.”
He muttered that it was strange how such a strong young man could be scared into such cowardice.
The talk of “zombies,” “monsters,” and “psychopathic killers” were all speculative jokes—the chances were quite low. Thinking it through, revenge seekers or gambling debt collectors seemed more likely.
Nie Jiuluo asked, “Did he offend someone, or maybe owe people money?”
Old Qian answered cautiously, “That’s hard to say.”
Fair enough—they were just regular coworkers, how would they know about each other’s private lives?
***
Originally, Sun Zhou had been staying at the hotel with Nie Jiuluo, but Old Qian was “locally” dispatched by the travel agency. Being a resident with a place in the county, he dropped Nie Jiuluo off at the hotel and went home, saying that if they still couldn’t contact Sun Zhou by evening, he would take over the remaining itinerary.
It was still early when Nie Jiuluo returned to her room. She took out her pen and sketchbook and quickly immersed herself in work.
For her next piece, she planned to sculpt a witch. She had already started several sketches but abandoned them all for one reason: while beautiful, they lacked a demonic quality.
This time was no different. She was already dissatisfied when the face had barely taken shape. After studying it repeatedly, she tossed the pen aside and leaned back in her chair, lost in thought.
The next moment, suddenly remembering something, she sat up quickly and imported the photos she had taken at the abandoned temple in Xingbazi Township into her computer, enlarging and examining them one by one.
She intended to draw inspiration from others’ work, but as she looked, her mind began to wander.
In Chinese temples and halls, the statues in the main or honored positions usually had dignified or benevolent expressions. Occasionally there were wrathful faces, meant to represent vajra deities driving away evil spirits—it was extremely rare to find enshrined figures with bewitching expressions.
Moreover, enshrined figures needed proper origins, like Taishang Laojun, Jiutian Xuannü, Lü Dongbin, or Erlang. But despite her extensive knowledge, she couldn’t identify the statue from the abandoned temple. Could it be some local mountain or wild spirit?
While she was pondering this, her phone rang with a new message.
Nie Jiuluo opened a “burn after reading” app, where there was a new envelope-style message from a sender nicknamed “That Side.”
Double-tapping the envelope revealed the content: “Day Seven, Safe.” Simultaneously, a ten-second countdown for the message’s self-destruction appeared at the end of the line.
When the ten seconds elapsed, flames suddenly erupted, instantly consuming the text. After the characters disappeared, a gray mist slowly dispersed.
Apps these days are quite ingenious. Nie Jiuluo was about to put down her phone but stopped. After a pause, she sent over the white SUV’s license plate number, adding “Check if this owner has any prior records, like gambling or loan sharking, just send the information to my email.”
If Sun Zhou still couldn’t be found, the police would eventually get involved and would certainly question her. Her intuition told her that while the little duck car’s owner might not be highly suspicious, there was something odd about him.
Putting down her phone, she returned to her work until hunger became unbearable. She finally remembered to order takeout, cutting it very close—she placed the order at 9:25, just five minutes before the restaurant would stop taking orders.
Around ten o’clock, the delivery arrived: a large container of stone potfish plus a serving of handmade noodles. Nie Jiuluo cleared a space on the desk and was about to start eating when she suddenly felt guilty: noodles were fattening, and the stone pot fish was extremely oily and spicy. How could she eat something so greasy this late?
She poured a glass of water nearby and dipped each bite of food in it to remove excess oil. This destroyed the original flavor, naturally making it less enjoyable, but she felt accomplished: compared to maintaining a good figure, these were minor sacrifices.
When she was seventy percent full, Nie Jiuluo stopped eating. Though the container was large, it was mostly soup, and she had fished out most of the solid ingredients. The meal wasn’t wasteful. Just as she was about to clean up, there was a heavy thud on the wall in front of her.
The sound was quite solid, indicating the guest next door had hit the wall quite hard.
As this thought crossed her mind, Nie Jiuluo realized something: the room next door was the end unit, Sun Zhou’s room. During the trip, all rooms had been booked and paid for in advance—the hotel wouldn’t have resold it to other guests.
Had… Sun Zhou returned?
He just came back like this? Without even saying hello to her? And the travel agency—if they’d contacted Sun Zhou, shouldn’t they at least call her with an explanation?
So much for the customer first. She had already lost her temper once, yet they were still being this negligent. They didn’t know this customer had an indomitable spirit.
The takeout had a strong smell, so after cleaning up, Nie Jiuluo tied the bag tightly and placed it outside the door. As she turned back to enter her room, she glanced at the neighboring door, hesitated, then went over to knock.
After all, Sun Zhou had been injured, bleeding badly. It was only right to show concern.
After quite a while, the door opened.
It was indeed Sun Zhou, wearing the hotel’s bathrobe and slippers. His head, face, shoulders, and arms were bandaged in several places. Perhaps due to his injuries, he appeared mentally exhausted, his eyes vacant. He stared at Nie Jiuluo for a while before saying, “Oh, Miss Nie.”
His expression suggested he had just remembered she existed.
“Miss Nie, how did you get back? Did you call a Didi?”
From this question, he hadn’t contacted the travel agency. And surprisingly, he showed some concern about how she got back—how “touching.”
“Haven’t you received any calls from the travel agency?”
Sun Zhou’s eyes bulged like a dead fish’s, and after thinking for a second or two, he said, “Left my phone in the car, forgot to bring it up.”
“Then hurry and get it. The travel agency has been trying to reach you, they might have contacted your family. If you stay out of touch like this, they might call the police.”
Sun Zhou thought again as if just realizing the seriousness of the situation: “Yes, I’ll get it right away.”
Though he said “right away,” his speech wasn’t quick at all. He was slow and sluggish, his reactions delayed, somewhat dull, like the frustratingly slow sloth from “Zootopia”: while others could react immediately, he needed two or three seconds.
Sun Zhou wasn’t like this before—had he developed PTSD from the fright?
Nie Jiuluo couldn’t help but ask a few more questions: “What exactly happened? How did you get these injuries? Where did you drive to afterward?”
Sun Zhou said: “The injuries…”
He was still incredibly slow, reaching up to touch the bandage on his forehead. His movement was so slow that Nie Jiuluo almost wanted to reach out and touch it for him—she wasn’t usually impatient, but Sun Zhou’s snail’s pace was truly aggravating.
“Wild dogs… bit and scratched me… I went to the hospital… for treatment, then… too tired… slept in the car… for a while.”
Nie Jiuluo was speechless. Listening to him speak was enough to exhaust anyone’s patience. And he “slept for a while”? His nerve was bigger than his face—had he completely forgotten that he had abandoned his passenger and nearly run her over?
She ended the conversation: “Well, contact your family soon, and get some rest.”
***
Back in her room, Nie Jiuluo sat at her desk, still speechless.
She sensed something odd about Sun Zhou, but she wasn’t particularly concerned about this oddness: after all, theirs was just a temporary and loose employer-employee relationship. It was good enough that he had returned. As for what had happened and what consequences might follow his return, let those close to him investigate.
She opened her screen, and a new email popped up.
It was from “That Side,” probably with information about the white SUV’s owner. Though since Sun Zhou had been bitten by wild dogs, that man’s suspiciousness had been cleared.
Nie Jiuluo casually opened it.
The face matched—it was indeed that man. His name was Yan Tuo, from Xi’an, born in ’93, unmarried, law-abiding with no criminal record. He owned several registered properties, including an entire strip of street-front shops in the bustling district.
Nie Jiuluo thought, if he had built this from scratch, it showed considerable ability.
Reading further, it turned out he mainly had a good father: Yan Tuo’s father, Yan Huaishan, had ventured into business in the early 1990s, operating coal mines and working as a construction contractor. He invested in stocks when the market first opened and hoarded properties when real estate was cheap—a true winner in life, except for dying too young—he passed away before reaching forty.
Yan Tuo’s mother was called Lin Xiru. In the late 1990s, she had an accident at a construction site where Yan Huaishan was the contractor. A falling cement slab left her paralyzed with severe brain damage. She had no cognitive function and remained bedridden to this day.
Reading to this point, Nie Jiuluo felt quite emotional. Arranging the timeline, Yan Tuo had effectively “lost” his mother in childhood, then lost his father a few years later. At such a young age, he had to protect an inheritance that others coveted. Who knew how he had endured through it all? No wonder his expression showed he rarely smiled—wasn’t there a saying? Lucky people are healed by their childhood, while unlucky ones spend their lives healing from childhood.
But a stranger’s story should remain just that—let it pass by.
Nie Jiuluo closed her email and tried sketching again. This time, whether due to renewed energy after eating or inspiration from the photos, it went surprisingly well. Her pen moved smoothly, and the drawing gradually captured the essence she wanted.
Just as she was getting into the flow, another heavy thud came from the wall her desk was against. This time, it wasn’t someone bumping into it—Nie Jiuluo instinctively felt it must have been something heavy being thrown against it, and there seemed to be the sound of breaking glass as well.
She lost focus, her hand slipped, and what should have been the witch’s gracefully curved neck became a rigid diagonal line.
What was going on? Was Sun Zhou demolishing the room?
Nie Jiuluo sat for a while, feeling increasingly uneasy. She stood up and walked toward the door. Perhaps due to some premonition, her steps became slower and slower. When she reached the door, her hand touched the handle but drew back. Then, she carefully put her eye on the peephole to check the situation outside.
Compared to normal vision, the peephole’s image was slightly distorted. Outside was quite quiet, with bright lighting.
Nie Jiuluo let out a breath, about to look away when someone entered her peephole’s field of vision.
It was a crew-cut man between twenty and thirty years old, not tall but extremely muscular, carrying a heavy canvas bag. He seemed very alert, looking around as he walked. For an instant, his face was directly in Nie Jiuluo’s direction.
It was hard to describe his appearance precisely—ugly would suffice, but not ordinary ugliness. It was the kind of congenital, pathological, defective ugliness.
He walked very quickly, leaving the peephole’s range in less than two seconds.
Nie Jiuluo’s heart began to race: this man had come from the left side, which was where the end room was. The room across had never opened, so… had he come from Sun Zhou’s room?
Thinking of the wall’s tremor and breaking glass earlier, she felt this man didn’t seem like Sun Zhou’s friend.
Estimating that the man should be far away by now, Nie Jiuluo carefully opened her door.
The corridor was empty. From next door came a “beep-beep” sound—the warning tone of a door not properly closed.
Nie Jiuluo quickly went over, but out of politeness, still, knocked first: “Sun Zhou? I’m coming in?”
No response.
Nie Jiuluo pushed the door open.
As she had expected, the room was in disarray. The tea table had toppled against the wall, its glass top shattered across the floor, and one of the hotel’s slippers lay sideways on the ground.
Sun Zhou wasn’t there, not in the bedroom or bathroom.
In a flash, she thought of the heavy canvas bag the crew-cut man had been carrying.