Jing Zhi had already curled up in fright. It was Murong, the bolder of the two, who was able to describe what had happened that day with calm clarity.

“When the people from the Military Police Bureau opened the gate, they were stunned. Every last one of the thirteen people in the Chen household had been killed. Describing it as a river of blood would not be an exaggeration. After the Military Police Bureau examined the scene, the bodies were taken away. Yet, even though the tragedy occurred more than half a month ago, the case remains unsolved.”

“Yes, yes, that’s right.” Jing Zhi shuddered as she chimed in. “They say it was a gang of bandits who did it — looted the valuables and wiped out the whole family. But there are so many bandit lairs around Shun Cheng, where would you even begin to look for the killers? And since the killers haven’t been caught, all thirteen souls of the Chen household linger on as restless spirits, making trouble every night at midnight. People in the surrounding area are too afraid to go near — they’re calling it a house of evil.”

The phrase “unsolved” sparked a great surge of interest in Yan Qing. The speed of her fingers tapping against her knees quickened another degree.

“Miss, why aren’t you frightened at all? Murong and I didn’t dare tell you before — we were worried it would scare you.”

“I’m not so easily scared.” The previous Sixth Miss might well have been frightened, but the current Sixth Miss only wanted to drop herself into the crime scene at once.

Yan Qing thought it, and she did exactly that.

Nightlife in Xin Guo was nothing like the abundance of the modern era. Even in the small hours, the streets of lively districts continued with unceasing music and bustle, but ordinary streets fell into dead silence come nightfall.

The Chen estate was a standard three-gated courtyard — quite a distinguished presence in the neighborhood.

Now, that elegantly appointed mansion stood in the night, quiet as a phantom in slumber, radiating a heavy and oppressive atmosphere.

Jing Zhi had flatly refused to come, but her worry for her young miss won out in the end, and she had tagged along with trembling steps. The entire way, she clung to Murong’s arm, jumping in fright at the slightest rustle or movement.

Murong was trained in martial arts — the patriarch had placed her at Yan Qing’s side since childhood to serve as her protector, and someone raised on martial training naturally carried a bolder spirit. Yet even she, facing this gloomy, forbidding “haunted house,” felt a chill creeping across her whole body.

She could not understand why Yan Qing showed no fear at all — in fact, her eyes seemed even brighter than usual. It was as if someone of extraordinary intelligence had suddenly encountered a puzzle capable of pushing them to their limit: excited, and full of anticipation for the challenge.

“There’s a small gate at the back of the Chen estate. Servants used to go in and out through it at night.” Though frightened, Jing Zhi at least had good intelligence on such matters. “The front gate can’t be used — it’s been sealed by the Military Police Bureau.”

“You two wait outside and keep watch. I’ll go in on my own.” Yan Qing adjusted the push rim on her wheelchair. The chair had been specially crafted by craftsmen commissioned by the patriarch, and could be operated by hand even without someone to push it, capable of crossing even low thresholds without difficulty.

“Miss, you can’t go in alone,” Jing Zhi said urgently. “There are ghosts inside.”

Murong, steeling herself, also said: “Miss, let me go in with you.”

“Don’t worry. In this world,” Yan Qing said, taking the electric torch Murong held out to her, “it is only people who do harm — not ghosts.”

She propelled the wheelchair forward and rolled slowly toward the small gate.

The massacre had occurred over half a month ago. The long-undisturbed wooden gate creaked open, and a cold draft rushed out to meet her.

In the still air lingered what seemed like traces of a blood-tinged scent — or perhaps the faint echo of sighs, and the hushed sound of quiet weeping.

Yan Qing closed her eyes and bowed her head for three seconds. It was a habit of hers — a moment of silence before every corpse and every crime scene, to express her reverence.

When she opened her eyes again, they were clear and sharp. Because reverence alone solved nothing. What she truly needed to do was seek justice for those who had died unjust deaths.

Through the back gate and to the left stood the rear service quarters — the rooms where servants lived and where odds and ends were stored, built at the furthest end of the estate. To the right were the side rooms.

The torch’s light was bright enough, but wherever it did not reach was a dense and shadowy gloom.

Yan Qing examined the rear service quarters thoroughly. She found no chalk outlines of bodies and no bloodstains. The killer had not claimed lives here — or more likely, the killings had not taken place at night, when the servants would still have been about their duties rather than resting.

Passing through a small door on the west side of the rear quarters brought her to a kitchen that had been converted from a side room. Side rooms — those small chambers flanking the main hall on either side, resembling the ears of the main building — were sometimes used for sleeping and sometimes as kitchens.

As soon as Yan Qing entered, she spotted a chalk outline of a body near the stove. The stovetop and lid were splattered with thick, dark brownish bloodstains. Sweeping the torch toward the doorway, she found another chalk outline and a wide spread of blood there as well, with scattered chopsticks and bowls lying beside the stains.

She leaned in for a closer look. Only small amounts of leftover food sat near the chopsticks and bowls — the incident had clearly taken place after one of the meals.

Moving on to the main hall, Yan Qing swept her torch across it and found two prone chalk outlines on the floor, one more at the threshold, and in the east side room, the scene was particularly grim: three outlines, all very small in stature — they must have been children. The room was not large, and the floor had been almost entirely soaked in blood. It was too terrible to behold.

Such chalk outlines continued to appear in the west wing and around the courtyard. Counting them carefully, she arrived at thirteen in total — the whole Chen household, masters and servants alike, not one spared.

Yan Qing carried her torch to the decorated inner gate — the boundary between the inner and outer quarters, the sole passageway between them, typically elevated by three or four steps. Lying across those steps was another outline, whose proportions, by Yan Qing’s estimate, suggested a very large and powerfully built man.

But what truly interested her was not the figure’s physique. It was the bloodstain on the lacquered red gate.

The wheelchair could not manage the steps, so she had to concentrate the torch’s beam as tightly as possible. Just as she was absorbed in her examination, a shadowy figure emerged from the darkness like a specter of the night.

—