Fate Trading System – Chapter 234

Plan A

Mist Map 7

Express Delivery

Su Xin didn’t know how to comfort this girl; after all, any comfort in such matters would be pale and weak.

Someone who hasn’t experienced it simply cannot comprehend that pain—the people closest to you in the world are gone, leaving you utterly alone thereafter.

There are good parents in this world, bad parents, and also people completely unworthy of being called parents.

The parents of Xiao Xiaoruo¹, this colleague of the original host, must have been the first kind.

Clearly seriously ill themselves, yet afraid of worrying their daughter, afraid of distracting her, so the couple endured it themselves, sought treatment themselves.

Losing one relative is devastating enough; Xiao Xiaoruo lost both parents at once, making her even more pitiable.

Su Xin was the same; her Mom and Dad passed away together. But Su Xin was still young then, without very deep impressions. She hadn’t thought about it much in her childhood either—after all, she was too busy. Every day she had to think about how to survive well, how to get more food, how not to be eliminated. How could she have had time to think about other things? She couldn’t even remember what her parents looked like.

“I’m on my way back now,” Xiao Xiaoruo sniffled. “I might need to rest for some time before working again.”

“The tree wishes to be still, but the wind never ceases; the child wishes to provide for their parents, but they are no longer there.”²

“Tears fall in vain wanting to see their faces and hear their voices; wanting to hear their teachings, there is only silence.”³

“Xiaoruo, I have some bad news I have to tell you.”

“What?”

“That painting, it’s been stolen.”

“Ah? How could that happen? Did they catch the thief?”

“No, the museum gave up the investigation, and the police aren’t that free either.”

“Then what do we do? What if some random person gets it and sells it off somewhere else?”

Wouldn’t that be smuggling then.

“A small part of that painting still hasn’t been restored, it’s too severely damaged. Plus, it’s not the work of any famous master. It’s unlikely to be sold off. I suspect the painting being stolen is related to something else.”

“What thing?”

“It’s tangled, too complicated. Anyway, you come back first, we’ll talk then.”

What worried Su Xin more was that the hidden pervert wouldn’t just target them. What if, driven to desperation, he started killing indiscriminately?

Su Xin and Liao Qingjie walked slowly back to the residential complex, each thinking their own thoughts.

Not long after Su Xin sat down at home, sketching to sort out her thoughts, she heard her phone ring—someone had sent her a text message.

“Who sent it?”

Liao Qingjie looked up.

“It says I have an express delivery, telling me to pick it up at the collection point by the complex gate. But I haven’t bought anything.”

For the past half-month, the original host would have been scared to death; where would she have found time to browse Taobao⁴, to buy things?

“I have a bad feeling about this.”

“Me too. Let’s go, let’s go check it out.”

It was a boxed package, but there was no shipping label on it.

“Hey, someone just left this here with me. He said a young lady would come by later to pick it up. That’s you, right?”

The middle-aged man said, taking out the box wrapped in a black bag.

Su Xin looked at the X-tong Express⁵ tracking number on the text message, her expression darkening. Right, the murderer could install GPS trackers in her phone and watch, how could he possibly not know her phone number?

“Yes, that’s me. Do you remember what the person just now looked like?”

“Ah, I didn’t pay attention. Just glanced up. It was a man, quite tall, wearing a medical mask. Didn’t get a clear look at his face.”

“What kind of clothes was he wearing?”

“A black top, I think… Aiya, young lady, I really don’t remember. I see a lot of people in a day, how can I remember them all?”

The middle-aged man shook his head.

“Thanks.”

Su Xin and Liao Qingjie exchanged a look and returned home with the package.

After removing the outer black bag, there was a box inside. Inside the box, placed neatly, was a human head, frozen. It looked very unsettling.

It was Zou Wanwan.

Beside it was a note. The handwriting was neat and tidy, looking very proper, like a primary school student writing character by character.

(Her things tasted very good. I think yours will too.)

Su Xin felt a wave of nausea in her stomach. They all knew what Zou Wanwan was missing. Unexpectedly, this pervert also had this kind of fetish.

Cutting off that part, not for venting anger or some other meaning, but for eating?

Su Xin inexplicably felt a sharp pain in her 36C chest.

Liao Qingjie took the note and looked at the characters on the white paper.

A tall man dressed in black, writing these words stroke by stroke with a smile.

Left hand? Right hand?

Liao Qingjie closed her eyes, her fingers twitching slightly.

Su Xin put the lid back on. Having some clue was better than having none at all.

Su Xin took out her phone and made a call to the Captain.

“Captain, Zou Wanwan’s head, it’s been found. It’s here with me.”

“I’ll be right there.”

Su Xin stared at the number on her phone that had sent the text message and decided to call it back.

It rang for quite a while before someone picked up.

“Hello, who is this?”

It was a young man’s voice, sounding somewhat pleased.

“Hello.”

Su Xin frowned, keeping her voice as steady as possible.

“Thank you for calling me! Oh my god, I couldn’t find it just now, I was freaking out. Good thing you called me.”

Su Xin stared at the call location displayed on the screen; it was a number from the neighboring city.

“Sorry, I dialed the wrong number.”

“Oh, oh, okay. No problem!”

Su Xin hung up. She wasn’t sure if this person was innocent or the murderer putting on an act.

“Let’s go, to the station.”

Su Xin placed the box in Liao Qingjie’s arms. Walking down the street carrying a human head was too weird, so Su Xin very unscrupulously gave it to Liao Qingjie.

“Deceased Zou Wanwan, female, 27 years old. Cause of death was excessive blood loss after decapitation by sawing. The murder weapon has not yet been found. The murderer likely stalked Zou Wanwan for some time, figured out her movements, murdered her intentionally, stole a car to approach the victim…”

Everything was interlinked, betting on people letting their guard down.

Who would an ordinary person think would want to murder them?

The Captain was in a dilemma. If public opinion crushed down, the entire city would surely fall into panic. They also had to speed up their pace.

“That note is already very targeted, Miss Bai. If everything is related to six years ago, the murderer must have a reason to target you. Six years ago, did you do anything unusual?”

Su Xin pressed her hands to her temples, closing her eyes tightly, but finally shook her head.

“Sorry, I really don’t remember.”

“The murderer’s next move probably won’t be you, but someone else. He might want to continuously intimidate you to achieve his goal.”

“But there’s a key point: how did the murderer find all of you?”

“Why wait six years to seek revenge?”

These were all points of doubt.

Su Xin didn’t even remember those people from six years ago, let alone know where they were now, what they looked like, or what they were doing. Why would the murderer know?

Why wait six years, instead of sooner?

“Cutting off female physical characteristics to consume them might indicate a psychological perversion, a dependency on breast milk or the mother. It could also be another situation. Miss Bai said they were strangely dressed people in a cave; perhaps this is an activity with some significance in their tribe.”

The Captain truly lived up to being an old hand, instantly deducing many possibilities.

“He placed the heads of two people before me. I feel it’s not just for intimidation, but…”

“But what?”

“Like watching prey struggle continuously in a net, watching the prey await a death that could descend at any unknown moment, watching her panic and fear, enjoying that pleasure.”

“I think I must be very special in the murderer’s heart. He loves me the most, and hates me the most. The fatal thing is, I don’t remember what I did.”

Su Xin rubbed her forehead, nursing a headache. What on earth did the original host do?

Seriously, don’t be too curious; curiosity kills the cat.

“I think these events are very likely related to one of the eleven of us. That person might have recorded our information back then, and the murderer found him, thereby finding all of us. I speculate that person might be the team leader at the time, since she was responsible for gathering all of us.”

In the vast sea of people, how to search?

Even more fatal, there was no information about that mountain left in her memory either.

She only remembered it was some unknown remote mountains and old forests, very desolate, very dilapidated.

If the Mist Map is related to the murderer, they could start with the map.

Su Xin felt it necessary to go back to the museum again.

“Captain, I’m going to the museum first. Liao Qingjie, let’s go.”

Su Xin was the type to act immediately on an idea, directly pulling Liao Qingjie along.

Liao Qingjie looked at her hand clasped with Su Xin’s, raised an eyebrow, but said nothing.

Taking a cab to the museum, Su Xin headed straight for the Curator’s office.

The Curator should be in at this time; the Curator had recently returned.

Su Xin knocked on the door. A response came from inside.

“Xiao Yan?”

“Curator, I wanted to ask where that stolen painting was unearthed?”

“Let me see.”

The Curator pushed up his glasses and went to the filing cabinet to search.

The Curator took out a folder. Every object entering the museum is recorded in a register, including its subsequent movements.

“From a small tomb in Qiuzeshan⁶. That one was a bit strange, slightly better than a common grave’s specifications, but much worse than a noble’s tomb. There was nothing inside indicating the tomb owner’s identity, only some items of moderate value. It might have been self-built by a merchant family. The painting was likely the tomb owner’s own.”

The Curator said.

“Emperor’s tombs are called ling, nobles’ are zhong, and commoners’ are fen.”⁷

“Qiuzeshan. Thank you, Curator.”

Su Xin repeated the name, and after thanking him, she dashed off again like the wind, pulling Liao Qingjie along.

“Where are you going?”

“Qiuzeshan.”

“Are you sure there’s a connection between them?”

“Fifty-fifty.”

“And you’re still going?”

“Should I wait here to die? If I go, at least I might find a clue!”

Su Xin stopped, raised her head, and met Liao Qingjie’s gaze.

“Are you scared?”

Her eyes held a challenge, like blazing sunfire.

“That word doesn’t exist in my life.”

In that instant, Liao Qingjie suddenly experienced a long-lost feeling.

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