Chapter 325: Aunt Wu

2022-05-20

I shared my thoughts with Zhao Mingkun, who fell silent after hearing me out. Still, these were only my suspicions—maybe close to the truth, but I had nothing concrete to prove it. Facing all this, I knew there was no way for me to dig up any real evidence.

Because this was one of those ‘willing participants on both sides’ situations. Lü Xiangyang hadn’t outright persuaded Jiang Xiaochun to kill. Even if Jiang Xiaochun finally decided to commit murder because of that phone, it would be hard to accuse Lü Xiangyang of instigating him. This was a kind of silent manipulation, and most of the time words alone mean very little.

All the planning happened between two people’s hearts, never written down, never spoken aloud. That’s exactly what made Lü Xiangyang so terrifying. As the old saying goes, threats in plain sight are never the deadliest. It reminded me that the world’s most notorious assassins are also often the most unsuccessful ones.

After a long pause, Zhao Mingkun finally asked, “So you’re saying we just let it go?”

I shook my head, then a moment later nodded, and answered, “Even if we don’t want to let it go, there’s not much we can say now. As long as there are doubts left, we can find more evidence. We already know Lü Xiangyang withdrew fifty thousand from his own account and used it to buy people off, and there’s no way he can explain what happened to that money.”

“And one more thing,” I continued, “Lü Xiangyang claimed he left to get revenge, which should leave a trail. I think he thought that online matters are hard to trace, so he used that as his excuse to leave. But honestly, if you ever leave a comment or visit a website online, it’s not impossible to track you down.”

Thinking about this, I said, “If we ask Mary, she could pull the records up, but the helpless part is—even if we find evidence, it might not change the outcome. When it’s all smoke and shadows, even with a few clues he’ll get off for lack of proof. In the end, Lü Xiangyang will just be destroyed.”

I looked at Zhao Mingkun and said, “No matter what, this will leave a mark on his life. He’s just a second-year high schooler—his life’s only just begun. Maybe… he really wants revenge for his sister.”

After a pause, I texted Gu Chen, telling him to have Mary check Lü Xiangyang’s social gaming chats—see if Lü Xiangyang had actually made any of those kinds of arrangements with anyone. If not, that would mean Lü Xiangyang was definitely lying.

But even if they find he really did reach out to people like that, it still doesn’t prove his innocence. Nowadays, online challenges are everywhere, and most people are all talk. With how scheming Lü Xiangyang is, stirring up some online stranger for a fight would be easy for him.

I said to Zhao Mingkun, “No matter what, Lü Xiangyang isn’t going anywhere. He played this ‘killing with a borrowed knife’ move beautifully. He should have been at school this whole time. Let’s wait for Mary’s investigation and see what results we get before we decide how to proceed.”

Zhao Mingkun went quiet for a while before adding, “I actually think that kid doesn’t seem so bad. He doesn’t look like the cruel type.”

I didn’t say anything more.

Gu Chen was still on the train when I texted him. He’d left at dawn and had to ride nearly twelve hours to reach Rob’s hometown, then catch a bus to Rob’s house. By the time he made it there, it’d already be night.

I told him to get some rest on the way, since there’d be more investigations waiting once he arrived.

Zhao Mingkun and I took the ID numbers of the middle-aged man and Ms. Wang, telling them we’d let them know if they were needed as witnesses. Both of them said goodbye with fake enthusiasm, then left.

Time slipped by, and before I knew it, it was evening.

Apparently, even Mary couldn’t pull chat logs from two months ago. Still, though we didn’t get any news about Lü Xiangyang, Gu Chen told us that he’d already arrived at Rob’s old home. He called to share what he’d found.

Rob’s from a small village with only a few hundred residents. After a few questions, Gu Chen found Rob’s house. When he knocked, it was just Rob’s mother at home. She was over sixty years old and, at first, she thought her son had finally come back.

When she realized it was a stranger at the door, Rob’s mother was a little wary. But once she learned who Gu Chen was, she relaxed.

Her name was Aunt Wu, though she couldn’t remember her full name. She’d never gone to school and couldn’t read or write. The old home was falling apart—cracks in the walls everywhere, big chunks of plaster missing. It was clear no one had bothered to fix anything in ages. The water vat in the house had a layer of dust floating on top. Even so, Aunt Wu used a ladle to drink that water. Gu Chen also noticed she had trouble getting around and needed a cane to walk.

He asked her about Rob’s background. Rob had worked far away from home for years. His father died when he was very young, so it’d always been just the two of them. Rob dropped out halfway through high school—Aunt Wu said he was never the school type.

After quitting school, Rob left with some other villagers to find work. His Mandarin was poor, so no one would hire him as a security guard or waiter. In the end, he followed a few fellow villagers and a labor boss to construction sites. He worked as a brick-carrying laborer for seven years straight.

But seven years ago, when Rob turned twenty-six, he suddenly left the construction site. He said he didn’t want that kind of work anymore. After collecting his last paycheck, he went back home for a short time before telling Aunt Wu he’d found a new job somewhere else and needed to go.

And once he left, he was gone for seven years.

Hearing all this from Gu Chen, I found it strange. Rob hadn’t returned home in all that time. Wasn’t he free to come and go, or was there some contract tying him down? Not once in seven years—he never came back to visit his mother, who’d raised him alone through thick and thin.

But Gu Chen confirmed it: in those seven years, not once did Rob come home.

Every month, Rob sent a letter from a different location. Each letter came with two thousand yuan inside. Every time, he’d ask how his mother was and assure her not to worry, saying he’d be back soon.

But the years slipped by, and Rob was still gone. Every time someone knocked on the door, Aunt Wu would grab her cane and hurry over, hoping it’d be her son at last. But it was always just villagers delivering water, or another envelope in the mail.

But Aunt Wu couldn’t read, so whenever someone came to help carry water she’d ask them to read the letter aloud and help her write back. Gu Chen looked through the letters—they were always quite similar, him asking after her and the family circumstances.

The day before Gu Chen arrived, Aunt Wu had just received another letter from Rob. Gu Chen read it aloud for her. Then, ignoring her protests, he cleaned out her water vat, filled it with fresh water, and even made a small roof over her bed with posters so that bits of plaster wouldn’t drop onto her while she slept.

The return address on the letter was from a city far to the south, nowhere near Rob’s hometown. Judging from the constant letters, it seemed Rob changed jobs every month or so, never staying in the same city. Gu Chen wanted to buy Aunt Wu a phone so she could call her son every day.

But she couldn’t figure out how to use one, even after trying many times, and the villagers said Rob didn’t use a phone either. So, in the end, they kept to the old-fashioned way—letters.

On the call, Gu Chen told us he’d spend the night at Aunt Wu’s before heading to the address on the latest letter to look for Rob. It’d be a long journey—twenty-four hours by train—then searching in the city. But Rob only seemed to move on to the next place after he got his mother’s reply.

So Gu Chen helped Aunt Wu write a letter back and promised to mail it for her, which made her really happy.

After hanging up, I thought about all this. Rob’s actions just didn’t add up. His mother had struggled to raise him, so why would Rob not return even once in all these years? Yet judging by Gu Chen’s account, Rob seemed devoted to his mother, and his letters were full of genuine affection.

So what reason could there be for Rob to stay away for seven years, never setting foot back home? I had a vague suspicion, but it was too early to say for sure.

Still, after all this, I realized that uncovering the truth about Lü Zhiqiu’s case—whether it involved Lü Xiangyang or Rob—was only a matter of time. The truth was already close at hand. But when it finally arrived, how would we face it, what choices would we make?