Chapter 399: The Truman Show

2022-05-20

Wu Zui urged the donkey forward while chatting, “That’s why I keep saying you’re always a step behind. Remember back then? We only asked for a million. That was far too little and, come on, who even uses cash these days? The real money had already transferred to us the moment we took Liu Yinyan away.”

“So I ended up with a huge chunk of startup capital. Liu Yinyan really is a top dog in the venture capital world. Just his personal assets alone are way more than you could ever imagine. Out in the open, maybe he only has a billion, but the real wealth behind the scenes blows that out of the water. People like him are always careful not to flaunt their riches. It’s just who he is.”

After hearing Wu Zui out, I fell into a long silence.

I always thought Wu Zui did all those things just for fun. But now I see, that’s just part of it. Every step he took was so carefully planned. It’s like this mountain before us—I know it well, I’ve been here before.

There’s a tombstone halfway up the mountain. This is the spot where Wu Xiufen once paid her respects, and we tracked things here before. It was right here that Guan Zengbin got snatched by Wu Zui and his group. And somehow, weaving through the twists and turns, we’ve ended up back at this place again.

Step after step, Wu Zui had already plotted out every angle before each case even began.

He found Lai San and Old Zhang, brought in Scarface—all for today. Every piece was carefully laid for one purpose: to break Shi Huacheng out.

And now here we are, standing beneath that tombstone again. The last time we came, Wu Xiufen’s body was hanging from a tree next to the grave, but this time, things are different. Wu Zui gave the donkey a hard kick and sent it running off in fright, vanishing into the woods before long. Who knew where it went.

The rest of us did the same. Four donkeys were gone in no time flat. I had no idea where Wu Zui got those donkeys, but I knew one thing: they weren’t coming back. That meant our trail couldn’t be tracked. No way those men would ever expect us to show up here.

At the base of the tombstone, I noticed two trapezoid-shaped carvings that definitely weren’t there last time. I had no clue what they were for.

Wu Zui glanced at Jasmine, and with a quick silent nod, the two of them pushed the tombstone over together. As it toppled, an entrance appeared before us. The opening looked much newer than the rest of the grave. That could only mean Wu Zui rebuilt this passage after Wu Xiufen’s case.

During Li Ai’s incident, we entered from this exact spot. Underground was a maze, and I chased a black shadow through its twists and turns until I ended up in a walled-off chamber. By the time I got inside though, whoever I’d been following had vanished.

After all that, Xiao Liu told everyone about how out of control I’d been, so I ended up at risk of being caught. That’s when I went on the run. But now, somehow, we’re right back here in this space I know a little too well.

Wu Zui helped Shi Huacheng down first. Jasmine tugged me along after them. Judging by the rough, unfinished entrance, this was just a job done for speed, not beauty.

At that moment, Wu Zui took off his belt. I noticed there were two slightly raised hooks on it. The edges weren’t sharp—they were just trapezoid-shaped clasps, so they didn’t dig in or make the belt uncomfortable.

Wu Zui crouched at the opening and hooked the raised clasps to the tombstone. Gripping the belt tight, he gave it a hard pull. There was a heavy thud as the tombstone shifted back into place, plunging the underground chamber into darkness.

A moment later, Jasmine flicked on a flashlight, bathing the tunnel in pale light again.

Wu Zui took his knife and sliced off the protruding part of the belt. Now it just looked like any regular belt. He buckled it on and headed off ahead. A few steps later, at a turn in the tunnel, he came across a coffin and pried the lid straight off.

Inside was a corpse—most likely Li Ai’s grandfather. Now, there was nothing left but brittle white bones.

“Let’s go.” They didn’t stop for even a second.

We continued down a simple passageway for about twenty minutes. After the first bend, the tunnel ran straight, all the way forward. Eventually, the path opened into that big room at the end.

The last time we left this place, the Special Investigation Team had practically collapsed. I thought the case was over for good, but I never guessed Wu Zui had set all this up for exactly what was happening now. We never bothered to investigate this underground space again, so nobody knew its real layout.

It was huge, with endless branching paths. In that dim gloom, even someone familiar with the setup might end up lost. Darkness, identical closed-off spaces, a complete absence of direction—all of it made this place downright deadly.

You could easily imagine a mischievous child wandering in here, only to be lost forever.

Suddenly, a vague sense of déjà vu struck me. I grabbed my hair, and a scene snapped into focus in my mind. I’d felt this way before with the Six Brothers, inside Master’s tomb. The same setup—if you didn’t know the exact route, one wrong turn and you’d never get out.

Back then, neither Zhao Mingkun nor I revealed our true identities to each other. We let Wang Ergou lead us out by scent. That tomb was stained with blood and littered with corpses. All you had to do was follow the bodies and you’d find the exit.

Maybe that’s why, the first time I found myself in this underground maze, I didn’t even realize it.

At that time, Zhao Mingkun went to Linfen looking for someone—Lai San. We tracked the clues to Lai San, but he’d already heard and run for it. With nowhere left to go, Lai San must have turned to Wu Zui for help.

Which means Lai San asked the Six Brothers for their secret craft—just so he could build this underground hideout.

The thought made my scalp tingle. That case was more than a year ago. So Wu Zui had been working on this escape plan all that time. Case after case, all with his shadow behind the scenes.

Maybe, even from years ago when I started helping out with cases, Wu Zui had his eye on me. From the start, he’s turned me into his point of reference, crafting each incident, pulling me in whether I wanted it or not. For all these years, I bet he’s watched my every move.

It’s terrifying. When someone is always observing your life, and you have no secrets left, it’s a horrifying feeling. He knows what you do, who you care about, what you want. Looking back, these last few months may have been the only time in my life I had any privacy at all.

“I need to clear something up!” I blurted out.

“Hmm?” Wu Zui kept moving forward, not even glancing back.

I pressed on, “Did you send Lai San to Linfen a year ago to get the blueprints to the labyrinth? Then, using the original pit Wu Xiufen dug, you spent over a year building out this underground maze just for today?”

Wu Zui snorted. “Depends on your perspective. I look at the big picture, but I never miss the details. That’s why things always play out my way. But you? You and your little team get lost in every tiny case and can’t pull yourselves out.”

“You know how I see you?” Wu Zui said, “A bunch of tinpot clowns. All of you think you’re so smart, but your whole life, your world, everything you believe in, has just been you walking down the paths I set. Without me, you’d be nothing but a worthless fool who never figured out a thing.”

Whatever else he said washed right over me. My mind was blank, empty, like something vital had just been sucked out. I suddenly remembered the movie ‘The Truman Show.’ This world was fake—everything was fake. All the things I took pride in were nothing but crumbs tossed my way by someone else.

You tell yourself the things you cling to are meaningful, but when you don’t even have true reality to stand on, what’s the point of anything you do?

Maybe, just maybe, I still have friends. There’s Guan Zengbin, Gu Chen, Sister Mary, Team Leader Shao, even Zhao Mingkun. Even if the world is fake, as long as these people are still with me, I can handle it.

I have to stay logical—it’s the only hope I have of getting the others out.

Caught up in my thoughts, I suddenly realized—we’d already reached the old underground space again.

Now, here I am, standing in this place all over again.