Chapter 47: Born in Darkness

2022-05-20

Maybe the fate of those six brothers was sealed the moment they killed Lord Chu. For them, death might be the best possible ending. Whatever they did in life, it’s all behind them now. They don’t feel anything at all.

But this case is far from over.

There’s something I’ve been overlooking. The moment I realized those six people from back then were actually the six brothers, I should have caught on sooner.

Someone’s lying!

There was someone else who knew what happened all those years ago—not just Chu Mei and the six brothers. That person is the one most likely to have been playing with ghosts and shadows. The ghost woman we saw in the courtyard was probably trying to scare us off, keep us from digging any deeper.

And during the ghost marriage, who stirred up chaos and made the six brothers believe Chu Mei had come back? There’s only one person who could’ve done it.

“Lin Daiyu!” I shouted. “It wasn’t the six brothers who killed Chu Mei—it was Lin Daiyu!”

“What?” Zhao Mingkun still seemed confused. He looked up and asked, “Can you explain that?”

I said, “I’ve always wondered why they all thought Chu Mei had returned. To the six brothers, Chu Mei never really died. That’s why they believed she could be colluding with one of them. The truth is, they never killed her that night.”

I went on, “The six must have thought their secret was out, so they feared Chu Mei would return for vengeance. But the reality was, Chu Mei was dead all along. After the brothers left that night, only Lin Daiyu and Chu Mei were left at the scene. That leaves just one possibility!”

Zhao Mingkun spoke slowly. “So you’re saying Lin Daiyu killed Chu Mei? But why?”

“I still don’t know.” I swept my flashlight around. “But Wei Changfeng once said Chu Mei was inside the tomb. Looks like it was Lin Daiyu pretending to be Chu Mei all along. And she’s still here in the tomb—we should be able to find her.”

Hardly had I finished speaking when a woman’s laughter rang out. “Ha! Your brother’s pretty sharp. That’s right—this was all my doing. It really was me who killed Chu Mei. I stole the corpse, set the brothers against each other—I’m behind everything!”

At the end of the passage, a woman stood revealed in my flashlight’s beam. She wore a long red robe, her hair draped over most of her face.

Just as I was about to question Lin Daiyu’s motives, Zhao Mingkun lunged forward. Say what you will, but the guy’s quick to act—never mind talking, just grab her first. Of course, Lin Daiyu wasn’t about to stand there waiting for us. She spun and took off running.

Wearing that red robe, she was hard to miss in the tomb. Zhao Mingkun and I chased after her, refusing to let up, but Daiyu was shockingly fast. She darted around the darkness without the slightest hesitation. At that speed, anyone else would’ve smashed headlong into a wall. Zhao Mingkun and I at least had our flashlights, but Daiyu had nothing.

So how come she didn’t run into anything? The only explanation is that she knows this tomb like the back of her hand.

Anyone who knew the secrets had to die, and Lin Daiyu showing up at the end of the tomb couldn’t be a coincidence. She wanted to lure us here on purpose.

“Wait! Something’s off—be careful!” I shouted.

Even as I spoke, we chased Lin Daiyu into a burial chamber. This room was much larger than the others, a massive coffin set right in its center. Judging by the setup, this had to be Lord Chu’s real coffin. The rest of his fortune was probably hidden inside.

We hadn’t even gotten a good look at the chamber when the ground vanished beneath our feet, and we dropped like stones.

The fall left me dazed and battered, every bone aching like I’d shattered from the inside out. My head buzzed painfully, but I forced myself to look around. At least my flashlight was still working, so I could see my surroundings.

Zhao Mingkun had landed not far from me. He was already trying to stand, looking like he was none the worse for wear.

We’d fallen into a cellar, maybe a dozen square meters across and about three meters deep. There were a bunch of small bulging bags scattered around, stuffed with who-knows-what. The walls were coated in smooth cement, and above us was a two-meter wide opening—a heavy iron plate sealing the way out.

Looking up, I saw Lin Daiyu leering at us from the edge. I knew there was a catch—she’d led us into a trap, right into this pit.

“Goodbye,” Lin Daiyu said with a smile. “Now only you two know the truth. When you die, nobody else will ever find out what really happened.”

With that, Lin Daiyu lowered the iron plate over the entrance and the sound of a bolt sliding into place followed.

She must have left. We were trapped by her in this cellar.

I cursed under my breath. “Great. Now we’re in trouble.”

Zhao Mingkun swept his flashlight around, then said, “It’s only three meters up. If I lean against the wall, maybe I can force it open.”

I got what he meant: he wanted to use me as a ladder. I sighed and crouched near the wall. Zhao Mingkun stepped onto my shoulders, and I slowly pushed myself up. With my height of 1.75 meters and Zhao Mingkun’s 1.7 meters, he could just barely reach the iron plate.

But no matter how hard Zhao Mingkun pushed, the plate didn’t budge. The bolt was locked tight—it had to be opened from the outside.

After five minutes of struggling, the plate still didn’t even creak, and my legs were shaking from holding him up.

We’re screwed.

Lord Chu’s tomb was like a maze, with three branching passages at every junction. Unless you know the layout, you could easily get lost in there. And now, trapped down here, Zhao Mingkun and I had little hope of getting back out.

Even if someone did a thorough search, by the time they found us, we’d probably have died of thirst.

Zhao Mingkun, on the other hand, started poking around in the bags, not looking the least bit worried.

Thinking it over, Guan Zengbin must’ve already gotten in touch with Team Leader Shao. If I didn’t check in with her for too long, she’d definitely come looking for me here. At most it’d take her an hour or two to arrive. Still, even then, chances are she’d never find this cellar.

“Want to know what’s in the bags?” Zhao Mingkun asked.

“What?” I replied.

Zhao Mingkun tossed me a bag. “All sorts of good stuff—silver coins, gold, jade pieces. Looks like someone was rolling in cash. You sure don’t look the type, though.”

“We might just die here—what’s the point of all this money?”

I lay down, figuring there was no point wasting energy when we didn’t have a plan anyway. To save the flashlight’s battery, I shut it off. Seeing this, Zhao Mingkun lay back too. With the lights out, darkness swallowed the cellar—couldn’t see my hand in front of my face.

“No idea if there’s enough oxygen in here,” I said.

Zhao Mingkun replied, “If you’re worried about oxygen, why bother talking?”

I put my hands behind my head, trying to get comfortable. “If it’s not enough, it’s not enough. If we’re gonna die, what’s another three or five minutes?”

“You’re pretty optimistic,” Zhao Mingkun laughed quietly.

“We don’t have to just sit here waiting to die, you know.” I turned toward him, though of course I couldn’t see a thing. “Why do you care so much about this case, anyway? What brought you here? Someone mentioned you’re after that male corpse?”

Zhao Mingkun grunted. “There’s something hidden in that body’s stomach. I want to find the person behind it all—Lai San.”

Lai San again. Turned out Zhao Mingkun was after him too.

“You could’ve left, you know. Why stick around with me?” Zhao Mingkun shot back.

For a moment, I wanted to blurt out who I really was. After all, we might be dead in three days anyway. But when it came time to speak, the words just wouldn’t come. I was just someone brought in to help, someone who could be tossed aside at any time, like when I’d been sent to the psychiatric hospital before.

“You still haven’t answered my question,” I said.

“Hmm…” Zhao Mingkun dragged out the sound, then after a long pause finally spoke. “I told you before: when I was a kid, I used to have dreams too. Later, everything changed—my adoptive father turned out to have another side. I have to help him, because he was good to me.”

So the so-called genius had once been in this line of work, too. Team Leader Shao had never mentioned that.

“My own dreams died, but sometimes I still wish I could do this work, even if it’s just once. When we peel back each layer and find the truth, when we bring justice for those who died unfairly—that feeling is indescribable.”

Zhao Mingkun’s voice was soft.

He went on, “I remember as a kid playing cops and robbers with his daughter. Since I was older, I was always the thief. Sometimes I wished I could stand in the sunlight—just once, not be forced to hide in the dark…”

I couldn’t see Zhao Mingkun, but I could hear the sorrow in his voice.

Do we ever really have a choice in how our lives turn out?

Are some people just born to live in darkness?