Chapter 42: How Much For The Rat Poison?
Li Juan couldn’t see the Underworld official, but she could see a chain appearing on Lu Ye’s soul body, hooking him away.
Even though she had just been hurt by Lu Ye, seeing his soul being taken away still panicked her, and she suddenly pounced toward Lu Ye: “No… Little Ye! Little Ye!”
The moment she pounced, Lu Ye’s soul body was taken away by the Underworld official, and she pounced on nothing.
Witnessing her own child die once right in front of her eyes, and then seeing his soul body being taken away, was too much stimulation for a mother. Under the shock, Li Juan’s eyes rolled back, and she fainted directly.
Nan Yuanman panicked and hurriedly stepped forward, mimicking the village adults by pinching Li Juan’s philtrum, shouting to Meng Qinian: “Brother Qinian, quickly call an ambulance!”
Meng Qinian stayed relatively calm and dialed 120, pulling Nan Yuanman away from Li Juan’s side, comforting her: “Don’t worry, she’s just fainted from too much shock. She’ll wake up in a bit. Don’t press anymore, or it’ll hurt her later.”
Children don’t know how much force to use, and pressing Li Juan’s philtrum might swell it later.
After waiting a good while, the ambulance finally arrived, taking the unconscious Li Juan and Lu Zhicheng to the hospital together.
Nan Yuanman was afraid Li Juan would get emotional and think negatively upon waking, so she stayed by her hospital bed without leaving. Her chubby little hands propped up her chin, squeezing out a bit of meat on her cheeks.
Meng Qinian sat beside her, glancing at her from time to time, afraid she would be affected by what just happened.
Suddenly, he heard Nan Yuanman ask: “Brother Qinian, what does it feel like… to have a mother protecting you?”
The little girl seemed to be asking purely out of curiosity. Before Meng Qinian could answer, she muttered to herself: “It should feel very warm, right? Yuanman has never seen her mother, but Grandpa said that when Mother gave birth to Yuanman, she also protected me well.”
She sighed like a little adult: “Sigh, it’s just that Mother went to the Underworld too early. Otherwise, Yuanman could have seen her and thanked her for protecting Yuanman.”
“Yuanman would absolutely never speak harshly to her own mother like that big brother did just now!”
Meng Qinian listened, feeling both sour and heartbroken for her. No matter how precocious Nan Yuanman seemed in front of him, she was just a five-year-old little bean, and she still depended on her mother.
He couldn’t help but reach out and ruffle her soft hair, saying something shocking: “You can treat me as your mother.”
Nan Yuanman: “?”
She turned her head in shock to look at Meng Qinian. Meng Qinian felt a bit awkward under her gaze and puffed out his chest: “What’s wrong? Isn’t a male mom a mom?”
Although he was only eighteen, he felt he was much more mature than those in the Jiang family, qualified to be her male mom.
It was the first time Nan Yuanman had heard this term, and she asked him in bewilderment: “I-Is that so? Can a boy also be a mom?”
Meng Qinian nodded firmly: “Yes.” Completely unaware of leading the child astray.
He opened his arms to Nan Yuanman: “If you miss your mom in the future, just treat me as your mom. Come into my warm embrace.”
Nan Yuanman retreated a bit with an indescribable expression: “S-Still, let’s forget it.”
While the two were talking quietly, Li Juan groaned on the hospital bed and slowly woke up.
Nan Yuanman quickly leaned her little head over and asked caringly: “Auntie, you’re awake. Does your body feel uncomfortable anywhere?”
Li Juan was stunned for a moment when she saw her, and the memories before fainting slowly returned. She suddenly sat up from the bed and grabbed Nan Yuanman’s hand: “Little Heavenly Master, Little Ye, he…”
“He’s fine. He was taken to the Underworld by the Underworld official. After settling the sins on him, he can reincarnate.” Nan Yuanman comforted her: “Auntie’s health isn’t great, though. You need to rest well.”
Li Juan’s eyes heated up. She opened her mouth, choking a bit as she asked: “I… what can I do for him?”
She no longer had the face to plead for Lu Ye, only wanting to do something for him to reduce his sins.
No matter what, he was her child…
Nan Yuanman: “Just do more good deeds.”
Li Juan tightly gripped her little chubby hand and nodded: “Okay, okay.”
“By the way, Auntie, Lu Ye said before he left that he was induced to commit suicide. We hope you can let us see his mobile phone from before he died.” Meng Qinian spoke up once Li Juan’s emotions had calmed a bit.
Mainly, Nan Yuanman wanted to check if there were other ghosts on the mobile phone. If there were, they needed to catch them early and send them to the Underworld for punishment to prevent further harm.
“Since we didn’t know which mobile phone was his, I brought all the visible ones from your home.”
Meng Qinian spoke naturally and pulled out three or four mobile phones from his pocket.
Li Juan didn’t blame Meng Qinian for being presumptuous and pointed to a black mobile phone: “This is the one Little Ye used before he died.”
Meng Qinian kept it and handed the rest back to Li Juan.
He passed the black mobile phone to Nan Yuanman. Nan Yuanman held it and sensed it, feeling no ghost energy on it.
She furrowed her little brows and clumsily turned on the mobile phone, but accidentally tapped into an app with a clover icon when it opened.
When she saw the picture that popped up in the app, her little body trembled in fright.
Meng Qinian quickly looked over: “What…”
At this glance, he saw a bloody, mangled wrist-cutting picture on the mobile phone screen!!
Meng Qinian: “!!”
He hurriedly covered Nan Yuanman’s eyes and snatched the mobile phone: “It’s nothing, it’s fake. We won’t look.”
Meng Qinian said this, but his hands quickly browsed the app’s content, discovering it was a social app made for teenagers, but… the group titles weren’t friendly at all.
Things like Suicide Group One, Suicide Group Two, and the pushed content was all highly suggestive articles.
Suddenly, a chat window popped up.
Tombstone in Headphones: [?]
Tombstone in Headphones: [Didn’t you say you would punish your overcontrolling mom with suicide? You’re not dead?]
Meng Qinian looked at the chat window, his brows slowly furrowing. Opening it, he found Lu Ye had chatted a lot with this Tombstone in Headphones.
The other claimed to be a depression patient and chatted deeply with Lu Ye, occasionally complaining about how bad their family was to them.
Later, the other frequently sent Lu Ye wrist-cutting suicide pictures, sharing their family situation and saying how great it felt to see the regretful and self-blaming expressions on their family’s faces after cutting.
Influenced, Lu Ye started asking if their family really regretted it when they cut their wrists. He said he couldn’t stand his mom’s control anymore and wanted to make his mom regret it, things like that.
Their final chat records were the other suiciding again with rat poison and being hospitalized, sending Lu Ye photos of their family regretting and crying.
Lu Ye’s last message to them was: [You said, if I hanged myself and Mom opened the door to see my corpse there, would she regret it?]
There were no more records after that; the latest was the message they sent.
Even if Meng Qinian was slow, he realized it.
This app was one made for teenagers, one that induced teenagers to commit suicide!
Nan Yuanman struggled to pull away Meng Qinian’s hand, stretching her little neck: “Let me see, let me see.”
“Too gory, children can’t look.” Meng Qinian pressed her head down and handed Lu Ye’s mobile phone back to Li Juan: “Prepare yourself mentally and look at this. Lu Ye was indeed induced to commit suicide.”
Li Juan took a deep breath, mentally prepared, and took the mobile phone from Meng Qinian, but was greatly shocked by the chats in the app and nearly fainted again.
“How could this be! How could there be such bad people!” Li Juan trembled with anger.
Meng Qinian sighed and said: “I advise you to call the police and catch the mastermind behind this app.”
No matter how angry he was, he wasn’t the party involved and couldn’t decide for Li Juan.
“I will, I will.” Flames burned in Li Juan’s eyes. She would send the entire development team of this app to prison!
–
After resolving the student ghost, it was already noon twelve when they left the hospital.
Meng Qinian felt a big weight lifted from his heart and happily carried Nan Yuanman to find a place to eat.
On the way, he casually asked: “Yuanman, your mom is gone, so what about your dad?”
Why had he never heard Nan Yuanman mention her dad?
Nan Yuanman was stunned and honestly shook her head: “Don’t know.”
Grandpa had never mentioned her dad’s existence, so maybe… he was gone like Mom.
Nan Yuanman thought dazedly when suddenly, a tired young woman’s voice entered her ears: “Excuse me, how much is the rat poison?”
