Chapter 37: Huang Qitao’s Truth
Li Jiahong suddenly rushed out the door in a hurry, not caring that it was already after nine o’clock at night. Li Jiahong’s family all felt it was strange.
“Maybe it’s something urgent.” Jiang Gu comforted the worried Li Father and Li Mother, then sent them back to their room to rest, saying she would wait in the living room for a while, and if tired, she would also go to sleep in her room.
Li Father and Li Mother hoped that Jiang Gu, who had just recovered from a serious illness, could rest well. Hearing their daughter-in-law say this, they felt relieved.
After seeing Li Father and Li Mother return to their room, Jiang Gu sat in the living room for a while until she heard the thunderous snoring from the two elders’ room. Only then did she suddenly stand up, walk back to her room, and carefully close the door.
She took a deep breath, opened her suitcase, and after pulling out a towel she had brought back from the hospital, she unfolded the neatly folded towel, revealing the dense feathers wrapped inside—one, two, three… countless.
“I’ve long been beyond saving.” Jiang Gu’s facial expression was calm as she muttered to herself.
Then she took one feather from inside, the thickest black-edged white feather that was the first one she had obtained, gripped it tightly in her hand, and her breathing gradually became heavy.
The desk lamp illuminated Jiang Gu’s shadow, only to see Jiang Gu holding the feather with both hands and suddenly stabbing it into her chest. Immediately after, her figure suddenly deformed—her head enlarged, her arms deformed like fractured bones twisting with wing membrane-like structures slowly expanding from under her armpits until her hands disappeared, replaced by a pair of huge plump wings…
Thump thump thump!
After the knocking, the house owner opened the door. Looking at the three men in black appearing outside, Huang Qitao frowned in confusion and asked, “Who are you? What’s the matter?”
He Jia’an smiled and explained their purpose. Under the influence of Li Yingqi’s hypnotic ability, Huang Qitao mistook the notebook He Jia’an showed him for law enforcement officer documents, so he mistook the three as law enforcement officers and immediately changed his attitude, looking somewhat embarrassed.
“Are you law enforcement officer comrades here because of what happened in the restaurant yesterday? I’m very sorry, I was a bit emotional at the time, and I definitely won’t dare to do it next time.” Huang Qitao said with a dry laugh, scratching the back of his head.
He Jia’an smiled and said, “Mr. Huang, you can calm down a bit. Rest assured, we’re not here for what happened yesterday; we just have a few questions to ask you.”
Hearing this, Huang Qitao immediately relaxed and asked suspiciously, “Not because of yesterday’s matter? Then may I ask what it is?”
“We are investigating an old disappearance case, which involves your late wife and missing daughter…” He Jia’an said in a calm tone.
But upon hearing this, Huang Qitao’s facial expression changed dramatically, fluctuating uncertainly. He clenched his fist, his forearm veins tense and bulging, and said in a deep voice, “You are not law enforcement officers.”
He Jia’an raised his eyebrows in surprise and said calmly, “But didn’t you just see the documents I showed you?”
“I don’t know how you did it, but I’m sure you are not law enforcement officers.” Huang Qitao said with a heavy facial expression. “If you were local law enforcement officers, you wouldn’t investigate this case at all, because it’s an agreement I made with the local law enforcement officers.”
“You do know some truth after all, Mr. Huang.” He Jia’an also simply laid his cards on the table, his face returning to its lazy roguish look as he pulled a somewhat deformed unlit cigarette that had been bitten on from his pocket and put it back in his mouth.
Huang Qitao stepped back, making way for them to enter, and invited, “Even though you are not law enforcement officers, I think you must be from some special organization in the Shenzhou Region that specifically handles special affairs.”
Following Huang Qitao to the living room of his home, He Jia’an and the other two did not let Huang Qitao go through the polite formalities. After asking for a few glasses of plain water, they asked Huang Qitao to talk about his experiences.
“If I’m not mistaken, you came to me because of Li Jiahong’s matter, right?” Huang Qitao asked. Seeing the expressions of He Jia’an and the other two, he immediately understood and shook his head, saying, “I told them not to investigate, but they still ended up provoking trouble they shouldn’t have contacted.”
“You actually knew long before Li Jiahong that your daughter’s disappearance and your wife’s death were not man-made, right?” Li Yingqi asked, using a mild hypnotic suggestion.
“Heh.” Huang Qitao laughed coldly, with a hint of terror in his eyes. “After seeing with my own eyes those monsters from the abyss easily killing a car full of law enforcement officers, how could I not know how mad and evil the culprits who took my daughter and killed my wife truly are, and how vulnerable we humans are.”
“I lost my leg at that time.” Huang Qitao said in a deep voice. “This matter overall has to start from after my wife’s death, when I was sorting through her mourning articles.
While sorting through her mourning articles, I found her laptop from her university days that she had abandoned afterward. Out of curiosity, I opened it to check, and unintentionally discovered a document in her uncleared recycle bin. When I opened it, it was full of strange and mysterious heretical texts knowledge.
I couldn’t believe my wife had once participated in these rebellious organization activities. Curiosity arose in me, so I continued scrolling through the computer information left by my wife, and eventually discovered a secret of hers that no one knew.
She had once held a summoning ritual about a certain evil spirit with members of her university club, somewhat similar to the demon transaction in Western legends, exchanging some price for the realization of one’s wishes.
My wife wasn’t a beautiful person before; there was an ugly birthmark on her face that couldn’t be removed. I originally thought it was as she said, benefiting from the help of a highly skilled doctor who performed a cosmetic surgery to repair the flaw. Unexpectedly, it was actually the result of that ritual transaction.
My wife gained beauty, attracted my attention, and then we developed a romantic relationship, naturally got married, and had children.
My wife must have felt that life was smooth sailing after the transaction, to the point of forgetting that it was an unequal transaction. So in the year my daughter was three, those bewitching demons took her life and snatched my daughter.
To find my daughter, I was brave once too, and tried to seek help from law enforcement officers, but our high-spiritedness at the time was just ignorant arrogance like mantises trying to stop a chariot; we were no match for those monsters at all.
When we gathered all the clues and finally found those monsters, we accidentally stepped into the monsters’ peaceful sleep place, angering them, and afterward paid an extremely heavy price.
The law enforcement officers who went together to handle the case all died; we were toyed with like bugs. Human bodies could be easily torn apart, bones simply broken. I barely escaped with my life with the help of a law enforcement officer who still had his reason, jumping down from a cliff by the roadside.
I paid with one leg and got back my life.”
Huang Qitao fell into painful memories, holding his head and saying, “That’s why I didn’t want them to investigate; it would just be sending themselves to death in vain.”
Posting one chapter first, there’s more tonight. Stole some time amid busyness, sacrificed lunch break to write a chapter for everyone on my mobile phone. There might be typos or sentence errors, please don’t mind. I’ll adjust any mistakes promptly.
