Volume 2 7

Translated by: TaffyGirl13

Chapter Seven

The bathroom on the desserts floor was soon closed off with yellow tape.

“Oh, great.” Li Lin Yu looked out the window at the noisy ambulance where several paramedics were currently moving the injured onto the vehicle. She said somewhat mockingly to herself, “I don’t even need to shake him off anymore.”

The current situation was like this: because the server had discovered the injured person lying in water inside the bathroom, all the people that had been on the second floor were forced to obediently stay behind to answer some questions.

Yu, whose entire body was drenched, let out a sneeze. He was currently wearing a large towel that one of the restaurant workers had given him earlier.

“Sigh, something goes wrong even while eating.” Yu Yin helplessly sighed, “Can we not even eat anymore...”

After circling around the area a few times, one of the policemen walked over to their table. “Are you all cla.s.smates?” He asked as he prepared to jot down notes.

“The one next to me is my younger brother, and that girl is my cla.s.smate. We just happened to meet each other here,” Yu Yin sat up straight and explained. “The guy being sent to the hospital is someone that had hit on my cla.s.smate here and invited her to this place for a meal, so my brother and I don’t know him,” he added.

“Understood.” After jotting this information down, the policeman put his notebook away. “Firstly, we’ve already eliminated the possibility of this being purposefully caused by a person. Based on the scene, it seems like the pipes simply burst from old age. The powerful water stream broke off the faucet, which then crashed into the mirror and shattered the gla.s.s. Thus, that young man standing before the gla.s.s ended up as the victim by unfortunate chance.”

“How theatrical,” Li Lin Yue exclaimed in admiration, which caused Yu Yin to give her a shove.

“It’s embarra.s.sing for us to say, but it really is that theatrical. We also find it hard to believe, but that is the result of the on-site investigation.” The policeman shrugged as he said, “Moreover, while being helped onto the ambulance, that young man testified about hearing the sound of something bursting and the noise of water rushing out. The case should be closed soon.”

“Then that means we can leave, right?” Yu Yin asked as he stood up.

“Yes, if we have any other questions for you all, we’ll contact you again. I will have to trouble you in advance to cooperate when that time comes,” the policeman politely replied.

“Of course.”

Just as the policeman left and the other three were preparing their things to leave the dessert area and head off in separate ways, one of the part-time students hurriedly ran over with large and small paper bags in his hands. “I apologise for the interrupting the mood while you were enjoying your meal. These are some foods that our boss specifically asked us to remake. We hope that the three of you will continue to come and try our shop’s specialties,” the person said with an extremely apologetic smile.

“Although the three of you purchased spots for having afternoon tea in the desserts section, we won’t be able to offer that today, so there are also two vouchers for each one of you in the paper bags. I sincerely hope that the two misters and missus come visit our shop again.”

Yu Yin accepted the two bags. The large one had enough food for two, while the small one had one portion. He pa.s.sed the small one over to his cla.s.smate standing next to him. “Please pa.s.s our thanks to the boss.”

“No worries at all. I hope that the three of you enjoy the food.” The part-time student bowed and bid farewell before walking away with a faint smile.

“The service here really isn’t bad at all,” Li Lin Yue raised her paper bag with a chuckle.

“It’s always been like that, haven’t you also been here quite a few times?” Yu Yin snorted and placed Yu’s large towel onto the table. The workers that had been free earlier were now all busy cleaning up, so it didn’t seem like they’d have the time to take it away. “Then, I’ll head home with my brother first. Here’s your wallet back.” He found the item that had been left in his care earlier and tossed it over.

Li Lin Yue caught it with ease and blew him a kiss. “Thanks~ In that case, I’ll head home to eat too.” She waved the paper bag in her hand.

They all went down the stairs to leave. The first floor was still filled with people.

Perhaps because the incident had occurred upstairs, the restaurant below hadn’t been affected much. They were still doing business as usual; in addition, because evening was approaching, a bunch of people had formed a line to wait outside as well.

In order to avoid the incoming visitors, Yu Yin dragged Yu to circle around and leave from the back door.

Only upon exiting did they realise that the sky outside had already begun to change color as dusk approached. The entire sky was filled with brilliant shades of orange and yellow. From a distance, it looked like was made of inks from a painting.

“I can’t put this in the front of the motorbike, so you hold onto it.” Yu Yin pa.s.sed the paper bag over and went back to the front door to warm up his motorbike engine.

Just as the sky was changing, they departed from the restaurant.

Then the sky began to darken.

***

When they returned home, the house was pitch-black everywhere.

After using his key to open the front door, Yu Yin soon confirmed that his dad and uncle had not yet returned home. However, he’d heard this morning that his uncle would be returning home, so it would probably just be a bit on the later side.

He flicked the light switch on and the living room immediately lit up brightly.

The two walked into the living room, and Yu Yin, whose stomach was still half-empty after all this time, placed the paper bag on the table to open it and take out the still slightly warm food. He discovered that there was also a portion of dessert in the bag, which made him feel that the boss was truly very generous.

Yu sat across from him but didn’t make any movement to reach out and grab any of the food.

“What’s wrong? Do you want to go back to your room to change clothes first?” Yu Yin removed the aluminum foil covering the paper boxes as he glanced at Yu’s still damp clothing. He asked, “Why don’t you go wash up first before coming to eat? This can be microwaved or heated in the oven, so you don’t need to worry about it going cold.”

The violet eyes looked at him for a moment before Yu lowered his head to open his notebook and write down a few things, pa.s.sing the paper over.

Puzzled, Yu Yin accepted the paper. Three seconds later, he immediately frowned. “You saw something strange in the bathroom mirror?”

He put the notebook down with a type of foreboding feeling. “What kind of thing?”

Yu tilted his head to think it over for a bit before lifting his palms up to his face and waving them.

“You saw a ‘maneki-neko’ in the mirror?”

A chair cushion immediately flew towards him.

“I’m just joking, don’t get mad.” Yu Yin hurriedly caught the flying cushion and placed it down on the empty seat next to him. “You saw someone waving at you in the mirror?”

Yu nodded, then stood up from his seat and began to walk towards the bathroom.

Unsure of what he wanted to do, Yu Yin followed along.

After switching on the bathroom light, Yu pushed Yu Yin in front of the mirror, then placed the notebook with his previous words next to the mirror.

“You’re saying that while you were washing your hands, you saw someone wave at you in the mirror?” Yu Yin warily looked at his home’s mirror that was only reflecting his and Yu’s images. He then immediately caught onto what was wrong about the situation. “Wait, if the one in front of the mirror was you, then why was that guy who gave Li Lin Yue the golden slippers the one that was injured?” Based on what Yu was saying, shouldn’t the victim have been Yu?

Yu didn’t explain any further, and simply walked around with his notebook in his hands.

Just as Yu Yin was about to turn around and ask him what he was up to, the other person suddenly grabbed his b.u.t.t. “What are you doing?!” He jumped in shock and immediately spun around.

Yu, who was now directly facing him, reached out to grab his shoulder and swapped their positions. He then slowly pa.s.sed the notebook over.

After Yu Yin read the contents of the notebook, he was suddenly unsure of whether to laugh or cry as he felt the slight urge to go over to the hospital and kick that guy a few times.

There was a short sentence written in the notebook: “Big brother can give you 5000 for a night, how about it?”

“So you’re saying that just as that guy was hara.s.sing you, the mirror with someone waving at you suddenly shattered?” Yu Yin clapped a hand onto Yu’s shoulder. He began to think that this unexpected incident and the hara.s.sment issue were two separate cases.

Yu quickly nodded.

“In other words, the injured one was originally supposed to be you,” Yu Yin frowned. “That’s right, let me see your hand.” He raised the other person’s hand and found the small bruises on the wrist.

Back then, everyone’s attention had been focused on the injured guy, and so he’d only caught a glance of this earlier too.

The bruises he saw definitely didn’t seem to belong to an adult hand, but that of a smaller child.

Ye Xiao Xiang?

Yu Yin instantly connected this thought to the water ghost’s mark.

“But if we’ve already found the body, why is it still coming at you...?” Usually, if the incident truly was an accident, finding the body would be enough to allow those things to rest in peace.

Clearly, this little girl wasn’t planning on ascending to heaven for eternal rest.

“Yu, I’m going to ask you a serious question. What exactly have you done for that little ghost to constantly go after you, and only you?” Yu Yin really found the entire situation fishy. Typically, being marked was due to a special reason, such as his ability to see, being the perpetrator, or being the victim’s previous lover and such...

Or perhaps looking for a scapegoat.

But Yu hadn’t recently gone anywhere to warrant being a scapegoat, right?

Yu stood there for a while with his head tilted, but then shook his head.

“Hurry up and think of a reason! Or else you won’t be able to keep your d.a.m.n life!” Yu Yin grabbed him by the shoulders and began to shake him forcefully, “Quickly! Even if your brain explodes, you’d better come up with the reason!”

By this point, Yu was seeing stars from being shaken so much, and was unable to think of anything.

Just as the two of them reached this deadlock, the sound of a key turning from the direction of the front door could be heard, followed by footsteps.

Then a certain person stood in front of the bathroom in bewilderment.

“...What are you two doing in the bathroom?”

Uncle Yu Xia had just arrived home, only to see his older nephew trying to murder his younger one.

And they had forgotten to lock the bathroom door.

***

That Sat.u.r.day night, because Yu Yin had been misunderstood as trying to murder Yu, he was beaten up badly by his Uncle. Still holding a grudge, the Monday morning he was supposed to subst.i.tute quickly arrived.

That morning, Yu Tong was preparing breakfast in the kitchen for the entire family as usual.

“Dad, Yu will go with me to the school today.” Yu Yin had woken up very early to finish preparing everything. As he made this declaration, he plopped his bag onto the living room couch.

“I know.” Yu Tong dropped some fruit into the juicer and stuck his head out. “Yan Si said to give him a call the next two days whenever you have the time.”

Yu Yin furrowed his brows. “Alright, got it.”

“What kind of shenanigans are you two up to?” Yu Tong asked with a feeling that something was fishy.

“Nothing at all. Don’t think too much, or you’ll get old.” Although the two of them have always looked young. After this rebuke, Yu Yin turned around and just happened to see Yu stagger towards the bathroom while rubbing his eyes.

“You’ll probably get old faster than us,” the father with an unrivalled baby face turned to go back into the kitchen to place some seasoned bread into the toaster oven.

Yu Yin walked back and forth around the kitchen to help set up the table. “That’s right, what happened with the Ye Xiao Xiang case in the end?”

Yu Tong turned to look at his son. “I heard that her family member strongly opposed to a.n.a.lysing her cause of death, saying that the young child dying in the water tower without anyone discovering her was pitiful enough. He didn’t want his daughter to suffer anymore by going under the knife as well.” It was pretty typical for a family member to be this insistent. Moreover, some people with certain religions tended to be more bothersome, since they firmly believed in not damaging the body.

“There are no doubtful points at all?” Yu Yin was slightly suspicious. Most people would find it hard to accept this kind of accidental death, and would at least cooperate in an investigation, right?

“There is, a very big one.” Yu Tong poured the fruit juice into a gla.s.s pitcher and slowly said, “Firstly, we couldn’t retrieve any fingerprints inside that water tower room...aside from that ball, which had the fingerprints of the child and her parents.”

“You couldn’t retrieve any? That’s way too clean.” If the child had really been playing around before getting into an unexpected accident, they should’ve at least picked up some of her fingerprints. “There’s no way she used a supernatural power to open the water tower lid and then jumped down from high up to drown, right?”

“Of course not. We discovered signs that the scene had been tidied up by someone, which clearly means it wasn’t an accident. At the very least, it can be concluded that it was definitely done by someone. After all, it’s not like the victim could be miraculous enough to crawl out and clean up everything she had touched after drowning. If that were really true, this case might as well be handed over to a supernatural program to take over.” Yu Tong’s last sentence was obviously a joke. He placed the food onto a large platter and carried it over to the dining table. “The camera at the scene didn’t catch anything, not even the child’s figure running inside. From this, we can conclude that someone had intentionally avoided the camera to enter the water tower.”

And that was where the question arose.

Anyone that wasn’t a resident wouldn’t notice there was a camera installed there. Only a resident of the complex that had been up on the rooftop before would know.

“Then it’s not an accident, but a premeditated murder,” Yu Yin quickly concluded as he helped to bring some food out.

“Right, so we’re currently trying to persuade the family member to let an autopsy be done.” Yu Tong put his things down on the table and couldn’t help but feel slightly unhappy at the thought of the stubborn Mister Ye. “Even though we could clearly advance further in this case...”

“Don’t worry, everything will be all right in the end. When there’s a will, there’s a way.” Yu Ying patted his father’s shoulder and then sat down at the dining table.

Yu Tong chuckled and sat down on the other side. “I truly hope that is the case.” He used his knife to cut some bread in half. “Strange, why is Xiao Yu taking so long in the bathroom?”

“...He probably fell asleep inside again.” Yu Yin rolled his eyes. His “panic” from two days ago was still fresh in his memory. “I’ll go get him.” With this, he stood up to walk towards the bathroom.

The bathroom was quiet, just like it had been two days prior.

He reached out to knock twice. As expected, there was no response.

Yu Yin rolled his eyes. Just as he was about to go back and get the master key, the bathroom door was suddenly yanked open, revealing Yu standing before him with a confused expression.

“Nothing’s the matter, just wanted to tell you to hurry out and eat breakfast. Otherwise we’ll be late,” Yu Yin randomly tossed out an excuse.

Yu gave him a strange look, but nodded and turned to walk towards the dining room.

Just as Yu Yin turned off the bathroom lights, he heard an empty echo coming from the drain hole.

The rumbling noises didn’t sound like water traveling downwards.

Puzzled, Yu Yin walked towards the drain hole and lowered his head to look down. The next moment, he felt his entire head go blank, unable to describe what he saw.

It was an eyeball.

From underneath the silver metal plate, a pair of eyes was currently glaring at him.

It didn’t feel like they were just eyeb.a.l.l.s, but rather as if they belonged to a living person. He could even see the veins so clearly that it was impossible to overlook.

Yu Yin immediately backpedaled a few stops, b.u.mping into the bathroom door. When he lifted his head, he noticed in shock that a shadow had appeared in the mirror. The blurry silhouette of a child was following not far behind Yu.

He quickly turned around, but didn’t see anything actually behind Yu.

“Ah Yin, what are you standing in the bathroom for?”

A chiding voice suddenly scared Yu Yin back to his senses. He turned around to see Yu Xia standing outside the bathroom and looking in. “Nothing, nothing at all.” He looked back into the bathroom but there was no longer anything inside.

“If you’re not doing anything, then get out. I want to wash my face.” Yu Xia yawned a few times and shot him a glance, before directly shooing him out and slamming the door.

Yu Yin stood outside for a moment, staring at the door. He had a feeling that the matter had not yet reached a conclusion as he turned around to walk towards the dining room.

Yu, who had already sat down in his own spot, didn’t seem to have any problems. There wasn’t any trace of a shadow either.

Yu Yin slowly sat on the other side.

“Ah Yin, what’s wrong?” Yu Tong asked as he noticed something off about Yu Yin’s expression.

“Nothing,” Yu Yin immediately shook his head and smiled.

They would have to be more careful for a while.

***

After eating, the Yu household went off to their own jobs as usual.

Yu Yin had already arranged a time for the manufacturer to drop off the supplies at the school. He would have to go over to wait for the delivery after the first cla.s.s, or else he could potentially miss the scheduled time.

“Yu, it’s about time we head out too.” Yu Yin lifted his packed bag and sat down in the entrance hall to put his tennis shoes on while calling out in the house.

The sound of hurried footsteps soon followed as Yu ran out carrying a canvas bag with unknown contents. He quickly put on his shoes and grabbed a safety helmet before running out to the courtyard.

After locking the door, Yu Yin walked up to the motorbike and placed his bag inside the storage area. “I’ll be teaching that bunch of horrible little devils how to make windchimes today. Do you know anything about handcraft?”

Yu looked at him and nodded slightly.

“Alright. I’ll lend these to you.” Yu Yin grabbed a pair of gla.s.ses from his pocket and placed them on Yu’s face. “These look like normal gla.s.ses, but they’re actually very thin and light-colored sungla.s.ses. This way, you won’t be captured by those demons and bombarded to death by their questions.” He had searched around for a long time before he had found this gift he had previously gotten from a friend. They just perfectly concealed Yu’s eye color.

Yu took the gla.s.ses off and held them up to the light to inspect them. After a while, he finally put them back on.

“They’re not bad-looking at all. When you wear them, they make you look more scholarly.” The corners of Yu Yin’s mouth tilted upwards in satisfaction when he saw that the violet color of the eyes was no longer very visible after being refracted. “Then let’s head out,” he said as he started the engine. Yu climbed on, and the two of them quickly left their home.

Having already been to the school several times and somewhat memorised the directions, Yu Yin avoided the rush hour traffic by crossing through some alleys. In the end, he arrived at the elementary school much faster than before.

Since it wasn’t yet time for the flag-raising or self-study, there were not many students on campus. Most of them were still arriving one after another.

He parked his vehicle in a parking spot next to the entrance, and after greeting the guard, led Yu towards the teacher’s office to greet Teacher Qi.

Just as Yu Yin was about to open the door to the office, Yu suddenly grabbed his shoulder from behind to stop him.

“What...” Before he even finished his question, he heard two very familiar voices.

The voices belonged to a man and a woman.

Suspicious, Yu Yin let go of the door k.n.o.b and quietly peeked inside from the window.

Aside from Qi Rui Xue, who had arrived early, the was unexpectedly also Ye Xiao Xiang’s father: Ye Li Sheng.

Why has a parent that has just lost their child come to pay a visit to the student’s teacher this early in the morning?

There was absolutely no way of hearing from outside what the two people were discussing. However, it looked as if the two of them were standing pretty close to each other, discussing something in low voices.

Since they couldn’t eavesdrop from outside, Yu Yin figured he might as well openly push the teacher’s office door open and charge straight in. “Good morning everyone!” He noticed that there were some other teachers that had arrived early, but they were either eating their breakfasts or reading their newspapers, all doing their own things.

Clearly startled by his entry, Qi Rui Xue immediately backpedaled a few steps before immediately smiling at him. “Morning, Teacher Yu. You probably already know this person, but this is Ye Xiao Xiang’s father.”

“I do know him. h.e.l.lo, Mister Ye.” Yu Yin quickly greeted. The other person nodded in response.

“Mister Ye came to ask me about some matters regarding Ye Xiao Xiang. I heard that the police want to dissect Xiao Xiang’s body. But Mister Ye believes that the dead should just rest in peace, and he doesn’t want Xiao Xiang to go under the knife, so he came to ask me for my opinion.” Qi Rui Xue gestured for them to switch to a more s.p.a.cious conference table to talk.

“Ye Xiao Xiang already died so tragically, yet those people want to cut her open. As her father, how could I possibly agree to that kind of thing?”

Ye Li Sheng seemed a bit emotional as he stubbornly insisted on sticking to his standpoint of rejecting the autopsy.

“Eh...I can’t really give you any suggestions regarding this issue.” Yu Yin felt a bit at loss. If he were to really voice his thoughts, he would definitely be standing on the side of clarifying the cause of death. However, this wasn’t the answer that Ye Li Sheng wanted to hear. “It seems to me that it would be better for you two to talk with the other teachers. I apologise for not being able to help.”

He swiftly left the seat he had just sat down in and dragged Yu out of the teacher’s office.

That kind of situation was just too awkward...

However, from that, he could tell that Ye Li Sheng was abnormally persistent on refusing the autopsy. He believed that his uncle and the others had definitely informed Ye Li Sheng that the death was possibly not an accident. However, the deceased’s father had come to discuss with a teacher not how to deal with the body, but to come insist that the body couldn’t be dissected.

Wasn’t that a bit too strange?

Yu walked up to him and quickly wrote some words down on his notebook to show him. “Why didn’t you continue listening?”

“Sigh, do you think they would actually tell us the main topic? No matter what, they would just end up continuing on that same topic, and we wouldn’t be able to draw up any conclusion.” Having pretty much guessed that nothing would come out of staying any longer, Yu Yin snorted and declared, “I don’t have any interest in listening to them continue their debate on whether to dissect the body or not.”

Oh right. While speaking of dissection, Yu Yin was reminded of another matter.

“Let me give Boss Yan a call.” Yu Yin wasn’t sure why Yan Si had been looking for him. He wandered around a bit before sitting on top of a short wall. An odd series of musical bells could be heard from his phone, and the line quickly connected.

The other end was pretty noisy; it sounded like there were several people present.

“Student that was ganged up on, why are you in the mood make this call so early in the morning?” The first thing he heard was an infuriatingly mocking voice.

“Weren’t you the one looking for me? Dad said to call you back,” Yu Yin bluntly replied. He swung his feet as he watched Yu wander around to survey the new environment.

“That’s right, I inspected that drowned corpse last night and discovered something intriguing. I figured you would be pretty interested.”

Yu Yin frowned, “I thought the family member refused an autopsy?”

“Oi, don’t underestimate medical knowledge and technology. You can a.n.a.lyse to a certain extent without using a knife, you know.” A wily chuckle could be heard from the other side. “The body was confirmed to have died after falling into the water, but we then discovered strange marks on her body.”

“Marks?” He narrowed his eyes and pulled out a notebook to quickly jot it down.

“The marks looked like they were caused by something pressing down on her. They were irregular in appearance, unlike those from being tied by rope...I personally think they looked a bit like marks from a type of bag.”

“You mean to say that after she died, she was stuffed inside a bag, and then tossed into the water tower while n.o.body was watching?”

“It’s a possibility that shouldn’t be eliminated. In addition, we discovered a fatal injury to her head, with signs of having been struck by a blunt object. From the size of it, it seems to be from something like a stick. Anyways, it has to be from a larger, heavier type of object.”

After recording down everything the other person had said, Yu Yin began to ponder what kind of object it could be.

“Eh, well I won’t say anything more. We have to take advantage while the family member hasn’t yet tried to hinder us and do some more examinations. I’ll hang up for now, bye-bye.” The person on the other end hurriedly hung up, as if being pushed by someone, before Yu Yin even had the chance to say “actually, that family member is here with me”.

After putting his phone away, Yu Yin gave a baffled look at the notes he had written in his notebook.

What does this all mean?

Someone killed the child, then tossed it away.

He believed that the media would definitely love this kind of sensational topic.

Yu Yin let out a sigh and stood up. Having noticed his movements, Yu walked over to him. “Let’s go find a place to sit down and have some drinks while we wait for the manufacturer to call.”

As he said this, he suddenly noticed a familiar figure walk out from a cla.s.sroom and turn the corner.

It was the young cla.s.s president.

Just as Yu Yin was about to call out to him in greeting, the words caught in his throat.

He saw the young cla.s.s president walk down the hallway holding a small bunch of white flowers. Then, a shadow slowly materialised behind him.

At first it just seemed like a ma.s.s of black, but it quickly changed appearance.

First was a pair of feet that were festered from being soaked in water for too long, dragging along the ground. Following that was the abdomen and upper body, with water dripping down from the loosely sagging and uneven shoulders that were hanging limply from the boy’s back like a broken doll’s.

The boy didn’t seem to sense anything. His pace did not slow, and he maintained his stride as he walked forth down the corridor.

Yu Yin then saw the face that was swollen and rotted beyond recognition.

Following that was the hair dripping with water stuck onto the face.

He could clearly see the strange marks that Yan Si had just mentioned. They were mottled unevenly all over the rotting body.

Then, the pair of eyes shrouded by the hair suddenly opened.

The blurred pupils that could no longer see slowly spun and locked onto Yu Yin.

Although he couldn’t say for certain, the face seemed to be smiling.

The boy turned the corner and left.