Volume 2 Chapter 5

Volume 2 Chapter 5

Some questions answered in this chapter...but also some new ones pop up.

Translated by: TaffyGirl13

Chapter Five

Yu Yin felt himself trembling slightly.

If he hadn’t seen incorrectly, then that water stain was one he recognised...

It was the seal of a water ghost.

He had been marked by such in the past, when he’d first started seeing these kinds of things. In the end, his dad had brought him to seek someone else’s help in removing the seal.

But Yu couldn’t see these kinds of things, so when could he have gotten it?

He began to surf through his memories. The first time he noticed it was probably at Yan Si’s home...when he had picked up that phone call, Yan Si had said that the day Yu had been trapped in the elevator, Yu’s entire body was found to be drenched upon being rescued. That was the day Yu Yin had first noticed a water stain. nove(l)bi(n.)com

“Let’s make a trip to Boss Yan’s home.” As Yu Yin pulled Yu towards his bike, he just so happened to see the restaurant owner walk out with a bag of food in her hands.

“Student, I thought you had forgotten to come back and grab your food,” the woman smiled as she saw them approach, and she pa.s.sed the food over. “Don’t forget to eat it once you get home.”

“Thank you.”

Yu Yin accepted the bag and placed it in the storage of his motorbike. He then pa.s.sed a helmet to Yu, who was standing on the side. “I’m going to call him first and see if he’s home or not.” He then swiftly dialed the number, and in just a moment, the line connected.

“Student that was ganged up on?”

“Are you at home right now?” Yu Yin supported the phone with his shoulder as he started warming up the motorbike engine.

“Wait a minute.”

Some minor noises could be heard from the phone, and it vaguely sounded like Yan Si was talking to someone else on the other end. After a while, he picked the phone back up. “Sorry for the wait, it’s fine if you two come over now.”

“Do you have a guest?” Yu Yin asked suspiciously, inwardly thinking if it would be better to not interrupt an ongoing discussion.

“Oh, it’s a work matter. He’ll be going back, so it’s no problem.”

“Then we should be there in a bit.” After Yu Yin exchanged these few words, he hung up on the line and turned around to see Yu, waiting for him while crouched on the ground with his helmet already on. “We’re heading out.”

Yu slowly crawled onto the backseat and his expression looked sleepy again.

“Sooner or later, you’re going to crash down from the bike like that.” When Yu Yin saw the image from the rear mirror, he turned to flick Yu in the forehead.

Yu cradled his forehead and blinked his eyes.

“Don’t randomly fall asleep while on the bike!”

After confirming the other person was completely awake, Yu Yin pushed down on the accelerator and they headed out on the motorbike.

There was still a bit of distance between where they were and Yan Si’s home. Since it was the afternoon, there were quite a few people out for food, so he took a detour down an alley. After a bit, they soon saw the complex where Yan Si lived.

Upon arriving, the guard recognised Yu and let them enter directly without calling the resident to ask.

Yu Yin stared up at the tall complex and walked into one of the buildings.

The elevator that had brought upon a strange phenomenon immediately appeared before them.

Yu, who was walking behind him, suddenly leaned against him and grabbed his clothes.

Yu Yin stared at the elevator in front of them for a moment but didn’t find anything weird about it. The elevator was currently stopped at the seventh floor per its lit up indicator light.

Seventh floor...

Why did he feel like he knew the resident on the seventh floor?

Who was it that lived there?

For a moment, Yu Yin was unable to recall anything.

While he was mulling over this, Yu suddenly gave him a push. Only then did he notice that the elevator’s indicator lights were decreasing in number. It jumped from the seventh floor to the sixth, then the fifth, fourth...bit by bit, it approached them.

Yu used all his strength to pull him backwards.

Although he had forgotten what had happened in the elevator, he still had this unexplainable feeling of resistance and opposition to it.

“Wait, wait a moment, inside...” As Yu Yin was trying to finish his sentence and was being pulled back, the elevator door suddenly rang out. The indicator light was now on the first floor.

The elevator stopped, and the door slowly opened.

In that instant, Yu Yin suddenly remembered who the seventh floor resident was.

“Oh? Did you two come looking for Mister Yan again?” As soon as the doors opened, the person inside momentarily stared at them blankly before coming around to give the first greeting.

“h.e.l.lo, Mister Ye.” Yu Yin nodded and smiled, “We meet again, what a coincidence.”

“That’s right. You guys are probably using the elevator, right? I’ve got things to do, so I’ll be leaving first.” As he said this, the man quickly exited the elevator, dragging something with his hands.

Yu Yin glanced at it. It was a small plastic bag, probably around the size of a supermarket shopping bag, and was stuffed with wet, black-colored garbage bags. “You’re bringing out the garbage again?”

“Oh, I want to get rid of some old plastic bags. They were originally used as pads underneath the flower pots on my balcony, but they’re so old that they’ve broken. Since I’ve had some free time these past few days, I figured I’d switch them out.” The man nodded again and gave a slight smile before turning to walk away with wide strides.

After staring at his back for a while, Yu Yin switched his line of sight by turning to look at Yu behind him. “The elevator’s here so might as well get on it.”

Yu looked at him and hesitated.

“Don’t worry, nothing should happen this time.” Yu Yin walked inside, pulling Yu along by the hand.

The instant they stepped into the elevator, he frowned.

There was an odor inside, like some kind of stink. Although it wasn’t very strong, it was still enough to unsettle his stomach.

Yu grabbed onto him from behind, clearly not wanting to enter.

“Alright, we can take the stairs.” Yu Yin rubbed Yu’s head and backed out of the elevator, heading towards the staircase.

Seeing that he was no longer insisting on taking the elevator, Yu quickly followed suit.

But what the two of them didn’t catch was—

The pa.s.senger-less elevator didn’t close its doors for a long while before a small reflection appeared in its mirror. It pressed the b.u.t.ton of the top floor, and the elevator doors closed bit by bit, at an abnormally slow speed.

“The elevator is going up—”

When the two of them arrived at Yan Si’s floor, they just happened to see Yan Si standing at the door to see his guest off.

“Hi, student that was ganged up on.” Yan Si noticed them with his sharp eyes the instant they arrived on the floor, and immediately greeted them.

“Yan-Dage.” Yu Yin politely nodded and looked at the other person standing at the door, who seemed very serious. He wore a black suit and was about Yan Si’s height. His facial features could be said to be pretty good-looking, and he gave off a cool aura that made him seem hard to approach. “Greetings,” Yu Yin said to the stranger.

Yu immediately nodded in greeting from behind him as well.

“You are...Mister Yu’s son. h.e.l.lo.” The stranger replied, then turned to Yu, “Oh...Shao Di Yu, looks like you’re doing pretty well.”

Yu Yin glanced at him in confusion, “You recognise the two of us?” He couldn’t recall ever seeing this person before.

“You can hear a lot of things among the friends at the police department. Moreover, Yan Si just mentioned you two.” The stranger gave a faint smile before immediately returning to his blank expression.

“Ah, this guy is a previous roommate of mine.” Yan Si wrapped an arm around the stranger’s shoulder and grinned, “He’s a very good person, not shady in the slightest.”

The other person swatted Yan Si’s arm away. “I have other things to do, so I’ll be taking my leave first.” He nodded at Yu Yin and Yu, then quickly left through the staircase.

“Tsk, coming and going in such a hurry.” After seeing his guest leave, Yan Si turned around and gestured for the two standing at the doorway to enter. “Don’t mind him, that guy is always like that.”

“He’s a forensic investigator as well?” Yu Yin asked as he entered inside and began to take off his shoes.

“Hah, as if. That guy’s position is higher; your dad and uncle have probably heard of him before too.” Yan Si shrugged, not bothering to explain any further as he walked ahead of them. “Do you two want any snacks? I just happened to buy some limited edition items yesterday~”

Upon hearing these words, Yu Yin just remembered, “We haven’t even finished eating lunch...” He flashed the take-out bag of food in his hand.

Yan Si turned around to say, “I’ll help you heat that up in the microwave first then. And why are you both so filthy? I’ll grab clothes for you two to change into. Do you want to go into the bathroom to wash your hands and feet first?” Although Yan Si didn’t really mind how dirty they were, it was his own house they were in after all. Cleaning up later would still be somewhat troublesome.

“Oh, ok. Thanks.” After surveying just how dirty both he and Yu were, Yu Yin also felt like they should go and wash up their faces.

“...You guys have been using water contaminated by a corpse for at least three days,” Yu Yin earnestly pointed out another very grave issue.

“Oh, there hasn’t been any news of any residents vomiting or having diarrhea, so it seems like everyone has strong stomachs,” Yan Si casually replied before focusing his attention back to inspecting the photos.

I’m pretty sure it’s not just a question of having strong stomachs or not!

Yu glanced around and then ran down the stairs before raising his head to look at something.

“What’s wrong?” Yun Yin followed down the stairs and looked in the same direction, noticing that there was a surveillance camera hanging there. “So this place actually had a surveillance camera...it’s just a question of whether it managed to catch anything on tape or not.”

Yu turned to look back at him and shrugged.

They were thinking the exact same thing.

Just as Yu Yin was about to tell Yan Si of this, another noise came from the rooftop garden’s entrance.

“Ah Yin! You got mixed up in something again!”

Truthfully speaking, Yu Yin had jumped in fright.

The one charging towards him with a shout was none other than his uncle.

“Didn’t I tell you not to randomly go looking for things?!” Yu Xia rushed over with a glare and scolded Yu Yin while shaking him by the collar.

“Sorry, I’m the one that looked for it this time.” Just as the two of them were about to start fighting, Yan Si interrupted from where he stood on top of the stairs, just in time. He smiled and waved at them, “Could I trouble you to come and collect the evidence first? Otherwise it’ll be really hard for me to continue with the process.” He pointed at the water tower room behind him.

Yu Xia let go of Yu Yin with a snort and then commanded the identification team to go up first. He then instructed some others to start blockading the place off with yellow tape.

“Are you guys the first ones to discover the body?”

“Obviously, or else we wouldn’t be the ones reporting to police,” Yu Yin fired back, then quickly backed off to barely dodge the iron fist that came down. “Uncle, didn’t you go out of the city? Why are you here today?”

“Hmph, it was someone else’s turn to support today.” Yu Xia shot him a glance and said, “I have a lot of matters I haven’t finished dealing with yet over here, so I can’t waste my time over there for long.”

Yan Si walked down the stairs and looked over at them. “Student that was ganged up, do you want to bring Xiao Yu down to eat first? It’ll be busy over here, and you two can’t randomly walk around either.”

“That’s...alright.” After seeing Yu Xia’s vicious expression, Yu Yin could only nod in agreement. “We’ll go down first, don’t forget to tell us any follow-up information later.”

“As if he’ll tell you that! Hurry up and get your a.s.ses out of here!” Yu Xia immediately prepared to hit him.

“Student that was ganged up on, I have some snacks and drinking water in the fridge, feel free to enjoy them,” Yan Si shouted as he tossed the keys towards them.

“Thanks!” Yu Yin dodged his uncle’s iron fists and quickly dragged Yu with him to escape.

After the two of them left, the scene was quickly wrapped off with yellow tape. The policemen walked back and forth around the area, inspecting anything remotely suspicious while taking photos.

Yu Xia walked up the stairs to see the few coworkers currently taking photos of the scene inside the water tower. “Why did you suddenly decide to come up and search the water tower?” He asked the person by his side that had called him earlier.

“Oh, intuition and experience.” Yan Si shrugged as he gave this reply. But he then said, “I hadn’t thought your boy would be so sharp too. Before I’d even said anything, he directly told me he wanted to come up here.”

“Hah, that guy is a different kind of sharp.” Yu Xia narrowed his eyes as he coldly snorted, “Ever since my brother’s family got into a car accident, he’s been like that, often running around all over the place. I really have no idea what he sees with those eyes of his.”

“Probably things that we can’t.” Yan Si replied as he looked down to see the photo-taking reaching its end. He then gestured for the corpse in the water tower to be carefully pulled out. “That’s right, I still don’t what they two of them suddenly rushed over to my place for.” He pulled his gloves back on and stepped into the water tower.

There was no way it couldn’t have been to just drink some water out of thirst.

Yu Xia’s gaze remained locked onto his colleague’s back as he followed behind with another cold snort.

“That scared me to death, I hadn’t thought that Uncle would appear.”

After boarding the elevator in panic, Yu Yin finally let loose a deep breath. “Really, why couldn’t he have found anyone else but Uncle?”

He continued to grumble as he waited for Yu to stop dawdling and finally enter the elevator. He then pressed the b.u.t.ton for the correct floor.

The floor indicator lights began to flash in decreasing order, from the top fifteenth level down to the fourteenth, thirteenth...

“But whose corpse is lying up there...?” After complaining, Yu Yin began to ponder over the chain of strange occurrences that seemed to have been arranged in hopes of him discovering them.

The first matter was the school, that table...

“Is it you? Ye Xiao Xiang?”

He couldn’t keep this strange conclusion from escaping his lips. At the same moment, the elevator suddenly shook fiercely and abruptly came to a stop.

After regaining his balance, Yu Yin immediately lifted his head to look upwards. The elevator had suddenly stopped moving at the seventh floor.

Wait...He thought. Isn’t the seventh floor where Mister Ye lives?

Yu had suddenly become panicked next to him, turning around and repeatedly pressing the open-door b.u.t.ton. After pushing it several times, the elevator suddenly let out a ding, and the doors opened.

What appeared before them was the staircase at the seventh floor. On their left was the door of seventh floor’s residence.

The surroundings were quiet, without a single sound.

Yu Yin looked around before stepping out of the elevator. Yu followed close behind, his hands uneasily gripped onto Yu Yin’s clothes.

It wasn’t particularly different from the third floor. There was a shoe cabinet in the hallway, and some potted plants that had already sprouted weeds. The door was metal, with a second door behind. There was also a door plate hanging on the side.

There were a man’s leather shoes and slippers in the shoe cabinet, as well as several pairs of a woman’s high heels. The top shelf also had a child’s shoes and slippers. It looked to be like an ordinary home of three.

That was right, he remembered that when he’d b.u.mped into Mister Ye earlier, he’d been going out to throw the trash away. He will probably be back soon.

“Don’t randomly touch anything.” Yu Yin pulled Yu over and quickly dialed a number. “h.e.l.lo? Dad? Could I ask you what Ye Xiao Xiang’s address is?”

He had been concerned about this matter the whole time yet had forgotten to check her address.

“It’s the same building that Yan Si lives in, right?”

A sound of affirmation quickly came from the other end.

Yu Yin felt that he already knew the ident.i.ty of the corpse.

“I’ll tell you the rest when I get back later...alright, bye-bye.” Yu Yin hung up and looked at the shoe cabinet again.

Although he felt that there was something weird about it, he couldn’t quite say how.

It was normal for a family of three...shoes belonging to two adults and a child.

Just as he began to think there was no link, Yu suddenly tugged on his clothes. Only then did he realise they had been lingering around there for too long. “Let’s go back to Yan Si’s home first.”

As he said this, he walked over to the elevator and pressed the down b.u.t.ton.

At the same moment, the elevator doors suddenly opened. Inside stood a person.

“What are you two doing in front of my home?”

Yu Yin hadn’t expected someone would be inside and stood there blankly for a moment before taking a few steps back. He then realised that it was the seventh floor’s resident, Ye Li Sheng.

“Aren’t you two Mister Yan’s friends? Why are you sneaking around my residence?”

The other immediately began to question them.

“Eh...we’re not actually...” Yu Yin saw that he seemed somewhat angry, and immediately thought of some excuse. “The body of a small child was actually just discovered on the rooftop, and the police even came. So we were looking around to see if any of the residents’ children had gone missing...collaborating with the police and stuff...”

“Small...small child?” The object in Ye Li Sheng’s hand immediately dropped with a thud and he rushed straight back into the elevator. “Xiao Xiang!”

The elevator doors immediately closed before Yu Yin and Yu.

“So impulsive.” Yu Yin looked at the doors and shrugged. “Let’s take the stairs, Yu.” He glanced at the thing that Ye Li Sheng had dropped just now.

It was a supermarket bag filled with instant noodles, cigarettes, and some canned beverages.

“That’s right, I remember Dad said that Ye Xiao Xiang has already been missing for a long time...no wonder he’s so frantic.” As they walked down the stairs, Yu Yin began to ponder over the matter.

If Dad told me to watch out for her from the beginning, then he must’ve already known that Ye Xiao Xiang had gone missing for a while; he just hadn’t thought that the corpse would be in the water tower. Probably n.o.body would’ve thought of that, right?

Yan Si had said that it had likely been there for at least three days. In addition, he’d been subst.i.tuting at the school for quite a few days now. In other words, Ye Xiao Xiang had died during the period of time she hadn’t attended school.

There was a ball underneath the water tower, and there weren’t any particularly weird marks around the area...at first glance, it looked like she’d slipped. After all, most children were extremely curious. Moreover, that place hadn’t been locked, so one couldn’t guarantee that a small child wouldn’t want to go in to explore...

But it was strange, truly very strange.

Why would she run into the water tower room for no apparent reason?

“Oh right, who was the first one to report her as missing?”