Chapter 129: That Four-Leaf Clover Pendant Will Never Fall (2) |
Zhang Shutong then realized why their attitudes toward him had been so strange—they all seemed to want to say something but held back.
"So what was the result?"
"The result is, the only surveillance camera that might have captured the scene suddenly broke, and there was no evidence of a second person at the scene. In a sense, we should thank that avalanche for covering up so much. So there's still no conclusion. Actually, the police wanted to come question you earlier, but your uncle and aunt blocked them."
Qingyi continued:
"But overall, the facts everyone deduced go like this—there really was a suspect who wanted to harm the Gu family. This person had scoped out the villa area beforehand, leaving footprints on that mountain road. And early this morning, on the way to the villa, you encountered this suspect. Something happened along the way—maybe you tried to stop him, or maybe he wanted to silence you, and there was some kind of struggle? Then you rode your bike to the villa to warn them, and just your luck, an avalanche happened. You got buried, and when the other party arrived at the scene, they probably didn't think you could possibly survive, so they gave up."
Zhang Shutong fell silent at these words.
"Don't feel so pressured. I'm not here to interrogate you, though I am pretty curious." Qingyi tried to console him.
"I know."
"Want some tangerines? Oh right, I forgot your hand is broken. Should I feed you? Actually, what puzzles me most is the motorcycle's rearview mirror, because that angle couldn't have been caused by the bike falling over. So I was exaggerating a bit earlier when I said it looked like someone punched it crooked."
"It's true."
Qingyi froze.
Zhang Shutong said quietly:
"Your guesses are basically correct. There really is such an existence beyond imagination—incredibly strong and very fast—but I'm not clear on who she actually is."
"I was going to say I don't believe it, but I've seen how Lu Qinglian kicked that poacher away before..." Qingyi murmured. "You're saying there's another existence similar to her, and then what?"
"I couldn't beat her, so I tried to ride up the mountain road to find the bodyguards for help. Unfortunately, I triggered an avalanche."
"And then you were coincidentally discovered and rescued by Lu Qinglian?"
"You could understand it that way."
"You're really damn lucky." Qingyi sighed. "Can you tell me one more thing—why were you so certain that early morning was when she would make her move? I remember you were in quite a rush when you rode off?"
"Teacher Song told me."
"Teacher Song?"
"Teacher Song asked me to come to his dormitory, said he had something to leave for me." Zhang Shutong reached for a tangerine with his good hand but couldn't quite get it.
"What was it?"
"Photos. Photos of that woman appearing under surveillance cameras, several of them, and the time was always early morning."
Zhang Shutong suddenly felt this explanation was quite clever. He might as well let his mentor take the blame for this too—after all, he was a man with stories, one more wouldn't hurt.
"A woman who punctually appears under cameras at dawn—sounds like an urban legend. Is it real?"
Qingyi couldn't be bothered with the tangerines anymore. Zhang Shutong took the opportunity to snatch one, chewing as he mumbled:
"Maybe that person is who Lu Qinglian is looking for. Teacher Song seemed to be looking for her too, though I don't know why. Maybe the afternoon car accident was related to her, which made him think of something, so he had Du Kang call to remind me—first pick up Gu Qiumian, then go to his dormitory."
"So Teacher Song has quite a few secrets. Could his years of driving around aimlessly have had another purpose?"
Zhang Shutong made a sound of agreement:
"That's not the point. The point is, I want to remind you, and Du Kang and Ruoping too—be aware that there really are some things on the island that might not follow common sense."
……
Eventually Qingyi left too.
Few things made him show surprise, but this time he truly left in shock.
Zhang Shutong began eating his first meal of the day.
Green pepper and pork over rice.
He bit into the soft, limp pepper strips, wolfing it down.
The fever had subsided. His left arm had a hairline fracture, and the rest were just soft tissue contusions with plenty of bruising. The anesthetic hadn't worn off yet, but he figured by evening he'd be in too much pain to sleep.
Zhang Shutong had already foreseen this miserable future.
While he still had the energy, he wanted to walk around a bit. So he forced himself out of bed, only to discover he was staying in that same observation room. Finding this out left him somewhat speechless, thinking this kind of fate was one he could do without.
He went to the hallway. The observation room was at the end of the corridor, so there weren't many people around. His parents had temporarily left for something, leaving him alone. Zhang Shutong leaned against the windowsill looking out—the snow had mostly melted.
Behind the hospital was an old building with red brick exterior walls. Perhaps the owner had neglected maintenance, or maybe the house had long been abandoned—weeds grew wild, withered ivy clung to the walls, half blown down by the wind, the enormous wall of leaves hanging precariously, a desolate scene.
The last time he regressed, he'd called it the Cold-Blooded Route. What should he call this time?
Unable to think of a cool name, he set it aside for now.
He finally had time to think about the reason for the regression.
Maybe it was near-death. After being buried by the avalanche and near death, he jumped straight to eight years later; and when he was resuscitated at the hospital and out of critical condition, he naturally came back.
Maybe it was related to that dream.
On the Cold-Blooded Route, he could gamble on one possibility—being killed by the murderer would send him back to the past. But this timeline no longer had that murderer, so maybe he'd gone looking for another method and disappeared for a while.
"Now you've paid a price and found another way to use 'it'."
This sentence resurfaced in his mind.
The sky was getting dark. The fluorescent lights overhead were bright. He saw his own face reflected in the glass. What have you been running toward these eight years?
Zhang Shutong murmured to himself.
There was no way to trace it now.
He shook his head, deciding not to think about it anymore. Things that couldn't be verified weren't worth too many brain cells—better to just keep a guess in mind.
The island really was a small place, and small meant you'd run into all kinds of acquaintances. Zhang Shutong turned around and made eye contact with the young nurse coming to check on patients for two seconds.
She shouted:
"Are you trying to run away again?"
Zhang Shutong quickly said no, he was just getting some air.
"Really?" She eyed him suspiciously. "I think I need to apply to the director to put a restraint on you and tie you to the bed."
One second she was gritting her teeth, the next she smiled:
"Just kidding. I heard you did something pretty amazing—you're practically a little celebrity at our hospital now. Acting heroically?"
"Celebrity? That's way too much."
"It's not too much at all. This morning leaders from your school came, the police too. Oh right, I think a big boss came as well—must have been a big boss, because I saw a bunch of luxury cars parked at the hospital entrance, with one person surrounded by a crowd getting out of the car. That big boss came to your room for a while. You were unconscious the whole time, and he talked to your parents for a bit before leaving."
"Really?" Zhang Shutong was startled.
"You didn't know?" The young nurse was even more surprised.
"Really didn't know."
No one had told Zhang Shutong today had been so eventful. The school and police coming wasn't that surprising, but he hadn't expected Gu Qiumian's father to come as well.
Theoretically, he'd had quite a few tangential connections with the man, but the two had never met face to face. Zhang Shutong didn't even know what the man looked like.
Of course, not meeting this legendary big boss wasn't a regret—on the contrary, meeting him would have been a headache.
"The girl you brought back came too," the young nurse added.
"I knew about that—I saw her at noon, but fell asleep before I could talk to her."
"Not at noon—now."
The young nurse pointed.
Zhang Shutong turned his head. At the other end of the corridor, he saw Gu Qiumian.
……
Gu Qiumian wore an all-black dress.
"I'm transferring schools."
She said it calmly.
When she said this, Gu Qiumian had come to his side. The hospital had the heating on so it wasn't cold, so over her dress she only wore a wool cardigan. That pendant was still tied in her hair, glinting before the window.
But Zhang Shutong's attention was still on those words.
He hadn't expected the first thing she'd say when they met would be this.
Even more unexpected was how sudden it was. Wasn't she supposed to transfer in the second semester of ninth grade?
"Oh..." He instinctively nodded. "Where to? The provincial capital?"
"Mm, the school's already been contacted."
"Set for next semester?"
"Not next semester—next week."
"So soon?" Zhang Shutong said in surprise.
Gu Qiumian gave a small nod. She also leaned against the windowsill, one hand propping up her face, her expression unreadable. Together they gazed at the ivy wall as the girl's soft voice drifted into his ears:
"Dad thinks it's not safe staying on the island, so he's making me transfer."
Zhang Shutong was caught completely off guard.
Which butterfly had flapped its wings now?
The only change he'd made was sending Gu Qiumian home before dawn.
But how had the transfer gotten moved up instead?
"I know what you were doing last night," Gu Qiumian said again. "You stopped the person who left those footprints, didn't you?"
"More or less."
"But you still didn't tell me."
"Because..."
"You could have just woken me up, had me call Dad, and let the bodyguards handle it, but you still went to take the risk alone."
"I'm sorry."
"I don't want your apology." Gu Qiumian turned around. "I came to the hospital just to say goodbye. I told you before not to hide things from me. I didn't want to see you running around outside with a fever, didn't want to see you facing those dangerous bad people alone, but you wouldn't listen. I'm tired of saying it."
Zhang Shutong seemed to understand what she meant—since she didn't want to trouble herself with worry, she might as well move away. That way, forget about worrying, they wouldn't even see each other.
What a perfect solution.
Zhang Shutong opened his mouth. A fierce gust of wind blew past, finally peeling the ivy completely off the wall. In his peripheral vision, the wall of leaves collapsed with a crash, but he had nothing to say.
The two made eye contact. Gu Qiumian looked seriously into his eyes:
"Though you stopped that person, Dad thinks that since he wasn't caught, it means the danger hasn't been eliminated, so he's decided to take me away. Do you understand what I'm saying?"
"I understand."
"Actually, I don't want to leave, but Dad's very firm about it—we have to go, unless I can find a reason to convince him."
"I..."
Her eyes lowered as she spoke:
"But I also know it's impossible to find a reason. That person disappeared in the end, the surveillance didn't catch anything, the police say they don't even have a starting point for the investigation. Who knows if he'll come back, so I have no way..."
"Actually, that person has already been caught." Zhang Shutong blurted out without thinking.
After saying it, he felt a wave of relief, immediately followed by regret.
He thought, now he was in trouble. Originally he could have played dumb, said the culprit got away, that he hadn't seen the person's face clearly, been vague about that night's events, and it would have become a cold case, like the shipwreck incident from many years ago. It might be a bit eerie, but as word spread, people would stop focusing on the truth itself.
But in the end, he'd let it slip. It wasn't that he enjoyed keeping secrets from people, but some things caused infinitely more headaches when spoken than left unsaid. Gu Qiumian's father and the police would surely press for details.
Life really was dramatic.
Either no one knew what you'd done, and you remained obscure.
Or people followed the trail of clues close to the truth—it didn't need to be very true before many people already thought he was a heroic youth acting bravely. The whole day had been eventful, being the center of attention. School leaders came, police came, the big boss came too. Maybe tomorrow there'd be TV reporters coming to interview him, pennants and prize money filling the room.
But once things started, they inevitably spread like a spider's web, weaving until they formed an enormous net that wrapped you up tightly. What changed was never just his own circumstances. A missing suspect could actually change many things.
He'd thought Gu Qiumian would be very surprised to hear this answer, but instead she only asked:
"Keep going. I want to know."
Zhang Shutong steeled himself and tried to say everything he could:
"You can understand it this way—that person couldn't fall into your family's bodyguards' hands. He's... how should I put it? You know about the Green Snake Temple on the island. That person is who they're looking for, but there are many things involved here. Even I haven't figured it all out, so I had no choice but to try to intercept that person."
Gu Qiumian nodded noncommittally. She simply closed the hallway window:
"The wind's too strong. You're not well—better to go back to your room to talk."
Fate was just that miraculous. This time it was Zhang Shutong following behind her back to the observation room. He sat on the bed, telling Gu Qiumian to find a chair to sit in, but she acted as if she hadn't heard, instead locking the door behind her and standing before the bed, looking down from above:
"Now I'm going to say things, and you just need to nod or shake your head."
Zhang Shutong nodded.
"You said that person was caught?"
Zhang Shutong nodded.
"The reason you're hiding it from me is because that person also happens to be someone others are looking for, and you didn't want him to fall into police hands?"
Zhang Shutong continued nodding.
"So that's why you and your friends secretly took action in the middle of the night?"
Zhang Shutong was still nodding. He thought to himself that there was also Teacher Song.
But he suddenly caught a hint of a smile at the corner of Gu Qiumian's lips, though she quickly smoothed it away with a frosty expression.
"Anything else you need to confess?"
"No..."
"How can you be so disobedient? Didn't I tell you to just nod or shake your head?"
Zhang Shutong shook his head.
Gu Qiumian stopped talking. She just looked down at him coldly, as if trying to discern whether his words were true or false.
Zhang Shutong felt guilty under her gaze. Actually, even he thought it was all a bit far-fetched. At noon when she was asleep, she hadn't been this icy. He wanted to say he'd rather dream about that motorcycle, but now clearly wasn't the time for jokes.
Gu Qiumian just stared at him without blinking. Soon a mist began to form in those beautiful eyes. Zhang Shutong thought, whether you're disappointed or angry with me, please blink—look, your eyes are getting tired.
But he quickly realized it wasn't tiredness—her eyes were visibly turning red. Zhang Shutong suddenly felt at a loss. He didn't know why Gu Qiumian would cry for no reason. He was always a fool in this regard, so he pulled tissues from the bedside, consoling her not to cry, not to cry.
But Gu Qiumian just snatched the tissues away.
"Just one last thing." He held up a finger. "I don't expect you to believe what I just said, and I don't expect to convince your father. In fact, I hope you'll keep it secret. The reason I told you is so you could feel at ease. But it's best not to tell anyone else."
This matter had stopped being just about him alone. At the very least, he couldn't sell out Lu Qinglian.
Zhang Shutong didn't know what else to say, so he could only console her:
"I think your father is doing this for your own good, making you transfer schools, so..."
But suddenly she broke into laughter through her tears:
"Idiot, what transfer? How would I not know about that?"
Zhang Shutong stopped pulling tissues, completely stunned:
"What was the first thing you said when you saw me just now?"
"I said you're dumb." She also sat on the edge of the bed, glaring at him. "I see you're not smart at all, dumb as can be."
Zhang Shutong had never thought himself dumb before, but now he seemed to feel it a little. He was confused:
"What exactly do you mean?"
"I mean those words were all lies to trick you, since you won't tell the truth." She kicked her boots high, her body trembling with laughter. "And then you believed it. Hah, who was it that heard I was transferring and quickly said, actually that person was caught!"
"I wasn't..." Zhang Shutong tried to defend himself. "I just didn't want to hide things from you."
"Then why did you run off last night?" She quickly turned back, glaring again.
Zhang Shutong obediently shut his mouth.
He just listened as Gu Qiumian said:
"Did you really think I'd believe that 'truth' the police investigated? If you really just accidentally ran into that bad person, how could you possibly call all your friends in the middle of the night? So I knew you were definitely lying again, that there were definitely lots of things you weren't planning to say.
"But today I finally figured it out. If I still asked you like before, the answer I'd definitely get would be sorry, sorry, sorry. I'm telling you, I'm so sick of hearing that word my ears are getting calluses!"
Having said this, Gu Qiumian continued glaring at him.
Zhang Shutong quietly said sorry, and only then did she turn back satisfied:
"You're just like this, you idiot. So I changed my approach, and you fell right into the trap."
She hummed:
"You're a bit dumb, Tongtong."
Zhang Shutong froze again.
……
The girl lightly tossed her long hair, revealing those eyes that never showed emotion.
The sky had darkened. In the last remnants of the setting sun, she walked to the temple entrance and pushed open the wooden door with its peeling lacquer.
Inside was dim, with weak candlelight illuminating her face. Lu Qinglian looked toward the altar before her.
Eight candle holders sat on the altar. Half had already been extinguished, barely illuminating the statue enshrined above.
"I'm back." Lu Qinglian said calmly to the vast empty hall.
A rustling sound came from the side hall. An elderly woman emerged from the side hall, looking at the small clay figurine sculpture Lu Qinglian held in her hand.