Chapter 98

(Extra chapter for her brother's crown) Chapter 21: Doubts

At 8 a. m., we were awakened by a sharp, high-pitched scream; just as we rubbed our sleepy eyes and got up from bed, we saw Chen Mo storming out of the room with a dark face.

"Good morning..." Pangzi had just stretched when I heard a bang, and then saw Chen Mo kick Pangzi.

I hadn't even processed what was happening when I saw a flash of movement; the scene shifted instantly—Pangzi was kicked onto the bed, then Chen Mo quickly climbed onto the large bed, straddling Pangzi, and began pounding him with her pink fists.

"You damn fatty, tell me, what did you do to me while I was unconscious last night?" Chen Mo shouted, pounding him while her eyes reddened, demanding: "Do you really think I'm easy to bully? First you stripped naked like a naked pig and hugged me, second you kissed me, and third you dared to bring me to a guesthouse to get a room."

Seeing Chen Mo's tirade grow fiercer, Pangzi's explanations fell on deaf ears. The two launched into a full-blown battle right on the bed. I could only adopt an "out of sight, out of mind" attitude, rinsed my mouth, washed my face, and went downstairs to buy youtiao and soy milk.

As I was drinking soy milk and holding a youtiao, re-entering the guesthouse, the sight before me was so shocking that I spat out the soy milk I had just swallowed with a puff.

It was still that white Simmons bed, the protagonists still a fatty and a policewoman, only the balance of power had reversed, and now the fatty held the advantage.

Pangzi's 150‑pound weight pressed down on Chen Mo like a dead weight, his two big hands pinning each of her hands to one side of the headboard; matching his half‑crouched pose, Chen Mo's red‑eyed, aggrieved expression was a living tableau… a beauty defiled by a beast, unwilling to suffer humiliation.

"I can't take it, I can't, looks like I need to go wash my eyes." I covered my eyes, shook my head, and headed to the restroom. Actually, I'd eaten too much breakfast and needed to relieve myself.

But to Pangzi it sounded different; he thought I had misunderstood him, his face flushed, and he hurriedly waved his hands, explaining to me: "Holy shit, Hai Sheng, it's absolutely not what you imagine."

At that moment, the disadvantaged Chen Mo seized the chance to counter‑attack, shoving the Pangzi who was on top back down and raining another heavy beating on him.

Next, I heard the crackling of their fight from the toilet; when I came out, I saw Pangzi sitting on the indoor sofa, his face bruised and eyes swollen.

Chen Mo on the bed had lost her usual fierce aura; her eyes were red, she hung her head and sobbed softly, looking more like a wronged girl next door.

To be honest, I couldn't make sense of what was going on—the side that got beaten black and blue didn't cry, while the unscathed victor burst into tears.

"Damn it, why are you crying? It's me who's hurt, not you," the swollen‑faced Pangzi muttered indistinctly, even slipping into a hint of a Shanghai accent.

But when Chen Mo heard Pangzi's words, she not only failed to stop her tears, she cried even harder.

A stalwart heroine of the women's corps, reduced to tears like pear blossoms in rain, I couldn't help but sit beside Pangzi, nudge him with my elbow, and whisper softly: "Hey, Pangzi, could it really be that you…"

"She, she, she—she's your sister, Your Highness, I didn't do anything!" Pangzi rubbed his sore face, glared at me with bull‑eyes as big as a copper bell, and looked at me with a murderous stare.

"I didn't do anything; it's just that her head's not screwed on right, she thinks I did something to her yesterday—you know I slept with you last night." Pangzi blinked innocently, then pleaded: "Hey, shouldn't you go explain things for me?"

I rolled my eyes: "You're the one who hugged her, you're the one who kissed her—none of my business. If anyone needs to explain, it's you, you do it yourself."

"Don't you want to know why she lost her soul last night? Don't you want to know how that female corpse died? Don't you want to get to the bottom of this?" Pangzi stared at the ceiling, acting as if neither of us cared.

"You damn fatty, you're ruthless…" I glared at that dead‑pig‑not‑afraid‑of‑boiling‑water Pangzi, then forced myself to go explain things to Chen Mo.

Fortunately, Chen Mo isn't unreasonable. She didn't buy Pangzi's excuses, but only because Pangzi was truly lecherous. Brother's character is still decent, and after my tireless explanations, Chen Mo finally grasped what had happened, patting her small chest and letting out a relieved sigh.

"Alright, now can you tell me what you saw when you smelled that flower scent in the alley last night?" I began questioning Chen Mo about her unconscious experience; in my view, what she saw in the illusion must differ from what I saw, otherwise she wouldn't have nearly lost her soul.

Ordinary people encountering this situation are surely struck by an immense fright, or rather, fear arises deep in the soul, causing body and spirit to separate.

Sure enough, after I posed that question, Chen Mo let out a sharp scream, her face turning deathly pale; she shook her head repeatedly, too frightened to utter a word.

Later, I handed her a cup of water, helped her calm her jittery nerves, and only then did Chen Mo recount what had happened the previous night.

After smelling that floral scent, Chen Mo's consciousness entered a previously unseen environment; at first, what she saw was exactly the same as what I saw—a green meadow filled with birdsong and floral fragrance, where a little golden‑yellow flower was in full bloom.

As she slowly approached that little golden‑yellow flower, the scene before her eyes shifted like rippling water, and the yellow flower suddenly morphed into a head‑with‑two‑legs monster that kept pulling her outward.

Ahead lay a small pool filled with blood, the blood boiling like hot water, churning; the monster was dragging her toward that very pool. She wanted to struggle, to break free from the monster's grasp, but she found her limbs weak, her whole body powerless. The monster's hands were like two giant pincers, clamping down on her ruthlessly; no matter how hard she struggled, she couldn't budge an inch.

At that moment, countless poisonous snakes and leeches surged up from the blood pool; the snakes coiled around Chen Mo's arms, straining with their long fangs to sink into her arms, while the leeches writhed, biting through her vessels and greedily sucking her blood.

This sight made even me and Pangzi, the two bystanders, feel our scalps tingle and goosebumps rise all over—let alone Chen Mo, the protagonist tormented in the illusion; what must she be feeling?

Later, Chen Mo was so terrified by that scene that she fainted; when she woke, she found herself lying on an unfamiliar bed. Moreover, the bed had some men's underwear on it… and on the headboard was a large photo of our Pangzi shirtless, showing off his little muscles.

I… no wonder Chen Mo woke up furious; if any woman woke to find herself on a strange bed, reached out and touched a stranger's men's underwear, then jerked her head back in fright only to see a lecherous stranger's big headshot, I doubt any woman could calm down and think straight for a while.

As I said that, Chen Mo's pale face, pale from recollection, flushed with a blush; when I turned my head and looked speechlessly at Pangzi, he quickly gave an embarrassed grin and explained: "Well… these past few days I've been too busy to tidy up my clothes…"

"Cough, cough, carry on, don't keep picking on me—you two keep discussing the case." Seeing the room's atmosphere turn odd, Pangzi hastily gave an embarrassed laugh and changed the subject.

I gave him a white‑eyed look, stopped paying him any mind, lowered my head, and sorted out this tangled thread. Clearly, what Chen Mo experienced in the illusion is fundamentally different from what we encountered; of course, I was startled awake by Little Fat before I even got to touch that golden‑yellow flower.

Nevertheless, after some pondering, I have already figured out how the serpent infant kills, and I now understand why that female corpse in the alley died so strangely—dead yet without a single wound on her body.

The serpent infant first lures people into a beautiful illusion; when the victim is off‑guard, it twists the illusion violently, turning heaven into hell, then subjects the mind to various eerie oppressive torments.

It's well known that when a person faces fear that exceeds their psychological tolerance, their body and mind go numb, and excessive fear can cause the soul to detach from the body. However, adults and children differ: a child's soul is still growing, mingling with the body, so children are prone to losing their souls from fright.

But adults… their bodies and souls have been tempered by time, and their mental resilience far surpasses that of children. To scare an adult into losing their soul, the fear must truly be extraordinary.

By now the whole sequence of events has become clear; the killing method has been found, and through it we can easily infer what the serpent infant takes after killing a person. It lures ordinary people with an illusion, then literally frightens them to death; the corpse remains intact, but the soul is nowhere to be found. Evidently, the serpent infant has taken it away.

But at this moment, I couldn't help but have another doubt arise in my mind.

Why does it take the souls of the living, and what is its purpose in doing so? No doubt this is a question worth probing deeply; perhaps once the answer surfaces, the truth will be near.

"The female corpse in the alley is already the tenth body our police have found in this period; the previous nine died in exactly the same way—mysteriously, with not a trace of injury anywhere on their bodies."

"What? Nine more corpses died the same way!" Chen Mo's words made me involuntarily exclaim.

Chen Mo nodded and said: "Indeed, before that female corpse in the alley, there were nine others who died identically—except that their facial features all twisted in unison from fright, and they bore no fatal wounds. Moreover, after checking the records, we found these ten people had no connections whatsoever; even their life backgrounds spanned different social strata, from high‑ranking officials and nobles to gangster thugs and corporate clerks."

"No, there must be a link between them; you just haven't noticed it." I firmly rejected Chen Mo's suggestion, pondered for a moment, and asked her: "Could you pull out the files on those deceased? I'd like to take a look."

When I said that, I was actually just hoping for a try; after all, I'm not an insider in the police and have no authority to rummage through those files.

Who would have thought that Chen Mo, upon hearing my words, would without hesitation say "Okay"—she said, then as soon as she got back she organized the deceased's data and sent it over to us, without any delay or beating around the bush.

"Damn it, you little girl agreeing so readily—could there be some scheme?" Pangzi touched his swollen cheek, eyeing Chen Mo warily.

Chen Mo puffed her cheeks, glared at Pangzi with a vicious look, then turned her head to explain to me—though she couldn't be bothered to pay Pangzi any attention.

"I just feel this case exceeds our police's capabilities, or perhaps goes beyond what ordinary people can comprehend; dragging it out like this isn't good for us police, and it seriously endangers the personal and property safety of Aomen citizens. Instead of dragging on, we should bring it out and study it together with you, hoping to crack the case soon."

Having said that, Chen Mo seemed to recall something, hesitated a long time before telling me: "I know you mainlanders also have some very special and secretive departments, full of religious gifted ones and specially trained professionals; we in Aomen have them too, only…"

"Just what?" I and Pangzi asked in unison, eyes full of expectation as we looked at her.

"Just…" Chen Mo smiled sweetly and said: "I don't think those folks who spend all day just chanting scriptures could handle this case."

Me: ……

After a brief rest, Chen Mo left; before she went, she seized the moment when Pangzi wasn't looking and kicked him hard. Pangzi jumped up, cursing: "Damn it, Hai Sheng already explained everything to you—I didn't do anything to you last night, why are you still beating me?"

Pangzi's words once again drew a fierce glare from Chen Mo.

"You think just because you took advantage of this young lady you can get away with it so easily?" Chen Mo gritted his teeth, saying each word deliberately: "I'm telling you, this isn't over." After saying that, he flicked his head and pushed the door open.

With a bang, the door was shut half-angrily by Chen Mo's casual push. Inside the room, I and Pangzi stared at each other, both silent for a long while.

Seeing Pangzi's expression grow more and more dejected, I couldn't help patting his shoulder to comfort him: "Pang Bro, forget it. Everyone says women are unreasonable; for the sake of solving the case, just bear with it."

Pangzi hung his head, let out a soft sigh, his expression dejected: "I've lost out, damn it, I've lost out. If I'd known, I would have done something last night. Now look, even if I do nothing, I'm being treated like a beast." Pangzi slammed his thigh hard, very unwilling: "I've lost out, damn it, I've lost out."

Me: …….