Chapter 3458

500,000! If he could get this money, why would he still be a security guard? He could completely use this money to buy an apartment, buy a computer that could connect to the internet, and play games at home every day for as long as he wanted. At that point, with so much money, who could control him?

His ideal seemed ridiculous, but one couldn't blame him. He came from a small place, and his monthly salary was only a little over 1,000. His horizons could only see these things. In his view, being able to play games every day, to his heart's content, was the greatest pleasure.

And buying an apartment was nothing to him. In this era, housing prices in Jiangcheng were still very low, only a little over 1,000 per square meter. After buying a 100-square-meter apartment for 500,000, he would still have over 300,000 left. In his view, that was enough for him to stay home and play games for a lifetime.

Please forgive him for not being able to think about a more distant future at this moment; marriage and having children were not in his considerations right now.

As soon as he saw the content of the reward, he couldn't help but recall the night before last, around six o'clock, when his cousin suddenly returned from outside. His cousin was panting, looking flustered, and the front of his cotton jacket was covered in blood.

He would never forget how his cousin looked that day. He asked his cousin where he had been, and his cousin said he had run into someone he had a grudge against on the road, got into a fight, and injured the other person, so the other person's blood had splattered onto his jacket.

His cousin said someone was chasing him, so he told him not to mention this matter to anyone. He, of course, promised to help his cousin keep the secret.

At that time, his cousin took off that cotton jacket, cut it into pieces with scissors, got some gasoline from his motorcycle, poured it over the pieces in an aluminum basin, burned them, and then flushed all the ashes down the toilet drain.

He had helped his cousin at the time. He saw that his cousin's hands were trembling the whole time, looking flustered, and he kept looking outside, terrified that someone might see him. Fortunately, it had rained that day, the weather was very cold, it was very dark outside, and there were very few pedestrians, so basically, no one saw him.

At the time, he also felt suspicious, wondering if his cousin had committed some major crime, but after all, it was his cousin, and his cousin had treated him well, so he could only bury this matter in his heart.

His cousin was five or six years older than him and had come to Jiangcheng to work before him. He had come to Jiangcheng to work as a security guard at this company because his cousin had introduced him, and the place he lived was also rented by his cousin. His cousin let him live there without charging him rent.

His cousin treated him so well; could he betray his cousin?

However, today, when he saw this reward post, this belief in his heart suddenly became shaky. This was 500,000!

When he saw the details of the reporter stabbing case mentioned in the reward post, he could almost be certain that the person who stabbed the reporter must be his cousin.

The time and location matched almost every detail. The place his cousin lived was not too far from that newspaper office, and he was very familiar with the environment here; it would be easy to run away after committing the crime.

And the time was also around six o'clock, which matched perfectly with the time his cousin returned to the rented apartment.

He had also seen the bloodstains on the front of his cousin's cotton jacket that day. The area of the bloodstains was very large. If it were blood from a fight, how much blood would have to be shed to have such a large patch? It looked more like blood splattered after stabbing someone with a knife.

His cousin was so flustered at the time; it didn't look like a reaction to a fight, but rather a reaction to having killed someone.

His cousin was not a good person to begin with. He often got into fights with others back in their hometown and was a well-known tough guy in their village. He had used knives several times and had been detained for fighting and injuring others. If one said he would kill for money, that would be perfectly normal.

Moreover, the next day, his cousin went to buy a new style of down jacket worth over 1,000, and he also bought one for him. He was wearing this down jacket while surfing the internet right now. This down jacket was indeed much warmer than those cheap clothes. Although it was already late at night, he didn't feel cold at all.

His cousin was also a security guard at another company, and his salary was not much higher than his. With his salary level, he couldn't afford such a down jacket. Where did his money come from? This was almost self-evident.

On this night, this young man named Qiangzi never opened the Diablo game again. He stared at the reward post for almost the entire night. His eyes were a bit dazed, and the ideological struggle in his head was very intense.

To report or not to report, that is the question. Just like Hamlet's classic question, it troubled Qiangzi for the whole night.

Qiangzi took out the phone in his pocket countless times, wanting to dial the phone number published in the post. It said very clearly on it that this phone number was answered twenty-four hours a day.

But every time he took out the phone, he would remember that this phone was bought for him by his cousin Erxiong. Although it was the cheapest 200-yuan second-hand phone, it was the first phone of his life. Erxiong had treated him well; could he really report Erxiong?

Moreover, if he reported Erxiong, could he still have a foothold in the village? Wouldn't his aunt and uncle hate him to the bone?

However, he looked at the post again. The post said that they would strictly keep the secret for the informant and would never leak any personal information to ensure the safety of the informant. And as for the 500,000, the informant could choose any method they felt was safe to collect it.

That was 500,000! If he could ensure his own safety and no one knew he was the one who reported it, then why couldn't he report it?

Besides, it was Erxiong who did the bad thing first. He killed someone. That reporter was a good person. If he killed a good person, then Erxiong was a bad person.

However, Qiangzi knew that this was just an excuse he found for himself. If there were no 500,000 reward, no matter how bad Erxiong was, what did that have to do with him? He would absolutely not take the initiative to report Erxiong.

Just like that, Qiangzi's psychological struggle lasted for an entire night. When he was still staring blankly at the computer, the internet cafe manager urged him to log off. He looked outside the door, and the sky was already bright. Only then did he realize that so much time had passed.

When he walked out of the internet cafe blankly, the manager glanced at the post on his computer screen and muttered that it was another person who had gone crazy for money, and then he casually turned off the computer.

Qiangzi returned to the rented apartment blankly. His cousin Erxiong had just gotten up and was preparing to go to work. He glanced at the disheveled and pale Qiangzi but didn't pay much attention, because Qiangzi was always like this whenever he came back from an all-nighter.

Erxiong said to Qiangzi: "Qiangzi, I'm going to work. There are some steamed buns on the table that I bought. Eat them before you sleep."

Qiangzi nodded. Erxiong's words made his heart feel warm for a while. He was glad he hadn't dialed that phone number.

Erxiong left. Qiangzi ate the buns, too lazy to even wash his face, and then got into bed, preparing to sleep. But no matter what, he couldn't sleep. The number 500,000 was dancing before his eyes, seemingly within reach, yet so far away, which made his heart beat wildly.

He didn't know how much time had passed, but Qiangzi finally fell into a hazy sleep. But he hadn't slept for long before he screamed. It turned out he had a nightmare. In the dream, he reported Erxiong and got the 500,000 reward, but his aunt, uncle, and even his parents, grandfather, and grandmother, all his relatives, were scolding him, saying he was not a human and wanted to sever ties with him.

Just as his grandfather was holding a cane and beating him over the head, he screamed and woke up. He was gasping for air, his face pale.

Erxiong said: "Qiangzi, what's wrong with you? Get up and eat quickly. You have to go to work after eating."