Chapter 1

After murdering a woman, the killer claimed her daughter as his own—and even wanted to marry her.

I thought it was the most horrifying case imaginable.

Until I discovered...

I’m an anesthesiologist.

Outside work, I don’t have many hobbies. Now and then I write a script for a murder-mystery role-playing game, just for a change of pace.

I’d just finished a new one. On the first page, I wrote:

“After murdering a woman, the killer claimed her daughter as his own—and even wanted to marry her.”

I poured a glass of red wine and looked down at my girlfriend, curled obediently in my arms.

She was beautiful, with large, clear, lively eyes like a deer’s.

Those eyes had me spellbound.

She put her arms around my neck.

“What’s this story about?” she asked softly.

I brushed a fingertip over her lashes.

“A particularly serious serial murder case. I adapted it from something that happened to a friend.”

Her interest sharpened at once.

“Which friend?”

I took a sip of wine.

“Wu Ye.”

Wu Ye was a rebel.

Born into a family of doctors, he should have followed the path his parents had laid out: choose the science track in his second year of high school, enter one of the country’s best medical schools, continue straight through to a doctorate, then marry a girl of suitable family standing from the same professional circle.

Except that Wu Ye loathed the pungent smell of disinfectant.

He fought his parents for an entire summer. He ran away, then resorted to self-harm. In the end they gave in and let him switch to humanities.

After that, things went fairly well. He studied history at university, then specialized in his favorite subject—Ming and Qing history—in graduate school.

The one complication was his girlfriend, Ruan Jing, a student at a vocational medical school.

His parents were vehemently opposed.

It made no difference.

Wu Ye loved her.

During the winter break in his second year of graduate school, he took her home.

His parents threw her gifts out the door. They wouldn’t even let her inside.

“You’re short, and you’re hardly handsome,” his father told him viciously. “That girl could win a beauty contest. What do you think she sees in you?

“She’s after our money, and the job we could arrange for her. I’ve met plenty of gold diggers like that.”

Wu Ye decided his parents were simply snobs.

He left with Ruan Jing immediately. That same day, they boarded a train for her hometown, a remote county town.

On the way, she told him that her father hadn’t had much education. He ran a breakfast shop and was very strict.

Wu Ye hadn’t imagined what “strict” would mean.

The moment they arrived, Mr. Ruan seized his daughter’s suitcase and searched everything in it. His intrusive inspection extended even to her underwear; he demanded to know when she had last washed it.

Then he found an opened box of condoms in her makeup bag.

His face darkened.

Before Wu Ye could explain, he was thrown out.

Finally Ruan Jing lost her temper.

“I love Wu Ye!” she shouted. “If you won’t let us be together, I’ll kill myself!”

Ten minutes later, Mr. Ruan opened the door.

He inspected Wu Ye from head to foot, openly suspicious and hostile.

Wu Ye didn’t find that strange. He was, after all, the man who had stolen away someone’s carefully raised daughter.

He studied the older man in return.

Ruan was in his early fifties, slightly stooped, with an unremarkable face that would disappear in a crowd. Only his eyes stood out—sharp and unnervingly bright. Otherwise, he looked like a greasy, thoroughly ordinary middle-aged man.

Once they were inside, he scarcely acknowledged Wu Ye.

He didn’t even glance at the bottle of Feitian Moutai Wu Ye had brought.

When Wu Ye suggested eating at a restaurant, he replied coldly, “No. We’ll eat here.”

Then he tied on an apron and went into the kitchen.

Wu Ye relaxed a little.

Truthfully, he didn’t like Mr. Ruan at all. If he married Ruan Jing, they certainly wouldn’t be living with her father.

His girlfriend told him to make himself comfortable while she washed some fruit.

Wu Ye looked around.

The old apartment was a little over sixty square meters. A few more people would have made it cramped.

There were two bedrooms. The door on the left stood slightly ajar, an old yellow talisman pasted to it.

Instinctively, Wu Ye felt that something was being kept in there.

He could just make out a muffled sob, as though it were drawing him closer.

He stopped at the door and frowned.

A strange stench seeped through the gap: something between rotting meat and a public toilet baking in the summer sun.

Someone slapped his shoulder.

Wu Ye jumped and turned.

His girlfriend.

His throat felt dry. He tried a joke.

“Smells like someone’s feet. Is this your dad’s room?”

Ruan Jing pinched his waist, then held a finger to her lips.

“No. Grandma’s.”

She switched on the light and gently pushed the door open.

The room was tiny. A filthy chamber pot stood on the floor. An old woman with white hair lay on the bed, so deeply asleep and motionless that she might have been dead.

“This is my grandmother,” Ruan Jing said, her voice catching. “She was very beautiful when she was young.

“In 1969, she was sent to the countryside with the educated youth. She taught at a middle school.

“Then a local thug raped her.

“That man was my grandfather.

“I don’t really know how they ended up married. Afterward, she was never mentally well again. Her own family cut her off.

“After Grandpa died, Dad was the only one left to look after her.”

She sniffed, then noticed the smell.

“I think she’s soiled the bed again. I’ll get some hot water and clean her up.”

After she left, Wu Ye ventured inside.

Perhaps studying literature and history had made him sentimental. He crouched beside the bed, looking at the old woman whose life had been so tragic, and sighed.

The smell of decay was growing stronger.

It seemed to be coming from under the bed.

He took hold of the sheet, about to lift it.

The old woman’s eyes flew open.

Her gaze was cold and sharp as a knife.

She seized his wrist.

“Someone’s been murdered,” she whispered shakily. “Run!”

Wu Ye recoiled.

Hurried footsteps sounded behind him.

He turned to find Mr. Ruan rushing toward him with a cleaver, a scrap of cabbage still stuck to its blade.

Ruan blocked the doorway, his eyes icy.

“Who said you could come in here?”

Wu Ye swallowed and glanced back at the old woman.

In those few seconds she had changed completely. Her piercing eyes were now clouded and vacant. Saliva trailed from her mouth. She looked utterly lost, as though she had never spoken that warning.

Something about it sent a chill down Wu Ye’s spine.

He didn’t dare ask. He forced a smile.

“Xiao Jing brought me in to say hello to Grandma.”