Chapter 8 of Volume 1: The Net of Heaven

  Please give me flowers! If before 6 pm today, the weekly flowers can reach 800, I will update three more chapters. If it reaches 1,000, I will update 10,000 words. Please help!

  The next day.

  The sky gradually turned dark, and it was already midnight. Nothing special happened today for the time being.

  Jiang Qicai drank the cup of coffee on the table, suddenly coughing violently several times. He felt a bit dizzy and his head was spinning. He struggled for a while, but eventually shook his head and fell onto the table.

  Outside the window, a pair of bright eyes hidden in the darkness had seen everything, and then she quickly left. But what she didn't see was Jiang Qi's slight smile at the corner of his mouth as he lay slanted on the table with his back to her.

  ……

  The lights in Wang Shiyu's dormitory suddenly went out.

  Wang Shiyu and Zhang Lan lay on their beds, rambling on without a care.

  Two young girls in the prime of youth, with their hearts full of emotions, and the topic that inevitably comes up is men.

  Unfortunately, Jiang Qicai happened to be a man.

  Then Zhang Lan said, "Shi Yu, I have a favor to ask of you, okay?"

  "Huh?"

  "Can you not get too close to that pervert from now on? I hate him!"

  "Really? But yesterday I saw you hiding behind someone, almost hugging them from behind! You told me not to get too close to him, just to benefit yourself?"

  "What are you talking about? I was... Ugh, do you think I'd fall for that guy? Don't disgust me! Just thinking of his face makes me want to vomit!"

  "Really? But you seemed to say something different in your dream last night!" Wang Shiyu said languidly.

  Zhang Lan became anxious, "Am I dreaming? How did I say that? Don't spread rumors!"

  Wang Shiyu giggled and then intentionally imitated Zhang Lan's deep tone, saying: "Unexpectedly, this guy sometimes looks quite safe!" At this point, Wang Shiyu added more fuel to the fire in a poetic tone: "Good brother, kiss me! Ah, do you know that I dream of you all the time?"

  Zhang Lan sprang up from the bed like lightning, pounced on Wang Shiyu's bed, and shouted: "You disgusting little flower idiot, I'm going to fight you!"

  "Hahaha! Am I wrong?" Wang Shiyu also quickly sat up and started fighting back with a pillow.

  Two girls suddenly got into a fight.

  But suddenly——

  "Xiao Lan, listen, what...what is that sound?"

  "Don't scare me, Shi Yu! Nothing dirty will get in, right? Just now when you went to the water room to fetch water, didn't you forget to close the door again?"

  "I..."

  At this moment, a white shadow flashed around the pendant lamp above the heads of the two people.

  Two people raised their heads and saw a girl with disheveled hair, wearing white clothes, wrapped around the lamp cord. Before long, this figure in white began to circle around the pendant light non-stop.

  If it were another girl, she would have been scared to death or driven mad by such a bizarre scene in the dead of night.

  But Wang Shiyu and Zhang Lan were different.

  Both of them had witnessed scenes of people killing each other with their own eyes, although it was just an illusion at that time, but they were also much bolder than ordinary girls.

  At this moment, both of them were equally frightened in their hearts, but Wang Shiyu still calmed down and didn't get scared stiff immediately. However, her mind was a complete blank, and she hadn't thought about approaching the white shadow, hitting it with a pillow, or making a run for the door.

  Wang Shiyu and Zhang Lan were both extremely brave, holding their ground against the white shadow. Both of their foreheads were sweating profusely, and their heartbeats were incredibly rapid, at least three times faster than usual.

  After an unknown period of time, a person's footsteps suddenly echoed inside the house again.

  The emergence of this footstep broke all balance and also broke all silence.

  Wang Shiyu and Zhang Lan's attention was immediately drawn back. And the white shadow on the pendant lamp surprisingly stopped rotating as well.

  Then came a crisp crackling sound.

  The pendant lamp in the bedroom lit up again.

  Jiang Qicai stood under the lamp with a smile on his face, holding a diary in his hand, his eyes fixed on the pendant light.

  Just as Wang Shiyu and Zhang Lan followed Jiang Qicai's gaze, the white-clothed girl on the chandelier seemed to want to subconsciously cover her face with both hands. Suddenly, she relaxed her four limbs hooked around the chandelier, lost her footing, and fell straight down from the chandelier.

  Jiang Qicai took a swift step forward, accurately catching her and holding her in his arms. He then chuckled lightly and said, "Qian Xiaoye classmate, your ghostly game has come to an end!"

  No sooner had he finished speaking than a dozen or so figures burst out of the dormitory door.

  Many teachers along with the principal, as well as some students who were there to watch the commotion, appeared collectively inside the house. Qian Xiaoye's face suddenly turned extremely unsightly, and her eyes gradually dimmed.

  At this time, except for the principal, all teachers and students showed a look of surprise, whispering to each other like a pot exploding, "Is it really Qian Xiaoye?"

  "Am I seeing things? She's actually spinning around the chandelier, how flexible are her bones?"

  "I've only heard that there's a 13-year-old girl in South Africa who can contort her body like a snake, I didn't expect our school to have one too!"

  "This... Qian Xiaoye classmate, why do you want..."

  The murmurs of discussion gradually subsided. 3

  As soon as Jiang Qicai put down Qian Xiaoye's body, he turned around and picked up the diary that had fallen to the ground, dusting off the dirt on it with his hand. He said slowly: "From the bizarre incident of nine deaths and one madness, to the mysterious snake man, and then to Liu Xiaofei's suicide, as well as Zhang Lan and Wang Shuyu's fright tonight... The cause of all this still starts from Qian Xiaoye's older brother."

  "Has anyone heard that in the largest hospital in this city, a series of serial rape and murder cases occurred? And the incident happened right in the hospital?"

  "Of course I've heard! Apparently all the victims were some trainee nurses under twenty years old!" a classmate chimed in immediately.

  "Yes! I've also heard about it, and the newspaper reported on it too. The police were at a loss for what to do with that flower thief, but later that person seemed to have died mysteriously in an alleyway. As for the details, I don't know!"

  "Hey, get to the point already! Even if that flower thief is amazing, what does he have to do with the bizarre case of nine deaths and one madness?"

  Jiang Qicai glanced at Qian Xiaoye, whose face had suddenly changed color, and said slowly, "Of course it's related, because the dead flower picker in the alley was Qian Xiaoye's brother!"

  After saying this, Qian Xiaoye's face changed color again! But she just bit her lip hard and didn't say a word.

  Jiang Qicai continued: "Before the master thief Qian Xiaorui was caught, the police had laid an ambush at every exit of the hospital three times, but still couldn't catch him... Qian Xiaorui, also known as Qian Xiaoye's older brother. The reason is actually very simple! Because after committing the crime, Qian Xiaorui didn't take the elevator to escape to another room in the hospital, nor did he leave through any main or back door. He left through... the morgue!"

  "What's with the infirmary?" The students present furrowed their brows together.

  "Not bad!" Jiang Qicai nodded, "If everyone has a certain understanding of the geographical location of this city, they will know that the hospital where the case occurred is just next to the 'Ji Yuan Shou Yi Dian' in front of the Alien Club. After careful study, it can be understood that there is actually a secret passage inside the mortuary that can lead directly to the Shouyi store! Moreover, I also know that the owner of this Shouyi store is Qian Xiaoye's brother. I think using the Shouyi store as a cover is Qian Xiaoye's brother's incredible escape method!"

  "A classmate raised a question, 'But if there really is such a large secret passage in the morgue, wouldn't the hospital staff have discovered it?'"

  "Good question! That's the key!" Jiang Qicai's gaze was fixed on Qian Xiaoye, "Just now everyone saw that Qian Xiaoye's bones can be flexible enough to bend her legs to her head, which is equivalent to shrinking bones! I have carefully observed in the mortuary that this hidden passage is absolutely impassable for ordinary people, but for Qian Xiaoye, or those who have mastered the art of shrinking bones, it's completely no problem!"

  "You mean..."

  "I've investigated Qian Xiaoye's file, and she has a younger brother by the same parents. From the age of one until now, she hasn't specifically learned yoga or shrinking bones kung fu, so I think her special ability is innate, inherited. Therefore, I believe that her brother Qian Xiaorui is also like her, born with soft bones!"

  Here is the translation:

  "Up to this point, Jiang Qi smiled slightly and slowly opened the notebook in his hand. 'Although it seems that those rape cases, as well as Qian Xiaoye's brother and the bizarre incident of Jiu Si Yi Kuang, are unrelated, but this diary of Liu Xiaofei is the key to unlocking all the mysteries! Let's take a look together, one entry in the diary mentions that on a certain year, month, and day, Liu Xiaofei, Wang Shiyu, Zhang Lan, and over a dozen girls made an appointment to go to the Alien Club..."

  "But there's no mention of Qian Xiaoye's brother here at all!"

  "Not bad! Although there's only one sentence written here, 'That night, in front of the entrance to the Alien Club, we ran into a strange man covered in mud who came out of the Giyuan Su Yi clothing store with a flustered expression. And what was even stranger was that his pants zipper was open to an exaggerated extent, and you could even see the color of his underwear inside. He's a pervert, he's a freak, and later on, I knocked him unconscious with a brick!'...". Jiang Qicai waved his notebook, "Although it doesn't explicitly say so, please note the adjectives used here - 'covered in mud' and 'pants zipper', plus the fact that there was a rape case that night, and the time when Qian Xiaoli walked out of the clothing store matches up..."

  "But all of this is just your guesswork, you don't have any evidence!"

  "Right! I don't have any evidence, but let's just imagine that Qian Xiaorui, who was being pursued by the police at the time, suddenly found himself face to face with these girls after committing a crime. Although he couldn't be sure whether these girls would recognize him or not, due to his guilty conscience, Qian Xiaorui would still choose to kill them to silence them!" As he spoke, Jiang Qichao's gaze turned to Zhang Lan and Wang Shiyu, "You two were also present that day. Can you recall the scene at the time? Do you still have any impression of that man?"

  "No!" Zhang Lan and Wang Shiyu said in unison. "But when we left later, it seemed that there was indeed a man following Liu Xiaofei, but we didn't notice it at the time, now thinking about it..."

  "Uh, Liu Xiaofei's diary also mentioned earlier, 'He is a pervert, is an abnormal person, later, I knocked him unconscious with a wine bottle!' From this sentence, we can imagine that at the time, Qian Xiaoqi was closely following Liu Xiaofei, seemingly wanting to kill her. However, Liu Xiaofei misunderstood him as a pervert who wanted to take advantage of her. Extremely frightened, Liu Xiaofei suddenly bent down, pretending to tie her shoelaces, but in reality, she secretly picked up a brick from the ground. At this moment, Qian Xiaoqi pounced on her from behind, and Liu Xiaofei's subconscious reaction was to stand up and hit him with the brick. Then she turned around and ran... But what she didn't realize was that the blow wasn't just enough to knock him unconscious, but directly killed him!"

  "Jiang Qicai's gaze was fixed on Qian Xiaoye, 'Because of your close relationship with your brother since childhood, after his death, you naturally wanted to help him avenge. Moreover, your resentment is great, you not only want to kill Liu Xiaofei, but also want to kill everyone who saw your brother that night, because you think it was them who killed your brother, if they hadn't appeared, your brother wouldn't have died! But you're very clever, your murder method didn't choose bloody violence, instead, you took advantage of your natural soft-boned physique, scaring them all to death. Liu Xiaofei also saw the so-called white-robed snake person, just like those crazy people, at midnight, surrounding something and spinning around it before losing her footing and falling off the rooftop. Isn't that right? Actually, when Wang Shiyu first saw the snake person, you already wanted to kill her, but you didn't succeed, you didn't think she had a bigger courage than you imagined. Moreover, you killed so many people, but no one suspected you, you're very proud of it, but you can't tell anyone, so you wrote all this as a supernatural story, isn't that right? Do you have anything else to say?"

  Jiang Qicai's words made the entire room fall silent, with everyone's eyes fixed on Qian Xiaoye. It was as if time had completely stood still.

  Qian Xiaoye hung her head, with both hands in her pockets, completely hiding her face. At this time, she used her long hair to cover her eyes and said in a hollow and hoarse tone: "Why? Why did you wake up so quickly when I clearly put medicine in the cup of coffee you drank, and I even saw you drink it?"

  Jiang Qicai chuckled and said, "Not bad, at the time I did indeed drink that cup of coffee, but after drinking it, I coughed up all the coffee! Do you think you can really rely on your cunning to secretly poison me? You're still a bit too tender!"

  "Hahaha..." Qian Xiaoye suddenly let out a terrifying and low-pitched laugh, her hands swiftly lifted from her pockets, her wrists flipped, and a gleaming dagger instantly stabbed towards Jiang Qicai's throat!

  Everyone on the scene exclaimed in surprise!

  But Jiang Qicai's mouth corner, however, revealed a hint of sarcastic smile.