Chapter 1: Strange Phenomena in the Underworld

  The quiet village became even quieter due to the cold light surrounding the lake, and also because of the withered lotus leaves on the lake's surface, which made it look somewhat desolate. In the village, the secretive forest was helplessly baring its teeth in the midst of the intense autumn atmosphere, everything looked lackluster.

  Chen Zhenhua and Huang Aiguo followed the local police officer along the only cement road leading to the village, which was beside the lake. They had already learned that Zhang Yuan's home was in this desolate village.

  The village was not large, and it seemed that if you shouted loudly at the east end of the village, you could hear it in the west. So when they entered the village, they heard a burst of crying sounds, including those of old women and young girls. The cries sounded very sorrowful.

  Chen Zhenhua and Huang Aiguo heard the crying sound, and their hearts had a kind of ominous premonition. Especially Chen Zhenhua, he felt that they were late, but he couldn't explain why he had this strange feeling, not even to himself.

  They hastened towards the direction of the crying sound, and soon arrived at a farmhouse on the west side of the village. The farmhouse had a courtyard, surrounded by a mud wall, with a tile-roofed house inside. Under the courtyard wall was planted a grapevine, but now in autumn, the grapevines that covered the courtyard wall had also become withered branches, like the thin fingers of an old woman, grasping into the muddy soil of the courtyard wall.

  The courtyard was packed with people, men and women, young and old, all of whom were gazing at the main house as if watching a play. Occasionally, a few gossiping women would whisper to each other, seemingly discussing something. Some elderly people with kind faces would occasionally wipe their eyes, trying not to let tears fall from their dry eye sockets. None of them wanted others to see them cry because they heard the sorrowful wails coming from the master's house.

  "What's going on here?" Chen Zhenhua, Huang Aiguo and the policeman entered the yard, and the three of them also curiously squeezed into the crowd to take a look. After a while, Chen Zhenhua asked a middle-aged man beside him, "Excuse me, is this Zhang Yuan's home?"

  The middle-aged man looked very leisurely, with his hands crossed in front of his chest and his eyes wide open, fearing that he would miss a single desolate scene. So even when Chen Zhenhua asked him, he didn't turn his head to look at Chen Zhenhua who had squeezed beside him at some unknown time.

  "This is Zhang Yuanjia's home," said the middle-aged man, "but he's dead."

  "Dead?" Huang Aiguo hastily asked, "When did he die?"

  "He fell into the lake and drowned, only to be discovered this morning. As for when he fell in, I have no idea." The middle-aged man still didn't turn around, his eyes fixed intently ahead, his bloodshot eyeballs unmoving.

  Knowing Zhang Yuan's death finally made Chen Zhenhua understand why she had such a strange premonition.

  He hastily squeezed to the front, standing at the forefront of the crowd. He saw that the house had three rooms, with the middle room being a hall where an altar was set up, inscribed with "Tian Di Jun Qin Shi Wei". On either side of the Tian Di Jun Qin Shi Wei were some other characters, but they were too far away to be seen clearly. Chen Zhenhua's family lived in the countryside and also had such an altar at home, so he roughly knew what those small characters said: there was Daode Tai Shang Zhen Jun, Jiuku Jiunan Guanyin Bodhisattva, and Zaosheng Du Kang Xian Shi, among others. Outside the door of the hall, a coffin was propped up with two wooden stools (it's customary in rural areas that corpses cannot be carried into the house), and next to it, under the eaves of the adjacent room, lay another corpse covered with a white cloth. If not for the gentle breeze blowing, Chen Zhenhua wouldn't have seen that the corpse under the eaves was male. He knew this was Zhang Yuan, although he had never met him before, but Xiong Lunbing had shown him photos.

  An old woman was squatting beside the corpse, crying as if her heart would break. A young woman dressed like a village girl was lying on the ground, also crying. The two women were so grief-stricken that they moved the surrounding women to tears.

  Chen Zhenhua also shed tears, when he was stabbed to death with an iron rod, his soul floated in the air and saw that his parents were crying like this too, which also caused many onlookers to wipe away their tears.

  There were several old men who walked into the corpse, they lifted the white cloth covering the corpse, Chen Zhenhua saw more clearly, the deceased was dignified in appearance, slender in build, although at this time because the corpse was lying under the dark eaves and couldn't see its appearance clearly, but Chen Zhenhua could also imagine how gentle and elegant this person was when he was alive, that is to say, from the surface, no one could tell that he was a murderer, and such a cruel murderer.

  The corpse's face was pale and swollen, which was caused by being submerged in water for a period of time. Chen Zhenhua, who always had a detective mind, stood far away but thought that his superhuman wisdom could see that the deceased had been dead in the water for more than ten hours.

  Those old men took off the clothes on the corpse's body, stripping them bare, and the women around them looked away in embarrassment. After the clothes were removed, the old woman who had been crying sadly went into the house and brought out several sets of mourning clothes to ask an old man to help Zhang Yuan put them on his body. Chen Zhenhua watched as the old men turned the corpse over and over, and he suddenly felt that something was not quite right, but he couldn't think of what it was for a moment.

  After dressing up, four young men came forward to lift the body and prepare it for the coffin. But unexpectedly, Huang Aiguo stood out and shouted loudly: "Don't put it in the coffin yet!"

  Everyone turned around and stared at this strange policeman, with a mixture of astonishment and anger in their eyes, as if those eyes could kill the policeman.

  "This man is related to a murder case, the police need to take the body back for investigation, don't put it in the coffin yet." Huang Aiguo swept his gaze around at the people, ignoring their angry eyes.

  "Is my son related to a murder case?" The old woman rushed forward with trembling eyes, staring at Huang Aiguo with tears in her bloodshot eyes and gritted teeth. "He's always been so well-behaved, never quarreling with anyone, how could he be related to a murder case?"

  "The police won't care if he's obedient or not, we only talk about evidence. Although it may not be him, he can't get rid of the connection, so we must take Zhang Yuan's body away." Huang Aiguo said with a snort.

  "I won't let you take it away!" The old woman said gritting her teeth, and clenched her thin fist like a withered branch at Huang Aiguo, her fist as black as charcoal.

  "Old lady," Huang Aiguo saw her clenching her fists and facing him, feeling that his dignified police identity was being challenged, so he also got a bit angry. He glared at the old lady with wide eyes, saying, "Don't interfere with the police investigation! Otherwise, I'll take you away too."

  "Then catch him!" The old woman was not afraid of Huang Aiguo being a policeman, she hunched over and rubbed her withered head against Huang Aiguo's belly.

  After all, he was an old man, Huang Aiguo was still somewhat at a loss, awkwardly retreating backwards, but in order not to lose the dignity of a policeman, he still pretended to glare angrily and made as if he wanted to take action.

  "It's absolutely unreasonable!" The accompanying police officer saw Huang Aiguo and the deceased's family members at an impasse, so he also wanted to show off. He rushed forward, grabbed the deceased's hand, trying to lift up the body, and said, "I'm a policeman, who dares to interfere with my work?"

  But as soon as he finished speaking, the woman who was originally crying on the ground suddenly stood up, grabbed the policeman's hand and bit it, causing the policeman to shout "Ah" in pain. Before he could react, the woman bumped him with her shoulder, causing him to stumble backwards, and then fell to the ground with his four limbs in the air, his police hat rolling far away, which caused everyone at the scene to burst out laughing.

  Standing beside him, Chen Zhenhua also smiled secretly, but he quickly calmed down and walked to the old lady's side, holding her hand and saying: "Old granny, I understand your current mood, but regarding the rules, we are also helpless. You just have to understand."

  The old woman turned around and looked at Chen Zhenhua, her anger had lessened a lot, but she still spoke firmly. "I won't hand over my son's body, if you want to take it by force, then take this old bone of mine first."

  Chen Zhenhua smiled and said, "It's normal for you to be sad about your son's death. My mother would be the same if she had lost a son." He almost let something slip out, so he quickly rolled his eyes and explained, then continued, "But your son is indeed related to this murder case. We came to the village this time to ask him to go to the police station for questioning, but we didn't expect him to be dead. I think it's a bit too coincidental, and the coincidence is a bit abnormal. Let's do this: we won't take the body away, let the forensic doctor come and perform an autopsy on his body. If there's no problem with the body, you can handle it yourself."

  "'You can say that much,' the old woman finally calmed down, she sighed and said, 'What are you going to do now.'"

  "We're not forensic experts either," Chen Zhenhua said, "Can you let us take a look at his room?"

  "Of course!" said the old woman, "I'll take you in."

  "Let me go instead!" Huang Aiguo was somewhat worried about Chen Zhenhua's ability to do things, and in fact he had always looked down on Chen Zhenhua's attitude towards doing things. He still remembered the previous Chen Zhenhua's carelessness and incompetence.

  "Let's go!" The old lady glared at Huang Aiguo and stormed into the house first, with Huang Aiguo hastily following behind.

  The policeman got up awkwardly, and the embarrassment of this fall was self-evident for a police officer like him. He patted the dust off his body, pretending to be angry as he stood aside, muttering curses under his breath, staring at the woman with wide eyes and saying: "Next time you fall into my hands, I'll make you pay!" After saying this, he felt as if he had avenged himself and that the embarrassment had been somewhat alleviated.

  The woman spat at him and then turned back to kneel on the ground, bursting into loud sobs again. The onlookers continued to watch quietly and listlessly, some of them yawning and stretching their arms.

  Chen Zhenhua turned around and looked at the dusty-faced policeman, couldn't help but smile again. The policeman saw him smiling and said angrily: "Brother Chen, what's with you... Hey! Stop smiling."

  Chen Zhenhua waved his hand to indicate that he would not laugh again, then turned around and walked to the side of the corpse, stretched out his hand to pull up the white cloth and continued to cover the corpse. In reverence for the deceased, he bowed down and made a bow.

  But unexpectedly, this bow made him take a big shock. He saw that the corpse's head, which was not covered with white cloth, had bloodstains on it, and the bloodstains that had already coagulated stuck his hair together. So he squatted down to part Zhang Yuan's hair for a closer look, and saw a small hole on the top of his head, as if something like an iron wire nail had been inserted into it, and at this time there were still some fresh blood oozing out.

  This case is getting more and more confusing. He thought.