Ren Yifei woke up to a scream. He and Saman were lying on the bed, while Blackie sat blankly in a chair, seemingly having not slept all night.
He remembered that he slept in a good position, but when he woke up he found that he had moved to the left a lot. The right side of the bed was basically empty, while two people were squeezed into the left side of the bed, with the blankets close together.
"..." Was it his subconscious that made him move in his dream?
The screams woke many people. Samantha opened his eyes, his gaze wide with no sign of sleepiness. He pulled his phone from under his pillow to check the time: 5:50 AM, dawn was breaking.
Then Saman stood up, walked barefoot to the door, and opened it: "What happened?"
Ren Yifei was still sitting on the bed wiping his eyes, while listening to the sounds coming from the other side.
"I don't know, it seems to be the girls' side." The other students who were also woken up were still a bit dazed. Judging from their dark circles, they had a tough night and had probably just fallen asleep.
"Should we go check it out? Something might have happened."
"But we can't help much if we go." It was morning, the weather was cloudy, and the big trees in the courtyard looked vibrant, but the shadow of death still hung over their hearts. They hesitated as they looked at the small gate leading to the main courtyard.
Before they could hesitate, the small door opened, and a girl rushed out in a panic: "He Xiangxue is missing. There's this sticker on her room door."
An abstract smiley face drawn with lipstick, blood red in color.
Ren Yifei had considered when an artist might take action, even projecting his own thoughts onto the situation.
The conclusion is either tonight or in two days.
Tonight, everyone's attention is on Chi Bo. Plus, they've been through so much today and are exhausted, so this is actually a good opportunity to make a move.
What puzzled him was how the artist had managed to coax He Xiangxue out. She had just been chased by a mysterious man, so she should have been at her most vigilant.
"He Xiangxue is missing? Have you called her cell phone?" Teacher Wang hurriedly came out of the room, wearing pajamas and slippers, holding her cell phone in her hand, and was calling He Xiangxue's cell phone.
"Teacher, we've already called, and our phones are off," the girl quickly added.
The group hurried towards the main courtyard, where a crowd had already gathered around He Xiangxue and Jiang Min's room.
After the two sisters had a falling out yesterday, they wanted to sleep in separate rooms. However, the other girls were clearly unwilling to switch, so they had to make do for one night. Therefore, the two of them ended up in the same room, which was the left-hand wing.
The side rooms in the main courtyard are much larger than the rooms in the rear building. In addition to bedrooms and washrooms, they can even be partitioned into a small living room with a sofa.
There's a thin blanket lying on the sofa now, along with a charging cable. If this charging cable belongs to He Xiangxue, then she slept in this small living room last night.
"I don't know, she wasn't here when I woke up." Jiang Min was also wearing pajamas, her hair was messy, and there was still sleep in the corners of her eyes, she looked like she had just woken up.
She looked terrified. The mysterious man could take He Xiangxue away, leaving behind her lipstick-covered face, or he could take her away as well.
"Could you please give us this paper?" The two police officers were also alerted. As soon as they arrived, they noticed the A4 paper in the girl's hand. The junior officer casually took out an evidence bag.
"Teacher Wang, could you please ask the staff of this guesthouse to come, especially those who were on duty last night?"
"Okay." Teacher Wang turned around to call someone.
The veteran police officer looked around and noticed that all the students seemed listless.
It was past five o'clock, and it wasn't fully light yet. These people hadn't slept well the night before, and everyone had dark circles under their eyes. Ren Yifei was no exception; he looked like he hadn't slept well and had no energy.
"Go back and get some more sleep," the veteran officer reassured the sensitive students.
They gave a wry smile: "How can we possibly sleep?"
None of the students wanted to leave. Ren Yifei, standing in the crowd, rubbed his face, forcing himself to stay awake. Perhaps only the gamers among this group could truly sleep peacefully.
The two officers had no choice but to ask the students to stay away so as not to interfere with their work. They put on their equipment, took their phones, and went inside to check the scene.
There were no signs of forced entry on the door lock, meaning either someone inside opened it, or someone outside had the key. Considering the phone the missing person took, it's highly likely she went out voluntarily.
"No, this is a smokescreen the killer used to mislead us. Someone outside opened the door and took the missing person and her phone." The veteran officer examined the soles of the slippers and came to this conclusion.
The students didn't understand immediately, so a junior police officer explained, "Look at the shoe prints on the ground."
He Xiangxue returned home yesterday looking disheveled, having stepped into many muddy puddles along the way, leaving her shoes covered in mud. They hadn't bothered to clean up, walking around the house in their shoes, leaving footprints everywhere.
But there are so many footprints everywhere, yet there are no footprints from the outside.
"What if she was wearing slippers?" one student wondered.
The young officer shook his head: "If she went there wearing slippers, why would she have left slippers here by the door? Besides, look at the shoe prints on the ground, aren't the ones near the door a little unusual?"
The students peeked out and looked for a long time but couldn't figure it out.
"Look here, the shoe prints look like they've been wet from water droplets. When did it rain last night? This person must have entered the house after it rained." It wasn't a very important clue, so the young officer simply said it, and the students suddenly realized.
Hearing that someone had infiltrated, Jiang Min's expression turned even more grim: "After the rain? When?"
By this time, the veteran officer had already conducted a cursory search of the house. The intruder was well-prepared and left virtually no clues. To be able to silently abduct a girl nearing adulthood, this person must be incredibly strong; it seemed more like the work of an adult.
Were these two incidents handled by the same person, Chi Bo, and what is the connection between them?
"Young lady, when and where did you find this painting?" The veteran police officer led the first girl who found it to a location to ask for details.
The girl was still feeling a chill run down her spine. She whispered, "I didn't sleep well last night and woke up early this morning. But my roommate is still sleeping. It looks like it's getting light outside, so I thought I'd go for a walk in the yard to wake myself up."
The girl hadn't noticed the paper when she first went out. After walking around the yard twice, she looked up and suddenly saw something dangling at the door of He Xiangxue's room, so she went over to take a look.
To her surprise, upon closer inspection, it was a blood-red face. This terrified her.
You see, there was a murder here just yesterday, and she hadn't slept well, so she was in a tense state and screamed in fright on the spot.
Then the noise woke everyone in the courtyard, including Jiang Min, who opened the door and asked her what was wrong.
"There's a scary drawing on your door," the girl said. She noticed that only Jiang Min came out and found it strange. "Where's He Xiangxue?"
Jiang Min was stunned for a moment: "They're right here... Where are they?"
Then the two suddenly realized that He Xiangxue was missing. They tried calling He Xiangxue's cell phone, but it was switched off. Knowing that something was wrong, they prepared to go find Teacher Wang.
"Was the side gate open when you went to look for someone?" The old police officer remembered that the main gate was locked at night.
The student hadn't noticed before, but after thinking about it for a while, he realized, "It seems to be open."
Just as I finished asking, Teacher Wang came over with two nervous-looking guesthouse staff members. They were the staff who had worked the night shift last night.
"Our shift ends at 1 a.m. If guests need anything, they have to call. However, the main door is locked; you need to know the password and the key to open it," the staff member on duty said.
"Do you have a back door here?"
"Yes, there is, it's in the back building."
They walked and talked, crossing the side gate to reach the rear building. Several people, awakened by the noise, were standing in the courtyard; besides students, there were drivers, illustrators, photographers, and a man with tattooed arms.
The chef and other staff at the guesthouse are locals and don't sleep here at night.
They went to check the back door, and sure enough, it was open, the lock had been opened, and there were traces of someone dragging heavy objects at the door.
Unfortunately, due to the heavy rain last night, the traces are very faint and almost invisible.
The young officer looked up and saw a security camera above the back door: "Is this camera working?"
The two staff members shook their heads: "Our store has few customers, almost none all year round, so these surveillance cameras are useless and were shut down a long time ago."
They already explained this to the police yesterday.
"There are very few guests? Why do the things here look like they're used a lot?" Ren Yifei, standing in the crowd, asked with some confusion.
He was just talking to himself, but the staff members who heard him changed their expressions slightly. They gave a dry laugh and said, "Even when there are no guests, we clean regularly, so it looks like it's used often."
"Hmm." Ren Yifei nodded, as if he had just asked casually.
The two police officers photographed all the traces at the scene and sent them back to the police station, where they also analyzed the evidence.
The only thing that can be confirmed now is that the intruder acted last night when it was raining. Because when 'he' entered He Xiangxue's house, he was dripping wet, and the marks on the back door had been washed away by the rain.
"Where were you yesterday when it was raining? What were you doing? Did you hear anything unusual?" The veteran officer began a new round of investigation. The junior officer was called outside to check if there were any other discoveries.
Most of the students were already asleep at that time. Ren Yifei shook his head and said, "I was asleep at that time. I only vaguely heard the sound of rain and didn't pay attention to anything else."
Samantha also said that he had been asleep for a long time and had not heard any unusual sounds.
Blackie, who shared a room with them, said he hadn't slept all night and had been sitting in a chair the whole time. But he hadn't heard anything either.
Ren Yifei and Saman now have alibis.
"I heard a creaking sound yesterday, but I didn't pay attention and thought it was just the wind." A student near the back door was still a little scared. He didn't expect to be so close to the intruder. Luckily, he didn't let his curiosity get the better of him and go out to check.
"Around when?"
"Let me think... Oh, I remember now, it was around three o'clock, and it was raining quite heavily then."
"Are you sure it's around three o'clock?" the veteran officer asked.
"Yes." The student nodded. "I have an app here that sends out update notifications at 3 a.m. every time. I remember hearing that squeaking sound not long before the app sends out the update information, so it's almost 3 a.m.
The veteran officer asked the others, and they said that many of them had slept lightly last night and vaguely heard some noises. However, three o'clock is when people are most sleepy, and with it still raining outside, none of them went out to check.
With no surveillance cameras, no witnesses, and most of the traces washed away by the torrential rain, even the most experienced police officers couldn't come up with a solution for the time being.
"Teacher," the young police officer rushed in, sweating profusely, his face a mixture of horror and curiosity, "I've made a new discovery."
"If you've made a discovery, you've made a discovery. What's with that expression?" The veteran officer couldn't stand it anymore.
The young police officer pulled him toward the back door, saying, "You'll see when you get there."
The veteran officers went to investigate. They avoided areas with visible traces, stepping over a newly laid wooden plank, followed by a line of students who were both afraid and curious. When they came out through the back door, their expressions mirrored those of the young officers.
There, against the wall by the back door, was a row of more than a dozen pairs of shoes.
Three or four inches, pointed toe, red, heeled shoes for small feet.
The author has something to say: Artist: I'm offering my embroidered shoes as a sacrifice to the heavens, sacrificing my fellow Daoists rather than myself.