Chapter 42: Strange

When He Jueyun received the notification of Qiong Cang’s registration, he was eating hot pot¹ with Xie Qimeng. One of his employees sent him a message, excitedly asking if they should arrange a sidekick role for him in Qiong Cang’s instance so the two of them could pick up where they left off.

He Jueyun had already been mentally scarred by this employee, whose brain seemed to have a few loose screws; the guy was remarkably skilled at sabotaging his boss. Besides, what kind of role would be tied to a fugitive? A hostage? Qiong Cang would undoubtedly finish him off without hesitation at the first opportunity. After all, who brings a massive piece of dead weight along when fleeing? Did they think it was a romantic elopement?

Did He Jueyun look like someone who didn’t care about his dignity?

He Jueyun replied coldly, “There is absolutely no need.”

The young man, who had no idea how to read his boss’s mind, asked again, “Boss, how about we arrange the identity of a captain of the criminal investigation unit for you? A man who might not be able to catch her, but whom she can never shake off! How about that persona?”

“No need!” He Jueyun replied angrily. “A Sanyao staff member going in to direct? Are you trying to feed the netizens free kills? All you think about all day is personas. Believe it or not, I’ll transfer you next door to be an assistant to the game planners!”

The young man said aggrievedly, “Fine. Then how about we arrange an ordinary little green man²… a minor public servant position for you? Would that work?”

He Jueyun felt a strong urge to block the guy. He put down his phone, only to see Xie Qimeng sitting opposite him, pointing his chopsticks straight at him.

Xie Qimeng asked dangerously, “Who are you talking to?”

He Jueyun kept a straight face. “Discussing work.”

Xie Qimeng asked, “Did you hear what I just said to you?”

“No.” He Jueyun poured himself a drink and said casually, “What did you just say?”

Xie Qimeng’s voice suddenly spiked, startling him so much that his hand trembled.

“Discussing work can get you that absorbed? You aren’t chatting with Qiong Cang, are you?”

What was wrong with these people! He Jueyun felt his self-restraint being tested by the people around him every single day. He said helplessly, “No! What is wrong with you lately? Did Qiong Cang bite you or something? I’ve never seen you this afraid of Fan Huai, but whenever Qiong Cang is involved, it’s like you have a psychological shadow. Can you show me some actual, reliable evidence?”

Xie Qimeng hesitated, and finally said solemnly, “She is very good at lying.”

If it was just about “deceiving people,” He Jueyun thought to himself that he had plenty of personal experience with that. Yet, even after being tricked so many times, he didn’t feel Qiong Cang was the type to take out her frustrations on society.

“You know what? If you really think about it, the people who have lied to you the most since you were a child are probably your parents. When you were still young and naive, they put you off, fooled you, coaxed you into taking medicine, eating vegetables, studying, and behaving. Do you find them terrifying because of that?”

Xie Qimeng processed this carefully, suddenly gasped, and said in horror, “You think Qiong Cang likes me? Where did you get that from?!”

“Bah! What kind of mush is in your brain? What on earth are you thinking?” He Jueyun almost choked on his own saliva. “I meant that those lies are harmless. She didn’t lie to actually deceive you, it was just a joke.”

Xie Qimeng said excitedly, “You don’t understand! It’s not that simple!”

He Jueyun tapped the table. “If you don’t understand, just eat!”

Xie Qimeng was speechless with frustration. He wanted to list Qiong Cang’s misdeeds, but some of the minor incidents were too trivial to bring to the table, and mentioning them would only make him lose sight of the bigger picture. He started to speak several times, but ultimately chose to gather his thoughts first, lowering his head to draft his arguments.

The hot pot broth had long been boiling, white steam curling upward. Slices of meat tumbled lonely in the red soup, and just as they were about to overcook, they were finally fished out by a pair of chopsticks.

Before he could take more than a couple of bites, He Jueyun’s phone rang again, receiving a message from customer service.

They said a talent agency wanted to sign Qiong Cang as a streamer and hoped Sanyao could contact her on their behalf. However, after customer service sent a message using the contact details Qiong Cang had left, they received no reply for a long time. Thus, they asked if the Inspector could help pass on the message, and forwarded the agency’s contact number to him.

Attached below was the commission table for Sanyao’s legal department to oversee the contract signing.

He Jueyun casually switched to his chat app and briefly relayed the message to Qiong Cang.

Qiong Cang quickly gave her answer.

Qiong Cang: Not interested.

He Jueyun then forwarded her response word-for-word to the agency.

Unexpectedly, the other party was extremely overbearing. They probably mistook He Jueyun for Qiong Cang and sent two long paragraphs of text.

“If you don’t sign with us, it will be very hard for you to get ahead. We can help you combat negative press, arrange partners for you, and manage your fans to solicit tips. This industry isn’t easy to survive in; a win-win is the only way out. I hope you think this through.”

“We also have a certain understanding of you, Qiong Cang. Don’t underestimate the power of a team. If you rise to the top, you’ll be taking away other people’s livelihoods, and those people aren’t as easy to talk to as we are. You have quite a few controversial points, making you an easy target for attacks. Your identity alone is enough to raise eyebrows.”

Seeing this combination of threats, bribes, and condescension, He Jueyun let out a dry laugh.

Ever since Qiong Cang’s ID appeared on the registration list for the new instance, her fan count had been growing exponentially. With her abilities, she didn’t need any extra promotion to rise to the top sooner or later. If she really wanted to make quick money, showing her face would be the ultimate shortcut. After all, who wouldn’t like a beautiful, high-IQ woman?

They wanted to make money off her yet acted so incredibly arrogant. Did they take Qiong Cang for some low-EQ sucker to be fleeced?

He Jueyun took a screenshot and sent it directly to Qiong Cang.

Qiong Cang: Reply: Get lost【Get lost】

Not bad. Text accompanied by an illustration. As expected of a former teacher, she was thorough in every detail.

He Jueyun sent the reply to the other party as Qiong Cang wished, blocked the agency, and put it out of his mind.

For once, Qiong Cang didn’t vanish into thin air, and she continued to chat with him.

Qiong Cang: Aren’t you having dinner with Xie Qimeng?

He Jueyun: Yes, I am.

Qiong Cang suddenly asked out of the blue: Do you know why Xie Qimeng³ is named Xie Qimeng?

He Jueyun naturally knew.

When Xie Qimeng’s mother was pregnant with him, she had a series of bizarre dreams for several days in a row, nearly shaking the faith of a perfectly good atheist.

As everyone knew, the birth of any great historical figure was always accompanied by some kind of omen. Rosy clouds filling the sky or a divine goddess appearing in a dream were standard requirements; without at least one, you couldn’t even make a decent showing. When the family elders heard about it, they felt this child of the Xie family was destined for greatness! Uncle Xie found the whole thing so hilarious that he simply put it right into his name, letting him exude an aura of the extraordinary from his name alone.

He Jueyun: You knew?

Qiong Cang replied with a soft sigh: He didn’t waste his parents’ intentions when they named him. He’s said it a hundred times, he’s exceptionally extraordinary.

He Jueyun was shocked: You know him?!

Qiong Cang: Yeah.

Qiong Cang: Otherwise, where would he get the material to badmouth me?

He Jueyun looked up and asked, “You know Qiong Cang? I mean, were you close to her before Fan Huai?”

Xie Qimeng froze for a moment, slapped his chopsticks onto the table, and condemned him with deep pain, “You, you, you! And you still claim you aren’t chatting with her! I knew that sappy look on your face meant you weren’t doing actual work!”

“That’s enough,” He Jueyun said. “What exactly is your relationship?”

Xie Qimeng hesitated. “Just… a distant connection?”

He Jueyun said, “What kind of connection is that?”

Xie Qimeng explained, “Her dad and my dad used to be close colleagues, though of course I didn’t know him. Her father passed away before Qiong Cang was even born. Her mother took it hard, and her mental state became unstable, so she cut off all contact with her husband’s side of the family. Later, her mother died too, and for a while, they couldn’t find any relatives willing to take care of her. My dad was a police officer, and seeing how pitiful she was, he brought her to our house to stay for a while. Originally, our family wanted to adopt her, or use our connections to introduce her to someone reliable who could care for her. I never expected… our time together would be so unpleasant.”

He Jueyun adjusted his posture, his face tense as he listened. But even before Xie Qimeng spoke, he already felt a subconscious resistance.

“I didn’t want to say anything at first, since she was still so young back then. But she was really strange, exceptionally strange, and she liked to scare people. She talked in a creepy way, trying to sound mysterious.” Recalling it now, Xie Qimeng still shuddered from the lingering fear. “Her mother had just died, and she was so small, yet she already knew how to lie using her mother’s name. She kept saying her mother was still around, and that there were dirty things⁴ around us. She’d also say things like, ‘You’re lying, my mother told me so.’ It gave our whole family goosebumps. I was young too, and she scared me so much I didn’t dare sleep.”

A trace of doubt flashed in He Jueyun’s dark eyes, and he raised an eyebrow. “Are you sure she did it on purpose, and not because of some other reason?”

“My dad thought she was hallucinating from trauma, so he took her to see a psychiatrist. She was a bit resistant to the doctor, but her thoughts were clear and her focus was sharp. There were no signs of schizophrenia, and she knew exactly what she was saying.” Xie Qimeng grit his teeth, his tone heavy with lingering resentment. “If it had just been that, we could have let it go, chalked it up to her being young and foolish, something that could be corrected over time. But she also tortured and killed small animals. The dog our family had raised for three years was killed by her.”

He Jueyun’s eyelid twitched. He raised a hand to pinch the bridge of his nose and said, “Wait a minute. You’re saying Qiong Cang tortured and killed animals?”

Xie Qimeng nodded, a wave of lingering fear washing over him. “Childhood abuse, animal cruelty, bedwetting – many serial killers exhibit these traits in their youth, you know that, right?”

He Jueyun tapped his fingers restlessly on the table, seeking confirmation once more. “She tortured and killed your family’s dog?”

Xie Qimeng said, “Yeah. That dog was very smart. Although it couldn’t compare to a police dog, my dad had trained it to be incredibly human-like. She fed the dog the medication the doctor had prescribed her, drugging it, and then killed it in the middle of the night, stuffing it into a kitchen cabinet. My mom was pregnant at the time and nearly had a miscarriage from the shock when she saw it. A child that young… can you imagine?”

“Setting aside whether Qiong Cang could even do those things at her age,” He Jueyun felt that everything Xie Qimeng was saying sounded bizarre, even absurd. He countered, “Qiong Cang is afraid of the dark. How could she go out in the middle of the night to torture and kill your dog, let alone hide it in a cabinet? Why would she do that?”

“Before she entered the game, she never showed any fear of the dark! Anyway, I… I think she’s terrifying. Back then, I even imagined that the dog I considered my friend couldn’t rest in peace after being buried, and would keep clawing its way out of the dirt with bleeding paws.” Xie Qimeng said, the fear still fresh in his mind. “Later, a succession of events happened around her, proving it wasn’t just my imagination. I don’t want to hold a personal bias, but if you were the one who went through all this, you’d feel exactly the same way.”

Xie Qimeng said, “When I saw her again, I knew from her eyes that she hadn’t changed. She’s just learned how to disguise herself – to you, and to everyone else. She probably enjoys the process of committing crimes and covering them up. She had a student who killed several people and disposed of their bodies, who was just like that. That Murderer thoroughly enjoyed hiding in the dark and watching the police run around in circles, and he absolutely worshiped Qiong Cang. Why is that?”

He Jueyun’s Adam’s apple bobbed, a heavy look of contemplation on his handsome face. He asked, “Qimeng, are you actually afraid of her, or are you afraid of her abilities?”

Xie Qimeng shrugged and sighed, “I know you have your doubts. You don’t have to believe me, but I hope you won’t overlook how dangerous she is.”

He Jueyun curled his lips into a smile, remaining noncommittal.

The two of them tacitly skipped the topic.

·

After saying goodbye to Xie Qimeng, He Jueyun went back to Sanyao to organize the files.

He pulled up the recordings of the two Instances Qiong Cang had participated in to watch them again, and also brought up the video of her taking the test.

When he had participated in the games himself, the Qiong Cang he faced was only one side of her, yet that image carried a sense of reality and familiarity. But when he watched the entire game as a third party, he realized that Qiong Cang was an incredibly reliable person.

“Reliable” was an interesting word. It represented the ability to give someone a psychological sense of security. When this word came to mind, He Jueyun knew that, deep down, he still believed Qiong Cang was a good person.

His intuition was a reflection of his life experiences. His life experiences were the accumulation of what he had seen, heard, and known. If he could not even trust himself, who else could he trust?

Besides, if Qiong Cang really had such superb acting skills, how could she fool him but fail to fool Xie Qimeng? Her IQ wouldn’t allow that.

He Jueyun found his own needless worrying rather amusing. He pulled out his phone, his gaze falling on the square avatar in the top-left corner of the screen. He drafted a few opening lines in his head, but before finishing, he exited the screen and called her directly.

Qiong Cang’s voice sounded a bit lazy as she asked, “Hello?”

Hearing her perfunctory tone, he actually felt a bit relaxed. He spun his chair around and said, “I want to ask you a few things.”

“Oh?” Qiong Cang let out a surprised sound, waking up a bit. She said, “You wanted to ask, and you actually managed to hold back until now?”

He Jueyun said, “If I didn’t ask you…”

Qiong Cang countered, “Can an expired lottery ticket still be redeemed?”

He Jueyun laughed.

He stood up, walked to the window, and looked outside. The stars poured down like a river, and the night lights spread out like a brilliant sea. The glittering points of light painted a breathtaking picture.

“I remember Fang Qi saying that the world of top students is already filled with answers. So, is your world really different?”

“There are no answers in this world. I’m just someone who suffered a brain injury,” Qiong Cang said nonchalantly. “But why would you take the words of a six-year-old child who just lost her mother, speaking out only to seek attention, seriously? I lied to them.”

He Jueyun asked, “Because you didn’t know any better?”

Qiong Cang said, “Indeed.”

He Jueyun said, “People are more likely to speak the truth when they don’t know any better, because they only learn to behave after hitting a wall.”

Qiong Cang’s voice was so soft it was barely audible, like a murmur under her breath. “Is that so?”

He Jueyun asked, “Why didn’t you explain it to Old Xie? He’s actually quite easy to talk to.”

Qiong Cang said, “I didn’t like that place anyway. I don’t like anywhere with other people. Xie Qimeng… haha, he’s quite an interesting guy.”

He Jueyun said, “So that dog Old Xie keeps thinking about…”

“Hmm…” Qiong Cang mused. “When someone is under extreme mental stress, they might do extreme things to vent. Afterward, they might feel regret, and there’s no point in dwelling on it.”

He Jueyun asked, almost without hesitation, “Who was that person?”

There was a brief silence on Qiong Cang’s end, and then she let out a muffled chuckle.

He Jueyun was taken aback by her laughter, only to hear her sigh softly, “The moon is beautiful tonight⁵.”

He Jueyun: “…”

“So…” He Jueyun paused, his expression turning quite strange. “You really are just praising the moon, right?”

Qiong Cang said, “Of course. It’s been clear all day, and the night sky is exceptionally clear.”

He Jueyun said, “Alright.”

Qiong Cang smiled and said, “Goodnight.”

He Jueyun mumbled in reply, “Goodnight.”

He Jueyun waited for a moment, but Qiong Cang didn’t hang up.

He pulled the phone away from his ear and was about to press the red button when her voice came through the speaker again. “Oh, by the way, let’s set a time for our next meeting. See you in the game.”

“See you in the game.” He Jueyun’s profile was bathed in a soft, gentle light, the corners of his lips curving upward. “I wish you a successful escape.”

“No need for wishes,” Qiong Cang said confidently. “It’s a done deal.”

Translator’s Notes