Lin Han was intelligent, beautiful, healthy, and adorable. Of course, she had another advantage: having lived a pampered life since childhood, she never took money seriously. Therefore, she wouldn't make Boss Wan climb Mount Tai for a hundred thousand yuan.
Was this a setup?
Currently, I had no leads. With my hands and legs injured, I could only place my hopes on Fatty. Fatty was skilled at tailing people; I could be confident about that. Big Huang and Fatty went to look for clues.
Big Huang had not slept all night. While Fatty was out of sight, sleeping in the car when Big Huang was chatting, Chang Dachun took Big Huang to a nearby hotel to rest. Not long after, Teacher Wang Ren also arrived.
"Did Zhang Si say anything?"
"Senior Brother said you arrived in Tai'an on the third day of the junior high school and visited his shop in the afternoon. After chatting for a while, Senior Brother had something to attend to and left. You and Lin Han went to the hotel. The next day, you and Senior Brother went to Mount Tai. You parted ways with him at the South Heavenly Gate and never saw him again."
Listening to this, I became even more perplexed. "I went to Mount Tai with Zhang Si, so why did I leave after only a short while? And I left without even notifying him?"
Teacher Wang Ren handed me a photograph. Looking at it, an indescribable sadness welled up in my heart. "Old Ghost has been captured."
This photograph showed Old Ghost chained like a dog, with a teleportation device nearby and a bowl of thin porridge.
"Xiao Shi is not someone who can be easily captured."
"Who could capture him?"
"The only ones who could deal with Xiao Shi are the senior and junior disciples who learned from our master. Someone who could do this might be Zhu Guang, who disappeared many years ago."
"Zhu Guang?" I repeated the name, and for some reason, a profound sadness washed over me.
"Have you remembered anything?" Teacher Wang Ren looked at me with concern. I shook my head and suggested, "Perhaps you could hypnotize me again?"
"Hypnosis isn't a panacea. What was the situation yesterday will be the same today. Things you haven't remembered are no longer in your brain. No matter what I do, you still won't recall them."
...
I sighed. "Teacher Wang Ren, can I ask about multiple personality disorder?"
"Why ask about that?"
"I don't know, I just suddenly want to know."
"You must have already figured it out during your three months here. There's no need for me to hide it from you and further confuse your already disordered memories. In fact, your grand senior uncle, Zhang Si, suffers from multiple personality disorder. He has three personalities: the scholar, the cook, and the lecher. Because of Master's teachings, these three personalities are relatively stable. He wakes up at six in the morning, and until two in the afternoon, the cook personality dominates his body. From two in the afternoon to ten at night, it's the scholar. The lecher is a negative energy personality. Therefore, the cook personality has to climb Mount Tai every day to exhaust himself completely. From two in the afternoon to ten at night, the scholar manages Zhang Si's Lu Cuisine restaurant. By the time the lecher emerges, his body is usually too depleted to do anything else."
"So that's how it is?"
"You must have known this, otherwise, you wouldn't have asked? The human subconscious is a marvelous thing. Even if memories are lost due to some accident, subconscious traits will still manifest."
This was a setup. I had initially intended to tell Teacher Wang Ren about it, but after she mentioned Zhang Si's multiple personalities, I fell silent. My notebook, left by Chang She Gui Li Jiu, was lost. Wasn't his warning still relevant?
"I still can't remember."
"Don't worry. I'll tell you what your grand senior uncle knows about your itinerary. You arrived in Tai'an in the morning, went shopping with Lin Han, and bought shoes. You visited your grand senior uncle in the afternoon. Since it wasn't the cook's time, the scholar personality of your grand senior uncle exerted great effort to make three dishes for you: Tofu balls, braised pork rice, and stir-fried noodles. Afterward, the lecherous personality of your grand senior uncle awakened, and he left you to go on a date. However, before that, you agreed to climb the mountain the next day..."
Wang Ren spoke to me in a somewhat rambling manner, but I couldn't recall anything. I interrupted her. "Did you ask about the runes?"
"I did. Your grand senior uncle doesn't know about any rune caves on Mount Tai. He goes up the mountain before two every day to do some health exercises, and then the scholar personality takes the cable car down to return to the restaurant and open for business."
...
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Wang Ren had no leads. I could only ask Teacher Wang Ren to rest well and then closed my eyes in contemplation. Luo Bo arrived. He hadn't come with Teacher Wang Ren. I thought that with Luo Bo's intelligence, he would surely bring up questions I hadn't considered. Indeed, Luo Bo immediately questioned me upon entering, "Tang Nan, Lin Han is dead, why didn't you report it to the police system?"
"I didn't?"
"You didn't."
"Then how did I cremate Lin Han's body?"
"This is a question I should be asking you?" Luo Bo sighed. Indeed, this was a question he should have asked me, yet I asked him first.
I smiled. This was the first natural smile since my accident. I asked Luo Bo, "Is it possible that Lin Han's death was faked?"
Luo Bo pursed his lips and didn't answer my question. Seeing his reaction, I said sadly, "There's no such possibility, right?"
"My thoughts are the same as yours. Therefore, I've already checked the urn with Chang Dachun. It does contain human bones..."
"There are still bones?"
"How could they be burned completely clean? There are always some human bones left. Forget it, let's not dwell on this. How was the person cremated? I'll solve this problem first; it might help you recover your memory."
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"How will you solve it?" I asked Luo Bo.
Luo Bo looked at me seriously. "Do you have any direction?"
"No!"
I had no ideas at all now, everything was a mess. Luo Bo had to investigate himself. Yu Xiaoluo stayed to take care of me. She offered me lunch at noon, but I didn't eat. She peeled an apple for me, but I still didn't eat.
I stared blankly at the contents of my bag. Yu Xiaoluo shouted angrily, "If you keep staring at those things and refuse to eat, I'll throw them all away!"
Hearing this, I looked at Yu Xiaoluo coldly. Yu Xiaoluo became a little nervous and stammered, "I... I just want... want you to eat. I didn't mean I'd really throw them away."
"What is this?"
I took out the Peppa Pig pen and handed it to Yu Xiaoluo. Yu Xiaoluo took it, looked at it, and said in confusion, "It's just a pen with a pretty little pig on it."
"Have you ever seen a pink pig like this before?"
Yu Xiaoluo shook her head.
"This probably isn't from China. However, Tai'an is a tourist attraction, so it's not unusual for foreigners to be here. The question is, why would I pick up something belonging to a foreign friend?"
Yu Xiaoluo shook her head again, her face contorted in a grimace. "You were always an incomprehensible little trickster, and now with your memory loss, I feel like you're just a bunch of garbled code."
"Is that so? Perhaps it's not garbled code, just needs time to reassemble."
...
Luo Bo returned first in the afternoon, looking somewhat dejected. "There's a major case, and the comrades here are also swamped. They found a beat cop who was also responsible for the crematorium. He drove me to the crematorium. Cremating without a death certificate is subject to accountability. I asked several crematorium leaders, but none of them had any clues. They all swore that no one at the crematorium would illegally cremate bodies."
"If they don't burn them, where did the ashes come from?" I was very displeased.
"That's what needs to be investigated. How can we find out by asking? Once the criminal investigation team has time, they will immediately file a case and investigate." Luo Bo said helplessly.
"What is the local criminal investigation team busy with?" Yu Xiaoluo asked.
"A British girl came here to meet someone online and has gone missing. It's an international missing person case. That British girl was on a tourist visa, so you can imagine the pressure on the local authorities!"
"When did this happen?"
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"She came here about a month ago."
"Why are they only investigating now?"
"It's only just been reported."
Because Yu Xiaoluo wanted to help me, her tone was not very pleasant. I listened from the side. The British girl's name sounded familiar, but I had no impression of it. I had no memory related to this at all.
...
At six in the evening, I was still receiving intravenous drips. Fatty and Big Huang arrived together. Big Huang looked more energetic, and Fatty didn't seem as tired.
"That Boss Wan stayed at the bathhouse all day. After we found him, he seemed a bit absent-minded, staring at his locker all day," Fatty reported his findings.
"What locker?"
"The bathhouse has member-exclusive lockers."
A spark lit up in my mind. I immediately asked, "The kind unlocked with a magnetic card?"
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"Yes!"
"What's in the locker?"
"Money!"
"If..."
I said two words and paused to think. Big Huang eagerly asked, "If what?"
...
It couldn't be that simple, could it? I needed to think carefully. I opened my bag and took out the magnetic card. Big Huang stared at it and even commented, "Impressive, and a Peppa Pig pen too."
"What is Peppa Pig?"
"It's an animated series released in the UK last year, suitable for all ages, and very good. I didn't expect merchandise to appear in China so quickly."
"British?"
"Why are you asking this? Let's talk business. If what?"
This pen was originally irrelevant. Since it was British, I decided to take it out, along with the two strands of hair, and clip them onto the black folder. I handed it, along with the magnetic card, to Fatty. "If this magnetic card can open Boss Wan's member locker, put these things inside."
"Then what?"
"Call the police."
Big Huang was completely bewildered by my instructions and asked me in surprise, "Don't you have police friends? Do we still need to call the police? And isn't your identity also related to the police?"
"Don't get us involved in this. Make an anonymous call."
"What should I say?"
"Say it's related to the British girl, then give the location and the member locker number. Finish it as soon as possible and don't expose your identity."
Big Huang wanted to ask more, but Fatty pulled him. "Let's go. It's dinner time, and I'm afraid Boss Wan might go to the massage parlor after dinner. Let's handle it first."
After they left, I said to myself, "It's already like this, so don't be afraid. The Charles Atlas effect states that the more afraid you are, the more you fail."