Ein Traum von der Seelenwanderung

Kapitel 12

His age.

As the man's figure covered Yu Ling's face, she asked tremblingly in Chinese, "Who...are you?"

"I am a very important person to you."

It was indeed standard Chinese. He stood in front of the sofa, looked down into Yu Ling's eyes, his face expressionless, except for his eyes which shot out an aggressive gaze.

Yu Ling shrank back further, seemingly burned and hurt by his gaze, but she was too weak to stand up and run away. She could only lower her head in fear and say, "No...please don't come near me!"

"I won't eat you."

His voice softened, but his eyes remained fixed on Yu Ling's chest, making the girl even more shy. "What are you going to do?"

"Could you let me see the pendant on your chest?"

"A pendant?"

Yu Ling looked down, wondering what this person was thinking, and hesitated before taking off the pendant.

A stranger in his fifties carefully took her pendant and opened the heart-shaped photo frame—inside was a picture of a beautiful woman who looked remarkably like Yu Ling; her name was Lan Na.

He examined the pendant carefully, even taking out a pair of glasses from his pocket, putting them on, and holding it up to the light to examine it as if he were appraising an antique. He spent more than two minutes on it before turning his attention to Lana's photograph.

The man's eyes flickered violently a few times, then immediately returned to calm, and he asked indifferently, "Whose photo is this?"

"my mom."

What's her name?

"Lanna".

He nodded slightly. "Where is she now?"

"My mother passed away long ago, not long after I was born."

These words made the man pause for a long time. He turned around and paced back and forth in the room a few steps before lowering his head and saying:

How did she die?

“That year, a plague broke out in the village, and my mother, who was in poor health, contracted the disease and died.”

Which year was it?

“Let me think—” Yu Ling frowned and thought for a moment, “Right, it was 1988, I was only three years old that year.”

He turned around and asked eagerly, "What's your birthday?"

"It's the same day as Buddha's Birthday—but my mother died too early, and I was raised by the elderly people in the village."

So you're an orphan?

These words stirred up her pain, and she nodded sadly, saying, "Yes."

"Poor child."

He reached out and stroked Yu Ling's hair, which made her even more nervous, yet she didn't know how to resist.

Then, he put the pendant with Lana's photo into his pocket.

"What are you doing?" she cried out anxiously, her voice trembling with worry. "This is my pendant! My mother left it to me! Give it back to me right now!"

But he shook his head unmoved and said, "But this is also my pendant."

"Yours? Just because it's in your hands doesn't mean it's yours! You scoundrel!"

Having been orphaned since childhood, Yu Ling was used to suffering all kinds of injustices, but she couldn't tolerate her mother's pendant being taken away. In her eyes, this pendant was more precious than her own life. She mustered all her strength and lunged forward, managing to stand up from the sofa, only to be pushed back down by the other person.

"Don't move, child."

This time, he actually spoke Thai. Yu Ling was so surprised that she sat motionless on the sofa, but she still stubbornly said, "Please give me back the pendant! Please!"

“I’m not lying to you, this really is my pendant.” He paused for a moment before saying loudly, “I gave it to your mother.”

"What?"

Yu Ling stared wide-eyed in disbelief. He tried to stroke Yu Ling's hair again, but she pushed him away angrily.

"I'll say it again, this pendant is a gift from me to your mother."

Who exactly are you?

This question made him tilt his head back and ponder for a long time, because this ancient question remains an unsolved mystery for each of us. Finally, staring intently into Yu Ling's eyes, he said in a daze—

"I am your father."

In the small, enclosed room, the air seemed to freeze instantly, as if it had been silent for thousands of years.

However, Yu Ling shook her head in despair—

No, I don't have a father.

19:30

Rainy night.

Nanming Hospital.

The horrific howls of the wolfhounds shook the entire building, making every inch of the dark corridor tremble, as if trying to awaken all the doctors and patients from a year ago.

The barking of "God" drew Xiaozhi out of the emergency room, where she rushed out and followed the sound to the other end of the ground floor.

"Wait for me!"

Ye Xiao carefully jumped off the stretcher. He can walk on his own now. His injuries are not serious, and he can hardly feel the skin and flesh wounds.

He chased her all the way into the corridor outside, where Xiaozhi finally turned around and asked, "Why did you come out?"

"Remember, don't wander around alone at night."

So the two of them found the opposite corridor, where thankfully there were a few dim corridor lights. There, they saw the huge body of the wolfhound "God" barking wildly at an iron door—this was the door to the morgue.

“‘God!’” Xiaozhi ran to her beloved dog, patted its back and said, “So you were here all along. What did you find?”

The wolfhound barked even more incessantly, pounding on the iron gate with its paws. It must have been "inspecting" the hospital building, but then it noticed something amiss at the morgue entrance—not just the smell of dead bodies, but also the smell of a living person, along with lingering gunpowder fumes.

"There must be something fishy about the door." Ye Xiao fiddled with the doorknob. "And it's locked from the inside."

But once the door is locked from the inside, it can be easily opened by turning the handle from the outside.

He carefully opened the iron gate, and a chill rushed out, along with the stench of decay that had accumulated over the years.

"Ah, this is the morgue! Don't go in!"

Xiaozhi then remembered and quickly covered her mouth and nose.

"No, I have a strange feeling."

Perhaps it was his police officer's sixth sense, but Ye Xiao quietly entered the morgue, his feet almost instantly freezing. He noticed several rows of large iron cabinets along the wall; there was no need to open them one by one to check—he knew what was hidden inside.

Walking all the way to the back of the morgue, I found a person lying half-reclined on the ground. Upon closer inspection, I was stunned.

He saw Tong Jianguo!

For a moment, Ye Xiao paused, unsure of what to do. The fifty-seven-year-old man before him, who had been relentlessly pursuing him that morning, their lives nearly at stake, was now lying motionless in a morgue—his left arm was bandaged, the lower half of his trousers torn, a thin layer of frost on his hair, his face ashen, and he remained completely still.

However, Ye Xiao's second reaction was to lower his head and touch Tong Jianguo's nostrils and pulse, and find that he was still breathing faintly.

"Come quickly and help!"

He turned back and called out to Xiaozhi, realizing that he had just been injured and was too weak to move the burly Tong Jianguo.

"ah?"

She trembled with fear, but seeing the wolfhound "Heavenly God" running fearlessly ahead of her, she could only find a mask to cover her mouth and bravely walk into the morgue.

"How could it be him?"

Xiaozhi's expression changed in the blink of an eye. This dying Tong Jianguo was the person in the tour group who hated her the most and was also the most eager to interrogate her.

"Never mind that! Can't you see he's dying? Save him first!"

He put one hand on Tong Jianguo's head and asked Xiaozhi to help lift his feet. The twenty-year-old girl frowned and hesitantly grabbed Tong Jianguo's leg.

One was an injured man, and the other was a girl. Neither of them were very strong, but Tong Jianguo weighed over 160 pounds. He fell down after only a few steps.

The fall jolted Tong Jianguo awake. He opened his eyes groggily and saw Ye Xiao. At first, he didn't understand what was going on, but his survival instinct kicked in, and he struggled to his feet. Luckily, he hadn't been asleep for long; if he had been an hour later, he probably would have become a zombie in the morgue.

Now things were much easier. Ye Xiao grabbed his arm, and Xiao Zhi supported him on the other side. But they were also very careful, fearing that Tong Jianguo might suddenly repay kindness with enmity and continue the hatred and pursuit from that morning.

Perhaps prolonged exposure to low temperatures made him sluggish; Tong Jianguo didn't react at all and was carried out of the morgue by Ye Xiao and Xiao Zhi.

Back in the corridor outside, the temperature quickly returned to normal, and his body was no longer frozen. Tong Jianguo finally came to his senses and struggled to shout, "Why are you all here?"

"Damn it! I'm the one who saved you!"

Ye Xiao was still shaken by what he had done that morning, and really wanted to punch him in the face a couple more times.

"ah--"

Tong Jianguo dared not say anything more. Looking down, he saw a ferocious wolfhound. He was also very weak, and with the gunshot wound to his left arm, he had no strength to resist. He could only be escorted to the emergency room by Ye Xiao and Xiao Zhi like a wounded prisoner.

Three people and a dog arrived at the emergency room, and now it was Tong Jianguo's turn to lie on the critical care stretcher. Ye Xiao was more vigilant; he touched Tong Jianguo's torn pants and discovered that the pistol was gone.

"Don't bother anymore, I have no weapons on me right now."

He uttered a sentence wearily, his body still feeling cold, after all, he had spent several hours in the morgue.

Give him a cup of hot water.

Ye Xiao gave Xiaozhi an order, which she could only reluctantly carry out.

The wolfhound "God" stared intently at Tong Jianguo, ready to pounce at the slightest sign of resistance.

He saw that Ye Xiao was shirtless, with bandages wrapped around his head and body, and asked in confusion, "What's wrong? You're also..."

Are you injured?

But Ye Xiao pointed to his injured left arm and asked, "What happened to your arm?"

"We've been caught off guard!" Tong Jianguo took the hot water Xiaozhi handed him and drank it down without any hesitation. "There's still someone in this city, someone we don't know about."

"who?"

He took a few deep breaths before saying, "A man in black."

"Is he a man in his thirties who speaks Chinese and is dressed entirely in black?"

Tong Jianguo was very surprised: "How did you know?"