Oracle bone fragments

Chapter 18

"They said they knew their daughter had a digital camera, but they just couldn't find where it was."

Han Shang died three days after filming the wizard skull, less than 48 hours later. Where did the camera go?

It fell off? Or was it broken and sent for repair?

What a coincidence?

As she slowly walked over, she kept thinking about this question, and said hesitantly, "Could it be... that night?"

Sun Jing slammed his fist into his palm: "Yes, that must be it."

He let out a long breath and reached up to touch his forehead, where it had mostly healed.

“He’s not looking for Han Shang’s dictation recording; he doesn’t even know such a thing exists. He wants the video camera! So, Han Shang’s death is because she filmed this video? What’s the big deal about just a video of a wizard’s skull? She killed someone in less than forty-eight hours. In such a hurry, what exactly did she film?” Sun Jing’s brows furrowed more and more.

Xu Xu's perspective on the matter differed from Sun Jing's.

"If this video is the motive for murder, how many people could know about its existence in such a short time? Could it be... Wen Zhenhe?" The disgust for Wen Zhenhe in her heart made this name pop into Xu Xu's mind immediately.

"He is indeed a suspect. If the wizard's skull cannot be exposed for some reason, then his firm refusal to let us into the warehouse makes sense. But he's not the only suspect. On the morning after the Han Shang Restaurant artifact warehouse, Wen Zhenhe reported Chen Jiongming's violation to the museum, so many people know about it. This is a bit like 'the magistrate is allowed to set fires while the common people are forbidden to light lamps,' and many people are spreading it as gossip. Maybe some people closely related to the museum will find out soon too."

"I see..."

"If only we could see this video. Go to the Han family again; maybe Han Shang will copy the footage onto her laptop." That night, Sun Jing roughly looked through the footage in Han Shang's room. He didn't remember her having a desktop computer, and he didn't see a laptop, but she always definitely had one.

"Don't worry, that guy might have taken it with him too," Xu Xu said.

"No, if he had this handbag, he wouldn't have been able to run so nimbly."

Xu Xu headed to the Han family again. This time, Sun Jing couldn't be as leisurely as before. He kept turning his jade ring and glancing at Xu Xu's path from time to time.

Sun Jing was now convinced that Han Shang had been murdered. As for how the killer made the murder look like an accident, he didn't think much about it. Everyone who participated in the mysterious experiment was eccentric; they must have a way of committing murders that defied common sense.

Twenty minutes later, Xu Xu returned. Sun Jing knew from afar that it was hopeless; she left with one bag and returned with another, nothing extra.

Xu Xu's expression wasn't particularly disappointed. She said, "Han Shang's laptop was sold to them because it was too painful to keep it and be reminded of him. They sold it a few days ago, and I don't know if it'll be sold in time. Before they sold it, they formatted the hard drive. As long as we find the machine, it shouldn't be too difficult to recover it."

The laptop had been sold to a nearby computer repair shop. The two men went to the shop, the owner made a phone call, and then told them the laptop was still there.

The Han family sold the computer for 2,800 yuan, and now they have to spend 4,000 yuan to buy it back, including a hard drive recovery service. That wasn't a problem. They waited for over two hours, grabbed a quick dinner nearby, and finally brought the shiny silver laptop home.

Of course, it's still Sun Jing's family.

The greater the expectation, the greater the disappointment. After searching through the recovered hard drive contents, I found nothing.

However, Xu Xu felt that Sun Jing had still gained something. They actually found a selfie of Han Shang in a dressing mirror in a folder. Her breasts were perky, her areolas were pink, her waist was very thin, and her legs were pressed tightly together.

“Everyone has a side that's unknown to others,” Sun Jing sighed. “Unfortunately, it's not popular enough yet.”

"What other exciting stuff do you want to see?" Xu Xu jumped up and grabbed Sun Jing's neck. "You immoral voyeur."

Sun Jing was a little out of breath, but she didn't struggle. She put her arms around Xu Xu's waist, and her hands naturally loosened.

"I think you're just getting angry because you don't have as good a figure as others."

"How is that possible!"

Sun Jing's hand slipped inside her collar.

"Or let me take some pictures and compare them with hers."

Xu Xu pursed her lips and remained silent, then pinched the soft flesh on Sun Jing's lower back forcefully.

The sun shone on my eyelids, and I slowly reached out to touch them, but didn't touch Sun Jing. I opened my eyes, turned my head, and saw Sun Jing sitting at the dining table.

Slowly, she pulled the blanket up and sat up, noticing fried dough sticks and soy milk on the table. Han Shang's notebook was open and placed in front of Sun Jing.

"You got up very early?" Xu Xu asked groggily, not fully awake yet.

"More than an hour."

Xu Xu hummed in agreement, sat there comfortably for a while, and then asked, "You were looking at her computer? You looked at it carefully several times yesterday, but there was nothing there."

As she said this, she suddenly woke up, threw off the covers, jumped out of bed, and angrily shouted, "You're looking at her photos again!"

Sun Jing pointed to the drawn curtains, then slowly and hurriedly began to put on her clothes.

“People have blind spots, so I looked at it again this morning,” Sun Jing said.

"Tch, we couldn't find any of the four eyes yesterday, who knows what you were looking at this morning."

"Don't be so insecure," Sun Jing laughed. "I actually found something."

At this moment, Xu Xu had already dressed and rushed to Sun Jing's side.

The screen displayed, however, the folder where Han Shang had stored the 13 recorded files. I had already looked at it yesterday.

"What's wrong with this?" Xu Xu asked, puzzled.

“We didn’t notice yesterday. Look, there are nine documents here.”

"Ah!" After Sun Jing's reminder, Xu Xu realized that there were only eight audio recordings on the USB drive, and there was an extra one here. Last night, their attention was focused on the video file that was probably a recording of the wizard's skull, and they had overlooked it without looking at it carefully.

"There's a new recording, dated the night before Han Shang died. She had already put the USB drive inside the chandelier shade by then."

"Why didn't you wake me up sooner? What did she say?"

"I'll wait to listen with you," Sun Jing smiled. "There's no rush for you to go to sleep. Go wash your face and brush your teeth first."

"Oh." She lowered her head and obediently walked to the bathroom.

Han Shang's voice came from the laptop.

It hadn't even been a month since Sun Jing last heard that voice. But now, it sounded both familiar and melancholic to him.

"The hope of borrowing the wizard's skull is getting slimmer and slimmer; in fact, I've given up hope. The head of the oracle bone department at the East Museum is difficult to deal with; I'm not sure if he's too rigid or just too greedy. But yesterday I managed to get around him; his subordinate led me into the storeroom and showed me the wizard's skull. But that's the most he can do."

"Perhaps it was because of too many expectations and imaginations beforehand, but when I saw it, I was actually a little disappointed. I thought I would immediately sense its unusual nature, perhaps a stirring of the soul, or perhaps my hallucinations would reappear. But none of that happened. Of course, after I circled it carefully with my camera again and again, the ancient symbols surrounding the round holes on the skull began to give me a sense of mystery. It slowly seeped into my heart, without any sudden storm. But then I doubted that it was just an illusion; perhaps anyone would feel a sense of mystery upon seeing ancient oracle bones."

"I still don't understand why Sven Hedin valued the wizard's skull so much. There must be a reason beyond its cultural value. Perhaps he had an insight that I can't reach. I will study the video footage I took back in the future, but it may not yield any results. After all, for decades, so many professionals have studied the oracle bone inscriptions on the skull, but no universally accepted reasonable decipherment has been found."

At this point, Han Shang coughed lightly and paused slightly.

Han Shang spoke these words somewhat hastily, but Sun Jing didn't sense urgency; rather, she seemed agitated. In all the previous recordings, except when mentioning her deceased boyfriend, Han Shang had displayed a calm demeanor, calmly recounting everything that had happened, almost like an observer.

But this recording is different. There are moments when his tone is calm, but Sun Jing feels that's just feigned composure. Hearing this, the speech becomes inconsistent, sometimes fast, sometimes slow, with hesitant pauses, clearly indicating that Han Shang is emotionally unstable and distracted.

"The man who brought me into the warehouse is named Chen Jiongming. He texted me earlier, asking me to meet him tomorrow. He said he had important information about the wizard's skull to tell me. Maybe he wants more money, haha."

In the recording, Han Shang chuckled twice, her laughter sounding slightly forced. Sun Jing and Xu Xu were stunned; the tomorrow Han Shang mentioned here was the day she would die.

“I called him back to ask for clarification, but his phone was off. Tomorrow is the premiere of ‘Tale.’ I’ve been looking forward to this day. The time he asked for is right before the premiere, and the location is a bit strange, but not far from the theater. I’m also looking forward to what he’ll tell me. I hope he doesn’t take up too much of my time, haha.”

She smiled again.

“I…I understand why she stopped there,” she murmured slowly.

Han Shang didn't explain why the agreed-upon location was strange, but Sun Jing and Xu Xu understood her meaning. Normally, meeting places, if not teahouses or cafes, would be the entrance of a building or in front of a landmark. But what Chen Jiongming texted her was likely just a street address. Han Shang found this ordinary address, stopped to wait for Chen Jiongming who had arranged the meeting, and then was killed by a falling flowerpot.

Han Shang continued speaking.

"Speaking of which, a lot is going to happen tomorrow: the premiere, Chen Jiongming, and Sun Jing. Sun Jing is Sun Yu's great-grandson. I wonder if I can find anything unusual about him. Given the special circumstances of the Sun family for four generations, I think it's quite possible. I used a rather interesting way to ask him to meet me, and I hope he likes it. I want to leave him with a good and deep impression so that he might have the patience to listen to my bizarre and absurd story instead of immediately kicking me out."

Han Shang stopped again. This time she paused for a long time, then took a long breath and exhaled.

"I hope to meet him...it will be pleasant," she said slowly and in a low voice. The recording ended there.

“She had a premonition,” Xu Xu said.

"Yes," Sun Jing sighed.

This ninth recording is clearly different from the previous eight. The previous recordings were all made after Han Shang had completed a certain stage of his investigation, and Ran had preserved them in audio form. If this standard is followed, then Han Shang should have recorded the ninth recording after reaching a conclusion on the video study of the wizard skull, or after obtaining valuable information from his meeting with Chen Jiongming.

But she didn't. In this recording, she only talked about what she had just done and what she was going to do; nothing of value had yet been achieved. Han Shang's dictation recordings were never her personal diary; she was trying to unveil the mystery of the experiments, preserving each step with her voice. This unusual behavior could only have one reason—she had a premonition of her own death, whether it was due to a mysterious intuition or a fear of the curse of Zweig's plays.

She must have felt extremely conflicted. Even though she had already put the USB drive under the lampshade, taking it out wouldn't have been difficult. The reason she didn't do so was probably to have a good omen.

Why the rush? It's as if there won't be another chance if today is missed.

She must have said that to herself.

No one wants to die, and when there are vague ominous signs, people are even less willing to do anything that carries an ominous connotation.

After the recording stopped, Sun Jing and Xu Xu were both silent for a while. They both needed time to process Han Shang's emotions and the information she revealed.

"How... could it be Chen Jiongming?" After a while, he slowly spoke.

This person, who was initially thought to be insignificant, even somewhat clumsy and ridiculous, suddenly found himself in the center of the stage. It was truly unexpected.

Is he the murderer? Is he connected to the mysterious experiment? But why did he write such a ridiculous letter to Xu Xu?

“There’s a problem.” Sun Jing shook his head. “Our original assumption was that Han Shang was murdered because she photographed the wizard’s skull, but Chen Jiongming was the one who took her to see the wizard’s skull.”

"But no matter what, we have to find a way to make contact with this person," Xu Xu said.

“Even if it’s not Chen Jiongming, there must be dangerous people around him. We need to think carefully about how to approach him.”

"Puff!" Sun Jing threw a thick felt blanket on the ground and unfolded it.

He put on rubber gloves and lifted the lid of the large, wide-mouthed earthenware jar next to him.

Inside was a yellowish, cloudy liquid, and a foul odor quickly evaporated into the air. It wasn't just stench; it also had a mixed smell of alcohol and sauerkraut, which was disgusting.

Sun Jing held his breath, reached in, and pulled out the skull that was submerged inside, placing it on the felt blanket.

He wiped the skull clean with a cloth and slowly rotated it in his hand. The surface color had changed slightly, becoming lighter and a bit yellowish.

The pile of seasonings he added to the earthenware pot wasn't for cleaning the skull. He turned the skull upside down, picked up a file, and made a small cut along the bottom edge. After examining the color inside the cut, Sun Jing threw the skull back into the pot; it still needed at least five hours to cook.

I rolled up the blanket and kicked it against the wall, took a shower to get rid of the strange smell, and went out.

They hadn't found a suitable opportunity to contact Chen Jiongming for the past few days. Although both of them felt that the possibility of him being the murderer was slim, it wouldn't be safe to ask him out rashly. Since a natural opportunity would arise soon, they patiently waited.

Today, Xu Xu, representing Ouyang Wenlan, went to the Dongbo Museum to receive the wizard's skull. There were only two people in the Oracle Bone Department, and both could see it. Sun Jing, on the other hand, went with Xu Xu under the pretext of wanting to see it first.

In fact, when Sun Jing and Xu Xu arrived at the Dongbo Museum, the wizard's skull had already been placed in a special temperature and humidity controlled safe. Procedurally, Xu Xu and the Dongbo staff would have the safe delivered to the Ouyang family home by a security company vehicle, and in front of Ouyang Wenlan, they would open the safe and retrieve the wizard's skull. The subsequent safekeeping and exhibition would then be Ouyang Wenlan's responsibility.

Only Wen Zhenhe was in the Oracle Bone Department office. Chen Jiongming, who had been sent to the warehouse to retrieve the wizard's skull, was probably sitting in the security company's car with the safe, waiting. Small fry are always destined to run errands; even if he hated Wen Zhenhe to death, he still had to obediently do the work he was given. Wen Zhenhe didn't care how long Chen Jiongming would wait. She made tea for the two of them, smoked her pipe, and with a respectful smile, inquired about Ouyang Wenlan's recent situation and the preparations at the Oracle Bone Museum. Half an hour passed in the blink of an eye.

Both of them were preoccupied with the security company van and had no interest in chatting with Wen Zhenhe. Xu Xu finished her tea, and when Wen Zhenhe offered to refill it, she declined.

“I have a meeting later, so I won’t be able to go see Elder Ouyang today. Please give him my regards. I’ll go to wish Elder Ouyang a happy birthday early on the opening day of the exhibition. The car is at the door; you’ll see it as soon as you go out.” Wen Zhenhe finished speaking and got up to see the two of them to the door. He didn’t usually seem like a considerate person, but his polite manners were so thorough; one wondered if he still had his eye on Xu Xu’s position as curator of the Oracle Bone Museum.

The van had already pulled up underground. Xu Xu and Sun Jing, who were waiting by the guardhouse, hadn't even reached the van when Chen Jiongming opened the door and greeted them with a smile.

The security company personnel sat in the front row, while the back row consisted of three people and a special safe that was larger than a regular microwave oven.

After so much planning and so many unexpected changes, the so-called wizard's skull was now within reach. The significance of this national treasure was no longer as simple as it had been at the beginning. Its magic, even though it was stored in a safe, still drew the attention of both men, who glanced at the silver-gray box before finally focusing their gaze on Chen Jiongming.