Asi Hell

Chapter 19

Besides the owner, Dong Zhihua, only the dozen or so people who had come to Asi Town remained in the Tanguan Hall. Qin Ge certainly didn't suspect Dong'er, and Su He could also be ruled out. After returning to Tanguan Hall last night, she had stayed with Qin Ge and had no time to commit the crime. Xu Juan and the other five model girls lived in two rooms. Unless they conspired together, they simply didn't have the opportunity to commit the crime. Therefore, the suspects were now only three people: Huang Tao, Zhang Song, and Lei Ming.

Qin Ge didn't want any of them to be the murderer, but he now had to face reality.

During the final search of the room, a small handbag carried by Liu Qian caught Qin Ge's eye. He vaguely remembered that night on the bus in the valley, he and Dong'er had discussed the people on the bus, and when they talked about Liu Qian, he emphasized that she always held this handbag tightly in her hand, no matter where she went. Later, when the landslide occurred and everyone abandoned the bus to escape, in that chaotic situation, even Qin Ge couldn't care less about his own luggage, but she still held this handbag tightly to her chest. All of this indicated that what was in this handbag was very important to Liu Qian. Now, Qin Ge could finally open the handbag.

Besides cosmetics, the bag also contained an ID card and several bank cards. The exact amount of money in the bank cards was unknown, but the woman in the ID card made Qin Ge and Gao Qiao look at Liu Qian in a new light.

The ID card does indeed belong to Liu Qian. Although the photo on it is somewhat distorted, you can still recognize her from her facial features as the deceased lying in bed. However, the name on the ID card is Zhao Qing, not Liu Qian.

Under what circumstances would someone conceal their own name, especially in front of a group of strangers?

Qin Ge could only think of two possible answers. One was someone utterly despondent, desperately wanting to start a new life somewhere no one knew them. Such a person must harbor deep-seated pain, determined to sever all ties with their past life, including their own name. The other possibility was someone with a profound secret, highly vigilant, and unwilling to reveal even a trace of their true self. Most criminal suspects exhibit this mindset while on the run.

If Qin Ge had to choose between these two outcomes, he would choose the latter without hesitation. This Liu Qian—or rather, Zhao Qingxing—was wearing impeccable makeup on the bus, her hair clearly freshly permed—a trendy, airy perm. A person utterly despondent wouldn't care so much about their appearance. Furthermore, Qin Ge had sensed a hostility from her before, though he couldn't understand its cause then. Now, he was almost certain that this hostility only surfaced after Qin Ge revealed his identity as a police officer.

All these factors combined made it easy for Qin Ge to associate it with the word "criminal," but what kind of things could such a seemingly powerless woman actually do?

The answer soon appeared in Qin Ge's hands.

From the inner pocket of his satchel, he pulled out a stack of newspapers folded to the size of his palm.

Asi Hell: 773 Horror Series 12, Part 5, Chapter 81: Suffocation (4)

In Asi Town, newspapers are synonymous with death. Yesterday afternoon, Qin Ge, Dong'er, Gao Song, and the six young model girls all received a newspaper; their deaths were all reported in it. Qin Ge had asked Huang Tao and Liu Qian if they had also received the newspaper, but Huang Tao shook his head and remained silent. His expression was ambiguous, as if he both anticipated his own copy and deeply resented it. Now it seemed that Liu Qian had received the newspaper yesterday afternoon, but she had hidden it in a lining of her bag, unwilling to let anyone know. Huang Tao had spent the entire afternoon with Liu Qian; he must have known she had received the newspaper, yet he kept it a secret. Either he was deliberately protecting Liu Qian, or he had also received the newspaper and was intentionally concealing the cause of his own death. Therefore, he and Liu Qian had made a pact to keep each other's secrets.

However, when Qin Ge and Gao Qiao found the news in the newspaper, they realized that all their previous deductions were wrong. They looked at each other, speechless for a moment.

In the afternoon, Qin Ge arrived at the altar alone. Cult Leader Alang had only given him two days to find the murderer, but now, Qin Ge suddenly lost faith in his mission. After lunch, he initially intended to gather everyone and present all his findings and questions, but later decided to give himself more time to think. Before leaving, he simply instructed everyone not to go out, to avoid any further accidents. All the murders targeted people who were alone; as long as everyone gathered together, the murderer would have no opportunity.

Dong'er was worried about Qin Ge going out alone, but this time, Qin Ge insisted that she stay at the Tan Guan Tang.

The altar appeared unusually empty. The towering statue of the great goddess As, with its face etched on thirteen stone pillars, faced Qin Ge for a long time. If the great goddess As truly devoted her entire life to eradicating the plague and saving all living beings, as the legends say, then how could her statue have the body of a strongman, and how could it hold such a crescent-shaped scimitar filled with murderous intent? Qin Ge stared at the statue's lean and vigorous face, and gradually saw two completely different expressions on it: one of compassion, the benevolent goodness of a healer who takes the well-being of all people as her responsibility; and one of violence, as if it could rise up at any moment and wield its blade to behead all the people in the world.

The statues are so lifelike that if you look up at them for too long, you'll have the illusion that the stone figures could come to life, bend down, and gently hold you in their hands.

A single statue with two expressions. Qin Ge recalled Gao Song's words: many Chinese gods were originally ordinary people, only revered as gods after death; the boundary between humans and gods is actually very blurred. Deep within the human heart, the forces of good and evil often linger, just like the two expressions of this great goddess As. Wouldn't such a god be more human?

In the afternoon, Qin Ge came to the altar because he wanted to take another look at the faces on the thirteen stone pillars.

Unlike the statues of the goddess As, the faces atop these thirteen stone pillars are not realistic. They seem to be the work of an avant-garde sculptor, with only extremely rough lines outlining the shapes of the faces, which are deformed and bent into cylindrical shapes attached to the pillars. The thirteen faces on the thirteen pillars each have a different expression; you don't need to think about it at all to immediately discern the emotions they convey.

Qin Ge eventually sat down before the thirteen stone pillars, his gaze sweeping over them. He felt something was about to emerge in his mind, but he couldn't find a way to express it. Later, he lay back, squinting his eyes, letting the sunlight swirl in them. The thirteen faces then became blurred like shadows. Shadows don't need to be seen; you only need to quietly touch them with your senses, and they often reveal something more substantial.

Those blurry shadows, like butterflies in the darkness, began to swirl in Qin Ge's mind. At this point, he simply closed his eyes completely; after all, the shadows were already etched in his mind. The butterflies flew and flew, the black butterflies displaying an extremely dazzling beauty in the shadows of the sunlight. They fluttered their wings, carrying a chilling aura, gradually changing shape.

Qin Ge saw Tong Hao's face in the swirling, dancing shadows.

He was startled. Then, after seeing Tong Hao's face, he saw Liu Qian, Huang Tao, Xu Juan and five other model girls, and finally, he saw Dong'er and himself.

He suddenly sat up, and when he opened his eyes, the butterflies and familiar faces vanished in an instant. Only thirteen cold stone pillars stood before him, and thirteen deformed and distorted faces were making different expressions at him.

Qin Ge recalled that Tong Hao's face hadn't been hidden in the swirling shadows, and the same was true for Liu Qian, Huang Tao, and the others she saw later; they seemed to have suddenly become clear, like those fluttering butterflies.

Those blurry shadows have become those real faces.

A chill ran through Qin Ge, making his hands and feet icy. He stood up and slowly walked to a stone pillar. Tong Hao's body had leaned against this very pillar that morning. The face atop the pillar had drooping eyes, and its slightly open gaze revealed immense sorrow. Didn't it perfectly match Tong Hao's state of mind before he arrived in Asi Town?

He approached the other stone pillars and stared at the expressions on the faces at their tops. His heart was pounding. He felt as if he were immersed in icy seawater, which was about to engulf his head. His breathing became rapid.

He felt he had found the key to the problem, although some questions still remained unanswered.

When he went down the mountain back to town, he suddenly felt like he had missed something. He thought hard and finally realized it. Among the real faces he saw when he lay on the altar with his eyes closed, three people did not appear: Lei Ming, Zhang Song, and Su He.

The cult leader, Alang, said, “You fourteen people are different from the others in town because your identities cannot be taken away during the sacrificial ceremony two days from now. Now that one of you is missing, not only are you saddened, but I am also very sorry. If the entire sacrificial ceremony is affected because of the loss of one person, then the murderer’s sins will be even more heinous.”

Qin Ge thought that the fourteen of them should be a whole, and no one could be missing. How could Lei Ming and the other two be missing? There must be something that they haven't figured out yet, and there must be something hidden about the three of them that others don't know.

Finally, Qin Ge realized that there were fourteen people in his group, but only thirteen stone pillars on the altar. Why was that? Upon entering Asi Town, Qin Ge finally understood the reason for this problem. He immediately felt his blood almost boiling, but cold sweat seeped from his palms and soles.

The setting sun was like blood. The crimson hue had already dyed the entire town of Asi red.

As Hell: 773 Horror Series 12, Part 5, Chapter 82: Suspicion (1)

When he was a fourteen-year-old boy, he met a girl. That year, his parents had been running a clothing store in the city for five years and had finally saved up some money, deciding to bring him from the countryside to attend school in the city. The schools in the city were very different from those in the countryside, and the students in his class seemed quite different from his old classmates. Sitting in the classroom, he always felt that many burning gazes were directed at him, and for some reason, he could sense the hostility in those gazes.

He had a dark complexion, yet wore expensive clothes. He spoke with a thick rural accent, but his monthly allowance was far greater than any of his classmates'. Everyone could tell he was the son of a nouveau riche, a classmate in those days who represented ignorance and lack of education, and in his classmates' eyes, he was almost like Jiang Menshen, the villain killed by Wu Song. None of them had seen his lean father, but in private, they described him as a butcher. How could a butcher earn so much money? He thought bitterly. His father had opened two more clothing stores, and he was even planning to take out a loan to build a clothing factory. The money he earned in a day might be enough for some of his classmates' parents to earn in a year. Thinking this, he felt a surge of superiority, but he never had the chance to display this superiority in front of his classmates.

He'd been at the new school for a week, and no one was willing to approach him or even speak to him. He overheard his classmates talking behind his back; they'd given him the nickname "Black Egg."

He was really dark-skinned. As a child, he used to run around naked in the fields under the scorching sun, and his skin was tanned to the color of a kiwi. Back in the countryside, no one ever told him that his dark skin was a flaw. Now, he felt inferior, and he thought his classmates' fair and delicate skin was quite beautiful, especially the girls.

He secretly applied his mother's face cream at home. The soft, cool cream felt comfortable on his face, but his complexion remained dark. Later, he applied the entire bottle of face cream to his face, a thick layer. His face in the mirror did become whiter, but he looked like a hideous little devil.

He felt somewhat desperate, thinking that he might never be able to rejoin his classmates in his entire life.

One day after school, he browsed two picture books at a book rental stall outside the school. By the time he got home, it was already dark. His home was in the oldest part of the backstreet, where the intricate network of alleyways quickly led him astray. The sky was overcast, threatening rain, and he wandered through the alleys, unable to find his way home. Later, when it was completely dark, rain poured down from the sky. He cowered under a protruding eave, tears streaming down his face.

He began to miss his old days in the countryside, where he could run around in the open fields for half a day without getting lost. Moreover, the countryside didn't have so many tall buildings and houses, nor so many people. Because he had parents who would make a lot of money in the city, he was the envy of all his classmates at school. Everyone vied to be his friend, and wherever he went, he was followed by a group of similarly dark-skinned little friends.

Those days have completely disappeared from his life.

The sky grew darker, and a dim streetlamp in the alleyway made the shadows of the falling rain appear even denser. He remembered it was a late autumn weekend; all the other students were wearing sweaters and coats, while he was only wearing a red pullover sweater. A wind blew from the depths of the alley, and he felt a chill.

He huddled under the eaves, sobbing.

Later, a little girl appeared beside him. She seemed much younger than him, about seven or eight years old, but she appeared much more mature. The little girl said, "Why don't you go home? Why are you hiding here crying all alone? Are you lost? Or did you forget your rain gear?"

He looked up at the little girl, bewildered. Her skin was very fair; in the dark alley, her face was like a peeled lychee, delicate and rosy, as if carved from jade. She wore two long braids, each adorned with a pink ribbon. Her eyes were large and watery when she looked at people.

Who is this little girl? Why did she walk up to him and talk to him?

The little girl was holding a small floral umbrella, with a plastic bag tucked under her arm. She said she was going to give a raincoat to her mother who worked at the store up ahead, and if he didn't say anything, she was going to leave.

He fell in love with a girl when he was fourteen, even though he had no idea who she was or what her name was. But in his later memories, the girl was incredibly beautiful. As he grew up, the girl also grew in his heart. But no matter what, she was still the same face he saw in the rainy alley, forever so fair, forever a face like a piece of jade.

That night, he told the little girl that he was lost. He saw the little girl suddenly giggle, and two dimples appeared on her cheeks.

“I grew up here. Just tell me the place, and I’ll definitely be able to take you home,” she said.

He was somewhat skeptical, and besides, he was a boy; how could he let a little girl take him home? However, he still gave her his address. Even if she couldn't really help him, at least he could spend more time with her.

As Hell: 773 Horror Series 12, Part 5, Chapter 83: Suspicion (2)

He put on the raincoat he had given to his mother, and the little girl led him through the winding alleyways until they soon saw a familiar big tree. He remembered this tree; his home was just around the left corner.

Standing under the eaves in front of his house, he handed the raincoat back to the little girl, feeling utterly lost. He truly hoped he would never find his way home that night, so he could stay in that rainy alley with the little girl forever. He wanted to thank the little girl and ask her name and which school she went to, but the little girl didn't give him a chance to speak, giggling and saying goodbye before running off.

Her mother was waiting for her in the store ahead; how could she waste any more time?

He stood blankly at his door for a long while before knocking, his mind heavy with worry. That night, he was awakened from a dream by a surge of power; the coldness in his lower abdomen startled him, leaving him bewildered and unsure of what was happening. Many years later, he finally understood that on that night, he had completed one of the most important rituals in a man's life. From that moment on, he would forever bid farewell to his childhood and step into another, more vibrant and colorful stage of life—adolescence.

More than twenty years later, he became the city's youngest and most promising municipal official, and his responsibility for urban infrastructure made him a target for numerous business tycoons to curry favor with. However, no one knew that deep in his heart, he still cherished the memory of that rainy alleyway and the little girl with the ribbon in her hair.

He was already married at this time, but had no children. In the third year of his marriage, after a medical check-up, he was told that he would never have children in his life. From then on, he devoted all his energy to his work, and in less than ten years, he reached his current position.

His wife was used to living alone. She was an ordinary, unassuming woman. She knew that behind every successful man, there was a woman who shed tears, and she didn't know whether she was lucky or unlucky to become that woman who shed tears. Besides silently enduring it, she really didn't know if she had any other choice.

He revels in the quagmire of power, and women have become almost meaningless to him.

But when he walked into the city hall that day and saw the woman in the pink suit in front of the duty room, everything changed, and his life became colorful from then on.

The woman had long, wavy hair, and a pink suit that hugged her slender, voluptuous figure. Her flesh-colored stockings made her calves appear full and rounded. She glanced back while filling out the visitor registration form, and their eyes met. At that moment, his heart raced, and he felt a surge of energy within him, quickly coalescing into a powerful force. He felt as if he had returned to that rainy night when he was fourteen, where he had completed a blissful rite of passage into manhood in his dream.

The woman's gaze swept over him briefly; she no longer recognized the lost little boy from years ago. He, however, recognized her instantly. Although she bore little resemblance to the image in his dream, he still recognized her.

She was the little girl who took him home on that rainy night.

Liu Qian's body has been sent to the town affairs center. She and Tong Hao lay side by side on a makeshift mortuary bed made of tables pushed together, their entire bodies covered by white sheets.

Qin Ge stayed in the room for a while, and then went out with Gao Qiao to return to the Danguan Hall.

Everyone was waiting for him to return, still in Huang Tao's largest room. There were eleven people: six young female models, plus Dong'er and Su He, and three men.

“I may take up a lot of your time tonight, but I think we need an opportunity to resolve this. Two people died overnight. I don’t know how you feel right now, but what I want to do most is to find the murderer so that this kind of thing doesn’t happen to us again.” Qin Ge stood by the door, his gaze sweeping over the room. “Of course, we don’t need to be too tense, because most of us here have nothing to do with these two murders.”

"You mean the murderer who killed Tong Hao and Liu Qian is among us?" Dong'er asked in surprise.

Qin Ge pondered for a moment, then said cautiously, "This is the answer to the riddle, and we must save it for last. Moreover, I can't be sure if the result is what I'm thinking right now. As you know, there are no instruments or data available in this town of Asi, so I can only make inferences based on the information I have now."

"So, even if we find the culprit now, there's no way to punish him?" Lei Ming said in a deep voice.

Qin Ge exchanged a glance with Gao Qiao beside him and shook his head helplessly: "That's how it is. Even in the outside world, when we police arrest criminal suspects and decide whether they are guilty, we can only wait for the court's verdict."

“Then, if we can’t punish him, what’s the point of finding the murderer?” Huang Tao said.

"Restore the truth and prevent the murderer from harming others again," Qin Ge said solemnly.

Huang Tao forced a smile, a stiff and mocking one: "Some truths are not as simple as they seem. Now I only hope that what you show us is the real truth and nothing else."

"I also hope that I will live up to my mission, so I would like to ask everyone here to cooperate as much as possible, because this is, after all, a major event that concerns everyone's reputation and life."

Asi Hell: 773 Horror Series 12, Part 5, Chapter 84: Suspicion (3)

"Then what are you waiting for?" Lei Ming said with a serious expression, seemingly getting impatient. "Everyone here wants you to find the real killer, if he really is among us."

Qin Ge walked to Dong'er's side, his brows furrowed, as if he was thinking about where to begin. Dong'er wanted to say something, but he stopped her with a wave of his hand.

"When I first arrived in this town of Asi and moved into this Tanguan Hall, I felt like I'd seen the name somewhere before, but I couldn't quite place it. It wasn't until the bodies of Tong Hao and Liu Qian were discovered that I suddenly realized the name came from a poem by Wang Wei." He turned around, walked back to the door, and recited aloud, "Even old friends with white hair still hold their swords, while the wealthy and powerful laugh at the Tanguan Hall."

He went on to explain: "Anyone who has read Jin Yong's 'The White Horse Gallops in the West Wind' will surely remember these two sentences. They mean that even if a friend who has known you until old age comes to your side, you still have to hold onto your sword hilt and be wary of him harming you. If your friend rises to prominence and you expect him to promote you, all you will get in return is ridicule. In my opinion, the meaning of these two sentences is actually very simple: you cannot easily trust everyone around you, not even your friends, let alone strangers you meet by chance."

"The strangers you're talking about must be us," Zhang Song said in a low voice.

"What I'm talking about now is just the origin of the name 'Tanguantang,' which has nothing to do with my wishes. I'm just feeling a bit emotional because I thought of those two lines of poetry by Wang Wei, and then I thought about the deaths of Tong Hao and Liu Qian. We've been together on the bus in the valley for a few days now. Although we can't say we've been through thick and thin together, we've certainly been in the same boat for once. I really don't want the murderer to be among us. But now, we have to face reality."

"Then hurry up and start, we all want to know who the murderer is," Xu Juan said from the other end.

"Now, let's start with something easier." Qin Ge paused, as if adjusting his thoughts. "Liu Qian's death seems simpler than Tong Hao's; she died right under our noses. I examined the body, but due to a lack of necessary equipment, I could only make a judgment based on my past experience. I believe Liu Qian's time of death was between 9 PM and midnight last night. During that time, Liu Qian had already returned to her room to rest, and there were people in the lobby all night until the next morning. Therefore, it was impossible for the murderer to sneak in under our noses, commit the murder, and then slip away unnoticed. So, the murderer can only be someone who remained in the Tan Guan Tang at the time."

No one spoke, clearly everyone tacitly accepted Qin Ge's deduction.

“During that time, apart from Tong Hao, everyone else was in the Tan Guan Tang. Now let’s use the process of elimination. I think Su He and Dong’er can be ruled out first. Su He was with me from beginning to end and had no time to commit the crime. As for Dong’er…” Qin Ge pondered for a moment, “She is my wife. I know her. That reason is enough for me.”

Su He remained expressionless; Tong Hao's death had dealt her a heavy blow. Although her relationship with Tong Hao had only lasted half a day, his death had shattered a dream within her. Therefore, her sorrow was tinged with despair.

Sitting next to her, Dong'er's eyes showed a lot of tenderness at this moment.

No one disagreed with Qin Ge's words.

Qin Ge took a few steps forward and walked to Xu Juan and the five model girls who were sitting together. "The six of you have been living in two rooms and have never been separated. Unless you were accomplices, you had no opportunity to commit the crime." He turned around and faced Huang Tao and Lei Ming. "So, I am now clearing the six of them of suspicion. I hope none of you have any objections."

Still no one spoke. The six girls smiled, as if to express their gratitude for Qin Ge's trust.

"Excluding those eight people, there are now four men left. When I returned to the Tanguan Hall, Liu Qian had already gone back to her room to rest. After that, I went out to look for Tong Hao, Su He, and Lei Ming, who had not returned. After returning, I went to the town affairs center with Su He and Dong'er. After returning, I stayed with Su He and Zhang Song until I left this morning. In this way, I can also eliminate my own suspicion."

“We wouldn’t doubt you even if you didn’t say anything,” Huang Tao said. “If we didn’t trust you, we wouldn’t be sitting here listening to you.”

"Thank you for your trust." Qin Ge walked back to the door, turned around, and scanned Huang Tao, Lei Ming, and Zhang Song. Huang Tao was calm, Lei Ming was indifferent, and Zhang Song was focused. Their different expressions seemed somewhat unreal to Qin Ge. Having been a policeman for so many years, reading people's expressions was an instinctive reaction. Behind Huang Tao's calmness lay helplessness, Lei Ming's indifference was mixed with resentment, and behind Zhang Song's focused expression seemed to be some expectation. Qin Ge didn't know if his judgment was right or wrong, but he was certain that the murderer was one of these three.