Ancient Mirror Mystery

Chapter 22

"Impossible!" Fang Jian jumped up. "Lin Wei was calling out her name anxiously before he died!"

Wu Linshan gave him a cold look and said nothing more.

A dazed, disoriented view of a dark, somber rooftop... Where am I?

Opening her eyes, Ningxia found herself in a field of dark gray tiles, beneath which lay a beam. Turning her gaze, she saw an extremely dilapidated house, dimly lit, with a candle burning on a broken table not far away. She was bound hand and foot, lying on the cold floor.

Ningxia tried to sit up, but found that she couldn't move her whole body at all.

"You're awake?" A high-pitched, thin voice came from the side, and Lin Qian's ghostly face appeared beside her.

"How is Lin Wei?" Ningxia recalled the scene before she fainted, the spurting blood still seemed to be warm as it splashed on her face.

Lin Qian glared fiercely at Ning Xia: "You brat! You finally got Xiao Wei killed!"

"What?" Ningxia felt a spasm in her heart, and pain instantly spread throughout her body, bringing tears to her eyes.

"You witch! I knew you would bring bad luck the first day I saw you! You witch! Witch!" Lin Qian glared at her angrily.

"Why! Why did you do this? Isn't he your brother?" Ningxia cried out to Lin Qian, tears streaming down her face.

"Shut up! You're the one who killed Xiaowei!" Lin Qian's face turned ashen, her eyes gradually became confused, her face flushed red, and she became hysterical.

Ningxia was stunned by her appearance. Lin Wei had once said that once Lin Qian lost her mind, she would do all sorts of strange things. She felt that she could not continue to provoke her like this, so she stopped talking and just cried softly.

"You witch! You witch!" Lin Qian paced back and forth in the room, muttering to herself as she looked around in utter confusion.

Ningxia simply lowered her head, no longer looking at her, but her heart was filled with extreme panic and fear.

Sure enough, without external stimulation, Lin Qian gradually calmed down. She sat down on a chair not far away, breathing heavily, and then surprisingly closed her eyes, emitting even breathing sounds. Incredulous at Lin Qian's unusual sleeping behavior, Ning Xia hurriedly sat up with her hands behind her back, looking around for an opportunity to escape.

The room was an old-fashioned brick house, sparsely furnished, with nothing but a broken table and a chair. Broken earthenware pots were piled on the floor, emitting a foul stench. The only window was nailed shut from the inside with several large wooden planks, and the door was securely locked with a large iron padlock. Lin Qian was fast asleep in a chair in front of the door.

He struggled to break the ropes binding his hands behind his back by grinding them against the ground. Ten minutes passed, but the ropes on his hands remained strong.

"What do you want to do? Trying to cut the rope and escape?" A cold voice rang out above Ningxia's head.

"Oh my god! How did she wake up like that!" Ningxia thought resentfully.

"Trying to run away! Not so easy!" Lin Qian grabbed Ningxia and reinforced the rope.

"What, what do you want? Why don't you kill me?" Ningxia looked up at her.

Lin Qian looked at Ning Xia and said quietly, "You? Of course you have to die! But you can't die so easily!"

"..." Ningxia looked at the confused woman in front of her and suddenly felt a sense of pity for her.

Lin Qian glanced at the tightly sealed doors and windows: "Hmph! That bastard died alone like this back then!"

A chilling glint appeared in her icy eyes as she smiled slightly at Ningxia, a smile that reminded Ningxia of butchers in a slaughterhouse.

"Do you know how you will die alone?" Lin Qian reached out and stroked Ningxia's smooth cheek, as if she were stroking a lamb to the slaughter.

Ningxia trembled all over and couldn't speak.

"You're starting to tremble, aren't you?" Lin Qian laughed, pleased with Ningxia's fear.

"You...you're really crazy!"

"A madman? Hahaha." Lin Qian's eagle-like eyes closed on the trembling Ning Xia, and she grinned maliciously. "Yes! I'm a madman. That bastard called me that before he died! But I, the madman, can live a good life, while you so-called normal people are going to see the King of Hell! Hahaha...!"

Lin Qian suddenly stopped smiling and stared at Ning Xia without saying a word. Ning Xia felt a chill run down her spine and thought to herself, "Oh no! I shouldn't have provoked this woman with my words!"

"Peace of mind? Hmm! Then let me ask you, how many people in this world can truly live with a clear conscience? You? You dare to say that you've never done anything to wrong anyone?" Lin Qian glanced at Ning Xia out of the corner of her eye and asked in return.

"I..." Ningxia was speechless for a moment. She suddenly remembered the cause of Chen Ying's death. If it weren't for her, Chen Ying would not have suffered such a misfortune. Moreover, it seemed that a series of events were all inextricably linked to her.

"Hmph! You know what? More than a decade ago, I was just as naive as you, believing that the world was beautiful and that people were kind. But once a person experiences certain things, they will paint a dark mark on this so-called beautiful world in their mind, until one day, they no longer believe that there is any hope in this world. At that time, the world in your heart will only be a dark hell without any light! If you want to survive in this hell, you can't be at peace with yourself!" Lin Qian's words this time sounded like those of a normal person.

"Didn't you ever have any hope? What about your feelings? Didn't you love your brother so much? Doesn't that give you any hope for life?" Ningxia looked at the almost desperate smile on Lin Qian's face and her heart suddenly stirred.

"Xiaowei used to be my source of life, but ever since you came along... his arms have started to turn against me..." Lin Qian's face showed extreme resentment again.

Ningxia inwardly cursed herself for being too talkative again, but Lin Qian's thoughts seemed to suddenly drift away: "And that person... their heart is never with me..."

Looking at Lin Qian's suddenly melancholy and dreamy eyes, Ningxia had a bold idea.

"Was that person someone you loved?" Ningxia cautiously followed up on Lin Qian's question.

Lin Qian was stunned for a moment: "Love..."

"You loved that person very much, didn't you?" Ningxia suddenly remembered what Lin Wei had said: Lin Qian had kept a skeleton locked in the Lin family compound and frequently whipped it. What could have driven a woman to do something so perverse? Besides extreme hatred, there was another reason: love! Ningxia made a bold deduction: she felt that more than a decade ago, Lin Qian had deeply loved a man, and that man was that skeleton!

"You've never been willing to give up on the person in your heart all these years, have you?" Looking at Lin Qian's thoughtful expression, Ning Xia continued, seemingly having guessed correctly.

"But this is just wishful thinking on my part! He doesn't love me at all!" Lin Qian's expression suddenly turned resentful.

Ningxia was startled and dared not say what she wanted to say.

After a long silence, Ningxia's unease intensified. She wondered if her words had offended Lin Qian, and if Lin Qian were to lose her temper, the consequences would be unimaginable. That damned Fang Jian—why hasn't he responded to the text message yet? The only way now was to stall for time, allowing Fang Jian to find her through the clues in the text message.

Just as Ningxia was racking her brains for a way to stall for time, Lin Qian unexpectedly began to reminisce: "Seventeen years ago, I was just like you are now, a blossoming age, full of love for opera. During an audition for an opera film, I met someone!"

"Seventeen years ago?" Ningxia thought for a moment, and realized that was the time when "The Ancient Mirror" was filmed!

"Have you met the person you love most?" Ningxia continued, "Who is he?" This was a question Ningxia had always been curious about.

Lin Qian glanced at Ningxia, her eyes filled with extremely complex emotions, making it difficult to tell whether it was love or hate.

"He's the one who ruined my life's dreams!"

"Do you love him?" Ningxia observed Lin Qian's expression, secretly pleased, as if she had drawn Lin Qian's thoughts into her memories.

"At that time, I had an extremely beautiful vision for the future. I just wanted to play that role well! But he destroyed my dream with his own hands!" Lin Qian's hands were clenched tightly, her knuckles turned white, her whole body trembled, and a tear rolled down her cheek.

Looking at her, Ningxia suddenly felt a pang of sorrow. It seemed that no woman could ever escape the shackles of love!

"Looking back, I was such a fool. He was nothing but a smooth-talking conman, and I was blinded by his facade, following him into that hell!"

"Qilin Pavilion!"

Lin Qian glanced at Ning Xia and continued, "When I first came to 'Qilin Pavilion' with the film crew, I felt an extremely strange sensation, as if... I had been here before! And everyone in the crew seemed to have been there at some point in the past!"

These absurd words sent a chill down Ningxia's spine: "At some point in the past..."

Lin Qian ignored Ning Xia's surprise and continued, "And I, who loved him so much back then, gave him my all, yet he actually gave the lead role to that Liu Fang!"

"Him? Could it be..." Ningxia suddenly remembered the report on the website. The director who insisted on filming "The Legend of the Ancient Mirror" was Chen Canyu, who had disappeared in Qilin Pavilion.

Could it be that the man Lin Qian loved back then was him?

"After arriving at the 'Qilin Pavilion' in Black Town, he treated me better and better, and promised me that he would replace me as the leading lady in 'The Legend of the Condor Heroes'. I believed him at the time, and under his enthusiastic sweet talk, I gave myself to him!" As she said this, a tear glistened in Lin Qian's eyes.

Ningxia remained silent; there is no greater tragedy for a woman than this!

Lin Qian said self-deprecatingly, "I was so naive back then. I thought I could rise to fame overnight and become a renowned star like Liu Fang!"

"So! What happened next?" Ningxia listened to her story while slowly putting her hand into the pocket of her jeans. There was a hard object inside—Lin Qian's neglected cell phone. Taking advantage of Lin Qian's reverie, Ningxia pressed the redial button. If she remembered correctly, her last call was to Fang Jian.

"And then?" A sense of panic suddenly flashed in Lin Qian's eyes, making Ningxia uneasy.

"So, what exactly happened back then?" Despite feeling a chill run down her spine, Ningxia was still extremely curious about what had happened.

"It's all because of that Liu Fang!"

"Lingering fame?"

"At the time, Chen Canyu and I had an agreement that our relationship had to be kept secret so that he could easily let me replace Liu Fang as the female lead. I complied. I always kept my distance from Chen Canyu in public, acting like a newcomer, respectful and cautious towards the director. Liu Fang didn't know about my secret with Chen Canyu. She took good care of me, taught me a lot, and always treated me like a little sister. I was quite grateful to her at the time; I felt she was genuinely good to me. Several times, I wanted to tell Chen Canyu that I didn't want the female lead role anymore. If I really took the role, wouldn't I be too ungrateful?"

Sure enough, the man Lin Qian loved was director Chen Canyu. It seems that Lin Qian, in the prime of her youth, had a bad experience with love.

Ningxia is filled with sorrow. Lin Qian was such a pure girl back then, how could she have become someone who murdered her own parents without remorse? Can the loss of love also take away humanity?

"Actually, he said that my temperament is more suitable for playing the ruthless princess in the play! He said that my temper is sometimes even more domineering than the princess's!" Lin Qian laughed as she said this, a hint of tenderness appearing in her eyes.

Gazing at her silently, Ningxia was eager to know how Liufang had died so suddenly! For some reason, she felt an inexplicable attachment to that actress who had been completely unrelated to her years ago.

"So... what happened next?" Ningxia was anxious, but she didn't urge Lin Qian.

"Although I've always been considerate of Liu Fang's feelings—what would she think if Chen Canyu suddenly cast me as the female lead? What would the production team think?—it seems Chen Canyu insists that I replace that disobedient Liu Fang. At the time, I didn't know what he meant by 'disobedient,' until that day when I discovered Chen Canyu's shameless face!" Lin Qian's eyes flashed with anger.

"What happened?" Ningxia's heart jumped; she really didn't want to hear those sad facts.

"At that time, I and several other actresses lived in the left wing of the back hall, while the male actors of the crew lived in the right wing. Liu Fang lived alone on the second floor in the middle, while Chen Canyu lived in the main room on the first floor. The rest of the lighting and production staff lived in another building."

I was quite scared at the time, but I mustered up my courage and ran to the toilet to take care of it before rushing back to the dormitory. However, as I ran back to the room on the left along the side rooms, I suddenly noticed some low voices coming from the second floor of the main building. It was Liu Fang and Chen Canyu's voices. Although they were lowering their voices, they were still very clear in the quiet of the night.

I stood quietly in the stairwell on the first floor, listening to the conversation on the second floor. They certainly didn't expect anyone to appear next to the main building where they lived.

Liu Fang's voice came over: "What are you doing here?" She sounded rather unhappy.

Chen Canyu's furtive voice said, "I'm here to discuss a deal with you!"

What kind of transaction?

"Your performance these past few days has been terrible. I'm considering replacing you with a different lead actor!"

"What nonsense are you talking about?" Liu Fang's voice was filled with shock and anger.

"Of course I have the right to replace him, unless..." A cold laugh rang out.

"Unless what?" Liu Fang tried to keep her voice down so that her angry shouts wouldn't carry.

My heart was in my throat. Was Chen Canyu blackmailing Liu Fang into doing those despicable things? Where did he put me? I almost rushed out, but just then, I overheard their conversation behind me.

"Didn't you recently receive a letter from your uncle overseas? Doesn't he want you to go to France with him to inherit his estate?" Chen Canyu's voice rang out.

"...What does this have to do with you?" Liu Fang said coldly.

"It doesn't matter now, but it will matter once I become your husband, won't it?" Chen Canyu's shameless words struck me like a thunderbolt, leaving me weak all over.

"What nonsense are you spouting!" Liu Fang seemed utterly astonished by Chen Canyu's words. "Are you crazy!"

"Hehe!! I'm not crazy! I still want to be your good husband!" Chen Canyu laughed.

A loud "smack!!" suddenly rang out.

"Why...why did you hit me?!" Chen Canyu's angry voice came from the second floor.

"I don't mind the nonsense you uttered tonight; I'll just consider it as you farting! You'd better forget it tomorrow. Alright, I'm going back to my room to rest!" Liu Fang said coldly.

The footsteps suddenly became chaotic, and it was clear that they were the sounds of two people arguing.

"What do you want to do?" Liu Fang shouted angrily.

"Hmph! You're not allowed to leave!" Chen Canyu seemed ready to throw a tantrum. "Don't you dare provoke me, I know your secret!"

"What did you say?" Liu Fang seemed to stop struggling, and the tearing sound ceased.