The killer continued, and from the voice, I knew it was the middle-aged man again, “I knew there are tracers in the bowls. I’ve already checked all four bowls when you are unconscious. I can’t remove the tracers because that will definitely break the bowls.” I frowned. “But we are currently underground, so the signal won’t get released. The police will need time to find this place, and that will be enough time for us to escape.” The man smiled at me. “But we’re running out of time also. Do you get me?”
The surrounding was silent but for a dripping sound.
“Why would you say that?” I asked.
The killer explained, “I can sense the other personas in this body and I can communicate with them. These personas are like normal people, they too will get sick and die. Our little sister has been trapped at her age for too long already, she is almost gone. If not for your partner, we would have completed our job already.” The killer meant Zhao Mingkun.
“I need to know that the person that you’ve captured is safe.” I hadn’t seen Guan Zhenglin.
The killer looked at me and said, “Before our demand is met, I will not tell you where that woman is. She is our only trump card. After we leave this place safely, I will tell you her location.”
“There’s one thing that’s bugging me. You’ve planned all these when I arrived at Xing Dong Village? Wu Xiufen is your biological mother, so she would abide by your every demand.” I studied the killer’s face, trying to get info from his expression, “Five years ago, your father, or rather Wu Xiufang’s husband died. You found out the truth from his notebook, it was then that your main persona started to show signs of fading. You are all created by her, so you have to protect her.”
The man explained, “There are four personas living in this body. The main persona is stuck at 5 years old. She couldn’t accept the death of her mother, so she chose to slumber and evade. It was then that the second persona, Yama surfaced. To survive, he would do anything. He was proud yet lowly, courageous yet cowardly. He was behind all the murders.” This persona was very slow with his words and was extremely intelligent. “However, the second persona couldn’t satisfy the sense of security the main persona was missing so the third persona, Ze, the main persona’s big sister surfaced. Ze is the main persona’s big sister, protecting her, accompanying her.
“5 years ago,” The uncle said, “I appeared. As the last persona, I didn’t know many things that happened earlier. As the third persona, Ze didn’t know many secrets too. Yama knew everything, but he never liked to talk to us.
“Anyway, I digress.” He continued, “When I showed up, I knew that I had to find the 12 bowls so that my little sister could paint with them. I looked at the notebook. The notebook said that the father didn’t leave with the bowls, so the bowls probably had been given away. The first thing to do then was to find my real mother, Wu Xiufen.”
I nodded.
The uncle laughed. “This sounds strange, but ultimately, Wu Xiufen gave me this body, and she was my little sister’s mother. Actually, Yama wanted to kill her when he saw her, but he gave up after witnessing one thing.”
I guessed, “Because of her 30 years of non-stop apology?”
The uncle snapped his finger. “That’s right. Although I don’t really know why Yama was so mad when he saw Wu Xiufen. After all, she was his birth mother. Then again, I don’t think you’d want Yama to come to explain himself to you. I managed to contact the outside world through Wu Xiufen because, at the time, Yama had already started to lose control.”
“That was when he started to kill?” I asked.
The uncle nodded. “That’s right. 5 years ago, Yama started to torture and kill people. The people who own the bowls are innocent but when a person has been tortured for decades, their mind would get twisted too.”
I finished his words. “So to prevent him from killing, you live underground and never interact with people?”
The uncle nodded. “That’s right. We’ve lived underground for 5 years already. I need to find all the bowls but Yama is a problem. He has a particular insistence on the bowls. No one can touch the bowls and not die.”
“Why?” I asked.
The uncle shook his head. “That’s his secret. I don’t know.”
“But how did you return to Dong Xing City so quickly?” I asked, “Even if you drove, you would take at least 3 and a half hour.”
“5 years ago, Wu Xiufen set up an underground space for us. After we stripped and set up your girlfriend, we set up an auto-camera. When you saw the first picture, we were already hurrying towards Dong Xing City.
“However, you still moved very fast.” The uncle chuckled. “As we drove back to the city, we already stumbled across roadblocks. I didn’t expect that. But the police didn’t once stop me, can you guess why?”
I looked at the killer. “Your clothes.”
The uncle nodded. “You are very clever, but your cleverness has tripped you up this time. Every time we appear in the case, we are all dressed in black, so once I change into a different colored outfit, the police won’t imagine we’re the killer. That is the human habit. However, this can only be used once.”
I nodded seriously, “You came up with all these? I knew the killer is familiar with psychology.”
The uncle smiled.
I continued, “As the sole high intellect persona, without you, the rest of them wouldn’t be able to do much. But you are familiar with computers, psychology, and many things. I believe you are the first to notice the existence of the other personas?”
The uncle looked at the watch he was wearing. Then he started to place the bowls on the table beside us. He arranged them according to the Chinese Zodiac Sign. I studied the bowls. Some of them had blood stains on them. This showed that each bowl had a bloody story behind them. He took out a piece of cloth and a bottle of cleaner. He started to clean the bowls. He moved slowly like he was dealing with important art. He slowly wiped away the blood. “Wu Meng, is there something in your life that you desperately want to get?”
I looked at him and said, “Yes.”
He smiled. “The main persona has wanted these 12 bowls since she was young but she has to wait 15 years for them. But thankfully, she is always trapped at 5 years old. 15 years might just be 1 year for her.
“Yama, on the other hand…” The killer added, “Has been resisting for the past 15 years. He wishes to live freely in this world and abandon the need to hide but now, because of him, we need to hide even more. Is that not ironic?”
As the killer wiped down the bowls, he talked to me but also to himself. “Ze, her appearance was to help the main persona walk out from her pain, to help her face the problem. But 15 years have passed, and she fails to do that and now the main persona is dying.” The killer put down the final bowl. The bowls gleamed like they just came out from the factory.
“What about you?” I looked at him. “What do you want?”
The uncle didn’t answer me. “Soon the main persona will appear. She doesn’t know about your girlfriend so don’t think about asking her about it. Your girlfriend is tied to the bed and the scalpel is not sharp enough to cut through the binding. The bed is specially structured that it would bend at 7 o clock. Then the scalpel will cut into her body.” The killer looked at his watch. “It’s now 5.30. There are one and a half-hour left. My little sister is a very good painter even though she has only studied it for a year. Of course, her one year is your 15 years. I’m leaving. I hope you can treat her nicely or Yama might surface.”
Then the killer closed his eyes. When they opened again, the killer looked shy. She twisted her hands together and looked at me carefully.
A helpless feeling rose within me. In a short amount of time, I had communicated with four different people sharing the same face. But it was also quite interesting. At least there would always be someone there for you.
“Look.” I pointed at the 12 bowls.
“Wow.” The girl cheered. “They are all back.”
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