230 Secrets

 

I was filled with sadness, despair, anger but the underlying emotion was helplessness. As a hermaphrodite, when the killer was born, she was hidden by her mother at home because she was a walking shame. Her father knew the truth, so he didn’t like her. Possibly, his father blamed himself for switching the babies. If not, he would have a normal child as his son. Only Wu Xiufang, this woman who was not her biological mother, loved her. However, I couldn’t imagine what Wu Xiufang would feel when she found out the child that she had sacrificed everything to save was not even hers.

And inversely, once Wu Xiufen knew the child that she wouldn’t spare her money to save was her own child, what would she feel?

The killer’s life was tough. However, that was not a justification for him to kill. I finally understood what Captain Zhao told me. You could never understand certain things until you had experienced them yourself. There were people who had the same fate as the killer in this world. However, they were still trying hard to survive. They never harmed or killed others. They didn’t blame others for the unfairness they suffered. If we forgave the killer because of his background, then it would be so unfair to those who had worked hard despite the hardship.

Before this, I believed that certain people deserve to die, and certain people deserve to be forgiven. However, when Guan Zhenglin was directly involved, I realized that if you showed these criminals a shred of forgiveness, darkness would eventually regrow in people’s hearts. They couldn’t control their sin.

“I pity you, but I will not let you go,” I said.

The killer nodded and wiped at his tears. “You never understood anything. You know, sometimes I wish I am not that clever. Clever people have to bear a lot of burdens. Do you know Yama has actually recorded what happened back then, but I have never seen it before?”

“You mean what happened 15 years ago?” I asked.

The killer gave a long sigh. “You are a clever man, I am a clever man. We should know when to let sleeping dogs lie. I am going to start a new life, so let bygones be bygones. The more you know, the heavier the burden. But lately, I can’t control myself anymore.”

I frowned. With regards to what happened 15 years ago, Wu Jianguo had his own version, Wu Xiufen had her own version, Wu Xiufang’s husband had his own version, I didn’t know which one was the truth. But now apparently Yama had the truth.

After a quick silence, the killer said, “Actually, your girlfriend might not be dead.”

My eyes brightened. “What do you mean?”

He leaned on the table and said slowly, “When you really want to kill a person, would you place the knife in her hands or directly on her stomach?”

“The latter, of course.” I had no idea why the killer was asking me that, but I answered anyway.

He explained, “It was Ze who captured your girlfriend and tied her to the bed. She did everything when she owned the body. Even though I have no idea where she hid your girlfriend, I know that Ze is not a killer. My question is still the same.” The killer asked, “If you want to kill, would you place the knife in the hand?”

I pulled on my hair and started to think. When the killer met me in the cat’s tunnel, she didn’t kill me but scared me away. Back then, I thought she was crazy, but now I realized she was merely trying to scare me off. Since Ze could let me go, then perhaps she could let Guan Zhenglin go. Ze’s goal was the bowls, and she didn’t want to kill Guan Zhenglin. Now that I had calmed down, I realized there was a high chance that Guan Zhenglin was still alive. If the killer wanted to kill Guan Zhenglin, she could have killed her at the beginning. In any case, I didn’t know Guan Zhenglin’s situation.

The killer looked at me and continued, “Come on, everything is over now. To start a new life, I need to surrender. I believe the records that I have taken for the past 5 years should be enough to prove that it was Yama who killed those 8 people.” He looked at me. “The real killer is gone. He has gone after he completed his goal. Other than myself, every other persona has their goal, and my goal is to help them move on. The interesting thing is that.” The killer continued. “When our physical body is just standing there, outsiders would assume I was spacing out, but in reality, deep inside our mind, we were arguing. When we were bored, the 3 of us could even play monopoly or poker with each other.” At this point, the killer’s expression saddened. He uttered. “But those days are no more. I am finally alone. The voices in my head will not appear again, and I will finally have a good night's sleep.”

I was suddenly very sad even though I just found out Guan Zhenglin might still be alive. Perhaps I was mourning the loss of the three personas. Other than Yama, the other personas were innocent. However, at this stage, what more could I say?

“There’s one more thing that I still don’t understand.” I looked at him and asked, “If Yama did everything, did he write the stories too? Why would he upload them online? Yama doesn’t seem like someone who would be a computer expert, so it was you who encrypted the IP address for him.”

The killer nodded. “I did do that, but I didn’t write the stories.”

I looked at the killer. “You didn’t write the story? But among the four personas, is there someone who is more familiar with psychology than you do? The stories manage to perfectly describe the victims’ perspective. I refuse to believe Yama can accomplish that.”

The killer looked at me, and I looked at the killer. From our eyes, we saw panic and confusion.

“It’s not really you?” I asked seriously. “But if it’s not you, who can it be?”

The killer looked at me dumbly. He leaned against the table, and I could feel him shaking. However, moments later, he said, “It’s really not me. Even though Yama doesn’t like to communicate with others, he would ask me questions about psychology. I admit I did encrypt the IP addresses, so at most, I would be charged with abetting a criminal. But I still know one more thing that will help me get a light sentence.”

I asked, “You might just be an accomplice, but you still are responsible for 9 human lives.”

The killer shrugged. “At most, they will lock me up for a few years. I am only 30 now. My life is still long.”

“What is this thing that you know?” I asked.

The killer shook his head. “I can’t tell you, I can only tell your superior. When you were unconscious, I…” The killer stopped and changed the subject. “So I will surrender with you. I believe the police who have followed the tracers are close to us already. Soon they will arrive.” I had no idea what game the killer was playing. It was instrumental for him to gain my trust because only he and I knew what happened here. Gaining my trust was crucial for him to gain the police’s trust. He was a clever person, so he should know that, but he decided to hide this thing from me. So it had to be something that was damaging to me but beneficial to him.

The first thing I thought of was Zhao Mingkun. She was a Grade A criminal. The killer had seen Zhao Mingkun and me together. If the killer reported that to my superior, then the higher up might even provide him with witness protection. Because what Zhao Mingkun did was more severe than what he did. He had killed nine people, but Zhao Mingkun had killed a lot more. Plus, Zhao Mingkun was the only way to get to Si Hwacheng’s remaining disciples who were still out there.

I looked at the killer and a murderous rage burned through me. When that happened, I frightened myself. I quickly pinched my thigh to remind myself that I was a police officer and not a criminal. I realized my paranoia had relapsed, and I had left the mental hospital for less than one and a half years.

At that moment, there was a bang, and several rays of light shot into the room. “Hands up! Don’t move!” Xiao Liu’s voice traveled down the distance.

“I surrender!” The killer knelt on the ground and raised his hands. I looked at the broken bowls on the ground. Xiao Liu hadn’t arrived here, but he would be in the room in less than 10 seconds.

So what exactly did the killer know?