My Only Son (Please Recommend)

Get out!

He lowered his head and glanced at the two people kneeling on the floor. He also knew that failing to find the murderer had little to do with them.

So he waved a hand, signaling for them to leave.

Seeing this,

the two felt as though they had been granted amnesty and immediately backed out obediently.

After they had left,

with no one else in the room,

Lu Mingshi's formerly straight back bent. It was as though all the vigor had been sucked out of him in an instant.

The lingering glow of the setting sun shone through the spacious, spotless floor-to-ceiling windows, lighting one side of his face.

It made his expression difficult to read.

After a long while,

a slightly hoarse voice came from his mouth.

"I have only this one son. I was afraid he'd melt if I held him in my mouth, afraid he'd fall if I held him in my hands. Whatever he wanted, I gave him. Yet you dared kill him. No matter where you are, I'll find you!"

Lu Mingzhong's expression turned grim.

At that thought, he seemed to have made some sort of decision.

Supporting himself on the chair, he rose to his feet and walked with slightly heavy steps toward the bookshelf to one side.

The bookshelf was made of dark-brown solid wood, its grain plainly visible.

The books upon it were arranged neatly. Some were as good as new, their corners sharp, as though they had never been opened.

Others looked slightly worn, their pages curling at the edges.

Their spines and edges bore signs of wear, clearly having been consulted many times.

At that moment, with the sunset streaming in through the window,

half the bookshelf was bathed in light, while the other half was hidden in darkness.

His gaze swept over it before finally settling on a spot within the shadows.

He stepped forward and reached in, taking out a mythological book titled Records of Local Customs.

The book was very new. There was even a thin layer of dust on it, clearly showing it had not been opened in a long time.

What drew the eye was its thickness—the pages were roughly ten centimeters deep.

Lu Mingzhong opened it. At the very center of the pages was a rectangular hollow carved out.

Inside lay a palm-sized gray flip phone for the elderly.

Lu Mingzhong picked it up and held down the power button.

After a few seconds of a simple boot-up animation, the phone turned on.

He opened the contacts. There was only one unlisted number inside.

Looking at the number, Lu Mingzhong's raised finger paused for a moment before he finally pressed the call button.

Beep, beep...

After several seconds of waiting, the call connected.

Drip!

Suddenly, dripping water could be heard from the other end, as though some liquid were falling onto the ground.

"What do you want from me?"

A pleasant female voice came through the line, though it was somewhat muffled, as if her mouth were chewing something.

"I want you to help me find the murderer who killed my son!"

Lu Mingzhong held the receiver slightly away from his ear, as though wary of something. Then he roughly explained the situation.

The other side was silent for a while.

"This isn't difficult. I can help you, but what are you willing to pay?"

"In the West District, there's an orphanage on the verge of shutting down. I bought it some time ago. The children in an orphanage like that have no fathers or mothers. Even if they die, no one will care."

Lu Mingzhong had clearly prepared for this long ago. Though he stopped halfway through his words,

they both understood what he meant.

"Hehe, not bad. You truly haven't disappointed me. My help to you back then wasn't in vain.

I'll come find you later. Prepare a personal belonging of your son's."

A clear laugh came through the phone. The other party was clearly in a very good mood.

Just from her voice, one could roughly imagine that she was a beauty.

But Lu Mingzhong had no stray thoughts whatsoever.

Of course, it was not because he was too old for that.

It was because he clearly knew exactly what kind of being the person speaking with him was.

After hanging up, Lu Mingzhong let out a light breath, and a trace of unease surfaced on his face.

What others knew about him

went no further than that he had once run with gangs in his youth and made his fortune through bars, bathhouses, and casinos.

But no one knew the real reason a poor boy like him had been able to reach where he was today.

Though his hardworking, striving nature had played a part,

only he knew that those were not the key.

At the root of it all, the true reason was that when he was young, he had met the person before him.

It had been a rainy day more than twenty years ago.

The gang he belonged to and a rival gang had arranged a brawl at the entrance to an alley over certain matters of interest.

In that sort of chaotic situation, no matter how experienced or agile one was,

there was no guarantee of walking away unscathed.

Everyone had their heads hanging from their belt, liable to die at any moment.

Naturally, he was no exception.

In the midst of the melee,

after cutting down one man, he let his guard slip.

Someone stabbed straight through him from behind with a machete.

As the fighting crowd moved farther and farther away, no one cared whether he lived or died.

He collapsed to the ground. As blood drained from his body, he tried to struggle to his feet, but he was powerless to do so.

He could clearly feel his life entering its final countdown.

Yet,

at the brink of death, he vaguely saw a figure slowly approaching through the curtain of rain.

The person merely crouched down and covered him with a hand. His fatal injuries healed completely within a few breaths.

That strange method had once made him think he had encountered an immortal.

But as time passed, as he came into more contact with the other party, rose higher in status, and obtained increasingly abundant information,

he came to learn that what he had encountered was no immortal, but a true demon.

After an unknown amount of time, he woke from his memories.

At that moment,

at the far end of the city beyond the window, as the last wisp of light vanished from the horizon, the earth sank into darkness.

Night had fallen.

Inside the office before the floor-to-ceiling windows on the top floor of the building, a shadow appeared abruptly.

The figure had appeared so suddenly, as though it had been standing there all along.

She wore a black dress, her waist slender, with a silver bracelet circling her right wrist.

Looking upward, a pure black mask covered the woman's face. Only a pair of indifferent eyes was visible, making it impossible to see her full appearance.

"My lady, you've arrived!"

At the sight,

Lu Mingzhong, who had been seated in his chair, hurriedly stood up. His expression was respectful, carrying even a trace of nervous caution.

More than twenty years had passed since he had first met her.

He had changed from a vigorous young man into someone in his fifties.

Though he had taken care of himself and looked no older than his forties,

the decline in every aspect of his physical abilities meant he could no longer compare to the truly young.

Yet the other party, though her exact appearance could not be seen, had tight, smooth skin on her exposed arms, a youthful voice, and that identity of hers.

All of it made him understand that she was still as youthful as ever. Time seemed not to have left a single mark upon her.

"Mm. Where are the items? Do you have a photo of that person?"

The woman's voice was calm.

"Yes."

Lu Mingzhong hurriedly took out the things he had had someone prepare beforehand: a photograph and a white shirt.

"This is the murderer who killed my son! I heard he's a fugitive murderer, with dozens of lives already on his hands. He still hasn't been caught, so I can only trouble you!"