Heaven's Punishment

At night, Lan Mu, dressed in a black hoodie with a bow and arrows on his back, moved across the rooftops of Pinghu Pedestrian Street.

The first and second floors along this street were mostly shops, while people lived on the upper floors.

Lan Mu began searching silently. He did not use his lightness ability to inspect each home from outside the windows.

Instead, he whistled. Soon, a large flock of birds of all kinds gathered behind him, fluttering around him.

"Search every window. Report to me when you find the target."

At his command, the birds scattered in all directions, flapping past every household's windows in search of the target.

Lan Mu had forcibly captured these birds, of every kind. He had forcefully drawn away each bird's Life Force before feeding it back to them.

In doing so, he had transformed the birds and given them the ability to communicate with him. With that communication, these birds became the eyes and ears of nature's will.

He had come up with this method solely to find the murderer. Plants and animals tamed with Natural Power would all fall under nature's will. This was the domain of an elf.

Although this was not a forest, his home ground, it was still useful for finding someone.

Lan Mu was not idle either. The birds' search was still somewhat immature, so he raced across the tops of various buildings, using his exceptional eyesight to scan every person below.

Finally, in the latter half of the night, Lan Mu received a report from one of the birds.

A suspicious target had been found. Lan Mu immediately had the bird lead the way, following closely behind it.

His agile figure darted through the steel jungle. With a casual leap, he could cross the gap between two buildings.

Yu Hetu really was hiding on Pinghu Pedestrian Street. There was nothing special about his hiding place; it was simply inside a residential building.

He slept in a room on the third floor, completely unaware that he had already been discovered.

Standing on the air-conditioning unit outside the window, Lan Mu saw the sleeping Yu Hetu on the bed and smiled grimly.

He knocked on the window, startling Yu Hetu awake.

Yu Hetu sprang from the bed. The first thing he saw was the black-clad figure outside the window, shrouded entirely in shadow, with a mask and sunglasses covering his face. Anyone would have been on guard at the sight.

Yet Yu Hetu did not scream right away. Instead, he tentatively asked, "Uncle Lang?"

This time, Lan Mu was the one stunned. What the hell? Uncle Lang? Had Yu Hetu mistaken him for someone else?

Was this Uncle Lang his accomplice?

Then Yu Hetu noticed the bow and arrows on Lan Mu's back and immediately realized this was an enemy!

Not only did he not run, he grabbed an iron rod and thrust it through the window.

The glass shattered with a piercing crash.

Lan Mu looked at Yu Hetu's futile resistance and shook his head coldly. With a slight tilt of his body, he dodged the strike.

Then he grabbed the iron rod and yanked it toward himself!

Pulled along, Yu Hetu staggered two steps forward.

Lan Mu moved swiftly, seizing Yu Hetu by the throat and dragging him straight out of the room.

Yu Hetu's upper body dangled outside, with only his feet still resting on the windowsill. He completely lost his balance.

If Lan Mu had not been holding him by the back of his neck, he would have fallen straight downstairs.

Yu Hetu shouted, "Who are you? Who are you?"

Lan Mu ignored him and said indifferently, "Yu Hetu, use your phone to call the police."

"Huh? What did you say? Let me go! Let go of me, damn it!" Yu Hetu ignored Lan Mu and struggled violently instead.

Unfortunately, Lan Mu's hand was wrapped in a layer of Natural Power, holding Yu Hetu tightly in place.

Still, Yu Hetu managed to turn his head and look up at Lan Mu's thoroughly concealed face from below.

Though he could not see his features, he was clever enough to suddenly understand.

"It's you! That cross-dressing freak in sunglasses! You were there that day too!"

Lan Mu's face darkened as he said grimly, "Do as I say. Call the police!"

With that, he released his grip. Yu Hetu lost his balance and fell out the window.

Lan Mu immediately caught his leg. Combined with Yu Hetu instinctively grabbing onto the air-conditioning unit, he barely avoided falling.

"I'll say it one last time. Call the police."

Yu Hetu knew he had been caught and stopped struggling and making a pointless fuss.

No one knew what he was calculating, but he slowly took out his phone, turned it on, and dialed the police.

"Say that you are Yu Hetu, and that you are sorry for every person you killed!"

"I... I..."

Once the call connected and he heard the operator's voice on the other end, Yu Hetu had no idea what this person wanted to do. But for now, he could only obey.

"I am Yu Hetu. I... I'm sorry for every person I killed..."

After Yu Hetu spoke, chaos erupted on the other end of the call. Clearly, the police had identified his number as well. He had kept his phone off before, and the police could not get through to it.

Now they had suddenly received a call from Yu Hetu's number, the number in their intelligence reports—and it was a police call! The police were immediately alerted. Within twelve seconds, the operator changed twice in succession. Finally, a deep voice said, "Where are you? Are you provoking the police?"

Yu Hetu felt like crying without tears. He was not provoking the police.

Lan Mu smiled faintly and softly said from the side, "Tell the police your location. Then tell them everything about your crimes and your accomplice!"

Yu Hetu frowned and snorted. "Accomplice? I don't have any accomplice!"

Lan Mu did not care that he refused to admit it. He had not expected Yu Hetu to confess honestly anyway.

However, Yu Hetu had given up his only chance at survival.

"Fine. Don't say it, then."

Meanwhile, the police heard the inexplicable conversation on the other end and immediately asked, "Yu Hetu! Who are you talking to? Where are you now? What exactly are you trying to do?"

Feeling the increasingly heavy pressure emanating from Lan Mu, Yu Hetu's mind became a mess. He could only say resentfully, "Damn it, I... I'm on Pinghu Pedestrian Street! Someone wants to kill me... Fuck!"

Even Yu Hetu himself felt ashamed saying that. He was a murderer who had killed a police officer not long ago, yet today he was humiliatingly calling the police, being threatened into telling them that someone wanted to kill him. The miserable feeling was driving him insane.

"Wrong!"

Lan Mu suddenly said, "This is Heaven's Punishment!"

With that, Lan Mu suddenly let go. Yu Hetu fell straight from the building. His panicked screams rang out, followed by a loud thud.

The third floor was not too high. Yu Hetu protected his vital areas well during the fall, and he surprisingly did not die from the impact.

He screamed a few times, then forced himself through his injuries and climbed up from the ground, limping away into the distance.

Quite a few residents opened their windows to look outside. They had all been awakened by the series of events here.

Some even looked outside and shouted, "Hey! Someone jumped from a building!"

A resident living next door to Yu Hetu opened his window. He first looked at the shattered window beside him, then at Yu Hetu fleeing in panic below.

Seeing no one else, he muttered, "I heard people talking just now, something about Heaven's Punishment. Where did they go?"

Yu Hetu fled frantically. One of his legs was broken, one side of his hip seemed shattered, and his right arm was dislocated. He could only stagger onward through the pain.

After going several dozen meters, he heard police sirens. Clearly, a large number of police cars were approaching, and those damned sirens came from every direction.

"Damn it! I'm really finished!"

"But it's good that guy didn't come after me. Looks like he can't show himself either."

Yu Hetu kept looking back, but he did not see any sign of that person. It seemed Lan Mu had already left.

He muttered, "Better to fall into the hands of the police than into his hands."

He could tell that Lan Mu truly wanted to kill him.

But suddenly, an indifferent voice sounded above him.

"Tell me. Who is your accomplice? Otherwise, you will not get the chance to be judged."

Yu Hetu shuddered in shock. He abruptly looked up and saw a black figure standing on a streetlamp, bow drawn and arrow aimed at him.

"You..."

He had no idea when the other person had arrived. In the darkness, dressed in black, he had appeared above Yu Hetu like a ghost without Yu Hetu noticing at all.

"Whoosh!"

An arrow flew out and struck Yu Hetu's unharmed left hand.

Yu Hetu screamed and finally became afraid. He shouted desperately, "Help! Police, save me!"

"Whoosh!"

Another arrow! This one struck his right chest, piercing his lung.

He struggled to breathe and no longer dared to shout. His lungs hurt unbearably.

"Don't kill me!"

Lan Mu asked coldly, "Tell me. Who is your accomplice?"

"I'll tell you! I'll tell you! It was Uncle Lang! Uncle Lang helped me!" Yu Hetu gave in. All he wanted now was to live. The cold sensation of arrows piercing his body made him tremble all over.

"Continue." Lan Mu drew another arrow and shot it into Yu Hetu's left leg with a whoosh.

"Stop shooting! Uncle Lang is from my hometown, and he's from Shandong too. I only know that his surname is Qu. We met by chance and only met a few times in total... Cough, cough, cough..."

After saying a few words, Yu Hetu felt a sharp pain in his lungs. But he did not dare delay, afraid that another arrow would come flying at him, so he hurriedly said, "After Zhang Hong fired me, I complained to him. He said he could help me vent my anger, then he kidnapped Zhang Hong. When I had her, she fought back fiercely. In a fit of rage, I accidentally strangled her to death... Cough, cough, cough."

"Uncle Lang said he would handle it and make sure the police could not determine the real time of death. I didn't know what he was capable of, so to avoid suspicion, I deliberately got myself detained at the police station."

"Only afterward did I learn that he had dismembered Zhang Hong. It seemed he did something else too. The time of death the police determined was all fabricated."

"Cough, cough, cough... After that, I was in the same boat as him. Every week, he kidnapped a woman for me to play with, then took her away to conduct some kind of experiment... Cough... I don't know the details. He seems to have been a doctor before. He's extremely skilled with a scalpel."

"He did all the dismembering every time! I only helped out!"

Lan Mu sneered. "But you killed a police officer!"

"I... I had no choice..."

Lan Mu asked, "Is that person called Qu Lang?"

"No. I only know his surname is Qu. He told me to call him Uncle Lang, but that must be a fake name."

"Is there anything else you haven't said?" Lan Mu asked with a smile.

Yu Hetu looked in terror at the black figure standing atop the streetlamp and said fearfully, "No, that's all! That's all I know!"

Lan Mu swiftly jumped down from the streetlamp, quickly pulled out every arrow, then casually tossed down a recording pen.

He then left at once, agile as a gust of wind, quickly disappearing into the night.

The mysterious person left behind only a recording pen containing Yu Hetu's entire confession.

The police were heavy-hearted and somewhat bewildered.