Transition

At 13:21, Ning Zhe finished his statement and walked out of the police station.

Within a single day, Ancient Tablet Town had seen three accidental deaths: Ye Miaozhu, Gu Yunqing, and Xie Sining... If Ning Zhe hadn't hidden Zhang Yangxu's body and assumed his identity, that would have been four murders in one day.

Furthermore, the three victims all died in the exact same manner—no external injuries, no internal trauma, and no signs of poisoning—yet their locations were nearly five kilometers apart.

These bizarre, sudden deaths that left behind no clues could hardly be classified as accidents, and they were enough to leave any forensic pathologist at their wit's end.

"If nothing goes wrong, we won't even have to wait for tomorrow's news. Speculation and conspiracy theories about these strange deaths will be flooding message boards, forums, and short-video platforms by this evening."

Ning Zhe had always been confident in the netizens' ability to gossip and dissect news.

But upon second thought, he felt that might not be the case: "But if tomorrow comes and there is still no public discussion about these three deaths online, or even a ripple of news offline... then things will get interesting."

That would mean someone was suppressing the information from the very start.

With some time left before 7:00 PM, Ning Zhe took the opportunity to learn more about the specific development of the land in Ancient Tablet Town:

Ancient Tablet Town was a small place without any pillar industries to drive the local economy, nor any leading enterprises capable of boosting employment.

Whether it was heavy industries like coal and steel, or cutting-edge tech sectors like automobiles and digital electronics, none of them had anything to do with this impoverished backwater.

Qinzhou did have rich rare earth deposits, but those were strategic resources, and their extraction had been banned for nearly half a century. Getting caught illegal mining carried a heavy sentence starting at 15 years.

After going in circles, the town's only advantage was its unspoiled natural environment and breathtaking, otherworldly landscapes, making it well-suited for tourism development.

The local government hoped to use the Xuanhu Waterfall on the west side of Ancient Tablet Town as a centerpiece to build a sizable tourist attraction to revitalize the stagnant, depressed economy. The promise of massive funding had attracted bids from several giant real estate developers.

Among all the bidding companies, the capital of Zhang Yangxu's New World Group and the New Homeland Group, owned by Feng Yushu's husband Bai Fugui, were the most robust, making them the two most likely candidates to win the bid.

In terms of business scope and corporate scale, New Homeland was actually larger than New World, and the proposals they could offer were even more enticing.

However, Zhang Yangxu was a local of Qinzhou, while Bai Fugui was an outsider from Yongzhou. The local government preferred to award the main contract to a local Qinzhou enterprise to better stimulate employment, and it was precisely because of this that Zhang Yangxu had the capital to compete with Bai Fugui.

...That was how it looked on the surface, but how did the saying go? When fellow countrymen meet, their eyes fill with tears.

Personal connections were one thing, but business was another. If Zhang Yangxu didn't bring out some proper bargaining chips and make some concessions, it would be very difficult for him to sway the person making the final decision at tomorrow's bidding conference based solely on his status as a Qinzhou local.

After all, it wasn't as if Yongzhou companies couldn't hire Qinzhou locals to do the work.

The bidding conference was scheduled for 3:00 PM the day after tomorrow, and Zhang Yangxu's main itinerary for today was to conduct a field survey of the geography around Xuanhu Waterfall and to network with the key decision-makers.

"This Zhang Yangxu is an interesting character. Even with his status, he's actually willing to come down and conduct field surveys himself." Ning Zhe was somewhat surprised by this.

But this worked out perfectly; he had been worrying about how to dispose of Zhang Yangxu's body.

In the southern heat of June, a body would start to emit a foul odor just a few hours after death, requiring quite a bit of air freshener to temporarily mask it.

Throughout the afternoon, accompanied by the driver and several locals, Ning Zhe visited several landmarks around Ancient Tablet Town. Many New World Group employees had arrived earlier than Zhang Yangxu, so Ning Zhe only needed to sign off on the reports they submitted.

By the time all the sites were inspected, it was already 17:47.

Ning Zhe then dismissed the driver, telling him to go to the booked hotel to handle meals and lodging, while he himself drove up the mountain road alone under the pretext of wanting to explore the scenic area a bit more.

As a high school senior, he naturally didn't have time to get a driver's license, but Zhang Yangxu did—the man had been driving for nearly twenty years.

Relying on Zhang Yangxu's seasoned driving skills, Ning Zhe drove as steady as a rock all the way to the heart of the future scenic area—Xuanhu Waterfall.

Xuanhu, or "Hanging Lake," to be precise, referred to a high-altitude barrier lake located in a mountain col west of Ancient Tablet Town, sitting more than a dozen meters above the surface. The rushing water cascaded down from a gap, looking just like someone in the sky holding a teapot and pouring it out; it was a spectacular sight from afar.

Ning Zhe stopped the car on the mountain road a dozen meters from the shore. After confirming no one was around, he opened the trunk, hoisted Zhang Yangxu's body onto his back, and took a small path into the mountains.

Having grown up in this area, he was intimately familiar with the geography around Xuanhu. Soon, Ning Zhe found his destination in the deep mountains at dusk:

It was a deep cave entrance surrounded by thorny barbed wire and overgrown with ferns. The sound of gurgling water drifted from within, and a warning sign marked with "WARNING!!!" stood in front of it.

The mountains near Ancient Tablet Town were mostly red soil and limestone. After years of erosion by flowing water, they had formed what was commonly known as karst topography. Deep underground rivers flowed through lightless caves, and the geological fissures and dark sinkholes were thousands of meters deep.

"If I dump Zhang Yangxu's body here, no one will ever find it." Ning Zhe climbed over the barbed wire and, with practiced ease, tossed the body on his back into the cave. It took a full seven seconds before the sound of a splash echoed from deep within.

After disposing of the body, Ning Zhe, now free of worries, returned to the car and drove down the mountain.

With three murders occurring in Ancient Tablet Town in a single day, it would be inappropriate to hold a lavish welcome banquet at the hotel. Even if one were held, the people who needed to be there wouldn't be in the mood to attend.

Ning Zhe was happy to have the peace and quiet. He returned to his hotel, had a simple dinner, and went to his room to wait patiently.

Ancient Tablet Town was a small place, and the best hotel in town wasn't actually that great. If it weren't for business, someone like Zhang Yangxu would never have stayed in a place like this.

The time reached 19:24. The rising sun had set, shrouding the town in the veil of night.

A buzzing vibration came from Ning Zhe's pocket, and a call came through. It is worth noting that the phone vibrating was not Zhang Yangxu's, but Ning Zhe's own.

Ning Zhe looked down at the caller ID and answered the phone while sitting on the edge of the hotel bed.

As soon as the call connected, before Ning Zhe could speak, an impatient, urgent voice came through the speaker: "Ning Zhe, are you okay?"

"Thanks for your concern, I'm fine." Ning Zhe chuckled: "Congratulations, Aunt, it seems you also made it back alive."

Rapid breathing came from the other end of the line, and Feng Yushu's voice sounded agitated yet suppressed: "Thank you, Ning Zhe. If it weren't for you, I... I wouldn't have been able to make it back alive. I'm truly grateful..."

"If you really want to thank me, give me something of value. Words don't mean much." Ning Zhe said nonchalantly: "Why don't we meet up? I have some things I need to understand regarding your daughter, Baizhi."

For instance, why did that girl dream about the scenes in He Family Village time and time again?