Like father, like son-my son is a dragon among men

"": 200,

"": "",

"": "Then Luo Bin continued onward.

He put away the Pocket Watch and set aside all his tangled, unnecessary thoughts.

He focused on just one thing: having Zhang Li find Zhong Zhicheng so he could learn where the Spirit Medium lived.

They were going into the mountains to scout the route tomorrow. He had to see Gu Yiren first.

When Luo Bin reached the bamboo grove, the courtyard was empty at a glance.

Many more fallen bamboo leaves littered the ground. No one had swept them away. He could even tell that no one had stepped on them.

"Zhang Li?!" Luo Bin shouted at the top of his lungs.

His panic reached its peak!

Silence...

Silence without the slightest response...

His panic abruptly became a sickening sense of falling.

Zhang Li... wasn't home again!

No... he hadn't been here when I came yesterday. He... hadn't come home at all?!

Luo Bin crossed the fenced courtyard and entered the main room. The Oil Lamp was still there; it hadn't been taken away.

Where had Zhang Li gone?!

Luo Bin's brows knitted tightly, and his expression grew uglier still.

Staying out after dark would get you killed.

Zhu Qianqian had gone out for no apparent reason, and Zhang Li had gone out too...

Could this really have something to do with Gu Yiren?

What had she said to Zhang Li and Zhu Qianqian before?

But Zhu Qianqian had been killed by an evil spirit.

What about Zhang Li?

Luo Bin stayed in the courtyard no longer. He quietly walked away.

Zhang Li could easily end up dead. Perhaps he had already died somewhere, and no one had discovered his body yet.

For a moment, his chest felt unbearably tight. Could good advice really never save someone determined to die?

He hurried through the alley and along the village road.

There was nothing he could do.

Without Zhang Li to approach the Village Chief and learn the Spirit Medium's whereabouts, could he go ask and search himself?

That wouldn't be appropriate.

Especially since the Village Chief had warned him just that morning.

That made it even less appropriate.

Chen Xianxian's home.

The underground chamber.

Zhang Li was tied to the wall on the other side, his hands and feet still unable to move.

The cloth was no longer in his mouth. Some food had been stuffed into it instead.

With bright eyes, pearly teeth, and long hair wound around her neck, Chen Xianxian kept staring at another wall.

Her sister, who had been sleeping peacefully, had woken again and stood there smiling.

"Luo Shan keeps passing my front door. Who could he be going to see? He wasn't exactly a good person before, you know. But now he seems to want to help you all. He keeps going to see you." Chen Xianxian turned to look at Zhang Li again.

Zhang Li was bewildered.

Why had Chen Xianxian suddenly brought up Luo Shan?

And how did she suddenly know that Luo Shan had been passing her front door?

"Hey, tell me. Is he really that kindhearted, or is it because Gu Yiren said something to him that night?" Thoughtfulness flickered in Chen Xianxian's beautiful eyes.

"I... don't know..." Zhang Li's face was utterly miserable, and he shivered.

"Oh..." Chen Xianxian pouted and said huffily, "You don't know anything. And you're supposed to be a university student on the archaeological team. Dummy."

Zhang Li wanted to cry.

No matter how he looked at her, the girl before him seemed sweet and demure.

But she kept an evil spirit.

Her own Twin Sister...

Zhu Qianqian had been eaten.

He should have met the same fate yesterday. But while Chen Xianxian was struggling to push him toward the wall, his face happened to press against the ground. He rubbed the wad of cloth out of his mouth and managed to say one sentence.

He said he knew how to leave the village.

Only then did Chen Xianxian stop what she was doing.

Zhang Li explained that during the instant between night and dawn, they could leave the village by following the evil spirits.

Chen Xianxian immediately started pushing him toward her evil spirit sister again, saying all men were pigs and liars.

In his terror, he could only tell her everything about Gu Yiren.

That included how Gu Yiren had first foretold their deaths, then predicted that the Luo Family hadn't closed their window!

Only then did Chen Xianxian spare him. But she refused to release him, giving him food and water instead.

Even when he suggested working together to escape Cabinet Mountain Village, Chen Xianxian remained unmoved. She even twisted his ear and said she would never believe a man's sweet talk.

"Ugh... just look at you. You're weak in the limbs and dim in the head. Other than having a decent face, you're a complete dope, utterly useless. Gu Yiren's been left with the Spirit Medium. How are we supposed to get her out?"

"You even said she's mentally ill. Then no matter what she says, the Spirit Medium probably won't believe her. She might even punish her more harshly..."

"Calling you a pig is giving you too much credit. You're a blockhead. Even my sister would get dumber if she ate you."

Utterly exasperated, Chen Xianxian stuffed another mouthful of food into Zhang Li's mouth.

By the time Luo Bin returned home, it was late morning, and even the sunlight had become glaringly bright.

Gu Ya sat in the courtyard stitching shoe insoles.

Luo Feng had actually come back.

A broad piece of leather lay on the ground, with many sheath-like pockets sewn onto it.

He was checking the knives one by one and putting them into the leather sheaths.

"Didn't you say you were going out for a breather? Why were you gone so long?" Luo Feng looked up.

Gu Ya looked up too, her eyes a little red.

"As long as Shan's all right. Don't scold him."

Luo Feng's brows tightened, but his gaze remained fixed on Luo Bin.

"I saw the killer." Luo Bin walked forward, lowering his voice considerably.

Luo Feng's expression changed in shock, and he sprang to his feet.

"When?!"

"Did he realize you'd spotted him?!"

"Dad, don't panic yet. Listen to me." Luo Bin stopped in front of Luo Feng.

By then, Gu Ya looked flustered and uneasy too. She hurried to the courtyard entrance and slid the gate bolt into place.

Only after Gu Ya returned did Luo Bin finally organize his thoughts.

He first took out the Pocket Watch and handed it back to Luo Feng, then said, "I didn't discover him afterward. While I was eating breakfast, I suddenly remembered that when I opened the door this morning, I thought I'd glimpsed someone."

Luo Feng didn't interrupt him.

"I got up at around five ten, then pushed open the door and went outside. That was when I saw him in the distance..."

"Then it took me two minutes to walk from the window to where he'd been. Allowing for that, it would take him two minutes to walk over. That makes four minutes in total."

"Even if it took him one minute to put down the body, that would leave five minutes. Within those five minutes, he had to get home from where I saw him, and he also had to have made it there from his home beforehand. Only then would everything add up."

"So if we take the spot where I saw him and work outward as far as someone could walk in about two and a half minutes, the killer has to be within that area. The danger in this village isn't quite so unknowable and terrifying. He's human. He's human, so he has to leave some trace."

Luo Bin spoke with absolute conviction.

Gu Ya's gaze held a trace of astonishment and incomprehension.

"Shan... you..."

She had barely begun speaking before her lips parted soundlessly.

Luo Feng's expression shifted in shock again and again, his eyelids twitching.

"And Dad, don't worry. I remember clearly that he never turned around. He doesn't know anyone saw him. I scuffed a little notch by the roadside as a marker, and I didn't wander around nearby, so no one would suspect me. I went somewhere else and walked around for a long time."

"You know the village. You should be able to tell which households are worth

suspecting just by going over and taking a look, right? If we keep away from them, we'll naturally be safe," Luo Bin explained further.

Luo Feng let out a heavy breath, but a sharp gleam flashed in his eyes.

Gu Ya was actually wiping the corners of her eyes, seemingly shedding tears.

"Mom..." Luo Bin didn't know what was wrong with Gu Ya, and he was starting to panic.

"You've made something of yourself, Shan. You really have," Gu Ya said through her tears.

"Like father, like son! My son is a dragon among men. Anyone who dares belittle you must be blind!"