Brother Liu told us about another case, but left out so much that we couldn't make sense of it.
How were we supposed to guess?
"At first, none of us took this case seriously."
Brother Liu said, "It started when this young man's mother came in to report that her son had been murdered. Naturally, we had to take a murder report seriously, but guess what?"
"She'd dreamed that her son had been murdered. And since she happened to have been unable to reach him for a while, she came in to report it."
Meng Yifan and I clicked our tongues in amazement.
I asked, "It must be hard to open a case over something like that, right?"
After all, the police weren't so idle that they could open a case over every dream.
Brother Liu nodded. "We all thought it was ridiculous. How could we open a case over that? But she really couldn't reach her son, and neither could anyone else. To reassure her, we had no choice but to file a missing-person report and help her look for him."
"But as you know, finding a missing adult is no easy task. We searched for a month without finding her son."
"Then, more than a month later, she came in again. She said her son had visited her in another dream. In it, he'd taken her somewhere and pointed at a mound of earth, saying his body was buried underneath. Then he told her who'd killed him and asked her to report it to the police, have his body dug up, and take him back to his hometown for burial. Otherwise, he couldn't be reincarnated."
Meng Yifan and I stared wide-eyed. "Then what happened?"
Brother Liu lit a cigarette and took a drag before saying, "We still didn't take it seriously. We couldn't waste manpower helping her look for a body just because of a dream."
"There was a veteran officer there who was also my mentor. None of us believed her, but he did. He actually took us across provincial lines, following that woman to the place she'd seen in her dream to look for her son's body."
"Guess what? I'll never forget how uncanny it was. We really did dig up a body there!"
"And afterward, forensic testing confirmed that the remains belonged to her son. Then we followed the leads he'd given her in the dream and caught the killer. We'd solved a murder with hardly any effort!"
After finishing his story, Brother Liu reflected, "I told a lot of people about it afterward, but not one of them believed me. They even mocked me, saying that if things like that really happened, why hadn't all the countless people murdered throughout history turned into ghosts and told their families who'd killed them?"
Meng Yifan asked curiously, "Brother Liu, since you've dealt with this yourself, you must know more than we do. Why don't other murder victims visit their families in dreams like that young man did?"
Brother Liu shook his head and sighed. "How could I explain something like that? But I personally worked on this case. I haven't embellished a single detail."
"Maybe it's like my mentor said. This land has thousands of years of history. You don't have to believe in certain things, but you should still treat them with reverence. Human knowledge is limited, after all. You can't see the whole world for what it is."
Naturally, Meng Yifan and I believed the story.
We'd just experienced something like it ourselves.
But as Brother Liu had said, people who hadn't experienced it firsthand really wouldn't believe in such things.
"Actually, when I saw you two today, I could tell something was off."
Brother Liu gave us a meaningful look. "You both looked awful. I was even wondering if you were doing drugs. Seriously, you need to take this kind of thing seriously and find a way to deal with it. Someone could end up dead."
As though we'd found a lifeline, Meng Yifan and I hurriedly pleaded, "Brother Liu, we don't know anything about this stuff, let alone how to deal with it. Point us in the right direction. Help save our lives."
Brother Liu nodded. Greedy as he was, he was still a decent guy.
He said, "I'll introduce you to someone. His name is Zhao Laoqi, but we all call him Seventh Master. My old unit ran into this kind of thing more than once, and he helped us deal with it every time. The old man knows a thing or two."
I quickly asked Brother Liu for this expert's address and contact information.
Brother Liu gave us the details, then cautioned us, "The old gentleman is from the northeast. He's straightforward and generous, but he has a bad temper. He responds to a gentle approach, not pressure, so make sure you're polite to him in every way."
I said that went without saying. We were asking him for help, and to save our lives at that. Of course we'd treat him like a revered ancestor.
By the end of the meal, we'd gained plenty of leads. Neither the dinner we'd treated him to nor the money we'd spent had been wasted.
Just before leaving, I remembered something I'd almost forgotten and quickly asked Brother Liu whether he had a photograph of Li Xiumei.
But Brother Liu said Li Xiumei had come from the countryside, and rural children rarely had their pictures taken back then. She hadn't returned to her hometown in years, either, so her family had no photographs of her. Still, she must have left photos when applying for certain documents in the past. It would just take him some time to get one for me.
After we finally left the restaurant, Meng Yifan and I saw Brother Liu to his car, and only then were we done.
"Chen Mo, was the house's first registered owner that Brother Liu mentioned really your dad?" Meng Yifan looked at me with a worried frown.
Our families were close, so naturally he was worried about my dad too.
If this went wrong, my dad could end up in trouble.
"I don't know, but I'm almost certain it was him."
I said I'd just called my grandpa, and something about his tone had sounded off. The Chen Guowen Brother Liu had mentioned was probably my dad, but there was no way my dad could have killed anyone.
Meng Yifan sighed. "What a mess. But you absolutely can't let Brother Liu find out that Chen Guowen is your dad, or he'll definitely stop giving us leads."
I nodded. Of course I understood what was at stake.
In the end, Meng Yifan and I agreed to go see Seventh Master Zhao together the next day.
If we didn't get this sorted out, our lives would be in danger!
Since Meng Yifan and I had both been drinking and couldn't drive, we each called a designated driver.
Meng Yifan didn't dare go home. He went straight to a bathhouse, planning to spend the night there.
As for me, I planned to stop at home first.
I had to ask my dad exactly what his relationship with Li Xiumei had been.
Before you continue