An unexpected turn

Before the summoning, Seventh Master had warned us over and over.

Whatever way we summoned the spirit, we had to send her back the same way.

Otherwise, Xiao Qing, as the spirit medium, could suffer a backlash.

We had taken every possible precaution, but we never imagined there was someone else there.

The person who suddenly appeared had clearly come with the intention of sabotaging us.

He kicked over several command flags and a whole bunch of candles, then fled.

The ritual formation was badly damaged, and the possessed Xiao Qing went completely out of control!

I had no time to chase him. A sinister wind suddenly swept through the living room, blowing down the remaining command flags. The candles toppled one after another.

Xiao Qing lay on the floor, convulsing nonstop, her eyes rolling back as foam poured from her mouth.

I noticed that Meng Yifan's shadow and mine had returned, while Xiao Qing's shadow was splitting apart.

Li Xiumei seemed about to break out of her body.

Panic hit me at once, and my scalp prickled.

Seventh Master had said that after the summoning, he would personally send Li Xiumei away, then perform seven days of rites. But those seven days would not be enough to help her pass on. Meng Yifan and I had to find her murderer within that time.

But now Seventh Master had been knocked unconscious, and the summoning procedure had been disrupted. Once Li Xiumei got out, Meng Yifan and I would be the first people she killed, followed by everyone in this building.

At the thought of the consequences, I forgot my fear and rushed over to pin Xiao Qing down.

Xiao Qing was a frail woman who should have been unable to resist me, but she seemed to have taken some kind of strength pill. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't hold her down.

"Meng Yifan! What are you standing there for?"

"There's a talisman in Seventh Master's trouser pocket! Bring it here!"

I shouted urgently at Meng Yifan.

He scrambled over to Seventh Master, fumbled around, and pulled a talisman from his left trouser pocket.

Seventh Master was supposed to use that talisman himself. I didn't know whether it would work in my hands, but I couldn't worry about that now.

I took the talisman and tried to stick it onto Xiao Qing's forehead, but she seemed to know what I was doing and swung her palm at my face.

A slap from a woman normally wouldn't have amounted to much, but Xiao Qing was clearly no ordinary woman at that moment. One slap sent me flying.

Luckily, Meng Yifan attacked her from behind and pinned her to the floor. He was stronger than me and actually managed to hold her down for the moment.

Seeing how desperately Xiao Qing wanted to kill us both, I inwardly groaned and hurriedly said to her, "Li Xiumei, we weren't the ones who ruined the summoning ritual. We're trying to help you."

"Killing us won't do you any good. We weren't the ones who killed you. Why not spare us so we can help you find the person who did?"

My words seemed to work. Xiao Qing, who had been struggling relentlessly, suddenly stopped moving.

I noticed the shadow on the wall. The shadow splitting off from Xiao Qing's body did not return to her. Instead, it gradually began to fade.

I immediately rushed over with the talisman and stuck it onto Xiao Qing's forehead.

The talisman proved remarkably effective. The instant it touched her forehead, Xiao Qing passed out.

"That thing works so well..." Meng Yifan marveled.

I had no time to marvel. I quickly told him, "Look after Xiao Qing and Seventh Master. I'm going after that man!"

With that, I rushed out of the apartment, praying I could catch him.

The man had run out of the master bedroom. The police had already dismantled the wardrobe in there, so the only place anyone could hide was beneath the bed.

I figured he had been hiding under the bed the whole time, listening to our conversation with Li Xiumei.

He hadn't wanted Li Xiumei to reveal what had happened back then, so he had rushed out, knocked Seventh Master unconscious, and wrecked the summoning formation.

Who wanted to silence Li Xiumei? Naturally, the person who had killed her all those years ago.

Who could that be? There was no doubt about it. The man we had just seen was Lü Zhengxian!

As long as we caught Lü Zhengxian, the man responsible for all this, Meng Yifan and I would be safe!

The thought filled me with excitement, and I soon ran out of the residential complex.

The man had already been running for a while, so I shouldn't have been able to catch him. But he had banged his leg against something in the living room, probably his knee, and he couldn't run very fast.

From a distance, I spotted him running while repeatedly looking back toward the entrance to the complex.

I chased straight after him. Frightened, he fled blindly and ducked into a narrow alley nearby.

I followed him into the alley, but strangely, once he entered it, he seemed to vanish into thin air. I couldn't find him anywhere.

The alleys around there branched off in every direction, with more than a dozen exits leading to apartment buildings or nearby older residential complexes.

Once I lost him, I would probably have a hard time finding him on my own.

But I refused to let him get away just like that and kept searching for quite a while.

In the end, I still couldn't find him. I stamped my feet in frustration.

I returned to the apartment, dejected.

Xiao Qing and Seventh Master were still unconscious. When Meng Yifan saw me return, he quickly asked, "He got away?"

I sighed. "He got away."

The man was gone. What mattered more now was getting Xiao Qing and Seventh Master to the hospital.

Meng Yifan and I didn't bother cleaning up. We each carried one of them on our backs, locked the door, and hurried out, then drove them to the hospital.

Neither of them was in immediate danger, and both woke up not long after arriving at the hospital.

Seventh Master had a mild concussion. We would, of course, be paying his medical bills.

Later, the doctor called me over, but it wasn't about Seventh Master. It was about Xiao Qing.

The doctor told me that Xiao Qing had organ failure, and it was stage three.

Stage-three organ failure was already very serious. Physical activity was restricted, leaving her able to manage only everyday tasks. If it progressed to stage four, even those would be restricted.

No wonder Seventh Master had said Xiao Qing wouldn't live past thirty. In her condition, it would have been a miracle if she did.

This woman really was risking her life to make money.

I walked into the hospital room with Xiao Qing's medical report. She and Seventh Master were both awake and receiving IV drips.

I handed her the report, not knowing what to say. I just felt sorry for her.

But after reading it, Xiao Qing merely smiled. "I've already had a checkup."

In other words, she had known all along that she had stage-three organ failure.

Meng Yifan and I sighed. There was little we could do to help her. Organ failure meant an organ transplant, and that could cost hundreds of thousands or even millions. How could the two of us afford to help?

Seventh Master lay in the bed beside her, cursing away. He said he had never expected anyone to be hiding in that apartment. If he found out who had ambushed him, he would beat the bastard to death.

Just then, Xiao Qing hesitated, as though she had something to tell us.

I asked whether she had discovered anything.

She said, "When that spirit possessed me, I saw some of her memories. I saw who killed her. I know what the killer looks like."