Chapter Forty-Four: Corpse Puppet

Yue Qianling had no intention of letting me go to this meeting alone, especially since it was Fang Yanan who invited me. It had been over two weeks since the incident at Longquan Lake. As soon as Fang Yanan was discharged from the hospital, she called to invite me for a meal, saying that great kindness needed no thanks. However one looked at it, this meal seemed perfectly ordinary.

But Yue Qianling remembered only what Xiao Lianshan told her upon his return: how I had used my mouth to draw out the red string from Fang Yanan’s throat. She cared little for the result, but the process itself left her unwilling to speak a word to me for an entire week.

So, as I gladly accepted the invitation, Yue Qianling followed along in silence.

It was a simple home-style meal. To my surprise, Hu Zhiwen was also there. Xiao Lianshan was absent, as he had to pick up Gu Anqi from the airport.

Without her uniform, Fang Yanan appeared gentle and lovely. She seemed less bold, but gained a delicate charm. Having just left the hospital, her health not yet fully restored, her complexion was pale with a hint of frailty, which only made her look all the more pitiable.

I kept glancing around, avoiding Fang Yanan’s gaze. Although the situation at Longquan Lake had been dire, and I had acted out of necessity, the fact remained that there had been intimate contact between us. But I had never entertained any improper thoughts—not in the slightest.

A heart that is not upright leads the sword astray.

Yet, sitting here, I could feel an ancient and unmoving iceberg beside me—its chill biting even without contact.

Yue Qianling clearly did not see herself as superfluous. She sat close to me, her smile as gentle as a spring breeze in March, but to me, it felt as cold and cutting as an autumn wind.

“Qin Yan…” Hu Zhiwen broke the awkward silence, holding his teacup. “I admit I was prejudiced before and made mistakes. Today I’m on duty, so I can’t drink. I’ll use tea instead of wine to apologize, and I hope you won’t take it to heart.”

It turned out Hu Zhiwen could smile; it was the first time I’d seen him without his stern expression. I was not used to it, and quickly raised my cup.

“You were just doing your job. There’s no need for apologies. Let’s have this tea and put it all behind us.”

Fang Yanan sat quietly for a long time before raising her cup as well.

“This meal is to thank you for saving my life. But I am a police officer—I treat everyone equally. If you ever do anything illegal, I will arrest you just the same.”

Yue Qianling shot her a glare, about to retort, but noticed me patting her hand under the table. I wasn’t at all surprised by Fang Yanan’s words. Black is black, white is white; her clear distinction between public and private matters was something I admired. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have invited me to this meal out of uniform.

“Officer Fang is right. Business is business. If I break the law in the future, I’ll accept whatever you decide to do.”

“Very well. Then I toast you with this cup of tea, Brother Qin. Words cannot express my gratitude. For what happened at Longquan Lake, I owe you my life.” Even in plain clothes, Fang Yanan’s tone was as resolute as any man’s.

Yue Qianling suddenly realized her presence was unnecessary, like thin air. She picked up a piece of food and put it in my bowl.

“This is your favorite—mapo tofu.”

She emphasized the last two words, and I caught her meaning, forcing a smile as I sat on pins and needles.

“There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you,” Hu Zhiwen said, setting down his cup and taking a file from his bag. “After Officer Fang was rescued, we searched the area around Longquan Lake for clues the perpetrator might have left behind. We found a torn piece of clothing, and later, the police dogs tracked the scent to its owner.”

“You caught the culprit?” I asked, uncertain.

Hu Zhiwen and Fang Yanan exchanged a strange look.

“We don’t even know if he counts as the culprit,” Hu Zhiwen replied.

“How can you police handle a case so ambiguously?” Yue Qianling finally found an opening to interject, dissatisfied. “Either he is or he isn’t. Don’t arrest the wrong person again; it’s better to be sure.”

“The person we found… we simply couldn’t question him!” Hu Zhiwen said awkwardly.

“Officer Hu, why not?” I asked, puzzled.

“The police dog followed the scent to the hospital morgue,” Fang Yanan said quietly. “The clothing remnant matched exactly with the clothes on one of the corpses.”

“A corpse?!” Yue Qianling dropped her food. “You’re saying… a body from the hospital… kidnapped Fang Yanan?”

I opened the file. The photos clearly showed the torn clothing on the corpse—a man of about thirty, thin and small, yet dressed in oversized clothes. I suddenly recalled what the superintendent said that day: two people came down from upstairs, both very fat but with small heads, looking oddly disproportionate, their gait puppet-like.

“This body had been dead for no more than seven days,” I said calmly, “and died by drowning.”

“How do you know?” Hu Zhiwen pointed at the corpse in the photo. “We checked the hospital records. The deceased drowned after suffering a sudden heart attack while swimming.”

“There are holes the size of a little finger on the chest, joints, brow, and the top of the head,” I said, putting the photo back. “And there’s black mud in the seven orifices, correct?”

Hu Zhiwen and Fang Yanan nodded silently.

“He was made into a corpse puppet,” I said gravely.

Yue Qianling lost all appetite. After seeing the photo, her stomach churned, but curiosity got the better of her.

“What is a corpse puppet?”

“Oh, the two officers probably won’t believe in such things, so there’s no need to explain. In any case, it’s over now.” Seeing Yue Qianling’s pale face, I smiled.

“Before, I didn’t believe either… but after what happened at Longquan Lake,” Hu Zhiwen took a nervous sip of tea, “I can’t dismiss what I can’t explain.”

“What really happened? You seem to know more about these things. Maybe you can give us a clue,” Fang Yanan asked curiously.

“After death, the soul lingers in the bones. On the seventh day, if it encounters a celestial clash, the soul, stimulated, leaves the bones and wanders. This man died in water and bore resentment against water. Earth overcomes water. Mixing earth with black dog’s blood can suppress the spirit, sealing it within the seven orifices of the body so the soul cannot depart. Then, ice spikes are inserted into the chest, joints, brow, and crown. As long as the ice remains unmelted, the body can be controlled—this is a corpse puppet.”

Yue Qianling swallowed, her skin crawling.

“You mean the corpse can move?”

“Not on its own, no. The art of driving corpses has long existed—it’s a Daoist Maoshan technique. The corpse-driving in Xiangxi is similar: leading the body and soul home. But making a corpse puppet goes against nature; it forcibly binds the soul to the body for the purpose of manipulation.”

“Then the person who kidnapped and tried to murder Officer Fang must have this ability?” Hu Zhiwen asked, shaken.

I nodded calmly. “It’s easy to make a corpse puppet, but to control one takes immense skill. This person is even more formidable than I imagined.”

Suddenly, Hu Zhiwen seemed to think of something, panic flashing in his eyes. “The real culprit is still at large. Although Officer Fang is safe for now, by what you said, he can still try again at any time. What should we do?”

“You don’t have to worry about that,” I replied confidently. “Officer Fang will be fine from now on.”

“Why? This person went to such lengths to take my life, but you saved me—why won’t he try again?” Fang Yanan asked, bewildered.

“With his power and knowledge, if he truly wanted you dead, he wouldn’t need such elaborate schemes.” I gave a faint, self-mocking smile. “I nearly brought disaster on you myself because I miscalculated your birth date. If not for this person saving you, how could you be alive today?”

“He… he saved me?” Fang Yanan stammered.

I nodded and calmly addressed Hu Zhiwen. “Do you remember when you came to arrest me? You said you found my fingerprints in Officer Fang’s apartment.”

“Yes, but later I asked her, and you’d never been to her place. Someone must have planted those prints to frame you,” Hu Zhiwen said.

I shook my head with a smile. “Whoever left my fingerprints wasn’t framing me; they wanted you to find me and take me to rescue Fang Yanan.”

The more Yue Qianling listened, the more confused she became. Tilting her head, she asked, “If this person wanted to harm Fang Yanan, why have you save her?”

“Clearly, he knows me—at least he knows I’m skilled in the Daoist arts. By planting my fingerprints, the police would find me, and once I arrived at Fang Yanan’s home, I could deduce her whereabouts.”

“There must be a motive. What did he gain from all this?” Yue Qianling persisted.

“I didn’t understand at first, but then…” I glanced at Hu Zhiwen. “When your colleague reported that the precinct had been robbed, I suddenly realized.”

Fang Yanan’s head snapped up in shock. “I see! He led you to me, so everyone would go rescue me, leaving only a few officers behind. The culprit could then break into the police station!”

“Exactly. His goal wasn’t to harm Officer Fang, but to draw the police away, making a feint in the open while acting in secret. His real target was the station.”

“The police station was robbed? What’s there to steal? It’s not a bank,” Yue Qianling blinked at Hu Zhiwen. “Afterward, did you find anything missing?”

“That’s the strangest part. At first, we thought they wanted weapons, but the armory was untouched. The evidence room was ransacked, but it didn’t seem they were after cash; money from drug and gambling cases—over a hundred thousand—was strewn everywhere, but not a cent was missing. Compared to the inventory, not a single item or file was gone.”