Chapter 107: The Demon Fetus (II)

The place was not hard to find. A few knocks on the wall quickly revealed that it was indeed hollow. I grabbed a hammer and struck it hard a few times; a section of bricks gave way, exposing a pitch-black cavity behind the wall. A musty stench, mingled with a foul, putrid odor, surged out, accompanied by a biting chill.

Zhu Zihao fetched a flashlight, and I cleared away the area, which was roughly the size of a door, revealing a downward-leading staircase. It was unfinished, with raw, unplastered concrete.

He was still young back then and had no memory of what was inside. The three of us descended, turning twice before reaching the bottom. I swept the flashlight across the space, and my goodness, it was a world unto itself!

There were over a dozen large trunks, the kind reinforced with iron plating and nails, and piles of porcelain and various bronze artifacts filled every corner. I pried open one of the trunks, and the golden light reflected from within nearly blinded me; it was packed with gold, silver, and jewelry. The spectacle stunned me, and Cha Wenbin had much the same reaction. As for Zhu Zihao, the man was nearly losing his mind—looping two strings of pearls around his neck and stuffing his pockets, laughing hysterically. It was as if heaven had dropped a pie right into his lap!

No one had imagined that the basement of the Zhu family mansion held such immense wealth. He would never have to worry about where his next meal was coming from again.

He even made sure to shove a few handfuls into my arms, trembling as he said, "Come, come, don't be shy, take it!"

Considering his grandfather's background, the origin of these items was likely less than clean, but that was all history now. Who cared? I, too, fell into a frenzy; in this day and age, who doesn't love money?

The revelry did not last long. The stench in the corner could not be masked by the scent of wealth. That odor, like a dead rat, made it easy to pinpoint the source: an exceptionally large trunk with a seal still pasted across it.

Opening that trunk was a nauseating experience. I barely remember how I escaped that basement. The three of us were retching uncontrollably in the garden; I suspect that even the most seasoned forensic pathologist would have reacted just as we did.

A pile of rotting flesh! To be precise, it was a mound of partially decomposed human remains soaking in an unknown liquid. When I saw an ear, already unrecognizable but still identifiable as human, floating in that crimson fluid mixed with copper-green scum, bubbles rising to the surface, I was struck dumb with horror!

Having nearly vomited up my own bile, I said, "Call the police!"

"Don't!" Zhu Zihao pressed his hand against mine. "If the police get involved, who can say where this stuff really came from? I might even lose the house."

"What do you think?" I asked Cha Wenbin.

Cha Wenbin said to Zhu Zihao, "If you want to keep that treasure, you have to figure out what's going on. Don't end up with enough money to spend but no life left to spend it."

"There's no need for that, is there? We could just find a place and bury it," Zhu Zihao said, still clinging to his fantasies. I retorted:

"By the time you bury it and someone finds it, you won't be able to clear your name even if you jump into Victoria Harbour."

It was later confirmed that there were four bodies in that massive trunk, all of them female! Without exception, every one of these women had a distended abdomen. The trunk had been exceptionally well-sealed, so they had not fully decomposed; they were laid out neatly like salted meat in that coffin. Judging by the remnants of their clothing, these women had been dead for a very long time.

The Hong Kong police arrived quickly. It was a major incident, causing a sensation throughout Hong Kong—four unidentified female bodies found in the basement of a luxury mansion. As for the wealth, we had already moved it to the second floor before the police arrived. This was private property, and the advantage of a capitalist system is the absolute protection and respect for private property.

Zhu Zihao was the sole legal heir to the mansion. According to Hong Kong law, he was taken in for questioning, and Cha Wenbin and I, as witnesses, were taken to the police station as well.

After giving our statements and posting bail, the three of us were released, but the authorities required us to be on call at all times. Until it was proven that we had no connection to the corpses, we were forbidden from leaving Hong Kong. The bodies were sent to a government mortuary, where they were to undergo forensic autopsies.

"I suggest immediate cremation, otherwise there may be trouble," Cha Wenbin told one of the officers in charge as we left. The man was a British superintendent, and his response was: "Don't let me find any evidence, or you will be the ones in trouble."

Early the next morning, a line of police cars arrived and took Cha Wenbin away.

Zhu Zihao pulled every string he could and spent a great deal of money, but for the entire day, he received no information. Nobody knew where the Chinese man had been taken. However, according to an insider, a major incident had occurred at the Hong Kong police station the previous night.

On the third day, at my wit's end, I was summoned by the police. The officer questioning me was a Chinese detective. The ashtray in front of him was overflowing with cigarette butts; his eyes were bloodshot, his hair a mess, and from across the table, I could smell that he hadn't bathed in at least two days.

"Mr. Xia, I have received all your files via fax from the mainland police. Can you tell me about your friend? What kind of man is he?"

Before coming, I had consulted with a lawyer hired by Zhu Zihao. Following his advice, I said, "A normal person, similar in age to me. I want to emphasize that we are law-abiding citizens. We haven't done anything illegal. If you have no evidence, please release him. According to the law, you cannot hold him for more than 48 hours."

"But the mainland authorities cannot find any information on him. How do you explain that?"

I understood why there was no information on Cha Wenbin; it wasn't that he didn't exist, but that this superintendent’s rank was far too low to access it. "We entered Hong Kong through legal channels. If there were no information on him, he wouldn't have passed customs."

He insisted, "Please cooperate! Two of our men are dead!" After saying this, he clenched his fists so tightly his knuckles turned white; he looked ready to explode.

I spread my hands. "Of course, I am very willing to cooperate. Where is he?"

"He says it's the work of ghosts and spirits. How do you expect me to believe that?"

"If you don't believe it, why arrest him? Just let him go," I continued. "You don't believe it, but you can't explain it, right? You want me to verify the results for you, but I am certain you still won't believe it. Officer, what if I told you he wasn't lying to you?"

He sneered, "Absurd!"

"Then there's nothing to talk about. If there are any further questions, you can contact my lawyer." I signaled to a nearby officer, "My lawyer wishes to see my friend and take him with us. Where do we handle the paperwork?"

Just then, a middle-aged man's voice came from the doorway: "Your friend cannot leave just yet." I turned to see a portly man in a grey suit and tie walking in. The superintendent across from me stood up to salute, but the man signaled him to stop.

"You want to see him, right? Come with me."

Led by this man, I got into a car. It drove through the streets and alleys of Hong Kong, eventually arriving at the foot of a mountain. After a long drive up a winding road, we reached a small, three-story white building halfway up the slope. There were armed police officers guarding the entrance. The car drove straight into the garage, and we took an elevator to the second floor.

There, I saw Cha Wenbin. He seemed fine; at least physically, he showed no signs of mistreatment.

"Why are you here?" He looked surprised by my visit.

The man who had brought me said from the side, "I invited him."

"Thank you." Cha Wenbin was very polite to the man, then turned to me and said, "I'm fine. I'm just staying to help them with a problem."

"What kind of problem?"

Cha Wenbin said, "Handling those bodies. It's very strange. The forensic pathologist who performed the autopsy and his assistant both died that night."

"The authorities suspect murder, but Mr. Cha claims it is a supernatural event." The man handed me a few photographs. "I hope you can handle this."

The photos showed two men and one woman lying on the floor, along with several of those small, boat-shaped hospital gurneys. The scene was a white room covered in blood; the walls and bed sheets were splattered with dots of blood from arterial spray.

The second photo showed several small handprints on the wall, roughly the size of an infant's. Seeing this, I felt an inexplicable sense of unease. Goosebumps erupted all over my skin. I quickly dropped the photos. "You're the police. Why do you need to ask us about this?"

"Don't be impatient, look at this." With that, the man put a videotape into the player. At first, the screen was filled with static. A short while later, the scene in the room appeared. Several men in medical attire walked in. They opened the trunk, and the bodies were lifted onto the gurneys one by one.

What followed was standard forensic procedure. About five minutes later, the screen flickered, as if the signal had been interrupted. When the image returned to normal, the doctors were already lying on the floor.

The footage was paused, rewound, and played again. When the signal cut out, it was paused once more. The man said, "Watch closely. A figure appears on the screen." He pointed to the bottom right corner. It was a dark, blurred mass. Played in quadruple slow motion, it seemed possible to discern a human shape, but that was all—just a possibility.

But what happened next left me dumbstruck: the footage continued in slow motion, and though I still couldn't see what had attacked the doctors, a few seconds later, a bloody handprint appeared on the wall... followed by a second, then a third...

These handprints had all appeared out of thin air.