27 A Visit

Fang Qingzhou sat up in bed, lacking the energy to debate with Zhou Suirong whether sleep in human activity could be subjectively controlled.

Before going to sleep last night, she had found time to draft several versions of her thoughts, attempting to lay the groundwork before revealing the truth. However, after writing over two thousand words of repetitive nonsense, she had to painfully delete it all upon self-review.

She finally drifted into a hazy sleep, but as too many things had happened during the day, the nightmares began again.

In her dream, Zhou Suirong was holding her and kissing her one second, and the next, he was dragging his suitcase away from her home without looking back. She instinctively reached out to grab his hand, only to be shoved aside.

The man placed his suitcase between them to block her approach, saying coldly, "We have already broken up."

Then, the scene jumped rapidly, filled with all sorts of bizarre and disjointed plots.

After an arduous adventure, Fang Qingzhou finally brought Zhou Suirong home and pulled up a chair to watch him play video games.

The little character on the screen jumped about, unleashing skills that flashed with colorful light effects. Just as Fang Qingzhou was about to ask about the rules of the game, Zhou Suirong suddenly turned his head and delivered another resounding statement: "Fang Qingzhou, can you treat your ex-boyfriend who you've already broken up with properly? You are not allowed to use my account to top up money anymore."

That woke Fang Qingzhou up in a fit of rage.

She turned over and went back to sleep, but this time, the dream did not follow the previous one; instead, it felt even more real.

She returned to the area outside Liang Yizheng's villa, walked under the tree, lowered her gaze, and saw the corpse with her own eyes.

But that pale, lifeless face was not Jiang Ping—it was Zhou Suirong.

Fang Qingzhou did not recognize him at first glance because such an image did not exist in any of her memories. Her gaze swept over those familiar features in panic, finally settling heavily on the long, narrow knife wound on the corpse's neck.

The shocking wound assaulted her vision, causing her thoughts to roar like a malfunctioning machine, falling apart into countless broken pieces.

She subconsciously wanted to escape and run away, yet her body moved closer against her will.

Suddenly, the corpse came to life. As if time were rewinding, scorching blood gushed from the congealed wound, bubbling out.

Fang Qingzhou collapsed to her knees, both hands pressing desperately against Zhou Suirong's bleeding gash.

The split flesh pressed against her palms; Zhou Suirong’s heartbeat and body heat slowly faded away once more amidst her chaotic breathing. Fang Qingzhou shrieked and cried for help, her voice turning shrill and cracking, yet her ears, ringing with noise, could not hear a single sound of her own.

This scene had happened before, allowing Fang Qingzhou to suddenly distinguish the nightmare from reality, and she woke up. The culprit who had startled her awake twice was now sitting at her bedside, face stony, asking her why she had stayed up late.

Fang Qingzhou stood up, and as she passed by Zhou Suirong, she deliberately stepped on his foot.

Zhou Suirong: "??"

Little Zhou tilted his head back to watch her walk into the bathroom and protested, "You have to charge me with a crime first, won't you, Officer Fang?"

Officer Fang ignored him.

Zhou Suirong stood by the door with his computer, waiting. With his long legs, broad shoulders, and bright, handsome features, his short hair styled casually, he looked incredibly pleasing to the eye standing in the circle of light.

Fang Qingzhou finished tidying herself up, lazily lifted her eyelids, and glanced at him. The straight line of her walk from the bedroom began to warp; when she reached him, her footsteps faltered as if she had lost her footing, and she leaned her upper body against him, bracing her hand on his chest before pulling the door open and walking out.

Zhou Suirong stood there honestly, having been blatantly taken advantage of. He raised his voice with a smirk, "What are you doing? Fang Qingzhou! I saw that!"

Fang Qingzhou tucked her hands idly into her trouser pockets and walked away as if nothing had happened.

...

Zhou Suirong huffed.

He knew it—he had hooked her back then entirely on the strength of his face.

The two had originally planned to meet Xu Youxiang in the morning to probe what the young man—who in everyone's eyes was the most likely to have been driven into a corner by Liang Yizheng—had encountered. But for now, they had to focus on eating.

Once in the car, Zhou Suirong checked nearby restaurants and asked her what she wanted for lunch.

Fang Qingzhou answered off-topic: "You're dressed all fancy today."

Zhou Suirong was left between laughter and tears, putting his phone down and saying, "Fang Qingzhou, I didn't wear perfume or makeup; I just washed my face. How is that 'fancy'? That's your own issue, isn't it?"

Fang Qingzhou insisted unreasonably: "It's still fancy."

Zhou Suirong stared at her side profile as she feigned seriousness and said with a hint of bitterness, "Fang Qingzhou, how can you be so focused on someone else's appearance? That's a weakness."

Fang Qingzhou retorted immediately: "Nonsense. No one has ever said that about me. I don't care what anyone else looks like at all."

Zhou Suirong drawled, "Oh, so it's my fault for washing my face?"

He had definitely dressed up—he had been quite calculating—but Fang Qingzhou didn't want to argue further about whose fault it was. She took his phone, scrolled up and down, and tapped on one randomly: "I want to eat this."

She had chosen spicy hot pot. Zhou Suirong didn't take her suggestion.

The two ate nearby and headed to the address Team Leader Feng had sent them.

Xu Youxiang lived in an old, unredeveloped residential area.

The building was fifty or sixty years old, and the entrance was hidden in a small alley to the side of a row of shops.

Parking was difficult, so Zhou Suirong went to find a spot further away. When he returned, Fang Qingzhou had finished browsing a supermarket alone, a bag in her hand.

Zhou Suirong took it from her, felt the weight, and opened it to find a box of mooncakes and two bottles of liquor. He was momentarily speechless at the bizarre combination.

Fang Qingzhou said calmly, "Shouldn't one bring gifts when paying a visit? This way, if he refuses to see us, he'll at least have to throw the items away before chasing us off. This local supermarket is too small; these were the only two things with decent packaging."

Zhou Suirong's praise arrived right on cue, not omitted despite the unpleasantness at noon: "You are truly making progress every moment, Leader."

Following the leader's pace, Zhou Suirong arrived at the second floor where Xu Youxiang lived.

It was unclear if Xu Youxiang was intentionally hiding or had moved, but after they knocked on the door intermittently for five minutes, there was not a sound from inside.

Zhou Suirong set the items down and was discussing with Fang Qingzhou whether to keep waiting or head back, when a person turned the corner at the stairwell.

The man had hair that was too long, messy and unkempt, blocking his eyes. Combined with his faded, ill-fitting clothes, he looked quite disheveled. An air of decadent sickness permeated his entire being, which, paired with his overly thin frame, made it seem as though his vitality had been drained away, leaving behind only a world-weariness inappropriate for his age.

He walked up the stairs, shoulders swaying like a scrap of paper in the wind. When he looked up and saw Zhou Suirong standing at his door, his footsteps froze. In a split second, not knowing which wire in his brain had crossed, he didn't wait for them to introduce themselves; he hurled the things in his hand forward and bolted downstairs as if fleeing for his life.

In an instant, he went from an eighty-year-old man to displaying the potential of a sprinter.

Zhou Suirong took a second to react before leaping down the long flight of stairs, grabbing the railing, and shouting, "Xu Youxiang, wait! We mean no harm!"

As soon as he said this, Xu Youxiang ran even faster, bolting through the security door like lightning and slamming it shut behind him.

Zhou Suirong followed close behind, chasing him out from the alley entrance. Scanning left and right, he caught a glimpse of Xu Youxiang's back amidst the blur of the street.

Seeing Xu Youxiang sprinting for his life toward a crowded area and making a move to dash across the road in his panic, Zhou Suirong's heart stopped, terrified by the man's reckless disregard for his own safety. Thinking quickly, he roared at the people ahead: "Stop him—the one in the blue shirt!"

A passerby in the distance jolted. Seeing Xu Youxiang zig-zagging and seeing Zhou Suirong’s righteous, imposing manner, he assumed they were plainclothes police officers apprehending a suspect. He planted his feet, ready to intercept Xu Youxiang.

The moment he made eye contact with the passerby, Xu Youxiang assumed the man was an accomplice of Zhou Suirong and that he was being surrounded. Driven by the instinct to survive, his adrenaline spiked; he abruptly changed direction and ducked back into the winding side alleys.

This place was Xu Youxiang's home turf. As soon as Zhou Suirong entered, he was led in circles and lost his sense of direction. He nearly lost him several times, only managing to track his position by the sound of Xu Youxiang's frantic footsteps, barely managing to catch up.

Xu Youxiang was exhausted; it was a miracle he had lasted this long. The breath he squeezed from his lungs sounded like the mournful wheezing of an old bellows.

He leaned one hand against a wall, panting rapidly, red-faced and gasping for air. He took two more steps, bent over, and retched, vomiting sour bile all over the ground.

Xu Youxiang's stomach began to cramp in agony. With saliva still hanging from his lips, he turned to see Zhou Suirong appearing like a persistent ghost. His eyes were bloodshot and bulging, shooting a glare that could almost turn solid.

Zhou Suirong stopped in his tracks and raised his hands in a gesture of goodwill: "We aren't with Liang Yizheng! Stop running!"

Xu Youxiang's hearing was consumed by the sound of his own heartbeat; he couldn't hear a word. Unwilling to accept his fate, he dragged his leaden legs and forced himself to run again.

Fang Qingzhou appeared from somewhere and blocked his path.

Zhou Suirong: "!!"

Zhou Suirong was terrified, his face turning three shades paler than Xu Youxiang's corpse-like complexion. He squeezed a few words from his throat and roared: "Get out of the way!"

Xu Youxiang clearly didn't take her seriously either, charging straight forward and yelling, "Get lost!!"

Fang Qingzhou kept one hand behind her back and curled the fingers of the other into a tight fist.

In the blink of an eye, the two collided head-on. Xu Youxiang, face twisted with ferocity, raised his hand to shove, but Fang Qingzhou calmly pulled an iron rod from behind her back and feinted a strike.

"Ah—damn!"

With a dull thud, the young man crashed straight into the wall to avoid the strike. His arm bore the full force of his momentum, and he collapsed to the ground, crying out in pain and rolling back and forth.

Blinded by pain, he cursed at the top of his lungs: "Damn it! You're shameless! You're so despicable!"

Zhou Suirong: "..."

He rushed forward, first checking Xu Youxiang's injured arm to see if there was a fracture, then pinning his uninjured arm and back to keep him from moving and worsening the injury.

Fang Qingzhou tossed the iron rod aside, pretending nothing had happened. Seeing the man drenched in cold sweat and his pupils unfocused, she hesitated and said, "Do you need me to take you to the hospital?"

Hearing the word "hospital," Xu Youxiang looked ready to spring off the ground. Enduring the stabbing pain, he broke free from Zhou Suirong's grip, scrambled backward, and screamed, "No—no! I'm not going! What are you trying to do now!"