Salted Meat

The moment my foot was seized by an icy hand, my nerves snapped taut—there was someone under the bed!

A rush of questions exploded in my mind. Hadn’t Jin Ze checked under the bed and said there was no one? Did he simply not notice this person, or had he lied to me on purpose?

Thinking back to when I called Zhang Wentong, only for the phone to ring on Jin Ze, I was filled with a sense of dread, a nameless terror settling heavily in my heart.

The hand was now gripping my ankle, dragging me backward. It was late summer, edging into autumn, yet this hand was bone-chillingly cold, as if it had just come out of a freezer. My panic grew, my thoughts running wild—could this be a severed hand, like those left behind by the deranged killer?

A horrifying thought rose within me—damn, could this be a dismembered hand grabbing me?

My fear mounted, but I knew I had to face whatever was happening. I had no idea what was happening with Jin Ze, but I couldn’t just sit here and wait for death.

So, like a startled mule, I kicked my leg backward with all my strength, trying to break free from the grip. At the same time, I braced myself and whipped my head around to look.

It was broad daylight, so even though the light beneath the bed was dim, I could clearly see what was before me.

Lying flat on her stomach beneath the bed behind me was a person. She clung to my right foot with both hands, her head tilted up, staring straight at me.

She wasn’t an adult, but a pale little girl—the same eerie child who’d left us a sketch at Chen Mengying’s house before vanishing.

Seeing her, I shuddered involuntarily. Her posture was disturbingly unnatural: both hands gripping my foot, arms braced on the floor, shoulders hunched high, her head pressed low between them, eyes wide and fixed on me. The way she moved reminded me of the ghostly woman crawling down the stairs in “The Grudge.”

As I stared, stunned, she suddenly yanked my leg hard and, moving at an unnatural speed, crawled out from under the bed.

By the time I reacted, she was already gone from beneath the bed.

Though still shaken to my core, I reasoned—she was just a little girl, after all. I was a grown man; surely, I could handle her. Besides, she was definitely a crucial clue—I couldn’t let her escape.

So I sprang to my feet and dashed out. I was so nervous I smacked my head on the bedframe—a sharp, searing pain—but I didn’t care. Clutching my head, I chased after her.

I burst out the door and reached the stairwell, ready to run downstairs, when I saw her standing at the landing below, gazing up at me.

My instincts screamed at me—was this a trap? She’d had a chance to flee, yet she hadn’t. Was she luring me into an ambush?

I skidded to a halt and called out, “Who are you?”

She didn’t answer, still staring at me with that blank expression. She was actually quite pretty, but her deathly pallor and those empty, oversized eyes made her look terrifying.

Seeing she wouldn’t speak, I pressed, “What do you want? I’m telling you, you can’t get away. If you cooperate, you’re just a minor—you won’t get into too much trouble.”

Still, she remained silent. Just as I wondered if she might be mute, she suddenly broke into a smile—a stiff, unnatural expression, not at all like that of a child.

Her smile made me shiver. Then she fixed her gaze on me and spoke, enunciating each word: “Big brother, you are a dead man.”

Big brother, you are a dead man.

Hearing those words spoken in her childish voice, I was instantly chilled to the bone. The phrase stabbed into my heart like a knife.

What did she mean? How was I a dead man?

I was perfectly alive—how could I be dead?

As I puzzled over her words, the little girl turned and ran. I wanted to chase her, but it was too late, and I had no heart to continue.

Left standing there, I wracked my brain trying to decipher her meaning. Suddenly, a chill ran down my spine, and in that instant, I felt I understood.

I didn’t know what this girl truly was, nor what her connection was to the string of cases, but one thing was clear—she hadn’t harmed me, and she’d left us clues before. When she said I was a dead man, maybe she didn’t mean I was already dead, but that I was doomed—I was about to die!

In other words, I was in imminent danger!

The thought made me even more anxious. I immediately called Fang Qinghe. After hearing what had happened, he told me to return to Jin Ze at once—only by staying together would I be safe, and he would send backup soon.

After hanging up, I reconsidered my suspicions of Jin Ze. If he’d meant me harm, he’d had a hundred chances to kill me without a trace. So I hurried back to Fang Lin’s house.

I went straight to the bedroom, but I didn’t see Jin Ze coming down from the attic, which puzzled me. I called out loudly, “Jin Ze! Jin Ze!” but there was no reply.

Worried, I drew the fruit knife I always kept at my waist for protection, steeled myself, and climbed into the attic.

As I pushed open the door, a strange, sour, rotting smell hit me—not quite the stench of decay, but sharp and pungent, reminiscent of pickled goods.

The attic window was tiny and half-covered, so the light was poor and visibility low. I switched on my phone’s flashlight and swept it around the room—and immediately shuddered.

Damn—there was a black wooden coffin sitting on the attic floor!

No wonder Fang Lin had never allowed me up here. I never imagined a coffin would be hidden in her attic.

But then I realized something was wrong. The police had already searched Fang Lin’s house; if there had been a coffin, they would have found it. That meant it had been brought here afterward.

What was inside? Was there a corpse?

Despite my fear, I edged closer, still quietly calling for Jin Ze, but there was no answer. How could a grown man simply vanish after coming up here?

I reached the coffin, debating whether to find a tool to pry open the lid, when I suddenly sensed a shadow beside me.

At first, I thought it was Jin Ze, but the shadow grew, looming over my head.

It was clear the shadow was descending from above.

As I tried to dodge aside, something landed heavily on my shoulder, slamming into me painfully.

Instinctively, I turned my head—and nearly gasped out loud.

Damn—it was a pair of feet pressing against my shoulder.

But these weren’t normal feet—they were bare, shriveled, the skin peeled away to reveal grayish-white bone.

Horrified, I looked up. What I saw nearly scared my soul out of my body.

There, suspended above me, hung a desiccated corpse. It must have been tied to the rafters and had just fallen, its feet now resting on my shoulders.

To be honest, the sight was appalling. The skin on its chest had been entirely stripped away, the flesh beneath slashed open, but still clinging to the skin at the base, wedged between skin and bone. The meat was completely dried, resembling cured meat left for days—no wonder I’d smelled that sour scent; it was the odor of preserved flesh.

Who could have done this, killing someone and turning them into a bundle of dried, skin-wrapped meat? What kind of hatred would drive someone to such extremes? And why would this ghastly, preserved corpse appear in Fang Lin’s attic?

As I was thinking this, a dull thumping suddenly sounded from inside the coffin...