The car sped along the elevated highway, flanked by towering buildings on both sides, their myriad lights twinkling like man-made constellations.
Meng Chao rolled down the window, chain-smoking in silence. Ni Xiangdong's scarred face was soon shrouded in mist, flickering in and out of view, indistinct.
The afternoon raid had come up empty, yet Meng Chao's mind was anything but. If Wu Ximei's account had brought some clarity to the case, Sun Chuanhai's words had plunged it back into confusion.
The old man's tears and pleas seemed genuine, but the more truthful his words sounded, the more absurd the entire case became. The kneeling supplicants had painted an entirely new picture of Ni Xiangdong—one starkly at odds with Wu Ximei's earlier testimony.
Could one person truly wear two completely different faces?
Late into the night, he dismissed his team for some brief rest while he headed to Ni Xiangdong's place alone, hoping to find new leads. Tong Hao, however, insisted he wasn't tired and tagged along.
"Tsk, so much change in just a few years," Tong Hao mused from the passenger seat, tapping the window with his index finger. "From a heinous criminal to a living saint—what the hell happened in between?"
"Hah, a prodigal's return," Meng Chao snorted, shooting him a sidelong glance. "You actually buy that?"
Tong Hao pondered for a moment before nodding with utmost sincerity. "I do."
The answer nearly choked Meng Chao, sending him into a coughing fit.
"Boss, you're not getting any younger. Ease up on the smokes," Tong Hao said, thumping his back vigorously. "So, what do you think? Do you believe it?"
Meng Chao blinked away tears from the coughing, cleared his throat, and finally spoke after a long pause. "I only believe in human nature," he said, steering the car off the highway toward the old district. "I believe a leopard can't change its spots."
"True enough. No matter how much someone changes, they can't completely abandon their core nature."
"Take me, for example. I've been a chatterbox since childhood, always mischievous and tactless. My mom nagged me for over twenty years, and I still haven't changed. Still getting chewed out for being impulsive, saying the wrong things, messing up."
"So what's the deal with Ni Xiangdong? Some kind of major trauma? How does someone just flip like that?" Tong Hao interlaced his fingers behind his head, tilting back to blink at the car ceiling before suddenly slapping his thigh. "Unless—"
"Unless what?"
"Unless he's possessed by a different soul," Tong Hao exclaimed, suddenly animated as he smacked Meng Chao's arm. "Boss, hear me out—this case might have supernatural elements. It could totally be—"
Meng Chao took a deep breath, biting back a curse. "Kid, if you're tired, just take a nap."
"I'm not tired—"
"Save your energy," Meng Chao shot him a glare. "When we get there, focus on finding clues."
"Don't worry about me, Boss. We're different—I'm young, full of vigor—"
"Shut up."
Ni Xiangdong's place wasn't far from Cao Xiaojun and Wu Ximei's rented apartment—just across the street on the same old block, less than two hundred meters away in a straight line.
The difference was that he rented a single-room flat in Sunnyside Courtyard, a cheaper and far shabbier option.The location wasn’t great—just inside the inner courtyard gate, the first room on the right, as conspicuous as a guardhouse. A few steps further ahead was the communal toilet, directly facing it, ensuring an unavoidable stench in the summer.
The layout was narrow, just a single cramped room where even three or five people would struggle to move around.
There were two doors—front and back. The back door had been sealed off, piled with junk and a coal stove. The front door wasn’t much better, flimsy and crude, just five or six planks nailed together and painted white, barely resembling a proper door.
Now, the paint was peeling, the hinges rusted, creaking and trembling in the wind like the wail of a resentful ghost.
Between the two doors was a window, taking up most of the wall. Useless, it remained locked year-round, its glass covered in old-fashioned paper cutouts—colorful diamond patterns, a fashionable relic of the 1990s. Faded, yellowed, and bubbled by time, it still dutifully blocked prying eyes, keeping the household’s secrets hidden from passersby in the courtyard.
What else was left?
Meng Chao slipped on shoe covers and stepped inside, flicking the switch. The fluorescent tube overhead buzzed, flickered, then cast a cold white glow across the room.
Everything in sight was just the bare necessities.
Right by the entrance stood a metal washstand with a chipped enamel basin, half a bar of Dettol soap, and a tattered gray-white towel left to rot, full of holes.
The fridge and gas stove were outdated, clearly the landlord’s castoffs. Beyond that, the only furniture was a table, two chairs, a plank bed, and a nightstand.
Sun Chuanhai hadn’t exaggerated—Ni Xiangdong’s life was indeed harder than his.
“Ni Xiangdong actually earns decent money. How come his place is so shabby?” Tong Hao flipped through the numbers in his notebook. “Where does all his money go?”
Meng Chao didn’t respond.
He felt the answer was on the tip of his tongue, but he hesitated to voice it, afraid of leading himself astray.
“Seasonal clothes are still here,” Tong Hao withdrew his head from the wardrobe and poked at the half-eaten steamed bun on the table. “This fermented tofu is still open. Doesn’t seem like a premeditated escape—more like he was pulled away mid-meal.”
Meng Chao stayed silent, gloved hands continuing to inspect the surroundings.
The cheap rental was barren, with nowhere to hide.
After a thorough search, they found no diaries, notes, or anything of the sort.
“Nothing out of the ordinary,” Tong Hao clicked his tongue. “Aside from being poor, this is just an ordinary bachelor’s home.”
But something was clearly missing.
What was it?
“This place feels so empty,” Tong Hao sniffed, hands on his hips. “Not even a family photo on the wall.”
Right—no photos.
Meng Chao pulled open drawers, searching carefully. There were none—not a single one.
To be precise, there was nothing to prove Ni Xiangdong’s past.
No photos, letters, or keepsakes.
It was as if this man had appeared out of thin air, existing only in the present, owning nothing beyond this very moment.
“Ni Xiangdong’s lived alone for so many years—never misses home? Pretty cold-hearted.”
Tong Hao kept muttering, but Meng Chao, following his words, had grasped a faint thread of a clue.He suddenly felt that bringing Tong Hao along was the right decision.
After handling cases for so many years, he occasionally fell into habitual thinking himself. But this "half-outsider" before him dared to say anything and make any assumption. Perhaps being too close to the situation obscured his vision, and Tong Hao might actually help him realize something.
The person who lived in this room had no past—or rather, he had a past he didn’t want others to see.
He had deliberately hidden everything from before.
But why?
Almost there. Just a little more.
"What else?" he pressed Tong Hao. "What do you feel is missing? Say it all."
"Lots of things are missing—TV, coffee table, sofa—"
"No, no," Meng Chao interrupted. "Daily necessities. Think about daily necessities."
Tong Hao bent down and carefully rummaged through the nightstand.
"Hmm," he frowned. "Strange. Look, there’s a comb, hair mousse, and a bottle of Dabao here. This means Ni Xiangdong cared a lot about his appearance—"
"Go on."
"But," he straightened up and looked around, "there’s no mirror."
No mirror.
Not a single mirror in the entire room.
"How could someone who cares so much about his appearance not have a mirror at home?"
No mirror.
Why no mirror?
The scar!
Meng Chao suddenly thought of something. "When was Ni Xiangdong’s face disfigured?"
"Huh?" Tong Hao was taken aback and quickly flipped through his notebook. "Was it when he was a child or an adult? Was it in Nanyang Province or Qindao?"
Tong Hao shook his head. "I don’t think we ever asked."
"We forgot to ask," Meng Chao said with a bitter smile. "Such an obvious clue, and I overlooked it."
"Boss, what do you mean?"
"I don’t know why, but I always feel his change has something to do with his face."
"True, I’ve heard of people whose personalities changed after being disfigured," Tong Hao mused. "But someone turning to good deeds because of it? That’s a first."
The scar on his left cheek was the key. The scar was his mask.
Ni Xiangdong, what exactly are you hiding beneath that scar?
The two racked their brains but couldn’t figure it out. An hour later, they were squatting side by side in the doorway, smoking.
Late at night, the old street was silent and empty.
The small shops along the street had closed early, their shutters drawn. The low buildings lay dormant in the darkness, with only the orange streetlights still awake, standing lonely watch, illuminating a long-faded dream.
"Boss, who do you think is lying?" Tong Hao suppressed a yawn. "Sun Chuanhai or Wu Ximei?"
"What they said served their own purposes."
Meng Chao stood up and stamped his feet, trying to shake off the cold.
"Maybe they’re both lying. Maybe neither is."
He looked back. The courtyard was pitch-black, every household’s doors and windows tightly shut—except for Ni Xiangdong’s window, where a light was on.
The flickering glow fell on the colorful stained-glass window decorations, casting a dreamy, unreal beauty on a small patch of ground, like stage scenery. It was so beautiful it didn’t seem real, as if the light itself was just a prop, part of a performance—and they were the only audience tonight.
Ni Xiangdong, what kind of act have you been putting on all these years?
A prodigal son’s return? A villain turned good? Meng Chao shook his head. No, he had his own motives.
The phone rang, startling them both. It was Chu Xiao.
"Captain Meng, you’re still up, right? Can you talk?"
"Yeah, I’m here. What’s up?""You asked me to trace the accounts, and I found it. Over the past ten years, Ni Xiangdong has indeed been sending money to an account, with large monthly transfers—roughly—" There was a rustling sound on the other end of the line, "I did a quick calculation, and it accounts for about four-fifths of his income."
"Who’s the recipient?"
Chu Xiao relayed a completely unfamiliar name over the phone.
"Alright, got it. You should get some rest too."
Meng Chao hung up the phone and took a deep drag from his cigarette.
Above him, an airplane streaked across the night sky, vanishing into the clouds.
"Boss, what’s next? Where do we go from here?"
"Book the tickets," Meng Chao stubbed out his cigarette. "We’re heading to Nanling Village."
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