SES Chapter 118 Part 1

Chapter 118

By the time they got back to the hotel, it was already close to ten at night. They’d originally planned to head over to Tengma Sculpture Terrace, but the unexpected incident had thrown everything into chaos.

Still, Yi Wansan was smug about it. “You guys don’t even know what a great job I did tonight.”

Even though the security footage had cleared Yi Wansan of wrongdoing, half the street had seen him chasing and beating Ma Chao. When asked about the cause of the fight, a thought suddenly struck him.

He put on his most “honest” face and said, “Well, the truth is, I was talking to him about Zhang Tong’s case at the time.”

The two officers taking his statement exchanged a glance.

The Zhang Tong case had been a huge scandal in Nantian County.

Yi Wansan pretended not to notice and went on with his pitiful act. “I was just joking, I told him, ‘Back on that bridge, it was only you and that woman—who’s to say who the killer really was?’”

“Next thing I know, he loses his temper, grabs a steaming hot clay pot, and dumps it on me. Officers, it was scalding hot! You get scalded like that, you wouldn’t lose it too? So yeah, I lost it. I jumped up and chased him down…”

With his wounded expression, his “sincere” tone, and the fact that he really was injured and still reeked of seafood, the police couldn’t help feeling a little sympathetic. They even gave him a small nod.

Relieved, Yi Wansan boasted, “See? Didn’t I successfully infiltrate the police, throwing out hints and leading them toward the doubts in the boss lady’s case?”

Cao Yanhua sighed. “Brother San, enough with the hints. Take off your shirt already. Let’s see if your shoulder’s burned. And your hand needs bandaging, right?”

Yi Wansan brushed it off like it was nothing—just minor injuries. Still, having someone fuss over him felt pretty nice.

So he stripped off his jacket, yanked his T-shirt over his head, and tossed it aside.

Only then did he realize Mu Dai and Yan Hongsha were sitting across from him. Yi Wansan froze, a little embarrassed. But when he saw both women looking perfectly calm, he couldn’t believe it. What kind of world is this? A guy takes his shirt off, and women don’t even bother to look away?

While Cao Yanhua applied a cold compress to Yi Wansan’s burns, Luo Ren summarized the theory he’d been discussing with Mu Dai earlier.

Yan Hongsha, who had been lying lazily on the sofa, shot upright at once. “The murderous scroll is on Ma Chao?”

The thought made her furious. “Figures—it’s him who spread the worst rumors about Mu Dai.”

Yi Wansan and Cao Yanhua didn’t comment immediately. After a moment, Cao Yanhua said, “If it really is on him, then Ma Chao’s… kind of weak, isn’t he?”

After all, the guy had been chased down half the street by Yi Wansan. And honestly, out of the five of them, Yi Wansan’s combat skills ranked dead last.

Yan Hongsha countered, “You can’t just look at physical strength—you’ve got to look at destructive power. Old Bang was strong too, and we still took him down, didn’t we? Ma Chao may be weak, but didn’t Mu Dai almost end up in jail because of him?”

That did make some sense. Cao Yanhua fell silent.

Luo Ren mused, “Let’s assume for now the scroll is on Ma Chao. Then what about the others? Yi Wansan clearly didn’t push anyone, yet four people stood up and swore they saw him do it.”

The mention of those four made Cao Yanhua bristle. “Good thing there are security cameras these days. Otherwise, with nothing but their words against his, we’d be screwed.”

Mu Dai thought it over. “Could Ma Chao have put them up to it?”

Yan Hongsha frowned. “He was unconscious at the time.”

Mu Dai explained, “Not necessarily in the way we normally think of orders. If the scroll really is on him, maybe it works like some mental influence—making people say certain things.”

Cao Yanhua scoffed. “If that were the case, why didn’t he just control Brother San, too? Why run around getting chased like that?”

Mu Dai had no answer, but Yi Wansan hesitated and said, “Maybe… maybe he couldn’t control me?”

He lifted his heavily bandaged hand, looking like a bear paw. “I remember when I pressed my hand against his face, he let out this horrible scream—like it hurt more than anything.”

His hand had been bleeding at the time, and some of his blood had smeared onto Ma Chao’s face. Earlier, their five drops of blood had surrounded the scroll… Could it be that their blood had some kind of restraining effect on it? That would explain Ma Chao’s extreme reaction.

But… could the scroll really fear their blood that much?

In the middle of the night, Luo Ren sat bolt upright in bed. After thinking for a while, he got dressed and slipped out.

He didn’t drive—the car would be far too conspicuous here. The city was small anyway, and soon enough, he reached the hospital.

It was 2 a.m.

The hospital was quiet. The daytime bustle had sunk into silence. A nurse was on duty in the lobby, but when she saw someone come in, she didn’t even lift her head—just assumed he was there to visit a patient.

Luo Ren wasn’t in a rush. Following the signs, he searched floor by floor, room by room. With Ma Chao’s condition so severe, he had to be either in the ICU or the morgue.

He found him soon enough.

If you could call it “luck,” the ICU here was barely up to standard. The machines worked, but the staff was thin. After checking the monitors, the duty nurse yawned and slipped out the door.

Luo Ren melted into the shadows, waited for her to vanish down the hall, then darted to the door and slipped inside.

The room went still as he shut the door. Green numbers flickered faintly on monitors in the dark. The machines hummed softly—not silent, but close.

Ma Chao’s breathing floated through the room, his chest rising and falling faintly.

Luo Ren approached the bed, turned on his phone flashlight, and examined Ma Chao’s face.

The blister ring he’d seen earlier—shaped like the pictograph for “mouth”—had almost faded, leaving just a faint red mark.

Setting the phone aside, Luo Ren pulled out a knife he always carried. He drew the blade lightly across the pad of his left index finger, squeezed out a bead of blood, and flicked it onto Ma Chao’s face.

The blood trickled down his cheek, no different from water except for its color. No burns. No strange reaction. Nothing.

Luo Ren frowned, waited a moment, then quietly slipped back out.

Retracing his steps, he walked through the night air, mind churning with questions.