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墨書 Inktalez
Fearing to disturb them, I searched outside the house and did not enter. However, as I looked around, I noticed that the breathing sounds were diminishing, and the scent was fading as well.
Then I peered through a hole in the wall and saw that there were fewer people on the bed, and the number continued to decrease until the commotion stopped. I made another discovery.
At first, I had a vague feeling that the women in the building belonged to three factions. One faction was the Sorrowful Faces, who wore expressions of misery all day long, lamenting their misfortunes. This group was the largest.
The second faction was the Emotionless Ones, who had no expression at all. When spoken to, they ignored others and focused solely on their tasks, like walking corpses. This group was the smallest; judging by their state of life, they seemed to have been confined for a longer time.
The third faction was the Smiling Faces, who surprisingly seemed to find some contentment in their confinement. Perhaps they had only recently entered or had endured too much hardship outside; at least inside, no one was scolding or beating them anymore. Thus, they occasionally managed to show a smile. However, due to the overwhelming number of Sorrowful Faces around them, they kept their smiles restrained for fear of offending anyone.
Everything in the building was as it should be, so it was tolerable for these three factions to coexist in one place. However, at night, these distinctions became apparent.
Most of those who disappeared were from the Sorrowful Faces and Emotionless Ones; not a single Smiling Face was among them. The others seemed oblivious to the disappearance of those around them and slept soundly.
Sang Qingxiao asked, "Disappeared? How did they disappear? Did you see clearly?"
Li Cu shook her head. "They suddenly vanished right before my eyes. Afterward, I didn’t care if they noticed me; I went to check each of their beds one by one. There were no traps or signs of any other means—it's as if they vanished into thin air."
I rummaged around and made quite a fuss but didn’t wake any of the others who were asleep.
"Did they come back later?"
"They did, about two hours later. They appeared silently; from my hiding spot, I saw that they all came with their eyes wide open. Clearly, they had voluntarily disappeared and returned with faint smiles on their faces."
Some exchanged glances but remained silent as they continued lying on their beds, waiting for the others to wake up before getting up together.
Everything unfolded so naturally that those still asleep had no suspicions at all. The ones who had disappeared seamlessly resumed their roles without revealing any hints.
Sang Qingxiao listened intently and forgot about those women for a moment, laughing as she said, "How interesting this building is!"
"I also heard some news," Li Cu said proudly, wagging her tail happily and exposing her belly for Sang Qingxiao to scratch gently. At times she would ask for lighter touches or heavier ones with a spoiled tone.
After enjoying herself for a while, Li Cu continued, "After Zhang Linglong went missing with Chen Xiucai, she has been bribing people to send things into the building. Initially, those she bribed could deliver half of what they brought inside; eventually, they ended up keeping everything for themselves. But that's not the key point."
Li Cu deliberately paused for effect before playfully continuing. "Logically speaking, Zhang Linglong shouldn't have been able to contact anyone inside directly. It would be easy for those in between to hide things from both sides."
However, just a few days ago, Zhang Linglong unexpectedly used some connections to frame that intermediary with another crime and sent them straight to prison.
This maneuver was clever; the intermediary never suspected Zhang Linglong at all. They thought it was merely their own carelessness or that they had offended someone else that led to such misfortune.
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