Chapter 1020 - A Person Made From Curses [2 in 1] (2/2)

Moments later, the agitated voice of a middle-aged man echoed out from inside the room. “Stop f*cking knocking on the door!”

The wooden door inside the rental house was pulled open. An unkempt, middle-aged man who was radiating an uncomfortable smell of sweat stood at the door. “Was it you who created such a loud commotion outside the door earlier? Did you just move here? Why aren’t you in bed when it is already so late at night. If you continue to make such a big ruckus, I am going to call the cops on you!”

“There is no need to trouble the police for such a small thing. I just wish to ask you a few questions.” Chen Ge smiled very politely. “Of course, I do not expect you to help me for no reason. If you can answer my questions nicely, I will give you one hundred RMB for each question that you have answered.”

“Are you sleep walking, or is this some kind of prank? You came to my door at two thirty in the early morning to give me a quiz?” The middle-aged man looked around cautiously like a possibility just dawned on him. “There is a camera hidden somewhere, isn’t there? Where’s the camera crew?”

“First, who is the landlord of this building?”

“I am the landlord of this place. What’s the problem? Are you here to rent a room? Then I have to ask you to leave. I will not rent to troublemaker like you.” As unsightly as the middle-aged man was, the way he looked at Chen Ge was still filled with derision and condescension.

“Second, have you rented out Room 205 at the end of this corridor to someone recently?” Chen Ge did not want to waste time on nonsense with the man. If not for his generosity, he would have barged into the room, released the Red Specters, and slammed the exit shut already.

“Room 205 has been rented out since about six years ago. The tenant sends me money every year punctually. The man does not stay here often, but he asks that I keep the room available for him. Since he is paying me money, I don’t see the harm in following his instructions.” The middle-aged man scratched at his hair that was clumped together from a lacking of washing.

“You have not rented it to anyone else during this past six years?”

“No, the tenant always gives me the money about six months before the deadline every year, and he often slips me extra, paying me more than the required rental. Why would I chase away such a good tenant?”

“What does that tenant look like? Do you know what kind of career he is in?” Chen Ge had a feeling that this tenant was the ghost fetus that he was looking for.

“Why should I tell you about that private information? Who are you? Are you a police officer? Why do you think I will leak my tenant’s valuable information to you?” The middle-aged man crossed his arms.

“If you tell me the specifics about the man’s appearance and what he does for a living, I will give you another five hundred RMB.”

“He is a student. He first moved here about five years ago. I believe it was because he got into a serious argument with his family, and he had run away from home. At the time, he had just gotten into secondary school, and he did not have much money on him.” The middle-aged man exposed the details of the tenant of Room 205. “He did not stand out in terms of appearance. He had long hair and a weak constitution. I could hear him very often, and he had the tendency to mumble in his sleep.”

“Is that all you can give me? That is a bit too general. Kids like that litter the street. How do you expect me to go and find him?” Chen Ge did not hold out much hope based on the clues that had been given him by the middle-aged man.

“You want to go and find him?” The middle-aged man gave Chen Ge a once-over and then extended his index finger. “Give me another one thousand RMB, and I will tell you a way that you will be able to find him.”

“No problem, you have a deal.”

“After he ran away from home, his mother came here to look for him. At the time, he was not home, so his mother came to talk to me instead. She left me with a message for the boy. When he came back, I was to inform him that his mother had come, and she wanted him to go to the Eastern Jiujiang’s Huai Ai Hospital to find her. She seemed to be the head nurse for that hospital.” The middle-aged man was not as sleepy as when Chen Ge first knocked on his door. Even though it was fast approaching 3 am, at the thought that he was about to get at least two thousand RMB from answering a few easy questions, his eyes were practically glowing.

“This information is very valuable. Of course, that is if you are not lying to me.” Chen Ge pulled open the zipper of his backpack.

“Why would I lie to you? Now stop wasting my time and give me the money. Don’t think you can cheat me. I have been counting. I have answered more than enough of your questions to earn at least two thousand RMB!” The middle-aged man saw Chen Ge open his backpack, so his greedy gaze involuntarily wandered to look inside it. He noticed the bulging backpack had a human spine lying inside it.

Rubbing his eyes, the middle-aged man glanced deeper into the backpack. Other than the real human spine, there was a pair of bloody red high heels inside the backpack!

A madman? Pervert? Murderer? Serial Killer?

Cold sweat covered and slid down the middle-aged man’s face. Without even realizing it, he took a cautionary step backward.

“My phone is running out of power, so I can’t do a bank transfer. Why don’t you open the door. I will hand you the cash instead.” Chen Ge leaned closer to the steel door, and his lips were slowly curling upward. “You just need to open a small gap for my hand to squeeze through…”

“There is no need. That is unnecessary. I… I only answered a few questions. Why should I expect to be paid for that?” The middle-aged man took another step back. “I have already shared everything that I know. I do not know any more than that. The kid has not been back here for a long time. I believe he will not return any time soon. So, you’d better go look for him somewhere else.”

“Okay. You are probably right about that.” Chen Ge nodded. With a sense of responsibility weighing him down, he turned to ask the landlord again, “Do you really not want the money?”

“No, no, I really don’t!” The middle-aged man waved his hands repeatedly and then quickly slammed the wooden door shut.

“Looks like there are still good people in this world.” Chen Ge carried his backpack and walked down the stairs. “I have not heard of this Huai Ai Hospital before. It should be a private hospital. I’ll go and visit the place tomorrow.”

Stretching his back lazily, Chen Ge left the old city without turning back. “When the sun rises, I’ll only have five nights left.”

When Chen Ge returned to his own haunted house’s staff breakroom, the sun was already rising. He had just crawled into bed when he received a message from Lee Zheng on the phone that he had just plunged into the socket to charge.

“This is an emergency! Reply to me if you see this message!”

“Chen Ge, call me immediately when you see this message!”

There were many similar messages. Chen Ge could hear the urgency in the messages, so he quickly called Lee Zheng’s number. The phone rang only once before it was picked up. Lee Zheng’s voice came from the other side of the line. “Chen Ge, are you alright?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Chen Ge was as confused as he could be.

“Yesterday, we closed in on the location of Jia Ming’s group, and the capture operation was scheduled to be done at night. The boy’s father, Zhen Chun, was killed by the suspect Bei Ye, while the boy’s mother, Yu Wangqing, is in ICU due to serious injuries. The suspect, Bei Ye, was shot and died on the spot. However, both Jia Ming and the boy were not at the crime scene. We have blocked all the roads, but no one has seen any sign of them.”

“How did Jia Ming manage to escape with a child?”

“From the very beginning, Jia Ming planned to use Bei Ye and the boy’s parents as bait. He purposely exposed himself, and when we were busy with his partners, he used the opening to escape. He used his partners’ life to buy time for himself. The man is so awful. How can a man be so heartless?”

“He is no longer a normal man, but Inspector Lee, why are you telling me all this?” Lee Zheng normally would not reveal this inside information to a member of the public. Since he had chosen to share the information with Chen Ge, it could only mean that what happened next would be related to Chen Ge.

“Jia Ming’s group did not leave Jiujiang because they were looking for something. For now, we do not know what that is, but we found a lot of information that’s related to you at their hiding place. I suspect that their next target might be you!”

“They are trying to come for me? Then that… is really so scary.” Chen Ge almost let slip the words… ‘would be perfect’.