Chapter Sixty: The Trail of Butler Ma
Page 1/3
Le Dong, Lin Xun, Cai Kun, and Ma Wenwen exchanged glances; Li Gang’s words were both expected and yet unexpected. After he finished speaking, the black mist churned violently, showing signs of a sudden surge.
“Hmph, there’s a lot of resentment!”
Seeing this, Lin Xun stepped forward, tightly gripping his baton, strange patterns faintly visible on its surface.
“Don’t move!”
Ma Wenwen, hearing the faint sound of the baton, spoke to stop him and explained, “Let him finish speaking!”
Lin Xun hesitated and halted.
In midair, the smoky figure of Li Gang trembled violently; his voice suddenly rose, filled with bone-deep hatred:
“It’s those three beasts—three damned beasts! They, alive and kicking... smashed my head with my own wrench—!”
With this mournful accusation, the barely maintained smoky human form suddenly collapsed and reformed!
A brand-new, terrifying image instantly replaced the vague outline, clear before everyone’s eyes!
It was still Li Gang’s face, but now it was marred with deep, intersecting, bone-deep wounds.
Most horrifying was the top of his skull; the entire crown had completely caved in, the shattered skull twisted at an unnatural angle, white brain matter mixed with dark red blood oozing like smashed watermelon pulp, sticky and clinging to the jagged edges of the broken skull and his face!
One eye was completely crushed, leaving only a bloody, mangled void; the other eye was wide open, the eyeball nearly bulging out, frozen with the terror and agony of death and overwhelming resentment!
This ghastly sight was exactly as he said: his head had been smashed alive with a heavy object!
“Hiss—”
This chilling scene caused Cai Kun to emit a short, sharp breath; Le Dong averted his gaze, stomach churning with a wave of nausea rushing to his throat.
Even the seasoned Lin Xun and Ma Wenwen instantly felt their breath catch, brows furrowed deeply.
“Who are the three?”
Page 2/3
Instinctively, Lin Xun blurted out.
“It’s... a young man with glasses. He came to me to fix his bike, and it was already late. They were in a hurry, so I let them in...”
Li Gang recalled regretfully:
“But as I was fixing it, one of the older men suddenly asked if I usually watch the news. I spoke too much, told them about a recent prison break report in our province...”
At this, Le Dong and Cai Kun, listening silently, trembled slightly, their eyes burning with eager curiosity.
“I felt something was wrong right after I finished speaking because they fell silent behind me. When I turned around, the young man with glasses was smashing my head with a wrench!”
“He hit me again and again; I didn’t even have time to scream!”
Hearing Li Gang’s tearful confession, Le Dong was almost certain these three were the Butler Ma and his gang!
He hadn’t expected that after their prison break, they would escape this way.
At that moment, as a police officer, Lin Xun also pieced the situation together. He turned to Le Dong and the others:
“I heard from some friends at the bureau’s analysis that they might really have fled in this direction.”
He immediately pulled out a photo and showed it to Li Gang.
Also a police officer, Lin Xun glanced at Le Dong and the others:
“According to my colleagues at the bureau, they probably escaped this way!”
She quickly opened her phone, pulled up the news photo, and raised it high, holding the phone directly facing the wailing black smoke in midair:
“Look carefully—is it these three who killed you?!”
In the photo, three men’s faces bore the grim and ruthless look of desperate fugitives.
On the far left was Xiao Zhang with black-rimmed glasses; in the center was a man around fifty with narrow eyes, exuding crafty cunning—that was Butler Ma; on the right, a greasy-faced, sleazy-looking fat man.
As soon as the photo was raised, Li Gang’s black smoke suddenly froze, as if struck hard by an invisible hammer!
The next moment, a fierce, venomous black aura surged from the smoke, plunging the entire repair shop’s temperature several degrees instantly.
The smoke churned violently, faintly redrawing that shattered, horrifying face. The lone remaining eye fixed intently on the three faces in the photo, emitting a guttural, ravenous “ho ho” sound from its throat.
“It’s... them. It’s those three beasts, those three damned murderers—!”
That piercing roar, thick with overwhelming resentment, echoed wildly throughout the empty repair shed, shaking dust loose from the ceiling.
Page 3/3
“Enough!”
Ma Wenwen, sensing Li Gang’s rising malice, scolded sharply, urging him to calm down:
“Every grievance has its source, every debt its debtor. Your blood feud will be judged by the laws of the living world and the iron laws of the underworld!
You have already died; lingering here only adds to your sins. You should let go of your attachments and return to the netherworld. Otherwise, don’t blame me for showing no mercy!”
Ma Wenwen’s words actually had an effect. The once-raging poisonous black aura visibly weakened as if doused with a bucket of ice water and transformed back into its original form.
Li Gang’s ghost slowly drifted to the ground. He no longer looked at the phone’s photo but instead gazed at the photo frame Lin Xun had just tossed aside.
“I can’t leave...”
His murmured words instantly put Ma Wenwen and Lin Xun on high alert.
“If I go... my foolish apprentice... will truly never find me...”
His voice was filled with endless exhaustion and an indescribable attachment, a poignant tenderness like a small needle gently piercing each person’s heart.
No anger, no hatred—only a simple, elderly man’s pure care for a child.
Le Dong and the others hesitated, gathering to analyze Li Gang’s mutterings.
“…He’s stubborn... set in his ways... worried his apprentice won’t find him... he must be anxious...”
Just as Li Gang finished speaking, a voice suddenly called out from beyond the rain-soaked green gate:
“Master... Master, you really are inside! Why haven’t you come out these past few days...?”
Outside the door, who else could it be but Li Gang’s apprentice?
But Li Gang said he died ten years ago, and Ma Wenwen had sensed the yin energy outside earlier. So if he’s appearing now...
Could it be another ghost!?
Thinking this, Le Dong couldn’t be sure what might happen with two ghosts appearing. Secretly, he tugged Ma Wenwen’s sleeve; she nodded and took out a talisman, silently performing a ritual.
Hearing the calling, Li Gang’s ghostly black mist dispersed. He floated toward the door, glanced at the old talisman stuck to it, then suddenly turned and knelt heavily before the group inside Pengzi’s workshop...