Chapter 166: Returning to West Gate City (7)

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The old man’s face had turned crimson from the pressure around his neck, and his fingers trembled helplessly as he tried to pry Chime’s hand away. But an old man simply did not possess enough strength. Once he was seized, he had no energy left for anything else and could only continue trembling.

An Feng and Molan immediately stepped forward to deal with the situation. Molan wrapped both arms tightly around Chime, while An Feng struck Chime’s hand with all his strength. The pain made Chime release the old man, and An Feng immediately pulled him a step backward.

“Calm down first and listen to what he has to say. Perhaps the footprints on the ground are just a misunderstanding.” Molan held Chime’s hand against her chest and gently spoke on the old man’s behalf.

The old man took several deep breaths before finally recovering. His eyes were red, and tears were on the verge of falling as he stared at Chime with an aggrieved expression.

“Are you trying to murder me, young lady? I don’t know what happened. Last night, after you paid me, I came back to check whether you were still here, only to find the place destroyed like this. I wanted to look for evidence and report it to the police, which is why I left so many footprints.”

As soon as he finished speaking, tears began to stream down the old man’s face. He covered it with his weathered hands and wiped them away. A cool breeze passed by, making him look all the more pitiful.

Only then did Chime calm down, though her sharp eyes remained fixed on the old man. After all, no one else knew they had come here. It was impossible for their ruthless enemy to have found this place so quickly.

The old man was still wiping away his tears. Seeing that Chime had gone too far, Molan and An Feng spoke at the same time.

“We’re only here to look for clues. Don’t make things difficult for him.”

“Make things difficult for him? Do you think I’m being cruel? It wasn’t your grave that was dug up. Of course you wouldn’t be heartbroken!” Chime snapped angrily before pushing Molan aside and running off.

She needed to be alone, to calm down and think through everything. There was no point in remaining here.

“No, that isn’t what we meant!” Molan explained as she tried to follow, but An Feng caught her by the arm and stopped her. Chime was in a terrible state. If they followed her and another argument broke out, they might even come to blows.

“Let go. If you keep acting this way, we really will end up parting.” Molan lost her temper as well, glaring at An Feng with resentment.

How had things come to this? The more she thought about it, the less she understood. Why did trouble always cling to them?

“I wasn’t lying.” Seeing the two of them like this, the old man sat helplessly on the ground. He was still clutching the hundred-yuan bill, and tears continued to fall. Being wrongfully accused clearly was not easy to endure.

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Seeing this, Molan said nothing. She walked slowly past the tombstones, studying the people whose names were carved upon them.

The graves in this area seemed to belong entirely to young people. There was not a single elderly person among them. Then why had this old man come here? The cemetery appeared not to have been cleaned in a long time, and no one seemed to have come to pay respects.

Molan counted eighteen tombstones in all, arranged in six rows of three. The flowers and grass nearby had clearly been trimmed regularly, yet there were no cemetery workers around. Who had been doing the trimming? Could it have been the old man?

As she walked, Molan sighed. It was heartbreaking to see how young all the people on the tombstones appeared. No one knew why they had died. Though the cemetery belonged to the public, there was no indication of which families the graves belonged to.

After making a complete circuit, Molan returned to where she had started. The old man had stopped crying, but his weathered face looked even more worn, and the light in his eyes had grown increasingly distant.

An Feng looked grim as well. He quietly squatted beside Coldblood’s tombstone and slammed his fist into the ground.

“Who did this? Damn them. In the end, I’m the one left carrying the blame. Once I find them, I’ll tear them limb from limb.”

Molan stood nearby for a long while, carefully examining the old man from head to toe. He truly seemed like a simple, honest man. The hundred-yuan bill in his hand had plainly been held for a long time; it was deeply wrinkled. The weathered look of his face made him seem more pitiful the longer one looked at him.

Molan sighed before asking softly, “Grandfather, can you tell me why you’re always here selling flowers and joss paper?”

They had to understand the matter at its root, or they would never find a way to resolve it. Chime had lost her temper, and they owed her an explanation from beginning to end. Coldblood was dead, and even his grave had been destroyed. Someone had to give him justice.

The old man thought for a moment. Gradually, his gaze grew resolute, and he rose to his feet. He pressed the wrinkled hundred-yuan bill into Molan’s hand, then walked to the second tombstone and reached out to caress the face of the woman carved upon it.

Slowly, the old man told them a story.

Long ago, there had been a very willful girl who was always asking her father for money. Father and daughter had depended on each other since she was young, yet for some reason, the older she grew, the more mischievous and disobedient she became.

Then, over a matter involving a thousand yuan, and because her father refused to let her be with the man she loved, the girl angrily ran away and was killed in a car accident.

From that day onward, her father wept constantly and aged at an extraordinary pace. Every day, he came to her grave to clean it and speak with her, afraid that she would be lonely beneath the earth.

After hearing the story, Molan and An Feng both frowned deeply. They did not know how to comfort this supposed father, nor how to explain what had happened moments earlier.

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“I’m sorry. My friend went too far just now. We shouldn’t have suspected you.” Molan and An Feng bowed to the old man, their faces filled with remorse.

The old man suddenly smiled and shook his head.

“When my daughter died, I blamed that man too. But he would occasionally come here and spend time at her grave. He never stopped. Those who have never experienced something cannot truly judge another person’s actions. Not even parents have that right. I can understand what your friend did.”

Those words taught An Feng and Molan a profound lesson. As Chime’s friends, they had behaved terribly irresponsibly. Whether it was telling her that Coldblood had died or dealing with what had happened now, they had done nothing but criticize her.

They had blamed her for being unreasonable and accused her of being too heartless. Yet they had never experienced such pain themselves. They had simply condemned her from some lofty, self-righteous position.

They had truly been wrong. Their earlier apology had come from a place of insufficient understanding.

Once An Feng and Molan had reached this realization, they immediately nodded and said to the old man, “Thank you for enlightening us. We have to leave now.”

The old man said nothing more. He quietly gazed at the lonely smile on the young girl’s face carved into the tombstone, sinking into deep thought and memories of the past.

Molan and An Feng did not disturb him further. They left everything as it was and immediately ran outside, preparing to catch up with Chime, who had disappeared into the distance.

In the flower bushes behind one of the tombstones, a man clenched his fists and struck the ground with all his strength. Blood immediately began to flow from his hand. Tears filled his eyes, yet he sat there motionless and utterly silent.

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