Chapter 41 Devil’s Duel 1
Shoutout to nyanmaru for the commission!
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Crackling, crackling…
The radio in the convenience store emitted a noise indicating poor signal.
“Li Dawei—! Got cigarettes? Bring me a pack!”
Little Shiyu hid in the corner with the little cat, observing the uncle in the convenience store—Li Dawei. He saw the uncle immediately reach out to turn off the radio upon hearing someone calling him. He lifted his head, and his expressionless face instantly broke into a kind and gentle smile as he replied:
“Yeah, got cigarettes! Coming right up!”
He got up, grabbed a few packs of cigarettes, walked out of the convenience store, and delivered them to the workers across the street.
Little Shiyu’s gaze fell on the gray radio inside the convenience store, a small iron-gray one placed on the glass counter where the cashier stood. The uncle’s action just now was quite strange; he heard someone calling him, and instead of leaving the radio on to wait for a response, he immediately turned it off.
According to Little Shiyu’s observation, usually, middle-aged men and women who ran shops would pass the time listening to the radio. They listened to some boring programs that they could choose to ignore. When the radio signal was poor and crackling, they would tap or hit it with their hands, then wait for the radio to respond.
If someone came to buy something, they wouldn’t turn off the radio; instead, they would leave it on, waiting for it to pick up a signal again. If the radio started playing a program, they would serve the customers while listening to the boring program. Missing one or two sentences didn’t matter; they treated it as background noise.
But just now, Little Shiyu observed that when the radio signal was poor, the uncle in the convenience store, upon hearing someone calling him, didn’t leave the radio on to wait for it to respond on its own. Instead, he immediately turned off the radio.
—This indicated that the uncle’s radio wasn’t playing some optional program; rather, it was broadcasting important information, or perhaps, the convenience store uncle didn’t want others to hear what was being played on the radio.
The seven-year-old Little Shiyu stared at the gray radio on the glass counter, wondering what secrets it held.
“Meow… meow…”
Little Shiyu reached out and gently stroked the little cat in his hand, comforting her, “Little Qi, be quiet, shh…”
The little kitten obediently quieted down. It rubbed against Little Shiyu’s hand, clearly fond of the boy who had rescued it from the tree.
Little Shiyu squatted in the corner, holding the cat, and heard the uncle, after delivering the cigarettes, chatting with the workers. They seemed to be ordering a crate of beer to be delivered to a certain place, and they wanted the convenience store uncle to deliver it.
“This…” The uncle showed a bit of hesitation on his face, “There’s no one to watch the store.”
Little Shiyu had an idea and lightly touched the cat named Little Qi in his hand. Little Qi, as if understanding human nature, timely meowed towards her owner, the uncle.
“Meow—meow—!”
The convenience store uncle turned his head.
Little Shiyu made a timely innocent and tender appearance, “Uncle! I found the cat for you—”
Before the uncle could say anything, the worker next to him said, “Hey! Isn’t that… whose son, I can’t remember his name for a moment, let him watch the store for you!”
The convenience store uncle: “He… is still a child, how could he watch the store?”
“Hey! You can’t underestimate kids, this kid seems smart,”
“I can help you watch the store, Uncle.” Little Shiyu said obediently.
“See! The kid is sensible!” The workers chimed in, not wanting to move the beer themselves, they persuaded the convenience store uncle to go with them:
“Oh, just rest assured, it won’t take long to move some beer, just a little while, there’s nothing precious in your little store! Let’s go, let’s go!”
Little Shiyu saw the uncle’s gaze turn icy cold, looking at the workers as if he was looking at dead people.
The uncle pulled the corners of his mouth, his smile was still very gentle and kind, making him seem very easy to talk to and not likely to refuse others, like a naive person who would be bullied.
“Well… alright then, I’ll go move the beer, you watch the store for me. And thank you for helping me find the cat! Little Shiyu, you’re really amazing.”
Little Shiyu said innocently, “No need to thank me!”
“Oh right,”
The uncle moved the beer, about to leave the convenience store, suddenly turned back, and warned Little Shiyu:
“Absolutely do not touch Uncle’s things, okay?”
Little Shiyu looked at him, although the uncle was smiling, his gaze was extremely cold, as if he was looking at a dead person.
“I won’t touch them!”
Little Shiyu also smiled, with an innocent and innocent look on his face.
The convenience store uncle and the workers left together.
As soon as they left, Little Shiyu immediately began his investigation of the convenience store.
Confirming the uncle’s identity early would also ensure his mother’s safety. And…
Little Chu Feng could come to his house to play.
Little Shiyu took out his graffiti notebook from his school bag.
Inside were his observation records, documenting the daily routines of suspicious individuals in the residential building. Uncle in Room 104 would do bad things to children and had always been the focus of Little Shiyu’s observations. This uncle would water the flowers in the courtyard every morning and then go to the factory. He would only return home as early as 5:40 in the evening.
Elementary school ended at three o’clock, so Little Chu Feng could play at his house for over two hours. This perfectly avoided Uncle in Room 104.
Now, there was another focus of observation, Uncle in Room 304, the convenience store owner.
The news mentioned the red plastic rope and the strange way it was tied. Little Shiyu also noticed these two characteristics on the convenience store uncle.
But this didn’t necessarily mean anything. Red plastic ropes were too common, and anyone could have them. As for the way of tying knots, the news didn’t specify what kind of strange method it was, and there were many strange knotting methods in the world.
Moreover, the convenience store uncle had been living here for several years. The cases reported in the news were the most recent, and it was reported that the culprit was estimated to have moved to their city…
The other suspicious points were just Little Shiyu’s personal feelings. He had an intuition that the convenience store uncle didn’t seem as kind, honest, and easy to be bullied as he usually appeared.
But that didn’t mean that any unkind and dishonest person was a serial killer.
If it turned out that the uncle was not the serial killer mentioned in the news, then he had overthought it… Little Shiyu calculated in his mind. He could immediately invite Little Chu Feng to his house.
There didn’t seem to be much to eat at home. Little Shiyu glanced at the snack shelf in the convenience store, unable to help but imagine, if Little Chu Feng came to his house to play, what kind of snacks should he buy?
The shelves were filled with a variety of snacks, colorful and cheap, each pack costing fifty cents.
Little Shiyu touched his pocket. Now he had ten yuan as a deposit for finding the cat for the uncle. He didn’t know if the uncle would fulfill his promise and give him another twenty yuan. If he had thirty yuan, he could buy sixty packs of snacks, and Little Chu Feng would definitely be stuffed.
Little Shiyu smiled at the thought of Little Chu Feng coming to his house to play in the future.
“Meow… meow…”
“Shh. I’m going to listen to the radio now. Can you please not talk?”
Little Shiyu placed the little cat on the glass counter. Little Qi behaved very well. Curling up its white tail, it really didn’t make any noise. It looked at Little Shiyu with its beautiful emerald-like cat eyes.
Little Shiyu checked his fingers, making sure they didn’t touch anything that could leave marks. He reached out, first lowering the volume of the radio, and then pressed the power button.
This time, when he turned it on, there was no crackling noise indicating poor signal…
From the radio’s speaker came a series of:
“… Along the way, he hunted terrorists… as the bureau’s chief inspector, he…”
It was english.
Very fast english.
Little Shiyu blinked his eyes. Although he had never learned English, he still knew a few simple words like “apple.”
The words that came out of the radio wasn’t as simple as “apple.” It was a bit like the words Little Chu Feng had spoken that day, fluent and beautiful, but Little Shiyu didn’t recognize any of it, giving off a mysterious sense of sophistication.
The speed of this bird-like language wasn’t slow like instructional material; it was natural speech, intended for listeners whose native language was English.
Soon, Little Shiyu heard something familiar:
“FBI is investigating…”
FBI.
That was what Sun Bing had mentioned that day! Little Shiyu guessed that this was probably a segment of news about a case, with the FBI investigating something. Little Shiyu couldn’t understand the rest, so he carefully turned off the radio.
Although he didn’t understand it, he knew that the convenience store uncle understood it.
And the uncle didn’t want others to see him listening to pure English.
—This was very strange because someone like the convenience store uncle, with his level of education, shouldn’t have such a strong command of English.
Little Shiyu had heard others say that the convenience store uncle hadn’t even finished elementary school.
—Either the convenience store uncle, Li Dawei, wasn’t as everyone imagined.
—Or the convenience store uncle, Li Dawei, wasn’t really Li Dawei.
***
“Then I’ll leave the beer here for now.”
“Hey! Old Li, we’ve come halfway, so why not help us finish the job!” the workers called out.
The convenience store uncle, contrary to his usual demeanor, was firm: “You guys can do it yourselves.”
The workers were taken aback. Old Li was usually very gentle and would never refuse others.
The convenience store uncle smiled gently again, “Sorry, sorry, I suddenly need to use the restroom, so I want to head back to the store. Really sorry!”
The workers thought about it. Old Li was usually nice to people, so they didn’t make a fuss either.
The convenience store uncle took steps back towards the store, a strange smile playing on his lips.
—Who knows how much that clever kid has found out.
***
In the convenience store, Little Shiyu began to search methodically.
He quickly observed the placement of each item, making sure to put everything back exactly as it was, even maintaining the same angle.
Little Shiyu pulled open a small drawer on the left side and saw a tube of pink cherry blossom-shaped object inside, labeled “L’OCCITANE.”
—Another foreign product.
Little Shiyu opened it and took a sniff, recognizing the floral scent from the uncle’s hands.
—This was imported hand cream.
A middle-aged man running a convenience store, yet using imported women’s hand cream. This kind of product wasn’t even sold in the department stores in their city. Little Shiyu didn’t know how the convenience store uncle had the means and money to get such a thing, let alone for his own use.
Next to the left drawer was a larger one with a key inserted into the hole.
Little Shiyu didn’t rashly open it. He observed that the key was tilted three degrees to the left.
Little Shiyu remembered this position and then pulled open the drawer.
In the instant he opened the drawer, the key loosened a bit. Originally tilted to the left, in the shaking of the drawer opening, it shifted slightly to the right, ending up in the middle position.
Little Shiyu carefully searched through the drawer. Before long, he found a piece of high-quality hard paper buried under a pile of scraps.
—All in English.
Little Shiyu couldn’t understand a word, but from the sense of sophistication emanating from it, he felt like it might be some kind of certificate.
But unlike the cheap certificates given out at their school, the seal on this English paper wasn’t made with a red ink stamp that teachers sometimes failed to make clear. The seal on this paper was embossed, clear under the light, exuding a hidden sense of sophistication. The paper was thick and had special textures.
Little Shiyu memorized the shapes of a few words like he would remember drawings: Dr…. Psy…. ShimingJi….
This certificate seemed very high-end and therefore important. Yet such an important document was casually left in a drawer in the convenience store.
And this drawer, clearly had a lock, but it wasn’t locked.
Little Shiyu’s suspicion rose. It seemed almost as if this document was deliberately left here for someone to find.
Suddenly, the usually quiet little cat on the glass cabinet started meowing and became restless, even attempting to bite Little Shiyu.
Little Shiyu quickly returned the paper, closed the drawer, and then slightly turned the key three degrees to the left, returning it to its original position.
In the next moment—
Bang!
The back door.
Little Shiyu was startled. He hadn’t known there was a hidden back door in the convenience store. The uncle appeared behind him as if out of thin air, grabbing his wrist, his face smiling kindly:
“Little Shiyu, what are you doing?”
The little cat stopped meowing, looking at Little Shiyu with its emerald-like eyes.
The uncle’s gaze shifted to the locked drawer, the key slightly tilted to the left, unchanged.
The convenience store uncle raised an eyebrow.
In an instant, Little Shiyu calmed down. He hadn’t left any traces. The key was obviously set as a trap for him. Little Shiyu used the voice of a mischievous child:
“Ouch! What are you doing! Let go of me!”
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