Li Dazhuang cleared his throat and said, his voice trembling slightly, "My uncle is a teacher at Luyuan Middle School. He's always been..."
Wen Wen stopped Li Dazhuang. "Wait, hold off on the long speeches for a moment. Just tell me what his behavior has been like, and I'll decide if this is something I should handle."
"He acts normal in front of others, but I often see him acting strangely, talking about incomprehensible things," Li Dazhuang revealed some of his uncle's issues.
"Perhaps your uncle is just... childlike, or maybe you should take him to see a psychologist," Wen Wen ventured.
"It's not like that. At first, I thought so too, and I took him to see a psychologist. The psychologist found nothing wrong, so I didn't think much of it, until one day..."
Li Dazhuang shivered, then continued, "Until one day, I saw him bite a mouse to death!"
Wen Wen's lips twitched. "Rats taste fishy and foul. I really don't know how your uncle managed to eat it... though they're quite good roasted with cumin."
"Detective Wen, what did you say?" Li Dazhuang shivered again. He was starting to doubt if he should have made this strange call.
"Ah, nothing important. Do you have any other clues?" Wen Wen said with a dismissive laugh.
Back when Wen Wen was just an ordinary detective, he had pursued a criminal deep into the mountains and gotten lost for over ten days.
During those ten days, Wen Wen had eaten whatever living things he could catch, including dung beetles... the kind that roll balls of dung.
However, he couldn't tell his clients about such things, or they'd think he was a pervert.
Li Dazhuang shook his head. "No more."
Wen Wen narrowed his eyes, contemplating in silence.
Whether it was acting strangely or biting rats to death, neither proved supernatural forces at play. However, it was enough to pique Wen Wen's interest. He was not one to sit idle.
He had been at home for too long, and it was time to go out and find something to do.
"Give me a location, and I'll come to find you. We can talk when we meet." After settling on a meeting place, Wen Wen hung up the phone.
"I'm leaving now. I have some things to take care of." Wen Wen said a brief goodbye to everyone and drove to where Li Dazhuang was.
When Wen Wen arrived, Li Dazhuang was sitting on the curb, clutching his clothes tightly, shivering in the cold wind.
Upon seeing Wen Wen, dressed in a white coat, step out of the car, Li Dazhuang's eyes widened. The terrifying memories flooded back, and he immediately jumped up and turned to run.
Wen Wen had saved him at Furong River Amusement Park once, but his memories of Furong River Amusement Park had been wiped clean by the Hunter Association.
The Wen Wen he remembered now was the psycho with the chainsaw that night.
So, as soon as he saw Wen Wen, he frantically tried to escape.
"Hey, hey, hey, don't go. Didn't you ask me to help you solve a problem?"
Wen Wen strode forward, grabbed Li Dazhuang by the scruff of his neck, and, like an eagle snatching a chick, dragged him back.
"You... you..."
Li Dazhuang pointed at Wen Wen, speechless, almost crying from fear.
Wen Wen lifted his shirt and said menacingly to Li Dazhuang, "What 'you'? I'm a good person."
Li Dazhuang: "..."
Beneath his shirt were a short sword, a dagger, and two guns...
After a short while, Li Dazhuang's emotions slowly (and forcibly) stabilized. Even though Wen Wen didn't look like a good person, he had no choice but to rely on him now.
"Look at you, scared like a frightened rabbit. Do I look like such a bad guy?" Wen Wen sat beside Li Dazhuang and asked grumpily.
Li Dazhuang was about to nod, but upon seeing Wen Wen's gloomy eyes, he quickly shook his head. "No, you don't look like a bad person at all."
"That's better. Come, tell me about your uncle's situation."
Li Dazhuang organized his thoughts. "I lived with my uncle for a few months, so we're quite close. Two months ago, I went to visit him and found that my aunt had moved out. He seemed very haggard."
"Perhaps he was just sad because your aunt left him..."
"That's what I thought at first, but when he talked to me, he acted fine. As soon as I looked away, he would start talking to himself, and sometimes he'd do very strange things."
...
The apartment, over a hundred square meters, was spotlessly clean.
A man with a pale face, a haggard expression, but not a trace of slovenliness, sat on the floor, covering his head with his hands, his expression vacant.
His name was Zheng Feng. He was a man of extremely regular habits, sleeping at nine in the evening and waking at six in the morning, with his meals, exercise, and work scheduled meticulously.
Furthermore, he had mild mysophobia and obsessive-compulsive disorder, so he always took care of the house's cleanliness.
Yet, for the past two months, he hadn't cleaned the house at all. He hadn't even washed or eaten anything on his own initiative.
However, everything remained so tidy, as if he were still living his life as before.
Not only that, but he hadn't gone to work in these two months, yet his boss hadn't come to inquire.
This was because, in his boss's eyes, he was still arriving and leaving work on time, just as before.
All of this began with an accident. One day, as he was heading home from work, there was a thin mist in the air, and then he was hit by something unknown, causing him to faint.
After that, the anomalies began.
That day, he had clearly returned home very late, but his wife acted as if she hadn't noticed.
This was not all. Later, even though his daily schedule had been completely disrupted, and he hadn't participated in anything, it was as if someone who looked exactly like him was completing his previous life for him.
This person would go to work for him, eat for him, and clean the room for him...
And this person, everyone except himself could see.
At first, Zheng Feng was just terrified. He was extremely flustered then, so he tried to act abnormally to attract attention.
But later, Zheng Feng realized that his presence seemed to be gradually disappearing, and eventually, he himself seemed to have become invisible.
It was then that he realized the one experiencing the anomaly was himself.
His wife might have noticed something was wrong, so she returned to her maiden home.
Of course, Zheng Feng knew that his wife hadn't returned to her maiden home, but was lying in his refrigerator...
Every day, a part of her flesh and blood would disappear...
Unfortunately, Zheng Feng couldn't convey this news to anyone.
What had recently made him fearful was that his nephew, Li Dazhuang, seemed to have noticed some abnormalities in him.
Would he also meet with misfortune?
If so, he wondered what he would taste like...
...