Iris 12

In the pitch-black rainy night, the rain fell without cease like a string of pearls snapped apart, drop after drop striking Mu Qin, Qiu Zijia, and the others.

Enduring the cold, Mu Qin pushed aside the waist-high weeds and peered through the darkness toward the entrance of the Little Church, where a faint light glimmered in the distance. He did not see Xu Fu chase out of the church. Perhaps Xu Fu was still inside, or perhaps he had already left through the back door... This modestly sized church did have a back door, behind the stage.

Though Xu Fu did not appear to have come out to hunt down Mu Qin and the others, that did not mean Mu Qin was safe. After watching the church for a while, Mu Qin turned to look in other directions. Besides the apartment building, the orphanage also had an office building. Mu Qin and the others had not explored it yet. It was not a large structure, only four stories tall by the look of it, and it might contain a clue to the exit gate key.

The situation was still unclear, and Mu Qin could not tell where was truly safe. Rather than chase that vague, elusive sense of safety, he thought it better to take a risk and gamble on a chance of escaping alive. He pulled Qiu Zijia over and pointed to the office building farthest away.

"We're going there," Mu Qin said. "We haven't explored it yet... and its lights are off."

Mu Qin and the others had successively explored the apartment building and the Little Church. They had turned on the lights in every room they passed through, so rooms with their lights on were all places they had already searched.

"But we only explored the first and second floors of the apartment building," Qiu Zijia said. "We haven't gone to the third, fourth, or fifth floors. And we couldn't get to the second floor of the Little Church, either..."

Mu Qin turned to glance at the church again. "I didn't see Xu Fu leave the church. Whether he's still in there or went out through the back door, we should go to the building farthest from the church."

Qiu Zijia was still frightened. "But if we go into that office building and turn on the lights while searching, won't Xu Fu know we're there?"

"He'll find out sooner or later," Mu Qin continued. "And we can't stop searching just because he might know. We have to find the exit gate key."

Qiu Zijia had no strength to refute him. He knew Mu Qin was right. The orphanage was only so large. If the killer was on one side, they would avoid it and explore the other; if the killer was on the other side, they would circle back and continue exploring here. It was nothing more than playing cat-and-mouse, a game of guerrilla tactics. A simple enough principle.

"All right. I'll do as you say," Qiu Zijia said.

Once the simple plan was settled, Mu Qin turned back and lifted Han Li, still unconscious beneath a tree, onto his back. As he did, he felt how burning hot her body was. He said to Qiu Zijia, "Han Li has a very high fever. We have to find her some fever medicine."

"Fever medicine?" Qiu Zijia seemed nervous at the words. Mu Qin had assumed that Qiu Zijia would urge him to leave Han Li behind. After all, Qiu Zijia had never cared much for the female teacher, and carrying a sick person around at a time like this was extremely dangerous. But unexpectedly, after a moment of silence, Qiu Zijia said, "All right. How do we find it?"

"You carry her." Mu Qin could not be bothered to ask why he had suddenly changed his mind. He simply decided to hand Han Li over to Qiu Zijia.

He told him, "Carry her... and move slowly toward the office building along the courtyard wall. It's very dark around the edges, and there are trees, flower beds, and weeds beside the wall. The plants can help conceal you, so it should be relatively safe. As for me, I'll go to the infirmary in the apartment building. There should be some medicine there."

Qiu Zijia roughly understood what Mu Qin meant. "You mean we split up? You'll get the fever medicine, and I'll carry her toward the office building."

"That's right. Once I find the medicine, I'll meet up with you there," Mu Qin said.

Qiu Zijia was deeply uneasy. "What if something goes wrong on the way? What if the killer finds us?"

"There are only two ways something can go wrong: either the killer finds me, or he finds you and Han Li." Mu Qin lowered his voice, speaking gravely. "If the killer comes after me, don't worry about me. Just go straight to the office building. I'll find a way to get away on my own. If I don't come find you for a long time, it means things have gone badly for me. Then whether you want to keep carrying Han Li or abandon her is up to you."

"On the other hand, if the killer finds you, sacrifice the pawn to save the king. Leave Han Li for him, then run and find me. I'll protect you," Mu Qin said.

Qiu Zijia looked at Mu Qin with a complicated expression. "You mean I should use Han Li as a shield?"

Qiu Zijia's question made Mu Qin stare sharply at him for a long while. Then Mu Qin said, "Yes. If necessary, she is your human shield."

"If she's a shield, why are you risking yourself to find her fever medicine?" Qiu Zijia did not understand. "Why not simply use her as bait? Tie her beneath a light, find an old radio and play music loudly beside her. That would definitely draw the killer in to take the bait. While he's hooked, we could search the office building over there without a care in the world, couldn't we?"

Mu Qin looked at Qiu Zijia with fathomless eyes. "I'm not a good person, Qiu Zijia... but I don't do evil. When I believe I can manage it, I'm willing to save someone. I'm willing to risk going alone to find fever medicine for this woman. The point isn't why I'm doing this. The point is you... Would you do the same?"

"I wouldn't." Qiu Zijia shook his head. "I wouldn't take any risk for this woman. My own life is what matters most!"

At Qiu Zijia's words, Mu Qin suddenly laughed. It was the first time Qiu Zijia had seen such an obvious smile on Mu Qin's face. Mu Qin had always worn a detached expression, and this sudden smile left Qiu Zijia somewhat dazed.

"Selfishness and self-preservation are only human," Mu Qin said. "If that's how you survived before, then keep living that way from now on. No one will blame you."

Qiu Zijia fell silent. He looked at Mu Qin with fear and sorrow in his eyes. Mu Qin could not imagine how Qiu Zijia understood the meaning behind his words, nor did he know what Qiu Zijia was thinking. He could not be bothered to care.

After handing the female teacher to Qiu Zijia, Mu Qin gave him a signal to begin. He watched Qiu Zijia carry Han Li into the grass.

Soon after, Mu Qin also left the grass and flower beds, stepping onto the stone path in the courtyard. Amid the pouring rain, he walked step by step toward the lit apartment building.

The apartment building was not far away. After only a few steps, Mu Qin entered its open corridor on the first floor. He raised his head and looked around, listening for movement. Other than the rain, he heard nothing. Everything seemed peaceful and still.

He began looking for the infirmary. It was beside the apartment building's staircase on the first floor, easy to find because every door had a room-number sign hanging beside it.

But just as Mu Qin reached the infirmary door, he had to stop in horror.

There was a great deal of blood on the floor.

Blood on the floor should not have struck Mu Qin as strange. After all, the corpse Mu Qin and the others had seen earlier was lying in the stairwell on the first floor of the apartment building.

The dead man's throat had been cut. He had fled from outside the courtyard into the apartment building, leaving a great deal of blood on the ground as he climbed the stairs. Later, when Xu Fu came to abduct Han Li, he had stepped in the blood as well, leaving a tangled mess of bloody footprints. Still later, Mu Qin, Qiu Zijia, and Cheng Guoxu had also stepped through the blood while leaving the apartment building, adding even more bloody prints.

As a result, the stairs from the second floor down to the first were covered in blood. The bloodstains extended into the first-floor corridor and out into the courtyard, though the rain had now blurred the blood outside, washing it into the stone slabs and soil.

But why was there blood outside the infirmary?

Although the infirmary was beside the apartment building staircase, it was still some distance away. Mu Qin was certain that when he, Qiu Zijia, and Cheng Guoxu had left the apartment building, they had not lingered outside the infirmary. In his memory, the floor here should have been clean.

Mu Qin carefully examined the footprints outside the infirmary. They were quite fresh. Then he noticed their direction... The person who had left them seemed to have entered the infirmary. The prints led through the door, then back out again. They might have searched inside for medicine or medical supplies.

Had someone come here?

Anyone who came to the infirmary must have been injured or ill and needed medicine. Mu Qin thought it over. Aside from Han Li, he could confirm that three of the six people had been injured. The first was the corpse lying on the neighboring staircase, but he was thoroughly dead; Mu Qin had personally checked his pulse and heartbeat.

The second was Cheng Guoxu. Mu Qin had watched Xu Fu cut Cheng Guoxu's throat, though he had not actually seen Cheng Guoxu die. Mu Qin surmised that Cheng Guoxu was not as strong as Xu Fu, nor as strong as the dead man on the neighboring staircase. There was no way Cheng Guoxu could have escaped Xu Fu and run to this infirmary to search for medicine.

The last was Xu Fu. Mu Qin had seen Xu Fu's leg struck by the candle chandelier he had set up. Yet Mu Qin did not know how badly it had been injured.

Xu Fu was indeed the most likely person to have come to this infirmary. His leg might have been injured, even fractured, and he might have needed to bandage or splint it. Yet Mu Qin and Qiu Zijia had crouched in the grass for quite a while just now and had not seen anyone emerge from the church's front entrance, so Xu Fu might have left through the back door.

After all these jumbled thoughts and deductions ran through his mind, Mu Qin slowly crouched down and quietly pushed open the infirmary door. The bloody footprints at the entrance showed that the person who entered had left again, so there was probably no one inside now. Still, Mu Qin could not put his mind at ease. He moved as discreetly and quietly as possible, pushed open the door that stood slightly ajar, and craned his head inside to look around.

Earlier, when Mu Qin, Qiu Zijia, Cheng Guoxu, and Han Li had all still been together, they had searched this infirmary. It was fairly spacious, and its light was on. Everything inside was abandoned. There was only a simple metal-framed bed with a mattress, its surface covered in disgusting black stains, whether blood or some other bodily secretion, he did not know.

Besides the bed, rows of cabinets stood against the wall, filled with medicine and medical supplies. Most of the cabinets were empty, but some medication remained. Mu Qin hoped there would be fever medicine inside, even if it was expired.

Once he confirmed there was no one in the infirmary, Mu Qin stopped moving stealthily and sprang into action. He rushed to the rows of cabinets and began rummaging through them. These cabinets had apparently been searched, too, by the person who had left blood outside the infirmary. That person had rifled through them and left quite a few bloody handprints on the cabinets.

Following the bloody handprints on the cabinets, Mu Qin inspected them. About five or six cabinets had been searched. That person had taken gauze, bandages, and alcohol from them.

Noticing this, Mu Qin continued searching the other cabinets. Inside, he saw bottles, jars, and boxes of various medicines. He did not know which medicine was for fevers, so he could only read the labels on each bottle and box one by one.