Winter Time Rendering

BOOM.

Lightning flashed across the sky.

For a brief moment, the world lit up, revealing Song Nanshan’s rain-soaked hair and illuminating his tense face:

"I think something’s really up. Come take a look."

"Gu Qiuyan?"

Zhang Shutong asked reflexively.

At the same time, he was already pushing open the car door, braving the rain to follow Song Nanshan.

Neither of them was in the mood to go back to the car for an umbrella. They circled around the property, practically jogging to the side and rear of the villa.

Song Nanshan had already turned on his phone’s flashlight:

"This is her backyard. Look—"

In their line of sight, through the faint light and the sheets of rain, was a patch of artificial turf.

A few uniquely shaped shrubs and trees dotted the lawn, withering silently in the rainy night.

The lawn, of course, was enclosed by an iron fence. Beneath their feet was a patch of wasteland overgrown with weeds, some reaching nearly to their knees. The desolate scene was a world apart from the garden inside the fence.

And at the outermost edge of the garden, beneath the black iron fence, was a row of potted plants. When Zhang Shutong looked closer, he saw that every single one of the planters had been smashed.

Shards of the exquisite flowerpots littered the ground. The soil had been washed away by the rain, and dark, muddy water seeped out from under the fence, slowly trickling toward their feet.

Zhang Shutong crouched down, the beam of his phone’s light lowering with him. Sure enough, he saw stones scattered near the flowerpots, some as large as two fists put together. He shuffled a little to the side and discovered a few broken bricks.

He stood up again and backed away from the iron fence, gauging the gap between two of the bars. He frowned.

"Revenge?" His tone wasn’t one of questioning, but of stating a fact. Zhang Shutong rephrased, "Can we be sure this happened today?"

He instinctively glanced toward the villa. A tall tree grew behind it, blocking the view between the building’s interior and exterior. Unless someone was specifically checking, they likely wouldn’t notice the situation in the backyard.

"It must have been," Song said in a low voice. "I dropped Qiumian off yesterday. I didn’t look over here, but there’s something else that proves it. See that black thing over there... yeah, shine the flashlight a little further in."

Zhang Shutong followed his finger with his gaze. A black shadow lay on the lawn not far away. Looking closer, he realized it wasn’t a shadow at all, but a...

Big dog.

A black Doberman was lying on the grass. The air was cold and damp, and a fine drizzle pricked their faces, yet the dog remained motionless, as if it were asleep.

Song continued:

"Yesterday, Qiumian showed me around inside. As soon as we walked this way, that thing rushed over and started barking like crazy..."

"So, because you didn’t hear a dog barking just now, you thought to check over here?"

Zhang Shutong immediately guessed the answer.

Song Nanshan nodded. He said that he had just unbuckled his belt when he saw the big dog lying in the yard from a distance. It startled him, so he instinctively moved to a different spot. It was only after he’d relieved himself and was walking back that he suddenly realized something wasn’t right—

The dog might not have noticed him, but on such a cold day, in such heavy rain, why would it be lying outside?

He went back to look, discovered the smashed flowerpots under the fence, and quickly called Zhang Shutong over.

’Zhang Shutong already had a guess.’

He went ahead and half-knelt on the ground. While Song held the flashlight, he pushed aside the wild grass and examined the area closely. Finally, next to the fence, he found a few fingernail-sized pieces of meat.

He rolled them between his fingers. The rainwater on his hand turned the bits of meat into a paste. Zhang Shutong sniffed it, then turned to look at Song Nanshan.

"Sausage."

"Poisoned?"

"Yeah."

Zhang Shutong stood up. There was no need to check on the dog now.

The two of them turned off their phones. In the returning darkness, Zhang Shutong instinctively gripped the iron fence in front of him.

A chill shot straight to his bones.

’Smashed flowerpots, a poisoned guard dog... When did this happen? What else haven’t they found in this pitch-black night?’

’Where was the perpetrator now?’

Zhang Shutong scanned the surrounding field, then hurried to the villa’s front door. The lock on the main gate didn’t seem to have been tampered with; otherwise, Gu Qiuyan would have noticed when she got home.

Besides, the methods used were all confined to the outside of the fence, which strongly suggested the perpetrator couldn’t get in. The odds of that being true were 99.99 percent... but no matter how many nines followed the decimal point, it still wasn’t 100.

So, after confirming the lock was secure, he looked up at the villa’s windows. In a small window on the second floor, he could just make out the silhouette of a girl sitting upright.

The faint sound of a piano drifted through the window. The melody was graceful, even making the falling rain seem to slow down. Zhang Shutong didn’t know classical music, but he could at least make some deductions from the tender, lingering notes—

’That must be the piano room. Gu Qiuyan probably doesn’t know they haven’t left. Just as Song had said, the girl was in a good mood today, so she’d gone to the piano after dinner...’ But Zhang Shutong really didn’t have time to think about what she had been doing tonight. Song Nanshan walked up beside him. Seeing the silhouette in the window, both men fell silent.

"A bunch of animals," Song Nanshan cursed under his breath. He gripped his phone tightly, his finger hovering over his contacts, but he hesitated to press the call button.

Perhaps Gu Qiuyan was safe tonight.

But even if she was, they had discovered something wrong and should inform her. Yet, at this moment, they couldn’t bring themselves to do it.

It was as if making that call would make them perpetrators, too.

"We should tell her. Let her know to be careful."

It was Zhang Shutong who spoke up first.

But Song Nanshan had his own idea:

"I’ll call her dad first. You go wait in the car. Come on, don’t be stubborn. You’ll catch a cold out here..."

He didn’t know about the murder case, so his hesitation was understandable. And in a way, Zhang Shutong could understand his feelings. He wanted Gu Qiuyan to be on guard, but he didn’t want to frighten her, especially since her father was away.

Song Nanshan had a thoughtful yet contradictory side. Zhang Shutong knew it was useless to persuade him right now, so he returned to the car and once again recalled the details of the murder case:

’One theory was robbery.’

’The other was revenge.’

’For now, he could focus on the latter.’

’And the direction it pointed to seemed clear.’

’The commercial street dispute.’

’But knowing that didn’t mean they could catch the killer. How many shops were on that commercial street? Finding one person, or a few people, among them would be anything but easy.’

’And even if he found them, the murder hadn’t happened yet. How could he resolve this hidden danger?’

’The only solution he could think of for now was to first find the person who poisoned the dog. It was hard to say if that even counted as a crime, but at least they could have the police detain them until Gu Qiuyan’s father returned.’

Zhang Shutong then thought of something else:

’Aside from the murder itself, there was the impact it had caused.’

’He remembered that after this incident, Song Nanshan had resigned to take the blame.’

’He had always thought it was because Gu Qiuyan’s family had too much influence, forcing the school to give Father Gu an explanation by making Song the scapegoat.’

’But looking at it now, there was more to the story.’

’First, Gu Jianhong leaving the island was something that wouldn’t change.’

’So, in the previous timeline, Father Gu must have also arranged for the homeroom teacher to help look after his daughter for a while.’

’Maybe on the last December 7th...’

’...Song Nanshan had dropped Gu Qiuyan off just like this.’

’But he hadn’t been in the car back then. Song wouldn’t necessarily have chatted about the past, and it was more likely he’d have left immediately after dropping Gu Qiuyan home. Therefore, he wouldn’t have discovered the clues with the flowerpots and the dog.’

’And by the time Monday, December 10th, rolled around and the girl was discovered missing, it would have been too late.’

Zhang Shutong was now very irritated by the subtle wording of "missing." ’Right, maybe Gu Qiuyan’s murder wasn’t discovered until Tuesday or Wednesday... but the question was:’

’Which day did it actually happen?’

’The answer to that question would determine his course of action tonight.’