CHAPTER 1147: CHAPTER 1147: THE SAME OLD TRICK 12

"Zhilan, fortunately you stayed here with us," Xiaojia said, still frightened. "Otherwise, if you were in the capital, living under the same roof with someone like her, it wouldn’t be safe even to sleep. Who knows when Brother He and the others will manage to capture her."

The death of Niu Rang still has some unexplained issues, particularly whether it was Gu En himself who pulled the trigger. This remains to be verified.

However, it is undeniable that it was Gu En who betrayed Niu Rang and revealed his identity. Therefore, the Niu Family, like He Zhilan, hate Gu En with every fiber of their being.

"I always believe that evil cannot prevail over good. People like Gu En will sooner or later reap what they sow and pay the price," He Zhilan spoke softly to comfort Xiaojia. "My brother’s return to the capital this time also involves investigating these matters in secret. It’s only a matter of time. Eventually, those who need to pay the price will have to pay it."

In the afternoon, a gentle rain began to fall on the village, and He Zhilan gathered all the children from the Niu Family who were attending school into the family’s main hall.

But although the Niu Family’s hall was spacious, it couldn’t accommodate all the children. By afternoon, the hall was packed tightly with people.

Every child attending the lessons brought their own small stool from home to sit on in class. The Niu Family provided the space but couldn’t supply enough chairs for so many children.

When Niu Li went into town, He Teng had him bring back some paper, pens, textbooks, and stiff cardboard. Since there were a large number of children in the village, He Zhilan currently couldn’t provide everyone with textbooks and writing supplies. So instead, she used the stiff cardboard to write down teaching materials that could be shared and passed around among the children.

Although He Zhilan had only lived in the village for a little over a month, the sounds of children studying could now be heard regularly throughout the village. In their tender, youthful voices, sprinkled with local accents yet to be adjusted, they recited poems aloud. Those working in the fields would pause their tasks, smiling as they stood and listened quietly for a while, seemingly trying to find the voices of their own children in the chorus.

Even older children picking herbs in the hills would hum nursery songs while playing and teasing their companions.

In the hearts of the village’s parents and children, there was a shared secret—one that no one spoke of: the village had a particularly beautiful and gentle teacher, Miss He.

——

The identity of the elderly woman was as mysterious as Chen Yun and He Teng had anticipated—entirely without any leads.

The doctors and nurses at the hospital had initially assumed the elderly woman was a patient or a visitor there. However, when they followed up, no doctors had treated her, and no one from any ward seemed to recognize her.

In an era when information was scarce, searching for someone with no name, and whose appearance had even faded from memory, was like finding a needle in a haystack. Whether the elderly woman had provided Gu En with a weapon or aided his escape from the hospital remained an unsolved puzzle.

Meanwhile, there was new progress regarding the young soldier who had been killed.

"These are the records retrieved from the army and the local police station where the soldier’s household was registered," Chen Yun placed the documents in front of Xing Ye and read aloud, "Luo Ying, twenty-five years old, served for five years. He comes from an upright family with no questionable background. He has a sister and a younger brother—he’s the middle child. After graduating high school at nineteen, he worked for a year, and at twenty, he passed the local conscription examination and was assigned to Y City’s armed police unit. After two years in the unit, he was exceptionally transferred to his current division in the capital, where he served until he submitted his resignation shortly before his murder."