From Robinson Crusoe

Having finally found a clue about his daughter, Ronald was so excited that he couldn't sleep all night.

He used the four dollars he borrowed to book a room, bought some bread and water, and rested for the night.

The next morning, Ronald left the hotel and went to the house near the Prescott Edge Church that the homeless man had mentioned.

Before dawn, the town was shrouded in a morning mist.

Several elderly people were walking together on their way to the church to pray.

Ronald followed behind them and saw the house in the distance.

In a small town in Arkansas, this house is undoubtedly quite avant-garde and luxurious in design.

The house is built in a green space. It has three floors, a garage and a tool shed on the left and right, and a neat white fence surrounds the yard.

Behind the house was a grove of trees, the trees of which looked quite old and were growing exceptionally well.

At the door of this house, you can see a sign with several exquisite wax figures of celebrities, and next to the wax figures are two smiling craftsmen.

From the images and words on the sign, Ronald learned that the family were wax figure artists, and he couldn't help but feel disgusted.

He was burned on the calf by a lit candle by a classmate when he was a child, and he was deeply impressed by the unique smell of wax. Even decades after the burn, he still hates all wax smells, and he doesn't even allow his wife and children to light candles when the power goes out at home.

Ronald once worked at a bank in New York, where there was a famous wax figure exhibition. His colleagues tried hard to invite him, but he refused, which shows his aversion to wax.

Upon discovering that the place where his daughter disappeared was related to the wax figure, Ronald instinctively attributed everything to bad luck.

He intended to knock on the door and ask the homeowner, but after looking outside, he found that perhaps because he had gotten up too early, the family had not yet opened the door. Even the curtains on the first floor were drawn, and the door was tightly closed.

Out of courtesy, Ronald decided to wait until the family got up before visiting them.

So he took out some bread, squatted outside the fence, and continued to wait while eating his breakfast.

……

The morning mist was thick, and the gaps in the white fence blurred the boundaries of the yard.

Sparse pedestrians pass by the church.

Before long, someone rang the bell in the clock tower, and with the clear and melodious chimes, the town began to exude its own vitality and life.

Ronald quickly finished his bread and observed the family through the gaps in the fence.

He was extremely anxious, hoping the homeowner would get up early, but the curtains never opened.

"I can't wait any longer."

Ronald told himself.

He wiped his hands with the bread wrapper and then prepared to stand up and go to their door, even though it was a bit presumptuous, but after all, he was looking for his child and believed they would understand.

Ronald had been squatting for so long that his legs were numb. He was holding his knees and hadn't gotten up yet when he suddenly saw a boy walking out from the side of the house.

The boy was not short, about eighteen or nineteen years old. He was carrying a plate of food. After leaving the house, he walked straight to the tool shed next to him, glancing around as he went.

However, since Ronald was crouching outside the fence and the morning mist had not yet dissipated, the boy did not notice anything unusual at first glance and continued forward.

……

Ronald initially intended to approach the man as soon as he left to question him, but after noticing the boy's somewhat strange behavior, he abandoned the idea.

Why is he holding a plate?

Who are you taking all this food to?

Ronald had a question.

If the homeless man wasn't lying and his daughter had been near the house yesterday morning, then he had reason to believe that the boy was bringing food to his daughter.

"They took my daughter away and imprisoned her!"

A bold guess suddenly popped into my head.

The more Ronald thought about it, the more reasonable his guess seemed; otherwise, there was no way to explain all of this.

After all, if a normal person finds a child without parents, their first reaction should be to ask about the child's parents' whereabouts or hand the child over to the police. Imprisoning the child must have ulterior motives.

Realizing that his daughter might have been taken away by this family, Ronald immediately abandoned all thoughts of going to inquire.

He was unfamiliar with Prescott and knew no one. If he got into a fight with someone over this, he would definitely not get away with it. It would be best to call the police and bring them to search the place.

Ronald felt a little relieved as he watched the boy place the plate on the grass, take out his key to open the tool shed door, and then step inside.

If she can eat, it means her daughter is not in mortal danger. The most important thing now is to rescue her.

Ronald raised his wrist, intending to check the time and whether the police were on duty, only to discover that his watch had also vanished without a trace.

So he could only look up at the sky and estimate that he would have to wait at least two more hours, which made him anxious.

"Perhaps I should wait until he leaves and then go check the tool shed myself..."

An idea popped into Ronald's mind.

Instead of calling the police directly, checking the situation in the tool room first is undoubtedly a better option.

If the family hadn't been delivering food to his daughter, he could have avoided creating a scene.

If the person delivering the food is his daughter, then after learning the exact situation, he can choose to directly break the lock and rescue his daughter in advance, or he can improvise and choose other methods.

After thinking it over, Ronald decided it was always better to check ahead, so he went along the fence and circled around to the other side of the yard, closer to the tool shed, to wait for the boy who brought the food to leave.

……

About thirty minutes later, the boy left the tool room with an empty tray and locked the door.

After watching him return to the house, Ronald struggled to climb over the fence and crouched down to approach the tool shed.

As he approached, he noticed that the family's lawn was meticulously maintained. The grass was lush and had been carefully mowed, with all the grass neatly arranged and almost no withered or yellowed grass to be found.

The overly fine grass created a snow-like effect, with each step Ronald took leaving an indentation in the grass, forming a clear footprint line.

However, Ronald didn't care about these details; all he wanted to do was get to the tool shed as quickly as possible and rescue his daughter.

He spent a fortune hiring top-tier lawyers to fight for custody of his daughter.

After divorcing his ex-wife, he only had one relative left in the world, his daughter Antina, and he could not allow anything to happen to her.

……

As they moved forward, they carefully observed whether anyone was leaving the house and whether they might be discovered.

It had been many years since Ronald had done anything so adventurous, and he could clearly feel his heart pounding.

He was very worried about being discovered by the homeowner.

This time, however, Lady Luck was on his side. His stealthy advance went very smoothly, and no one discovered him until he reached the tool shed.

"Whoo~"

With a sigh of relief, Ronald took two steps around one side of the tool shed wall.

He wanted to look through the window to see what was going on inside.

However, this family seemed very afraid of being spied on from the outside, and even the tool shed had its curtains drawn.

Their curtains were all made of thick, black linen, completely airtight, so from the outside there was only darkness, and you couldn't see anything at all. "Damn!"

Seeing that he couldn't see inside the tool shed through the window, Ronald cursed.

This made him even more certain that there was something wrong with this family.

Which normal person would seal off the room where tools are stored so tightly, unless they have a secret they want to keep hidden?

……

"Antina, Dad's here to save you!"

After glancing at the house again to make sure no one would come out anytime soon, Ronald encouraged himself and walked to the door of the tool shed.

Fortunately, the tool shed door was old enough that it could not be completely closed. Even when closed, there was a gap about 20cm wide through which Ronald could observe the inside of the tool shed.

With his face pressed against the crevice, Ronald opened his eyes wide, searching for his daughter in the dimly lit tool shed.

His gaze swept past a pile of clutter and landed on a large chair fixed in the center of the room.

The chair was facing away from him, and several ropes were wrapped around its back.

From the outside, it looked like someone was strapped to the chair, but Ronald wasn't sure if it was Antina because the chair was so big.

Judging from the thickness of the rope behind the chair and the width of the chair back, the person tied to this chair was probably not an adult, and his daughter was obviously not that tall.

Although he couldn't see clearly whether the person tied to the chair was his daughter, Ronald believed from this strange incident that the homeowner must have many unspeakable secrets.

People who do bad things usually don't do just one bad thing.

If they can kidnap one person and keep them at home, they could kidnap a second person.

"Perhaps I should rescue him first. If my daughter is also imprisoned, he should have some clues."

With that thought in mind, Ronald grabbed the door lock.

The heavy padlock that secured the door with an iron chain had a large keyhole.

Ronald tried tugging on the chain, but the door didn't budge.

Looking around, Ronald couldn't find any stones or hammers on the clean grass, so he had to go into the woods to find tools to pick the lock.

A moment later, he returned to the tool shed with a stone in his pocket, then picked up a padlock and smashed it down hard.

As the sound of metal clashing against metal rang out, the person tied to the chair in the tool shed suddenly began to struggle wildly.

His mouth seemed to be blocked, making it impossible for him to speak; he could only manage a few roars from his throat.

With a chilling, beast-like roar, the chair fixed to the ground swayed from side to side. After a few moments, a chair leg as thick as a forearm snapped with a crisp sound.

With one leg gone, the chair could no longer maintain its balance and tilted backward as the person struggled harder.

Ronald thought the man was struggling because he saw a glimmer of hope for freedom, so he pounded on the padlock even harder, hoping to rescue the man as soon as possible.

However, when the chair tipped over completely, revealing the head of the person bound to it facing him, his raised hand, gripping the stone, froze instantly—

It was an exceptionally ugly face, so ugly that it didn't resemble a human face.

It was fat, bloated, covered in hair, had no bridge of nose, and its face was covered with pus-like protrusions and two nostrils.

One of his eyes was hidden between pustules, while the other was crooked, growing on the other side of his face. His mouth wasn't gagged, but he had no tongue, which was why he couldn't speak.

The light streaming through the crack in the door into the tool shed cleaved the entire space, shining directly onto the man's face.

Upon seeing him, Ronald froze, while the man lying on the ground grinned, revealing a mouthful of uneven teeth, and burst into laughter.

The laughter was silent, only the whooshing sound of exhaling and the rattling sound of the chair hitting the floor tiles as it was moved.

Ronald didn't see his daughter; he only saw this horrifying face.

A chill rose from the soles of his feet, giving him goosebumps.

"Something's wrong!

I have to get going!

Knowing he might have stumbled upon an even more terrifying secret, Ronald dropped the stone in his hand.

When he turned around, he saw that the side door of the house had been opened and a boy was running towards him.

Further away, Brian and his wife stood inside the house, coldly watching Ronald through the window, like two wax figures.

……

Without thinking too much, Ronald took off running towards the fence.

He was already over forty years old, and by all accounts, he shouldn't be able to outrun that young man.

In fact, due to his pampered lifestyle in recent years, Ronald's physique has become increasingly bloated, and his physical strength has declined significantly. His wife often complained about his incompetence in bed, which was one of the reasons for their divorce.

Not long ago, it took Ronald a lot of effort to climb over the fence, which was only about 1.5 meters high. He almost thought he was going to be caught by the boy.

Fortunately, the boy seemed more concerned about the person locked in the tool shed and did not try to catch him.

Panting heavily, Ronald climbed over the fence, then, not daring to linger, continued running out of town until he disappeared into a grove of trees.

……

Hoo~ Hoo~ Hoo...

Ronald was already out of breath after running eight or nine hundred meters. He leaned against a big tree, bent over, and pressed his hands against his knees, feeling as if he was about to expel his lungs.

"Damn it!"

He kept cursing in his heart, not knowing whether he was cursing the family, the imprisoned freak, or his own incompetence.

"Now I really have to call the police."

Even if they weren't the ones who kidnapped my daughter, they're not good people either.

Thinking this, Ronald glanced out of the woods again.

To his surprise, the family did not follow, seemingly unconcerned about their secret being discovered.

……

After resting for a while, I finally caught my breath.

After straightening his clothes, Ronald prepared to bypass the street and go to the other side to call the police.

However, before calling the police, he needed to go to the town bank to see if he could withdraw some money, as it would be easier to get things done with money.

In addition, he also wanted to send a telegram to his ex-wife.

Although he didn't want to appear incompetent by asking for help, the situation had indeed become so serious that it was beyond his control.

My daughter has been missing for over forty hours, and we still haven't found any useful information.

Ronald knew very well which was more important: his own reputation or his daughter's life.

Emerging from the other side of the woods, he glanced furtively at the street, and seeing no one from that household, he felt slightly relieved.

After crossing another street, Ronald, who was heading towards the police station, unexpectedly turned a corner and found himself in front of the motel where the homeless man had stayed the previous night. (End of Chapter)