The Mystery of the Inner Demon

Chapter 103 Art Film
Qi Fei looked at the suite and said, "No, I can just sleep outside."

Zhong Kui smiled and said, "No need, come." Then she gestured for Qi Fei to walk into the room.

"Zhong Kui, I hope that when we are working, we can just be colleagues. I'm sorry, but this is a principle I must stick to..." He was speaking alone with his head down.

"What are you talking about?" Zhong Kui held a USB flash drive in her hand and looked at Qi Fei expressionlessly. "I asked you to come in and watch the footage I found to look for clues."

When Qi Fei saw this, he suddenly realized that he had misunderstood and stammered, "Ah, that's what I meant!"

Zhong Kui saw through it immediately: "After all, I am a professional psychologist. Don't try to lie in front of me."

"When Lan Die first came to see Zhong Xiaoyu, the dream she described was far more detailed than it is now. Although Zhong Xiaoyu guided her out of her psychological depression, mental illness, like physical illness, can lurk and relapse, and some are terminal. The reason Zhong Xiaoyu gave her patients those origami yellow irises was mainly to remind them to return to her when their illness relapsed."

"So Lan Die committed suicide, right?" Qi Fei asked. "However, I can't figure out how she managed to appear in two places at the same time. After all, the distance between Lianhu Lake and Yunshen Secret Realm is too far. It is almost impossible for her to go back and forth in such a short time."

Zhong Kui poured a glass of red wine and handed it to Qi Fei: "No hurry, watch the show first."

Qi Fei didn't know what Zhong Kui was up to. The screen lit up and the dead Lan Die appeared vividly in front of him.

This is a master tape of the sequel to The Conspiracy Against the Tang Dynasty, which is the clip shot by Lan Die on the night Hong Mei died.

The more Qi Fei read the content, the more his brows furrowed, and he murmured, "Could it be... that the so-called female ghost is Lan Die?"

"And Hong Mei, they are the female ghosts of the villa, two female ghosts..." Zhong Kui checked the time. "It's a long night, we have enough time to watch a movie. So, let's watch an art film." As she spoke, Zhong Kui switched the video files. When the first scene of the movie came out, Qi Fei couldn't help but shout, "What is this?!"

The movie opened with a limited edition poster. On the poster, an actress's face was designed to unfold in a spiral shape, just like the peeled apple skin, just like the cut skin of Hong Mei's face.

This made Qi Fei, who had not been interested at first, sit up straight immediately: "What is this?!"

"The answer you want." Zhong Kui's voice was cold and direct, with that kind of terrifying sense of superiority and the arrogance of knowing the truth. "I saw the scene. This grand sense of ceremony, coupled with the fact that the deceased was an actress, is a typical mirror personality substitution mechanism. The murderer is not only destroying Hong Mei's life, but also using her death to complete his ultimate interpretation of a certain plot. If we want to seriously analyze the scene of Hong Mei's death, it is very complicated. I think the roses that Huang Daqiu gave to Hong Mei temporarily triggered the movie imagery in the murderer's mind, and what she was determined to execute was this movie, David Lynch's Mulholland Drive." "Huh? Is it the foreign director who just passed away?" Qi Fei remembered that if he hadn't read the news about the director's death recently, he, a police academy student, really wouldn't have the time to watch art films.

The film is rather obscure, and everyone has their own interpretation. However, one interpretation is generally accepted: through a hazy dream, the film actually tells the story of an actress pursuing her dream in Hollywood and killing another actress who betrayed her fame. The two actresses, one famous and the other failed, fantasize about replacing the other in her dream.

When Lan Die first approached Zhong Xiaoyu, she repeatedly mentioned the film. Zhong Xiaoyu felt that Lan Die, like the character in the film, had a strong sense of projection. In the film, a frustrated actress in real life dreams of an idealized version of Betty: innocent, talented, and sought after, she achieves a perfect audition and achieves her moment of glory. Lan Die would often bring up scenes and lines from the film during counseling sessions, and it took a period of remedial therapy for her to recover, Zhong Kui explained.

"You didn't mention this detail when we met Lan Die on the set." Qi Fei's attention fell on Zhong Kui. "You said you didn't remember the case of Zhong Xiaoyu."

Zhong Kui didn't like Qi Fei's question and raised an eyebrow: "I naturally have a way, you don't have to worry about it."

"You didn't just watch TV series when you returned to Zizai Mountain, did you?"

Zhong Kui pointed to the clock on the wall and said, "We have plenty of time, but not too much. If you want to take a nap before dawn, I advise you to focus on the case first."

Qi Fei knew that Zhong Kui would not say anything she was unwilling to say even if a knife was put to her neck, so he had to give up.

"I know you have learned about the vague message that Lan Die sent to producer Hua Deping. I have an audition in this city, and it may be my major breakthrough." Zhong Kui said as he pulled the progress bar of the movie.

As the play button was pressed, the blonde girl named Betty spoke this line with anticipation in the dreamy soft light.

"According to the real timeline, when Lan Die sent this message, it wasn't a prophecy, but Hong Mei had already been killed by her. She had always known that Liu Yi wanted her to play Xian Yao. With Hong Mei's death, the only emergency plan was to change the plot and let her appear in the series as the reborn Xian Yao. Her long-cherished dream of becoming the lead actress was finally coming true.

Hua Deping's dark photos had helped her through countless nights. Without Zhong Xiaoyu's help, she survived in her own, even darker ways, ultimately leading to destruction. Submitting to darkness is always easier than embracing light. But this world is so fair; the power of darkness inevitably comes at the cost of both self and self-destruction. It's a shame Lan Die didn't discover this sooner.

As Zhong Kui's voice played, Qi Fei looked out the window at the faint traces of snow, remembering his first visit to this place, which was also a chilly day. "No wonder the indoor plants were wilting when I saw them then. A place that prides itself on professional service shouldn't have made such a mistake..."

(End of this chapter)