Eyes that are the same as those of evil

Chapter 199 The Murderer Tan Jia 18
After a while, someone approached outside the room.

The footsteps were soft, each step like walking on tiptoe, reminding Tan Jia of the intruder Wen Jinbing she dreamed of while at the guesthouse.

The thought flashed through her mind, and she waited with bated breath for the "guest's visit" in the darkness.

The key was inserted into the lock, making a faint sound of metal teeth scraping against each other. Then the door was pulled open with a creak, as if it had been there for many years; one could almost imagine the rust falling off.

Someone came in.

No light came in from outside, so Tan Jia couldn't see the person coming, but the other person seemed to be able to see her clearly and very precisely bypassed the chair she had deliberately thrown halfway there.

A hand reached out towards her.

She instinctively wanted to fight back, but in the end she pretended not to see clearly and let that hand suddenly cover her mouth and nose.

After a violent struggle, she slowly lost her strength and her head drooped down, thanks to a towel soaked in a pungent medicinal smell.

The man cautiously tested her, and once he felt reassured, he dragged her out of the room.

Tan Jia's limit for holding her breath is three and a half minutes. She closed her eyes and carefully resumed breathing while trying not to attract attention.

His limp hand dragged along the ground, but his fingers never left the edge of his trouser leg.

As she passed the door frame, the corner of the wall, and the table leg... the man stuffed her into the trunk of his car, with no intention of doing anything to her.

As the car door slammed shut, Tan Jia heard him talking on the phone.

"Yes, it'll be sent over right away. Okay, I'll talk to him about it."

The voice belonged to a middle-aged man, not Zhou Qi'an.

The murderers should be trying to distance themselves and run away as soon as possible, but they have accomplices willing to get involved.

Fortunately, she didn't make any rash moves.

The trunk was bumpy and stuffy. She didn't know where she would be taken. She tried to guess and sort out useful information. The road was difficult to travel. After leaving the place, she made one left turn and two right turns. After going straight, the road became rugged and uneven. Occasionally, branches or other things would hit the car.

It seems to be a very remote place.

After driving for about half an hour, we turned right and stopped.

The trunk was opened, and someone held the car door open, staring at the "unconscious" Tan Jia for a moment before ruthlessly throwing her to the side of the road.

The car roared away, and you could barely hear the person making a phone call, saying "hello" in an impatient tone.

After that, I couldn't hear anything anymore; it disappeared as the car sped away.

After lying quietly for a while, Tan Jia opened his eyes.

What came into view was a patch of grass. I got up and looked into the distance, and there was a bamboo grove not far away.

She remembered that after Zhou Qi'an's parents divorced, his maternal grandparents raised him for a period of time. At that time, he could only use a wheelchair and did not go out much. It wasn't until his maternal grandparents passed away that his mother took him back to his former home.

Could this be Zhou Qi'an's safe haven?
After she destroyed the surveillance camera, why did he have her brought to his hideout instead of replacing it with a different camera and continuing to observe her from a safe distance?
...Because the person who gave her the package didn't know about the surveillance? Did Zhou Qi'an's accomplices, or rather, his "superiors" who were being used against him, actually know that he made his fortune through various surveillance cameras?

Furthermore, Zhou Qi'an met with her, and others allowed them to meet as well, taking such a great risk. Was this related to their goal of making her "commit suicide"?
Tan Jia stood up and looked around. This bamboo forest was very large. If it really was Zhou Qi'an's lair, there must be a lot of cameras here.

No one has come to take her away yet. Is this person planning to watch her break down and struggle on the mountaintop from their computer screen, waiting until she's exhausted before finally appearing to deal with her?

A person with a leg disability, wearing a prosthesis, does indeed need this method to wear down their opponent's energy.

After finishing tidying up, Tan Jia let out a breath, squinted at the direction the sun was shining, and barely managed to make out the time.

She's been locked up for at least twelve hours. I wonder how Captain Zheng and his team are doing with their investigation. If the progress is too slow... she can't just wait for them to rescue her; she has to find a way to save herself.

She walked into the bamboo forest.

They were also placed under 360-degree surveillance without any blind spots.

The screens displayed her image from different angles. Because of the ample lighting, when magnified, one could even clearly see that the slightly curled green ends of her hair were stuck in her necklace.

The pendant of the necklace is a "nothing to worry about" plaque. When climbing uphill, it will sway in mid-air, and after climbing to the top, it will swing back and stick to the chest.

Perhaps finding it cumbersome, Tan Jia took off the "Nothing to Do" sign halfway through and wrapped it around his wrist three times.

These actions were clearly visible to the viewer on the screen.

The lenses on his nose reflected a faint light, and he finally relaxed. That sense of control returned to his mind, allowing him to continue leisurely watching the humans on the screen who looked like ants.

There was no boredom. He watched the sun set from the blazing midday sun until it began to slant westward. When the person on the screen stepped into the designated area, his eyes widened and his face lit up with excitement.

In the surveillance footage, Tan Jia stumbled upon a bound corpse, with bamboo shoots growing out from between its legs and piercing into its flesh, causing blood to pool on the ground.

She looked terrified, fell backward in fright, and crawled backward on her hands and feet while screaming.

People in front of the screen burst into laughter.

"Beep beep beep—" An alarm sound appeared on another screen, his laughter stopped abruptly, he frowned, slid across the chair to another computer, and his fingers flew across the keyboard.

The person in the warning box stared at the camera, and the next second, the surveillance footage of that area turned black.

"Damn it!" he cursed, and promptly disconnected the connection. Before his hands even stopped, more warning boxes appeared in other places, and more screens went black.

He slammed his fist on the keyboard in a fit of temper, his mouth moving as he muttered complaints.

After disconnecting a large number of surveillance cameras by region, he finally had time to look back at the surveillance footage of the bamboo forest, only to find that Tan Jia's figure had disappeared from several screens.

As night fell, Tan Jia had been standing motionless in the corner for half an hour, like a ghost.

The house went from being completely silent at first, to gradually emitting tentative sounds.

—The murderer is indeed a soft-hearted person, lacking both defensive and offensive capabilities, so he hides himself tightly and refuses to show himself easily.

Not only is their hideout in a secluded bamboo forest, but they also stay in the basement and refuse to come out.

Until he can no longer see anyone in his proud "eyes," just like discovering that a cockroach on the floor has disappeared, his heart will pound, and he will always have to lift the sheets and blankets to check the most important places.

In the silence, a crack appeared in the top of the wardrobe on the first floor. Several minutes later, a figure cautiously stepped out, landing very lightly.

He was of medium height, very thin, wore glasses, and had messy hair. His face was not very clear, but he looked very similar to Zhou Qi'an, whom they had investigated.

Tan Jia lowered his hand, his fingers touching a sharp piece of plastic hidden on the edge of his trouser leg, which he had found from the surveillance equipment he had smashed earlier.

Zhou Qi'an walked a little closer, but instead of heading towards the door, he adjusted the positions of several well-hidden cameras around him. Then, he paced back and forth in the middle of the living room in agitation for a couple of minutes before finally crawling back into the wardrobe.

The wardrobe door closed quietly. Just as his hand touched the sliding panel inside, someone rushed in from behind, and a sharp pain shot through his back!
"Nice to meet you, Onion Heart."

Ignoring the bleeding from his palm, Tan Jia used a piece of plastic to cut a long gash in his arm, then used his hands and knees to remove the prosthetic leg from his right leg.

With a clatter, the prosthetic leg was thrown into the movable board and rolled all the way down the stairs to the basement. The next second, Zhou Qi'an, like an old dog without eyes or teeth, was also pushed down.

(End of this chapter)