I See Murders Before They Happen

Chapter 288: Chapter 286: Human-faced Sheep Horn God

The windowsill before Chu Xingrou had a thin layer of dust on it.

The window before Su Miaoyi, however, was spotless. It had clearly been wiped clean, and not long ago.

They then checked the inside and outside of the windows.

The footprints had all been cleaned up again.

Officers from the local police station and others from the sub-bureau arrived with crime scene kits and went over the C-store, inside and out, but they found nothing.

It was wiped clean.

Su Miaoyi and the others stood in front of the C-store’s loudspeaker.

”Normally, the C-store uses this loudspeaker to announce new arrivals. It’s the same type as the one at the village committee office. The whole village can hear it, and if the wind is right, you can even hear it in town,” said Officer Zhao Yongliang from the local police station. ”It’s simple to use, too. You just turn it on.”

”This is a small player. This is what was playing the nursery rhyme,” Duan Wenrui said.

Su Miaoyi took the player and examined it.

It was small and very old.

Su Miaoyi turned it on to play the recording.

The nursery rhyme instantly blared out.

The sound quality was terrible, full of static.

DOOM DOOM DOOM, DOOM DOOM DOOM, divine punishment is descending now, the guilty will not be spared, the Sheep God has been sent to their homes.

DOOM DOOM DOOM, DOOM DOOM DOOM...

It was just those few lines, repeating over and over. There was nothing else.

”Is this a local nursery rhyme?” Su Miaoyi asked.

Duan Wenrui and the officer from the local police station both shook their heads. ”No, we’ve never heard it. This is the first time.”

Su Miaoyi glanced at Duan Wenrui, who seemed fine. Then she turned to the local officer. ”But I get the feeling your expressions change the moment you hear it.”

Duan Wenrui also looked at the local officer.

Lu Zhishen looked at them as well.

Something was definitely off.

The owner of this C-store hadn’t come to turn it off after hearing a rhyme like this.

Even though every household was awake with their lights on, no one came out.

The entire village was unnervingly quiet.

”We’ve truly never heard this rhyme before, but the Sheep God is no stranger to us around here,” Zhao Yongliang said.

The others all looked at him.

”We call it the Human-faced Sheep Horn God, or just Sheep God or Sheep Horn God for short.”

”The Human-faced Sheep Horn God,” Su Miaoyi repeated.

”Yes,” Zhao Yongliang said. ”It’s a belief we have here, a god we worship. There’s a place in town dedicated to the Sheep Horn God. The Human-faced Sheep Horn God protects this land and its people; it’s the guardian deity of this area. We hold three major sacrificial ceremonies for the Sheep Horn God every year.”

”If it’s a guardian deity, why does everyone seem so afraid of it?” Lu Zhishen asked.

”Legend says the Sheep Horn God has two sides, yin and yang. The yang side is the guardian deity, protecting nature and the people. The yin side is the god of punishment. When it appears, it’s usually accompanied by some form of divine retribution. This rhyme clearly implies that divine punishment is coming, so of course everyone is afraid.”

Su Miaoyi looked at them.

Chu Xingrou said, ”This is obviously man-made. Someone snuck in, planted the player here, and is deliberately using the Sheep Horn God to create panic. Why is everyone still so scared? Not a single person has come out.”

She sounded surprised as she spoke.

The entire village. Not one person had come out.

”Yes. It’s been passed down from generation to generation that when the Sheep Horn God’s punishment descends, you must not speak, not go outside, and not disturb the Sheep God as it judges and punishes evil,” Zhao Yongliang explained. ”We’ve worshiped it for generations, so there’s a natural sense of reverence and fear. But this time, it’s probably also because it’s so late. What kind of decent person sneaks into a C-store to play a recording like this? It’s most likely a criminal, so of course no one dares to come out. If they ran into him, it’d be all over.”

Chu Xingrou nodded. That made sense.

”The C-store owner didn’t dare come in either. He called and said that if the criminal was hiding inside, he’d be walking right into a trap, so he was too scared to come,” Zhao Yongliang said. ”Especially since there’s been a murder in our village and the killer hasn’t been caught yet. Every household is terrified.”

Chu Xingrou nodded again.

’I’m the one who’s really been scared stiff by this ’divine punishment,’’ she thought. ’My brain has almost stopped working.’

”Whoever thought to use this to create panic must be from this county. Only our county believes in the Sheep Horn God,” Zhao Yongliang said.

”Could it be related to the killer?” Duan Wenrui asked.

”Hard to say,” Su Miaoyi replied. ”But this person jumped in through the window, jumped back out, and cleaned up all the footprints.”

”After all, we’ve conducted large-scale searches for footprints before. Any criminal would be afraid of being identified by their tracks and would probably try to clean them up,” Lu Zhishen said.

Duan Rui nodded.

Su Miaoyi played the recording from the player one more time. ”Since it’s not a local rhyme, it was probably made up. This voice... it doesn’t sound AI-generated. It sounds like someone recorded it.”

Lu Zhishen listened again as well. ”The voice has been altered; you can’t tell if it’s male or female. We can send it to the city to see if they can restore it and analyze it.”

”Okay.” Duan Wenrui placed the player into an evidence bag.

”But then again,” Duan Wenrui said, ”if this is the person who killed Wan Shuang and Gao Hui, why would they come here to play a rhyme like this? Why try to scare people? Wouldn’t that just make them easier to catch? And if it’s not the killer, who would play this, and for what reason? To create panic? Why create panic?”

”I think it’s a bit of a provocation aimed at the police,” Lu Zhishen said.

Su Miaoyi looked at him.

At the mention of provoking the police, the face of a man appeared in her mind.

”We’re in the middle of an investigation, and he comes here in the dead of night to play this thing. Besides scaring people, I think it’s a clear provocation aimed at me,” Lu Zhishen said.

”Why provoke us?” Duan Wenrui looked like he wanted to curse, but he swallowed the words before they came out.

Yanjing Village wasn’t very large.

The police made a full circuit of the village, partly to search for suspicious individuals and partly to ensure the residents’ safety.

After confirming that everything was secure, they used the loudspeaker at the village headquarters to broadcast some safety precautions.

They told everyone that someone was deliberately trying to create panic and advised them all to lock their doors and windows, take extra security measures, and be vigilant, especially about not going out at night.

Su Miaoyi and the others didn’t go back to sleep, staying at the village headquarters to discuss the case.

Officers from the local police station took turns patrolling and searching the village.

They were worried the criminal might be hiding in some corner or in someone’s yard.

So they didn’t leave all night.

The village chief showed Su Miaoyi and the others the Human-faced Sheep Horn God they had been talking about.

They saw both the yin and yang faces.

The yang-faced god was more majestic and divine, while the yin-faced one had an added element of terror.

It looked very similar to the ghoulish mask Su Miaoyi had seen in the video footage.

But the ghoulish mask in the footage was even more terrifying and malevolent. You could see the connection to the Sheep Horn God, but its primary purpose seemed to be to inspire fear...

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