The Sutured Lips

“You figured it out?”

Noticing the look in Bai Wanwan’s eyes, Chu Annian knew at once what she was thinking.

“Don’t be too surprised. Someone with your talent was bound to be recruited once the Bureau of Special Incidents found you.”

“The organization gave me a direct order. So even if I can’t persuade you, we’ll drag you back if we have to.”

Chu Annian offered a slightly embarrassed smile.

She then pointed to the heavy laptop by Bai Wanwan’s side. The machine looked custom-designed, bearing no resemblance to the sleek, lightweight models on the market.

“You’ve gained access to valuable data, haven’t you? It’ll be a while before your own computer is approved, so you can use mine for now. Any information you find must be kept strictly confidential, understand?”

“Furthermore, you cannot disclose a single word of our conversation today. Always remember to protect your identity.”

Chu Annian added a few more instructions, mostly to reassure Bai Wanwan and stress the need for secrecy, before she departed.

Many people were still waiting for her at the hospital to deal with the strange events of the previous night.

With so many eyes around, spending too much time with Bai Wanwan would make it difficult to keep her own identity a secret.

“She doesn’t seem hostile.”

Liu Hanzhi leaned close to Bai Wanwan and whispered.

“And isn’t it better to have a powerful backer than to go it alone?”

Liu Hanzhi didn’t quite understand why Bai Wanwan was so resistant to working with the government. A generous salary of a million a year was a rare opportunity on its own.

That wasn’t even mentioning the connections. Bai Wanwan herself had seen the deep respect the people behind the police cordon showed Chu Annian.

“I’m just not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing.”

Bai Wanwan’s gaze fell upon the laptop. Judging by its bulky exterior, its design was clearly not meant to satisfy anyone’s aesthetic preferences.

She had also noticed during their conversation that Chu Annian carried a massive, clunky phone in her small bag, one that resembled an old television remote.

From the sound of it, Bai Wanwan would be issued a similar computer in the future, which suggested this equipment was standard for the Bureau of Special Incidents.

Was it designed to function in high-interference environments? Or was there some other security requirement?

Bai Wanwan didn’t know, nor did she have the time to dwell on it. Right now, her curiosity was fixed on the vast database she had gained by essentially selling herself to Chu Annian.

The database contained hundreds of thousands of entries on Weirdscapes, with records from all over the country.

Most absurdly, Bai City was at the top of the list.

The sheer number and high danger level of its Weirdscapes were among the highest in the nation.

Nearly every discoverable Weirdscape was classified as extremely dangerous—the kind you were advised to run from on sight.

This, of course, included the Weirdscape located within Bai City Hospital: the Sutured Lips Hospital.

Bai Wanwan opened the file and began to read.

Information on the Sutured Lips Hospital was sparse. As an extremely dangerous Weirdscape, no one who entered ever came out, which meant no useful intelligence could be retrieved.

But Bai Wanwan noticed that nearly every entry, regardless of the Weirdscape, placed heavy emphasis on something called a “Weird Item.”

This was most likely the “treasure” Liu Hanzhi had mentioned, something that existed within these strange realms.

And the Weird Item hidden within the Sutured Lips Hospital was called the Ghost Hand Golden Needle, a very high-level artifact.

Its function was unknown, but it was likely used to repair something.

‘Repair something?’

Bai Wanwan thought of the dead night guard and nurse. According to the official report, they had been dead for an hour, yet they had still managed to knock on the door of Deng Shuqi’s brother’s room.

It was an incredibly bizarre event, something even she, with her deep knowledge of folklore, couldn’t comprehend.

After all, death is like a lamp extinguished. For a dead person to still be able to move was as strange as a snuffed-out lamp still casting light.

When a person dies, their heart stops beating, and their soul is collected by the underworld to cross the Bridge of Helplessness and be reincarnated. It is an irreversible process.

To defy this process was to challenge the heavens themselves, and the resulting punishment would be more than anyone could bear.

Aside from puppetry, there were virtually no other methods to control a corpse.

But puppetry required extensive preparation, and the control it offered was imprecise. It would be difficult to make a corpse walk normally, let alone knock on a door.

So something else must have been at play, something that trapped their souls, creating a situation where the body was dead but the spirit remained imprisoned within.

The mastermind could then control the soul, a much simpler task.

“Sutured lips…”

Bai Wanwan stared at the screen, lost in thought.

Suddenly, as if struck by a realization, she slammed the laptop shut and bolted out the door.

Liu Hanzhi had been peering over Bai Wanwan’s shoulder, simultaneously reading the data and enjoying her pleasant scent.

She jumped in surprise when Bai Wanwan suddenly shot up and ran out.

With no time to think, Liu Hanzhi scrambled to follow.

Out in the hospital corridor, Chu Annian was inside the cordoned-off area, carefully examining the two bizarre corpses.

Bai Wanwan and Liu Hanzhi were naturally not allowed to enter, but the commotion drew Chu Annian’s attention. A hint of a smile touched her eyes as she looked at Bai Wanwan, as if she had expected her to come.

“Let her in.”

Chu Annian said softly to the person beside her.

“But Team Leader Chu, is that really appropriate?”

A middle-aged man in a police uniform, his badge number strikingly simple, asked in a low voice.

“It’s fine. She’s one of us now. Letting her take a look might be more productive than us standing here racking our brains.”

Chu Annian smiled, then gestured for the officials blocking Bai Wanwan’s path to step aside.

“If you’re going to touch the bodies, remember to wear gloves.”

Chu Annian looked at Bai Wanwan and thoughtfully handed her a pair of medical gloves.

“Thank you.”

Bai Wanwan nodded. The surrounding officials, who all seemed to hold significant positions in Bai City, cleared a path for her.

She walked quickly to the two bodies. Her eyes immediately locked onto the grotesque sutures on their lips, which resembled fangs.

“Sutured lips…”

Bai Wanwan murmured. The moment her gloved fingers touched the thread, she instantly understood the purpose of the Ghost Hand Golden Needle.

It wasn’t just their lips that had been sewn shut! Every opening through which a soul could escape—the mouth, eyes, ears, and nose—had been sealed.

Though the stitches looked like the perverse handiwork of a serial killer, their true function was to trap the soul completely within the corpse, until it shattered in despair inside its former vessel, like a violently shaken egg.