4.
Whenever I remember the tragedy that night, my whole body still trembles.
I couldn't hold back my tears. It felt as if my heart were being torn apart.
To my surprise, Dương Phong frowned.
“I told you, I didn't come here to hear the story you gave the police.”
“Your story may move people, but it has one enormous hole in it.”
I stopped breathing and looked at him.
Dương Phong continued, “Your younger brother was in the hospital the whole time. How did he suddenly show up at home, already hiding in the kitchen?”
I started crying again. “I secretly brought him home.”
5.
That New Year's Eve, I went to visit my younger brother in the hospital.
He was lying in his hospital bed, saying he was bored out of his mind.
Kids that age loved holidays more than anything.
They got pockets full of red envelopes.
And got to set off firecrackers all day long.
Every boy's favorite pastime.
Even though he was seriously ill, my younger brother's eyes were still full of longing.
He begged me to sneak him out of the hospital. He could hide in the kitchen.
Then, when Dad and Grandma weren't looking, he could slip outside to play.
But who could have known…
He never got to enjoy his one day of fun each year.
All he got was Mother's knife.
I always thought that if I hadn't given in…
Maybe my brother wouldn't have died.
Maybe that night's massacre could have been prevented.
6.
“I forgot to tell you, my younger brother and I look a lot alike.”
“I was underfed and malnourished as a child, so I'm about the same height as him.”
“Long hair or short, all we had to do was change clothes and no one could tell us apart.”
Dương Phong gritted his teeth, puzzled. “So… the person your mother wanted to kill was you?”
I didn't want to admit it, but I nodded.
“From the very beginning, I was the only one Mother wanted to kill.”
7.
That night, my younger brother hid in the dark kitchen, his heart full of hope.
Mother came in with a knife, mistaking him for me.
When she realized her mistake, she clung to my dying brother and sobbed.
“Mother killed my brother by mistake, and that's why Grandma and Dad were so angry.”
“I've already told you everything that happened after that.”
Dương Phong still didn't believe me. He pressed on, “Then why did your mother want to kill you?”
I bowed my head miserably. “Because everyone, including Mother…”
“Thought I was the one who made my brother sick.”
8.
That day, my younger brother had someone send word home.
He said he missed me and wanted to introduce me to his friends.
I was thrilled and secretly went to the town.
That day, I stood before him, my heart brimming with hope, only to be met with ridicule and contempt.
His friends looked at me with disgust.
“Phan Tinh Bảo, is this your sister?”
“Why does she look like a beggar?”
“What's that smell coming off her?”
My younger brother didn't look happy either. His eyes were full of contempt.
“Phan Lạc Lạc, couldn't you have cleaned yourself up before coming?”
Even so, he took me along to eat with them.
When he tossed a chicken bone to me in front of everyone, I stared at him, bewildered.
His friends laughed and teased him.
“Phan Tinh Bảo, you said you never ate other people's leftovers.”
“You were just bragging. Your sister doesn't even do what you tell her.”
My brother's face darkened. He shouted at me and pinched me:
“Why aren't you eating? You do it at home all the time!”
“You embarrassed me, and you still have the nerve to stand there?”
In front of everyone, my younger brother slapped me across the face.
I was so ashamed I wanted to run home.
But I didn't expect him to pull me back and stubbornly shove the bone into my mouth.
As we struggled, my younger brother lost his footing and fell to the ground, clutching his chest and shaking.
9.
“Dad and Grandma called me a jinx, a monster who brought harm to others.”
“Mother did too.”
“Mother thought I had gone to the town just to hurt my younger brother.”
“My younger brother was Mother's only remaining hope. As long as he was here, she could live a little better.”
“She said that if he died, she wouldn't live much longer either.”
“So I was the one who had to die in his place!”
Dương Phong's expression didn't change. He took a sip of milk tea and looked at me coldly.
“So those horrible circumstances awakened your desire for revenge.”
“From that moment on, you wanted to kill them all! Then you figured out how to carry out your plan, right?”
“You were only eleven then. That's enough to send a chill down anyone's spine.”
Dương Phong's words pierced my heart like a thousand knives.
I took a deep breath and shook my head.
“No. The only death I ever thought about back then was my own.”
“Suicide?”
Dương Phong curled his lip and asked, “What changed your mind?”
“I found the first glimmer of light in my life—a woman who was already near the end of her days.”
“She told me, ‘Even the dead want to come back to life. How could someone as alive as you go looking for death?’”
“If an old woman like me is still trying to live, young girl, don't throw your life away so easily.”
Dương Phong asked, “Mrs. Trần?”
I was stunned. I couldn't believe he knew; I'd never told anyone about this.
Dương Phong smiled and explained, “After an old woman in a neighboring village died, the eight members of her household also died of poisoning.”
“I stumbled on this clue while revisiting your family's case.”
“I wondered if the Trần family massacre might also be connected to the New Year's Eve bloodshed.”
“After all, you were at the scene of both cases, and you're the only one who survived.”
Faced with Dương Phong's baseless accusations, I glared at him angrily and shouted:
“You don't understand anything!”
10.
Mrs. Trần had also been tricked and sold here, but her husband died young.
To raise her children, she practiced spirit-medium rituals for fifty long years.
*The original term is “dancing for the great spirit” or “dancing for the great immortal.” It is also a kind of fortune-teller or spirit-medium, so I translated it this way.
That day, I ran up the mountain alone to look for a tree.
I had just put a rope around my neck when I met Mrs. Trần.
She appeared before me, leading a small yellow dog.
Then she gently said those words to me.
They made me let go of the thoughts of hurting myself.
But I had no idea that Mrs. Trần had also gone there to kill herself that day.
She'd brought the dog along so it could alert someone and have them retrieve her body.
My appearance was what changed her mind, and she urged me not to hurt myself.
So I still don't know whether she saved me that day, or I saved her.
After that day, I often went to Mrs. Trần's house.
Every time, she made delicious pastries for me called thousand-layer apple preserves cakes.
Mrs. Trần was also a well-known spirit medium, but she never found anyone to pass her craft on to.
Seeing how kind she was to me, I asked to learn how to draw those spirit-inviting talismans.
I happily followed her every day, looking at those strange, patterned talismans. Those memories became one of the few bright spots in my childhood.
Sadly, our happy days were all too short. Mrs. Trần suddenly fell gravely ill and passed away.
After her family finished the funeral, they all suddenly died, too.
Dương Phong smiled again. “According to my investigation, those people all died of food poisoning?”
“What a coincidence: every one of the dead was related to Mrs. Trần by blood.”
Seeing the suspicion on his face, I calmed down a little.
“It was karma!”
“Karma?”
Dương Phong snorted. “Or did you take revenge for her?”
11.
I jerked my head up and stared at Dương Phong without fear.
Dương Phong continued, “She suffered through every kind of hardship while she was alive, and her children never cared about her.”
“Her body wasn’t even cold before her children started fighting over her estate.”
“As someone who owed Mrs. Trần a debt of gratitude, you’re the prime suspect.”
He kept picking a fight, and I was so angry I could barely catch my breath.
“That's all speculation!”
Dương Phong said calmly, “Then what’s the truth?”
I gave a bitter laugh and replied, “After dividing up the estate, those hypocrites sat down together for a farewell meal.”
“I’d just finished telling you that Mrs. Trần had been planning to kill herself.”
“The cured meat they served as the main dish was something Mrs. Trần had prepared for herself.”
“If they’d shown their mother even a little care, this never would have happened…”
At that, Dương Phong’s expression turned cold, and he suddenly slapped the table.
“Enough! I’ve heard quite enough of your lies.”
His sudden outburst truly startled me.
“I asked some bystanders. They said they saw you holding a yellow dog and crying outside the hospital gates.”
“The funeral was over, and you showed up at the crime scene. Were you there to mourn Mrs. Trần’s unfilial children?”
“Everyone died, so why was a useless dog like that still alive?”
“The most reasonable explanation is that it was Mrs. Trần’s final keepsake for you. Of course you wouldn’t want to poison it.”
I calmed down and disagreed. “They didn’t even care when Mrs. Trần died…”
“Do you really think they’d have kept the dog she left behind after dividing up her estate?”
Dương Phong chuckled and clapped.
“Not bad. The logic is airtight at first glance.”
“You were only eleven that year, yet you’d thought it all through so carefully.”
“I don’t know whether to call you clever or frightening.”
“But you overlooked one very important detail…”
When Dương Phong got to this point, he deliberately paused, waiting for me to respond.
12.
My throat felt parched. “What did I overlook?”
Dương Phong looked around, then took a satisfied sip of milk tea.
“You’d only been out of the orphanage for a few years.”
“Where did you get the money to buy a storefront like this on a prime commercial street?”
“Can I assume that after all of Mrs. Trần’s descendants had died, you secretly took her entire estate?”
Clatter. The glass slipped from my hand, answering for me.
After carefully studying my expression, Dương Phong pressed his advantage.
“As I said, the poisoning was a practice run to build up your nerve for the murders on New Year’s Eve.”
“With Mrs. Trần’s inheritance, even a child like you could live comfortably on your own.”
“But the only obstacle standing in your way of escaping was those four people.”
“You had to find a way to get rid of them before you could disappear and finally be free!”
Every word Dương Phong spoke slammed into my chest like a heavy hammer.
“No… No, that’s not how it happened! That’s not how it happened!”
My eyes welled up as I denied it over and over.
Dương Phong acted as if victory were already his, as if he could see right through me.
“Phan Lạc Lạc, the truth behind all your lies…”
“It must have gone like this…”