Chapter 129: Seeking Documents and Surveillance

"Who are you imitating so well~" Chen Qing deliberately distorted her voice, speaking in a rather repulsive manner.

"Imitating Daddy!"

"Oh!" She froze for a moment.

Daddy—her own uncle?

Rummaging through the lingering fragments in her memory, this uncle seemed to have been a spineless coward his entire life?

Without lingering on the thought, she fished a crisp hundred-bill out of her pocket. The note barely stayed in her hand for a second or two before the child snatched it away.

He dropped his knife, the blade clattering loudly against the floor.

He turned and retreated toward the doorway, then asked Chen Qing over his shoulder, "Is that uncle coming?"

"Which uncle?"

"The one who locked the door and fought with you!" Noticing Chen Qing's incomprehension, his voice grew somewhat irritated.

"Oh—" Chen Qing hesitated for a moment before shaking her head. "No, he didn't come."

"Oh." He seemed a bit regretful. "He said if I called him daddy again, he'd buy me a toy..."

Hearing this, Chen Qing nodded in sudden understanding.

Ah, so it was that father, not the other one.

Wasting no more time, she walked straight into the master bedroom of her memories.

That had originally been her room, her very own space.

Standing before the door, her steps involuntarily slowed.

The wallpaper on the walls had been scraped off, and the desk that once bore her handwriting was gone, but the lampshade in the room was still the original one.

She smiled brightly. What if those memories weren't even her own to begin with?

Thinking this, Chen Qing felt her mood lift considerably.

She made her way to the bedroom wardrobe, pulled open the moldy wooden door, and was instantly hit by a stale, musty stench mingled with mildew.

The wardrobe clearly hadn't been tidied up in a long time.

Gazing at the indented shape inside the wardrobe, it looked as though someone had lain curled up in there for quite a while.

She frowned, but a little voice inside her mind was coaxing her to smooth away the furrowed lines between her brows. She ought to be natural, she ought to relax.

With a soft sigh, she relaxed.

"What is it you're looking for?" Bu Zhaozhao stood beside her, keeping an eye on the younger brother who was still glued to his phone in the living room.

"Documents, bank transfer records, the papers signed when guardianship was transferred back then." She frowned. "It's impossible that nothing was left behind..."

"There's nothing over at Jiang Wan's place..."

"That's only because too much time has passed and no archives were kept back then. But people like them..."

Chen Qing fell silent for a moment. Closing her eyes, she began to question herself, asking the little voice residing in her heart: "If I were to hide a document... one that could ruin me financially and destroy my entire family, where would I hide it?"

"Hide what? Burn it!"

Chen Qing frowned. "What if it couldn't be burned? If she... if I absolutely had to preserve this document?"

The little figure in her mind propped its chin on its hand, hesitating for a long time. "A place I would never forget, somewhere I see every single day, yet a spot where no one else would ever open."

"Could it be in the bedroom?"

"Somewhere out of reach for my son."

"Could it be the kitchen?"

"That pig goes into the kitchen more often than I do."

"He... my son's bedroom?"

"No. Impossible, he'd take it out to play with, and I wouldn't even scold him."

Chen Qing nodded. So it was in the bedroom.

But where in the bedroom?

She cast her gaze around. Not the wardrobe; the wardrobe was far too cluttered, and it looked as though someone had hidden inside it previously.

Perhaps that mistress.

Under the bed? No, not there either.

Her gaze shifted and suddenly paused right in front of her.

The wallpaper had been changed, and the desk had been replaced.

She had clearly tried to wipe away every single trace of Chen Qing, but what about that lamp?

She reached out her arm and gently detached the lampshade.

Looking at the documents pasted inside the lampshade as lining paper, the corners of her mouth finally curled into a smile.

...

An hour later, Chen Qing removed her disguise. Once that family gathered at the home tonight, or perhaps even later in the dead of night, someone would inevitably discover with astonishment that the bedroom light had grown brighter.

He tapped gently on the documents in his hand, shaking off the accumulated dust.

There weren't many documents, perhaps three or four sheets in total.

He walked all the way out, and before long, he had exited the residential compound.

"Aren't you going to check out that anomalous entity in the stairwell?" Bu Zhaozhao walked beside him, finding his guilty, thief-like demeanor rather amusing.

"Not for now." Chen Qing hesitated for a moment, then raised his head to survey the surroundings for a brief second before speaking, "I have a lingering feeling someone is watching us. Let's head back first."

His words came out of nowhere, yet his tone was exceptionally resolute.

Hearing this, Bu Zhaozhao shook her head without saying anything further.

She simply figured Chen Qing was being overly sensitive; after all, as a spiritual entity, if anyone was truly watching them, her field of vision was more than enough to spot them.

Thinking thus, she followed Chen Qing onto the path back.

Yet long after they had walked far away, until the residential compound was completely out of sight behind them, a solitary figure slowly emerged from the shadows of the stairwell.

Gazing at the door Chen Qing had pulled shut, the figure parted his lips and spoke word by word: "The documents... are gone."