Xin Yiping lived in a self-built house outside No. 7 Middle School, part of the earliest teacher housing blocks without elevators, now mostly rented to students and staff. Xi Wan, with a search warrant, knocked. A thin, tall girl—Xin Yiping’s thirteen-year-old daughter, Xin Lian, in her first year of junior high—backed away nervously.

Though searching a suspect’s home, Xi Wan felt pity for Xin Lian. Showing her badge, she said gently, “Your mom’s involved in a case. We’re here to check some things.”

Xin Lian nodded, retreating to her room, sitting at a lit desk. The cold white light illuminated her gaunt face. She gripped a pen, facing away from the detectives in the living room, but didn’t write a word.

Xi Wan sighed, watching her back. “Let’s start.”

The search had two goals: collect Xin Yiping’s DNA and determine if this was the murder scene.

After finding the body, Major Crimes searched Jiayu Road but hadn’t located the primary scene. Gan Pengfei’s four knife wounds and glass bottle abdominal injury suggested heavy blood spatter, absent in public areas, likely in a private residence. Without clear evidence, a search warrant for private homes was hard to secure.

DNA was easy—Xi Wan bagged hair with follicles. Scanning the one-bedroom apartment, she prepped for luminol testing.

The living room was split by a curtain: one side held a bed, Xin Yiping’s “bedroom”; the other had a dining table and chairs. No valuables, all furniture old, but Xin Lian’s room had a new bookshelf packed with study guides, showing Xin Yiping prioritized her daughter’s education, sacrificing her own life for it.

Xin Lian emerged, whispering, “Did my mom really kill someone?”

Xi Wan paused. “What do you know?”

Wiping tears, Xin Lian said, “You can’t confirm she killed anyone yet, right? If I confess now, can it count as surrendering? I read online that family confessing counts as self-surrender.”

Xi Wan removed her gloves. “Don’t rush. Tell me what you saw.”

Xin Lian shook her head. “I saw nothing. This door’s never closed—I do homework, and Mom watches from outside. But on the 12th, near midnight, after I finished homework, she pushed me into my room, told me to lock it, and not open it no matter what I heard.”

“I was scared, asked what was wrong. She told me to stay out of it, found a key, and locked me from outside. Later, I heard her leave. I couldn’t sleep. Past 1 a.m., the front door opened, but she wasn’t alone. Something hit a table or something, and a man’s voice—Mom seemed to be fighting him. Then it went quiet.”

“I banged on the door, yelling for her to let me out. She came to my door, told me to sleep. I heard her drag something out. I already guessed—I could’ve helped her!”

Xi Wan: “You’re ‘surrendering’ to say your mother killed a man here that night?”

Choking, Xin Lian said, “He came to our door. Mom was protecting herself.”

Xi Wan: “Do you know who he was? When did she let you out?”

“Don’t know. We rarely deal with men. She came back at dawn, hugged me, cried, said not to worry—she’d handled it.”

Luminol testing revealed heavy blood spatter in the living room and a dented floor patch near the entrance with glass shards. The cart’s corner blood matched Xin Yiping’s DNA; the home’s blood matched Gan Pengfei’s.

Evidence solid, Xin Yiping sat with hands on her knees. “I admit it. I killed Gan Pengfei. My daughter knows nothing.”

In the interrogation room, cameras and recorders running, Ji Chenjiao asked, “Why kill Gan Pengfei?”

“He wanted to kill me. Those days, he was lurking around Jiayu Road, even followed me. If I didn’t act, he’d kill me and my daughter.”

Ji Chenjiao: “Your daughter said you left past midnight. You lured Gan Pengfei home to strike. You planned well.”

Xin Yiping froze, then gave a bitter smile. “True, I wanted him dead. But if he hadn’t come to my door, I wouldn’t have acted.”

Ji Chenjiao: “Walk me through it.”

On April 6, news of the Xieyang Road murder spread. Xin Yiping overheard cleaners chatting during a break, learning Huang Xuntong was the victim. Instantly wary, she slipped back to Xieyang Road to snoop, buying a kitchen knife on her way home.

From then on, she watched everyone closely, tracking the case obsessively, sometimes acting paranoid.

Days later, she sensed someone tailing her.

She feared someone aimed to bury the past forever, and she might be next. Years earlier, she’d stayed hidden; most “kindred” didn’t know her. But one man—sly and suspicious—had noticed her: Gan Pengfei. She’d watched him back then, and he’d watched her.

Sure enough, on the 11th, she spotted him near No. 7 Middle School. He was hunting her, planning to kill her like Huang Xuntong.

She acted oblivious, worked normally, but before Xin Lian’s school let out, she hid the knife in a wall cabinet by the door, stole a tricycle, parked it downstairs, and covered it with a tarp.

On the 12th, with crowds around the school, she lingered on the streets. Gan Pengfei followed from a distance, hesitant to approach.

Putting herself in his shoes, she guessed he’d strike that night. So she’d strike first.

Near midnight, she locked Xin Lian in her room and slipped into the dark, searching empty streets for Gan Pengfei. Soon, a shadow trailed her.

She wasn’t worried he’d attack on the road. If she were him, she’d follow her inside, striking behind closed doors.

As expected, he only followed. She took a winding route back to her building, deliberately slowing her door-opening to give him a chance to barge in.

Gan Pengfei thought he had the upper hand, but in the dim doorway, his foot caught on triple-layered ropes Xin Yiping had set up. A broken beer bottle, fixed to the floor, stabbed straight into his abdomen. Before he could struggle, she slammed the door shut, grabbed the kitchen knife, and drove it into his waist.

Gan Pengfei rolled over in pain, but she was faster, plunging the knife into his chest without hesitation.

Stunned, Gan Pengfei stared at her, unable to utter a full sentence before he died.

Her daughter sobbed and knocked from the bedroom, but Xin Yiping wouldn’t open the door. The plan had gone smoothly so far. She bagged Gan Pengfei in prepared plastic, intending to drag him to the tricycle. But he was too heavy—she could barely drag him downstairs, let alone lift him onto the cart.

Her daughter called, “Mom, I can help!”

How could she let her daughter step into this filthy mire?

The building was asleep. She dragged Gan Pengfei downstairs as fast as she could, spilling no blood. But lifting him onto the cart proved impossible.

For a fleeting moment, she thought of her daughter. The next, she banished the idea. Over the years, what hardship hadn’t she overcome? What suffering hadn’t she endured? Moving a dead man was nothing.

Psyching herself up, she summoned all her strength and shoved Gan Pengfei onto the cart. She didn’t notice her arm had been cut by the cart’s sharp corner—pain was trivial amid her taut nerves.

She pedaled swiftly to the alley between the two schools.

She knew this road well: busy by day, deserted at night, and cleaned by sanitation workers’ high-pressure hoses before dawn, erasing footprints, blood, and tire marks. The cameras at both ends were unavoidable, but tricycles like hers were common. If she ditched it far enough, police wouldn’t trace it. She’d covered herself thoroughly, concealing even her gender.

After dumping the body, she weaved through alleys to the northern suburbs. Noticing blood had leaked onto the cart, she used a hose at a public restroom to rinse it clean.

Only then did she see the gash on her arm, pain surfacing. She endured it, rinsing the cart’s sharp corner for ages, and ditched the cart among countless tricycles at Wangbei Station before dawn.

She didn’t take a bus. Using cash, she hailed a taxi—the first in her life—asking the driver to stop one neighborhood short of Jiayu Road, then walked back.

At home, she fretted, staring at her injured arm, feeling she hadn’t executed perfectly. But given the haste, she knew she couldn’t have done better.

Xin Yiping paused, smiling bitterly. “I didn’t expect Ji Ke to write us all down. I shouldn’t have listened to him. He turned us from ordinary killers into monsters he caged.”

“Wang Shuxin’s death…”

“Not an accident. I caused it.”

Fourteen years ago, Xin Yiping worked as a waitress in a Pinglan County diner near Wang’s family factory. Wang Shuxin, the family’s “fool” son, often ate there and fixated on her.

Her family was poor, with no strong men to protect her. Coddled by his family, Wang Shuxin assaulted her. Knowing her poverty, his family paid her off. She considered reporting it, but her elderly relatives needed money for treatment. Like others Wang assaulted, she swallowed her anger.

Then she got pregnant. Unable to accept bearing a “fool’s” child, she nearly aborted but couldn’t—she believed the child was innocent.

As her belly grew, her hatred for Wang Shuxin deepened, wishing him dead.

Though intellectually impaired, Wang Shuxin could manage basic communication. Luring him to an abandoned building with a promise to “show him the child,” she told him to jump to prove himself, and she’d birth the baby.

Grinning, Wang Shuxin leapt, splattering below.

Watching him fall, she only shrugged slightly, unmoved.

Police questioned her, but Ji Ke, then selling tiles in Pinglan, vouched for her, saying she was counting tiles for him at the time.

Lacking evidence, and given Wang Shuxin’s erratic behavior, the case was ruled a suicide.

“Why help me?” Xin Yiping asked.

“The crime wasn’t yours—it was Wang Shuxin’s and those shielding him,” Ji Ke said. “You see your child as innocent. To me, you’re innocent too.”

Stunned, Xin Yiping asked, “What can I do for you?”

Ji Ke smiled. “Be a good person. I love seeing people reform and start anew with my help.”

Half-understanding, Xin Yiping birthed her daughter and followed Ji Ke to Xieyang Road in Xiarong, renting a place.

City jobs were plentiful—if you worked hard, you could support yourself and a child. But as life stabilized, Xin Yiping felt like a grasshopper in a glass box, with Ji Ke peering through a magnifying glass.

Her initial gratitude turned to fear. She questioned Ji Ke’s motives—was anyone truly that kind? Bearing a murder, was shielding a killer kind?

Ji Ke seemed to relish watching her transform from a fallen sinner to an ordinary person. She found it unbearable. Was she his only “project”? Were other killers hiding here?

Years ago, as she considered moving, she crossed paths with Gan Pengfei. That glance made her think he might be her “kindred.” She subtly tracked him, learning he’d inquired about her.

She grew certain he was another of Ji Ke’s. Using herself and Gan Pengfei as a lens, she secretly observed Xieyang Road’s residents, finding Huang Xuntong the most abnormal.

But she didn’t observe long, fearing she’d become a monster. She packed and left without notice. She stayed in Xiarong—her secrets, known by others, caged her here. She wanted to leave but couldn’t, needing to react if something arose.

Hearing of Huang Xuntong’s murder, her first thought was a “kindred” silencing others. She’d often wanted the same but never acted.

This time, she knew she had to.

After her confession, Xin Yiping exhaled deeply, as if unburdening a decade-long weight. Her expression grew weary, eyes dull.

Ji Chenjiao pressed, “Huang Xuntong’s death—you had no part in it?”

Xin Yiping smiled bitterly. “Wasn’t it Gan Pengfei who killed him?”

The interrogation paused, leaving Major Crimes with a dilemma: who killed Huang Xuntong?