Read Chapter 4: — THE VILLAGE

Police, doctors and forensic staff travelled to the Ye family’s mountain village.

A funeral had already begun. White mourning cloth hung from a striped canopy. Musicians played an old local melody that seemed uncertain whether it belonged to grief or celebration. Near two small coffins, children whispered until elders pushed them back toward solemnity.

Ye’s son sat beside the coffins, hollow-eyed.

Li showed him a copy of his father’s scan report.

The man recognised the name and broke down.

“My boys,” he said, pointing to the coffins. “Twins.”

Li waited before asking, “What did they eat that day?”

The man shook his head too quickly.

Behind the house, the Mystery Team found discarded food and what looked like old vomit. Among the scraps were pieces of mushroom.

Tang reached down.

Li caught his wrist.

“Don’t.”

“You don’t even know what it is.”

“Exactly. If I’m wrong, we lose thirty seconds. If I’m right, you lose the evening to toxicology.”

Chenxi crouched beside him.

“Amanita?”

“Possibly. We need a proper laboratory.”

The nearest one was hours away.

Li remembered an old screening technique he had once read about, historically used as a crude field clue for certain mushroom toxins. With help from a local chemistry teacher, they prepared a controlled preliminary test while police packaged formal samples for laboratory confirmation.

The reaction changed colour.

Twice.

Li looked at Ye’s son.

“Your father and your children ate wild mushrooms?”

The man covered his face.

He had gathered them himself. One portion had gone to his father in hospital. The rest had been served to the boys. The cats drank leftover broth.

The radioactive finding in the grandfather’s body was simply residue from legitimate imaging.

There had been no secret nuclear experiment.

There had been a family meal.

By evening, local television was correcting the story.

Nuclear Medicine reopened.

Qin Zhengjie, who had been told his administrative role was at risk if the department stayed closed, watched the news alone in his office until relief finally allowed him to fall asleep at his desk.

The village stayed with Li for another reason.

The father had not poisoned his family out of malice. He had wanted to give them something nourishing because money was tight and his father was weak from cancer.

When formal toxicology later confirmed the mushroom poisoning, a television reporter asked Li whether the father should be blamed.

“Warn people about wild mushrooms,” Li said. “But don’t build your warning by humiliating a man who has just buried his children.”

Chenxi heard him.

It was the first time she understood that Li’s bluntness could coexist with mercy.

On the drive back, Old Zhao glanced between them in the mirror.

Neither reacted.

He smiled anyway.