Hurrying back to the flower bushes where she had thrown her phone, Su Cui retrieved her phone and scarf. She checked the time—it was already past three in the morning. She brushed the grass clippings and snow off her scarf, wrapped it around her neck to cover half her face, put on her down jacket's hood, threw away the mask, opened her phone's map navigation, took a detour to make sure she was a good distance from the city center, and then hailed a taxi.
Su Cui gave the address of a supermarket about two stops away from her old neighborhood home. Throughout the ride, the taxi driver tried to strike up a conversation, but she pretended to be sad, dabbing at her eyes from time to time without responding.
When she reached the supermarket, she got out. Immediately, she jogged back home.
Unlocking the door with the key, Su Cui entered and went to open Su Baixue's bedroom door to check on her. But when she pushed the door, she found Su Baixue wasn't in bed.
Su Cui was startled.
She already had an ominous feeling.
Back in this small home belonging to Su Cuihua and Su Baixue, Su Cui finally relaxed. At the same time, as she replayed the sequence of events on Christmas Eve, she suddenly realized that ever since the square on Christmas Eve, she had been in a strange state of agitation.
The church, the Madonna and Child painting, the car accident. The possibility of a scapegoat.
She had been in this book world for so long and rarely thought back on the past, but the chain of events on Christmas Eve stirred up a memory she least wanted to recall.
Su Cui had always been cautious about anything involving Su Baixue.
When the accident happened, Su Baixue immediately wanted to go out and see.
Ordinarily, if there was commotion outside, she wouldn't let Su Baixue go out alone to check what happened. But that day, she just let her. Why?
Thinking carefully, Su Baixue on Christmas Eve was also different from usual—bolder than normal.
The moment the commotion occurred, she hadn't even reacted. But Su Baixue, contrary to her usual self, immediately wanted to see what happened.
Su Cui recalled the scene from that moment.
Su Baixue looked at her, and she instinctively nodded. Then Su Baixue... immediately let go of her hand! And she had let go without a second thought.
Su Cui shuddered.
Something was wrong!
Something was wrong!!
Think again!!!
From the church to the accident, Su Baixue told her the driver seemed off. She chased after him and saw it was clearly a tall, thin middle-aged man. But what Su Baixue said to her at the time was—
"I remember at first glance, the driver was a very young person."
Did Su Baixue say it wrong?
Or did she hear it wrong?
Even from a distance, that middle-aged man was definitely not dressed or behaved like a young person. The accident was indeed suspicious. But the driver wasn't young; it was that tall, thin middle-aged man.
The accident where the driver was young wasn't the one at the church on Christmas Eve.
The accident with a young driver was actually the one before Su Cui transmigrated into this book.
Before Su Cui transmigrated, in her real life, there was a car accident. A luxury car crashed into her, and she clearly saw the owner was a young man. But later, they produced a different middle-aged fat man similar to the one from Christmas Eve!
Su Cui felt dizzy and leaned against the wall.
The hallway's motion-sensor light buzzed and went out. Su Cui stomped heavily to turn it back on.
Taking a deep breath, she calmed down, pulled out her phone, and dialed Su Baixue's number. Then she immediately went downstairs to the third floor and knocked on Li Guizhi's door. She knocked for a while, but no one answered.
The phone rang for over thirty seconds but no one picked up.
Su Cui pieced together the events of the past few hours and finally spotted the problem: everything that happened tonight seemed designed to lure her away from Su Baixue.
The accident at the church touched the deepest resentment in her heart. Even though back then there was evidence pointing to the real culprit, she couldn't let it go and always had doubts.
This extremely similar event made her unable to ignore the possibility of a "scapegoat." If it had been an ordinary car accident, she wouldn't even have been interested in investigating it.
Su Cui began to form a new conjecture about this book world.
She couldn't predict what had happened to Su Baixue. Li Guizhi hadn't come back either. Where had they gone? The only thing Su Cui had left to rely on was the tracker watch she had given Su Baixue.
She hung up and opened the tracker interface that she had specially set up, pulling it up.
The interface showed that the red dot representing Su Baixue was at City A's Fourth People's Hospital.
Hospital?
Su Cui frowned.
Just then, her phone rang. The screen showed Su Baixue was calling.
*
Xiao Qin saw Su Baixue returning from the restroom and handed her phone to her: "Bai Xue, your grandma called."
"Ah!" Su Baixue quickly took it and called back.
The ring was picked up after one second.
"Bai Xue, are you safe now?" The voice on the other end sounded urgent.
"Grandma, you're back!" Su Baixue was delighted.
Perhaps because of Su Baixue's joyful tone, the caller calmed down.
"Where did you go so late?"