Chapter 386
Chapter 386
Seventh Master and I entered the villa’s dining room and stood beside the table.
The fact that we could see this scene meant the magnetic field had already been abnormal when the Massacre Case occurred, allowing it to record what happened beforehand.
This was the final meal shared by Tan Wannian’s family of seven.
When people do not know they are eating their last meal, they behave as they always do.
But what if Tan Wannian was already planning to kill them afterward?
We focused most of our attention on him.
Dark circles ringed his eyes, and heavy bags hung beneath them, signs of chronic sleeplessness. He looked dispirited and ate absentmindedly.
When someone obsessed over a single matter for a long time, that matter occupied his thoughts even while he ate or did something else.
What was Tan Wannian thinking about?
During the two years before the Massacre Case, he had barely left the estate, spending all his time studying alchemy and immortality.
By now, he was nearly consumed by obsession. Even while eating, he must have been pondering how to become an immortal.
My first impression was that Tan Wannian was an eccentric.
Yet whenever the others asked him something, he answered earnestly and calmly. He never became angry when his thoughts were interrupted.
That showed he was cultivated and respected his family.
Many people respected outsiders but not their relatives. A person who respected his own family possessed exceptionally good character.
Tan Wannian had not completely lost himself. In his mind, attaining immortality meant taking his whole family with him, freeing them from life and death and allowing them to live without illness or pain.
Then I studied his parents.
They were very old. From their perspective, their son was obsessed with an illusory path to immortality, while their second daughter-in-law was terminally ill. Someone had to support the family and keep life functioning with some semblance of normalcy.
That was why his parents spoke the most during dinner, constantly serving food and saying things to brighten the mood.
Tan Wannian’s second wife looked terrible. Her illness was clearly visible, and she was obviously near death.
Yet to keep the family from sinking into gloom, she tried to behave as though she were healthy, laughing with the children and speaking most often with her parents-in-law.
Then I looked at Tan Wannian’s three children.
One son and one daughter seemed normal. Only the eldest son was different.
He was Tan Wannian’s child with his first wife and the oldest sibling.
His expression was difficult to describe because his face displayed no expression at all.
He seemed alien to the family, unable to perceive their existence. He never joined the adults’ laughter and barely responded when his grandparents or stepmother spoke to him.
But why?
One meal did not reveal enough.
Besides, most of our attention remained on Tan Wannian.
I noticed he held his chopsticks in his left hand.
“He really was left-handed,” I told Seventh Master. “If a right-handed person decided to murder someone, would he suddenly switch to his left hand?”
Seventh Master shook his head. “This scene was recorded by the field, proving it had become chaotic before the killings. Tan Wannian could not have caused such an anomaly.”
“He killed them but suddenly changed dominant hands. I believe some ‘thing’ controlled him. The murders were not his will.”
As Seventh Master and I discussed it, a sudden bang rang out.
Tan Wannian’s wife had collapsed onto the table, striking her head against a bowl and knocking it to the floor.
Everyone else reacted in shock. Only Tan Wannian’s eldest son remained expressionless.
Tan Wannian’s parents started to rise, then simultaneously dropped back into their chairs, their heads striking the table as they lost consciousness.
His second daughter collapsed next, followed by the youngest son.
Of the family of seven, everyone except Tan Wannian and his eldest son had mysteriously fallen unconscious.
“The drinks were drugged…” Seventh Master said, narrowing his eyes.
Everyone had a drink, but Tan Wannian’s glass and his eldest son’s remained untouched and full.
Who had drugged them?
Tan Wannian?
Or his eldest son?
The moment his wife collapsed, something strange flickered across Tan Wannian’s face. It quickly vanished, leaving him dull and wooden.
His eldest son, meanwhile, had worn the same expression from beginning to end.
Tan Wannian stood and walked into the kitchen.
He soon returned carrying something: the murder weapon that had killed his family, a kitchen knife.
Strangely, he held it in his right hand!
His dominant hand had already changed.
Seventh Master and I both knew what would happen next.
Yet the approaching horror still made my heart pound.
Tan Wannian killed his wife first.
He seized her hair and cut her throat with a single stroke. Blood sprayed across the youngest son beside her.
Then came his mother, his father, and his youngest son…
I retreated repeatedly. The scene was too brutal to watch.
If I had not feared missing some detail, I would have looked away.
His daughter followed. Most of her blood sprayed across the eldest son’s face, yet he remained expressionless and did not even flinch.
Finally… it was the eldest son’s turn.
He had not been drugged. Any normal person would have fled, but he did not move.
The young man, who looked to be in his early twenties, simply turned and stared at his father.
For the first time, expression appeared on his face.
Hatred, and a desire to die…
Then the knife fell. Tan Wannian had slaughtered his own family.
His expression remained wooden from beginning to end, without the slightest fluctuation.
That alone explained the problem.
Tan Wannian was not hallucinating, but the consciousness controlling him was not his own.
The scene left me too shocked to speak.
Seventh Master remained silent as well, wearing the same expression as me.
But it wasn’t over…
Tan Wannian began moving the bodies. He carried every one into the Basement.
After he brought the final body downstairs, Seventh Master and I followed.
The Basement was large but crowded, filled with a disorderly collection of objects.
We had no time to examine the surroundings. Our attention remained fixed on Tan Wannian.
A low platform stood inside, high enough for an adult to step onto and wide enough for one person to lie flat.
Tan Wannian climbed onto it and lay down.
Seventh Master and I watched for a long time. After lying there, he never moved again.