Chapter 2: The Mute’s Desperate Embrace

Before she could react, her body had already lost balance and was tumbling down the slope.

Muddy water rushed into her mouth, stones scraped the back of her hand. She curled up, unable to do anything, merely letting herself roll.

One turn.

Two turns.

She didn’t know how long she rolled, until her body slammed into something—

Something soft.

Something warm.

Su Yutao lay sprawled atop that thing, covered in mud, her mind buzzing.

Then she felt it.

Not stone.

Not mud.

It was—

Cloth?!

Soaked cloth, with warmth beneath it, still trembling faintly.

It was a person.

Definitely a person.

And it was the person who had screamed earlier.

Su Yutao’s breath caught.

She opened her mouth, wanting to curse, wanting to shout,

‘Of all places, why did you have to die here? And with my luck, I had to roll down right on top of you.’

But no sound came out.

She desperately tried to push herself up, to crawl away from this dead—no, not yet dead—person and keep running.

But just as she braced her hands, before she could move—

A hand suddenly grabbed her wrist.

With astonishing strength.

Su Yutao was startled, instinctively trying to pull back—

Then a voice, so weak it was almost drowned by the rain, sounded in her ear:

“Save… me…”

It was that woman’s voice.

She wasn’t dead yet.

She was still alive.

Su Yutao froze.

She wanted to run.

She should run.

She was a blind, mute little thing who couldn’t even save herself—how could she save anyone else?

But that hand gripped her wrist, so tightly, like a drowning person clutching the last piece of driftwood.

Su Yutao remembered a winter at the orphanage when Xiao Jing fell into the pond. She had jumped in without a second thought, pulling the seven-year-old out. Back then, she was fifteen and couldn’t swim, but she jumped anyway.

Granny Dean later scolded her, saying, ‘Do you want to die?’

She had said, ‘I couldn’t just watch her die.’

Now someone was gripping her wrist, whispering in her ear: Save me.

Su Yutao closed her eyes—though it made no difference—and took a deep breath.

No escape.

Resigned, she tightened her grip on that hand.

The rain fell harder.

Su Yutao knelt beside the wounded woman, holding her hand, her mind a tangled mess.

She wanted to ask, ‘Where are you hurt?’ and ‘How can I help?’ but she couldn’t utter a single word.

All she could do was use her small, calloused hands to feel upwards, inch by inch.

She touched the wrist—cold.

She touched the forearm—wet, but not from rain. It was sticky.

Blood.

Su Yutao’s hand trembled.

She continued upward, touching the shoulder, the neck, the face—

The face was very cold.

But there was still breath.

A faint warmth brushed her fingers.

Su Yutao’s heart clenched.

What should she do?

She couldn’t see anything, she couldn’t make a sound, her body was short and thin, her clothes were patched and ragged, her strength pitiful.

She didn’t even know where she was, or whether the killer would come back.

But the person in her grip was still alive.

Still breathing.

Still relying on her.

Su Yutao took a deep breath and, with those hands, pulled the woman on the ground into her arms.

Light.

Lighter than she expected.

Holding this woman whose face she couldn’t see, she knelt in the rain, staring blankly at the void before her.

Then she heard footsteps.

Soft.

Slow.

Stepping through the rain, approaching bit by bit.

Su Yutao’s entire body stiffened.

She hugged the woman tighter, straining her ears, struggling to think—

The footsteps stopped.

Right in front of her.

So close. So close that she could sense someone standing there, looking down at her. Su Yutao opened her mouth.

No sound came out. The rain kept falling. That person spoke.

Their voice was cold, like a blade cutting across ice: ‘Are you two together?’

Su Yutao’s mind went blank.

Together?

What together?

What was happening?!

She suddenly realized—this person was the one who had acted earlier.

The killer.

Now they stood before her, watching her hold their target, and asked: Are you together?

Su Yutao shook her head frantically.

She wanted to speak, to explain, to shout, ‘I don’t know her, I just rolled down here!’—but she couldn’t get a single word out.

All she could do was shake her head.

Shake it desperately.

Rainwater flew off, landing on her face and on the woman in her arms.

The person said nothing.

Silence.

Only the rain.

Su Yutao could feel their gaze, fixed on her, on the woman in her arms, on her frantic head-shaking.

Then—

‘You don’t know who she is?’

Their voice was closer now.

As if they had crouched down.

Su Yutao felt a chill approaching, right in front of her. Very close.

So close she could smell the blood in the rain—whether from the woman in her arms or from this person, she didn’t know.

She shook her head again.

Then nodded.

She didn’t know how to respond.

She knew nothing.

She was just a newly transmigrated unlucky soul, blind, mute, short, and poor, inexplicably caught up in a murder.

Who the woman in her arms was, who this person before her was—she had no idea.

But the one she held was still alive.

Still breathing.

Still trembling faintly in her embrace.

Su Yutao, drawing on some unknown courage, pulled the body closer.

Then she lifted her head, ‘looking’ at the person before her.

She couldn’t see anything.

But she did the only thing she could—

She opened her mouth, pointed to her throat, and waved her hand.

I can’t speak.

Silence.

The rain continued.

Then she heard a soft laugh.

Very light.

Very cold.

Like rain seeping into bone: ‘Interesting.’

‘A mute.’

Their voice was light, as cool as the rain.

Su Yutao knelt on the ground, holding the dying woman, her body rigid. She couldn’t see anything, but she could feel that gaze fixed on her, like a blade pressed against her throat.

Then—

A tremendous force suddenly kicked her in the shoulder.

Su Yutao flew sideways, rolling twice on the ground, her face smashing into the mud.

Pain.

Her shoulder felt like it was shattered.

She lay on the ground, mouth open, trying to scream but unable to, only gasping for air.

The rain kept falling.

She heard footsteps behind her.

Soft.

Slow.

Not coming toward her.

Heading toward—

Su Yutao’s heart clenched.

She heard the footsteps stop where she had just been kneeling. Stopping beside that woman.

Then she heard a very short, choked grunt from the woman, as if cut off.

Followed by the sound of a blade entering flesh.

One.

Two.

Three.

Steady, calm, not a single extra thrust.

Then the grunt stopped.

Su Yutao lay in the mud, trembling all over.

Dead.

That woman who had gripped her hand and begged ‘save me’ was dead.

Right beside her.

And she could do nothing.

(An incompetent wife, no—should be a husband.)

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