I thought with evidence in hand, with his weakness exposed, Zhou Yan would compromise. I was wrong again. He was far more ruthless, far more unscrupulous than I imagined.
That afternoon, my phone rang—it was my sister. She suffered from depression, her emotions fragile and sensitive, afraid of the dark, afraid of strangers. On the other end of the line, she sobbed uncontrollably:
"Brother… there's a package… it stinks so bad… I'm scared…"
My heart lurched.
"What package? Who sent it?"
"I don't know… no name… there's a blank piece of paper inside, and… a terrible stench…"
My blood turned to ice in an instant. Zhou Yan. It was him. He'd found my sister. He did not threaten me directly—he struck at my softest weakness. The blank paper was not empty; it was a silent warning. The stench was his signature. He was telling me: keep prying, keep investigating, keep fighting back, and I will hurt your sister.
My sister's depression had always been up and down. Receiving such a package had pushed her to the brink of collapse. I held the phone, my body trembling, anger and fear and heartache and despair swirling together in my chest. I was caught in a dilemma: give up the investigation, and I would lose my sense of smell, go mad, die. Keep investigating, and my sister would be hurt, dragged into this, broken.
Zhou Yan. You are truly ruthless. But you forgot—I hold your ace in the hole too.
I pushed all emotion down and comforted my sister first:
"Don't be afraid. Brother will handle this at once. Move right now, go somewhere no one knows, don't go out, don't answer strange calls, don't open the door."
I sent her a courier at once—a bottle of antidote spray, to carry with her at all times, to spray if she smelled any strange odors. I sent a sachet too, telling her if she was in danger, to scatter the spice powder around her—I would smell it, find her.
When I'd arranged for my sister's safety, I struck back. I brewed a spice powder that mimicked the scent of the crime scene from the old hallucinogen murder case—the scent Zhou Yan most feared, the one he least wanted anyone to mention. I put the powder into an envelope, slipped in the photo of the discolored invisible ointment on the ground, no words, no signature. Late at night, I slipped the envelope through the crack of Zhou Yan's door. When he smelled the scent, saw the photo, he would understand—I knew everything, his case, his trash, his secrets.
When I was done, I returned home and waited.
That night, the stench from the seventh floor stopped—completely. It did not drift out again. No more packages were sent to my sister, no more counterattacks. He was afraid. I had him in check.
I sat in a chair and let out a long sigh of relief. Zhou Yan. You have a weakness, and so do I. But you dared
to touch my family. I dare to expose your past, to burn everything to the ground. Mutually assured destruction. You would not dare.