Chapter 32: The Twentieth Cycle of Time (III)

Chapter 32: The Twentieth Cycle of Time (III)

In this timeline, seeing Mr. Zhang and feeling that he is still alive is comforting enough for the two young people.

Or rather, it was one of the few things they could do to feel that "our efforts were worthwhile" after so many f*cking cycles of time.

Li Shiqing had just cried, and now that she saw Mr. Zhang, her heart was filled with joy and sorrow, and her eyes were red.

"Yo, what's the matter with you? Afraid to see your uncle the police, huh?"

When Mr. Zhang saw the little girl's crying face, he smiled and coaxed her like a child, "Don't be afraid, the police don't arrest good people, only bad people."

"I know ......"

Li Shiqing forced a smile at her and nodded.

"What's wrong with her?"

As Mr. Zhang led them inside, he observed that Li Shiqing and Boy were acting very familiar and intimate, so he took him for Li Shiqing's boyfriend and asked him in a whisper.

"Why aren't you in the right mood?"

"She's been upset since she found out about the bus accident that killed so many people. On the way to the police station, the radio in the taxi was carefully broadcasting the incident again, so she couldn't hold it in and ran to the side and threw up as soon as she got off the bus."

After what he'd been through before, Boy knew better than to lie in front of these well-trained veterans, so he told the truth.

"It's psychologically hard to accept that someone you just saw is suddenly gone when you say it's gone."

"How can you think that, you should be thinking 'it's great that something big like this happened and nothing happened'!"

Hearing Boy's explanation, Mr. Zhang looked at Li Shiqing with softer and softer eyes, and his voice also became softer, "Little girl, you don't have to blame yourself, and don't be afraid ......"

He has studied psychology and understands that some 'survivors' suffer from a kind of 'moral trauma', feeling that they didn't do enough during the disaster or blaming themselves for not doing anything and going into deep guilt, which can lead to psychological problems.

This 'moral trauma' is known in psychological circles as 'survivor's guilt', also known as 'survivor's syndrome'.

Unlike PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), there is a tendency to place more emphasis on PTSD than on people with 'survivor's guilt', and by the time tragedy strikes, it is often too late.

Li Shiqing is still such a young girl and the young man in front of him looks so gentle, Mr. Zhang can't just sit back and watch their psychological situation go so wrong, while he walks around and tries to relieve the two young people of their negative emotions.

"No one wants this to happen, you don't have to feel like you didn't do anything, or keep thinking about things that are too tragic, or that what you did or didn't do was wrong, it has nothing to do with ordinary passengers like you at all ......"

People who develop such "trauma" are often people with a strong sense of morality, whereas a selfish and indifferent person has no problem with this.

"...... It is the people who planted the bombs that should be condemned and punished, not you lucky people who escaped from a narrow escape."

Sometimes, those who know how to do things take on more, which makes Mr. Zhang's heart go out to these two young people even more.

He rambled on and on for the sole purpose of conveying one message.

[It's not your fault.]

It's not your fault.

A few simple words, but Li Shiqing was completely tense.

They have tried for so long, failed for so long, seen the light of hope and endured the darkness of no top.

Sometimes they even feel that the whole world is trying to persuade them to give up, but they do not want to give in and resign themselves to their fate, and as soon as they are awake, they have to grit their teeth and tell each other - "one more try" - even though they have been frustrated and suffer deeply.

But even though they have tried so hard, nothing can be saved.

After the last time cycle, Li Shiqing was already a little tired of it all, feeling that such "strange" things like this didn't deserve to happen to an "ordinary" person like her.

She is so stupid, so weak, that it is a waste for God to give her such an "opportunity", she can't do anything right, she can't do anything at all, she can only watch the whole car die again and again.

But now, there is a man who is saying to them.

-- "It's not your fault."

Having understood the meaning of Mr. Zhang's words, Li Shiqing burst into tears.

Probably feeling pretentious and ashamed of this, she wiped her eyes carelessly and held her arms tightly over her eyes.

Even Xiao Heyun, a man who doesn't shed tears easily, felt a little uncontrollable at this moment and quietly tilted his head.

They are too bitter, just too bitter.

So bitter that they can't even bear a word of advice from others.

Mr. Zhang did not expect his reassuring words to make the two young men so emotional, but his instincts as a detective of many years immediately made him understand what was going on.

If they had simply gotten out of the car, these two children would not have been so emotional. They must have known something in the car and not actually acted on it, which is why they felt so "guilty" about it.

At this point, Mr. Zhang's heart swelled with joy and his attitude towards the two young men became more cautious.

They made a number of calls asking for the assistance of the passengers who had gotten off the train, and these two were the quickest of all to answer, the least hesitant to agree, and the quickest to come, and now Mr. Zhang sensed that they seemed to know something, which meant that there was a high probability that they would cooperate!

Mr. Zhang took them to the office of the task force. Officer Du, who was on the phone, saw them enter and was too busy to speak, only gesturing to them from afar to "sit" and continue talking on the other end of the phone.

Apart from Mr. Zhang, who had gone out to meet them, and Officer Du, whom they had met before, there were many other officers coming and going in the office, but everyone treated them well.

"Is the Trace Section stuff out yet!"

"No!"New novel chapters are published on

"Where are the files! Have the victim's files been compiled yet!"

" Fang Zi, call up the CCTV and get information on the middle-aged woman carrying the pressure cooker in the car!"

Officer Du gave the order straight away.

"Especially the social connections!"

"Yes!"

" Mr. Wang, hurry up the trace section! Determine if the explosives were in the pressure cooker, focusing on all the pieces that could be the remains of the pressure cooker!"

"Yes, chief!"

" Fang Zi, once you find out what the identity of the woman with the pressure cooker is, inform Little Jiang to lead a team to search her residence immediately!"

"Roger that!"

The other officers on the task force gathered around when they heard of the significant discovery.

The officer who had just shouted for information from the Traces Section took two plans of the interior of the bus from somewhere and handed them to Li Shiqing and Xiao Heyun.

"There are no more stops to board after East River Road station, you were the latest to get off the train, and we have seen no suspicious persons from surveillance along the route who boarded the train midway, we speculate that the person responsible for the bombing could have been on the train at the time."

He said, "We want to know who was in the car and roughly where they were sitting, especially the suspicious older woman in fancy dress that you have mentioned. We hope you can recall as much as you can and mark their positions on the floor plan."

"I'll do it."

Xiao Heyun took the pen from Mr. Zhang, thought back for a moment and began to mark on the plan.

"Here's an old lady, here's an old man with a snake skin bag with something round and round in it, I think he's carrying a melon ...... here's an older man with a black gym bag, here's an older woman with a basket of vegetables."

He used a pen to mark the people sitting in each position while making X's on the floor plan, and even wrote down what they carried with them.

"...... Here, here's the aunt in the flowery shirt."

Xiao Heyun's pen paused and continued with an 'X', "She was sitting in front of us with a pressure cooker."

From his recollection, he drew out the positions of all of them, except for the masked man who got into the car later.

Since they got off at the same stop where the masked man got on, they shouldn't have known where he was sitting.

Several officers gasped as he gestured while drawing.

"The broken black gym bag was found on the bus earlier!"

"Traces of melons were indeed found at the scene!"

The police summoned the passengers who got off the bus to ask for information, which is only one way of gathering information. How much information can be gathered all depends on how much the person who cooperates with the investigation can remember.

In past experience, it is not uncommon for people to panic or even babble after being frightened, and even when some normal-acting informants give clues, they often appear illogical or inconsistent and have to be repeatedly checked before they can be used.

But this time it was different. This time the witness who cooperated with the investigation was very clear-headed and the words he said and the information he marked out were backed up by sufficient traces or evidence at the scene.

"Boy, what a way to go, remembering so well!"

Mr. Zhang excitedly patted Xiao Heyun on the shoulder and placed a little more trust in the clues they had provided.

"I have a good memory, I get on the bus and get bored and like to observe the passengers."

Boy took the compliment in stride and pushed up his glasses.

"It's good to be able to help."

With the new clues, the direction was instantly clear, no longer looking for information from all sides as before.

The whole task force was running like a machine with its motor running at full speed, carrying out the tasks at hand in an orderly manner according to Officer Du's every instruction.

In the meantime, Li Shiqing and Xiao Heyun were also uneasily awaiting the outcome of the police investigation.

As much as the police expect them to, they also hope that the police will follow their leads and provide them with more information that is not easily investigated by ordinary people.

After waiting for almost an hour, Mr. Zhang gathered enough evidence and information from various colleagues, pulled a surveillance photo from his mobile phone and rushed to the two young men's side.

"Look guys, is this the woman with the pressure cooker?"

The photo is a bit blurry, so you can't see her face, but you can only vaguely see a woman carrying the large plastic bag that Li Shiqing said she was carrying, so there's no way to tell from the surveillance if it's a pressure cooker.

But the outfits, Li Shiqing and Xiao Heyun, are all too familiar.

"It's her."

Li Shiqing nodded, "I remember her clothes."

"It was indeed her, using a bag from the Family Mart."

Boy is also certain.

"Check! Find out who this woman is and what her connection is to Wang Xingde immediately! Tell Little Jiang to request search procedures and be ready to go!"

Another hour or so passed before news first came in from the Trace Section.

"The trace section has confirmed that the explosives were in the pressure cooker!"

Within minutes, Mr. Zhang, who was investigating the middle-aged woman, also arrived in a hurry and whispered in Officer Du's ear, " Mr. Du, the little girl is right, this woman is a serious suspect ......"

"She and the driver, Wang Xingde, are married!"