Artifact Report

Chapter 352 Mai Minghe: Stranger, Familiar Stranger, Familiar Familiar

...Who made the decision to convert the old mental hospital into a police station?
Mai Minghe casually looked away, but when she turned back, she noticed a pair of yellow eyes still floating on the edge of the ground in the distance, staring at her.

The man's head was obscured by the cell roof, and his face was hidden by the lobby floor, leaving only a pair of dim, teary eyes visible. Mai Minghe looked around again and found that in every cell, if someone was imprisoned, a pair of eyes would peek out from the edge of the lobby floor on the first floor of the police station.

It's a really uncomfortable design.

Perhaps it was the psychological effect of walking through the former mental hospital, but she felt as if her mind was on the verge of going insane.

In brightly lit areas, the carpets and walls have a fuzzy white sheen, giving the impression of someone desperately trying to wipe something away and then pretending nothing happened, which only makes things more obvious.

Near the surrounding dugout-like cells, the original dark brown walls of the mental hospital are still preserved. The lights cannot illuminate the deep, dark recesses around the walls, which resemble empty, toothless gums.

The cells were sparsely populated with people; out of sight of Mak Ming-ho, someone was calling out repeatedly, "Mom. Mom. Come quick, Mom. Oh. Hey. Mom. What is this? Come quick, come see!"

Even when a fellow inmate or a police officer occasionally yells, "Stop yelling, shut up!" the man pays no heed and continues—"Oh no. It's really coming. Oh no. Oh no."

...If you close your eyes, it's as if this place has never been converted into a police station, but is still a mental hospital.

Has the Central Police Department always been like this?
She knew that a significant portion of the homeless suffered from mental illness; could it be that the Central Police Department had just arrested a few homeless people today?

Mental distress is not just caused by the building environment or people locked in prison cells.

Mai Minghe sat on the waiting bench and glanced at a man sitting at a police desk not far away, reporting a case; after two seconds, he glanced at him again quietly.

Even from several meters away, she could still faintly hear the man's voice.

“I don’t know him,” he said sternly. “I don’t know him at all.”

It's hard not to look at him.

"...But she insisted that you were her husband, and that you changed the locks and wouldn't let her in." The policewoman taking the notes was young and spoke politely.

"I don't know, you're crazy, I've never seen her in my life."

“She has a driver’s license, and the registered address is the same as your home address. You also share the same surname,” the policewoman patiently reminded her.

“It’s not uncommon to have the same name, and she can register any address she wants, right? I told you I don’t know her, but you insist on me bringing a strange woman home. You’re not worried about her safety, but I’m worried about mine.”

The female police chief sighed, opened the files on the table, and said, "She described the layout of your house, and said there's a photo of the two of you on the wall of your bedroom, and a marriage certificate in the filing cabinet. She also said we can call your parents or colleagues to verify... Sir, you should know that if we go to your home and find these pieces of evidence, you will be held responsible for affecting the police's work."

“I have no parents,” the man chuckled. “See? She really is a madwoman, a stalker, she’s been exposed. You don’t have a search warrant, do you? Then don’t talk about coming to the door.”

The policewoman stared at him for a second.

The two continued their verbal exchange for a while, until a policeman nearby answered a phone call in a loud voice, and Mak Ming-ho couldn't hear what they said after that.

However, the policewoman was indeed quite experienced, managing to remain unfazed by the man's demeanor throughout the entire conversation—regardless of whether he actually had a wife, she never once asked him, "What are you doing with your hands?"

Mai Minghe sat for several minutes, and the man's hands were also in a frenzy for several minutes.

His sleeves were empty, so he pulled his arms back into his clothes and raised his hands at his chest; his hands emerged from his collar, palms touching, fingers spread wide to the sides, forming a "flower" at his chin.

The "flower hands" remained motionless, gently supporting his face, regardless of his sneer, glare, or explanations; the hands continued to bloom inside his collar.

Why?

What are they doing?

Mai Minghe couldn't help but look at him again and again, and he couldn't help but admire the policewoman's composure—could this man have suddenly developed some kind of mental problem, which is why he doesn't recognize his wife and is acting like this?
After finally getting rid of the man, the policewoman sat for a while, feeling both annoyed and exhausted, before standing up and beckoning to Mak Ming-ho, "Please come over here."

After Mai Minghe sat down, the policewoman looked her up and down a few times, seemingly relieved. "What is it?"

"That person just now..."

"Blackmore City has no shortage of weirdos. What do you want?"

“My friend is missing,” she said, pulling out a printout of Ivan’s photo that Seaweed had given her from her bag.

No, he said it shouldn't be called a "photograph"—he said it was drawn by the AI ​​after he described it to it; Mai Minghe now understands the specific principle, it turns out to be an intelligent robot, something she had seen in science fiction movies before.

The brushstrokes in the portrait are greasy, and the skin and hair have a slippery, sticky feel, which makes people uncomfortable to look at; but the facial features and face shape are indeed 70-80% similar to Ivan.

That should be enough, right?

“This is an AI-generated image,” the policewoman recognized it immediately. “Isn’t he your friend? Don’t you have a photo of him?”

"He...he doesn't like taking pictures."

"These days, are there any young people like taking pictures?"

Mai Minghe was taken aback—she had just looked at the policewoman and thought she was at most in her early forties, in the prime of her life; but now, after being told "you young people," she suddenly realized the disconnect between herself and the outside world. It felt like walking along and suddenly stepping into thin air.

She was truly afraid that the next time she stumbled, she would be jolted awake from her youthful dreams.

"He's rather introverted..."

"Don't his parents have any photos either?" The policewoman took the portrait, clicked the mouse a few times, and said to the screen.

“I don’t know his parents,” Mak Ming-ho said, already prepared. “He came to stay at my house, but suddenly disappeared.”

Before asking for details, the policewoman asked for her personal information as usual; Mak Ming-ho answered truthfully. As for whether the police would investigate her later and find out that she was actually an 86-year-old woman, she planned to deal with it as it came.

In life, one must learn to prioritize and focus on the present. If you worry about every little thing that hasn't happened yet, it's hard to live to eighty-six.

As the policewoman was typing information into the computer, the burly policeman next to her received another phone call.

"Madam, speak slowly and clearly," the burly policeman asked. "You mean you saw a naked man?"

Even a common man like Mak Ming-ho would immediately perk up his ears. Who wouldn't?

The burly policeman's next words made her ears practically stretch to their sides.

"Huh? What? Are you sure?... He's completely bald, no hair, and... um, no genitals?"

Even the policewoman who was registering the information stopped what she was doing and stared blankly at the policeman who was answering the phone, along with Mak Ming-ho.

"Okay, okay, I got it. You definitely didn't see wrong... Oh, he even talked to you. What did he say?"

The policeman seemed dumbfounded and could only repeat what he had said.

"He tells you, 'I escaped death and had such a valuable experience that I can definitely earn a lot of money. Do you want to go on a date with me? If I behave well, I'll reward you by making you my wife'—did he really say that?"

The policewoman scoffed and turned her attention back to Mak Ming-ho.

"What did I tell you? I've seen plenty of weirdos in all these years."

She placed the AI ​​image on the table, looked at the computer, and frowned. "Hmm...you said his name is Evan Weston? Are you sure that's the right name?"

Mai Minghe's heart skipped a beat, but he could only say, "That's right."

"When did you disappear?"

I heard that you can only report a missing person after 24 hours, and Evan appears to be a male adult capable of acting independently... So Mai Minghe could only try to stretch out the time as much as possible, saying, "It's been almost two days."

She had already considered that if the police station didn't take her report seriously, she would have to exaggerate the situation and make it sound more serious; but she didn't expect that the policewoman would suddenly purse her lips, give her a deep look, tell her to wait, and then pick up the phone.

……what happened?

Mai Minghe was puzzled and could only wait for her to answer the phone.

Not far away, the burly policeman was still asking about the situation: "Where did you see it?... Oh, the welfare housing construction site... is that the area around Cain Street?"

The policewoman answered the phone just then, but she kept her head down and said quickly in a very soft voice, "Someone reported that Evan Weston went missing from her house two days ago."

Does the police already know Evan? Does he have a criminal record?

Mai Minghe's attention was momentarily divided into two parts: on one hand, the policewoman hung up the phone and turned to ask her for details; on the other hand, the burly policeman said something to the person on the phone.

"Huh? Downtown? Didn't you say it was a welfare housing construction site?" the burly policeman asked into the phone. "The construction site is on Kane Street, ma'am, you must have made a mistake..."

“Describe what he was wearing before he disappeared,” the policewoman said.

Mai Minghe struggled to explain the vague, unsettling feeling in her heart—it was as if something was going on that she didn't know; because of her arrival, the gears had been engaged and were slowly starting to turn.

She answered the question casually, giving an embarrassed smile.

"Excuse me, where is your restroom? I'll be right back."

"I'll take you there,"

A woman's voice suddenly rang out from behind her.

Mai Minghe turned his head and saw a middle-aged woman with dark skin, a narrow and long face, and a capable appearance—her uniform seemed to indicate that she held a high rank.

"Chief," the policewoman called out.

(End of this chapter)