Prologue: Desolate and Painful Memories!

Chapter 1: Wanted

In the eyes of his classmates, he was a silent, dull boy.

In the eyes of his boss, he was a numb, submissive temp worker.

In the eyes of the police, he was a meticulous, ruthless, and vicious wanted criminal.

Preface.

William Ford.

Male.

Han ethnicity.

Both parents deceased.

On the night of February 25, 2009, he was discovered missing. Half a month later, his aunt reported to the police, and three highly decomposed male corpses were found at home. DNA testing confirmed they belonged to fellow villagers Henry Clark, Kevin Harris, and David Wright. After extensive investigation, it was determined that eleven accidental deaths in Yuhong Township over the past two years were all likely connected to this suspect.

This is the only information the police have on him, and most of it was found in the empty, dilapidated house of William Ford. The clues left behind in this serial murder case were far too few. Anything of value had long been sold off by William Ford to pay off the debts incurred after burying his parents. The pile of burnt joss paper ashes in the corner seemed to symbolize the boy’s half-life: gloomy, fragile enough to be scattered by the wind, and, of course, death.

The motive for the crime was as clear as the glass in the frame hanging in the main room. The parents of William Ford, who had been dead for three years, were smiling brightly in the photo at the three corpses who could not rest in peace. The police confirmed that, over the past two years, a total of six people had died, either directly or indirectly, at the hands of William Ford.

Exactly five men and one woman, making six in total.

Not one more, not one less.

These six people had relatives, spouses, children, and friends. Their relationships formed a web—a web that could drive two ordinary people to a dead end! Of course, perhaps they never intended for these two to die, but they instinctively built their happiness on the suffering of others, or wanted to create some entertainment, and overestimated others’ ability to endure oppression.

So, tragedy struck.

These two people were precisely William Ford’s parents, but they also had another extremely secret and intimate relationship.

Brother and sister.

Biological brother and sister.

So, when this shocking news spread, a once happy family quickly became precarious under public opinion and the spittle flying during people’s mahjong games. Most terrifying of all, on her way home, William Ford’s mother was suddenly ambushed and gang-raped by those five men!

The reason these people spared no effort to spread others’ secrets was that they had long coveted the beautiful young woman. Driven by the evil thought that if they couldn’t have her, they would destroy her, these five men committed such a heinous act!

So, on a stifling summer night, a couple unable to bear the pressure of the world, feeling a sense of release, swallowed rat poison. By the time William Ford noticed, their pupils were already dilated, and their hearts and breathing had stopped for a long time. The family of three collapsed in an instant.

He did not cry or make a fuss. With a pale face, he sat dazedly beside his parents’ corpses for several days, only occasionally swatting away mosquitoes and flies, which was the only sign he was still alive. Finally, when the neighbors could no longer stand the stench and angrily came to knock on the door, William Ford calmly called the funeral home.

Only then did the rampant rumors suddenly die down. Everyone felt a twinge of guilt and was too embarrassed to bring up the matter again. The crimes of those five men that night were never spread, but talk about William Ford gradually increased.

“I always thought this kid was a bit slow. Turns out I was right.”

“Of course, when siblings do that, their child is bound to be an idiot.”

“His grades were never good. My daughter said the teacher scolded him the most.”

“A teenager so lifeless—he probably won’t live long.”

But these people only knew the surface, not the reason:

Every normal person may carry several or even a dozen harmful recessive alleles. Close-relative marriage increases the chance of these alleles meeting and causing genetic abnormalities. Half of a human’s nuclear genome comes from the father and half from the mother. In close-relative marriage, the chance of two problematic genes combining is much higher than in non-relative marriages. Their offspring have a higher mortality rate and often suffer from intellectual disabilities, deformities, and hereditary diseases.