5: Chapter 5 Oscar Night and the Explosion of Art
The halo struck with the weight of a thousand tons, smashing hard against the demon's ugly face, which was smeared with lipstick.
Zzzzzzt—!
It was the sound of pork belly hitting a sizzling grill.
The stench of burning flesh instantly filled the entire living room.
“Aaaauuuughhh—!!!”
The Red-Faced Demon let out its most shrill and desperate scream of the night.
In a life-or-death moment, the intense pain triggered all the fel energy within its body.
A black shockwave exploded outward with the demon at the center.
Emma was knocked over and went rolling behind the sofa.
Qin Ming, who was at the center of the explosion, was sent flying backward.
Crash!
The massive floor-to-ceiling window shattered.
Qin Ming's body flew out of the villa and slammed heavily onto the lawn outside.
Inside the house, the demon clutched its half-rotten face, cast a venomous glance out the window, and then crashed frantically through the side wall.
Thump!
The wall collapsed, leaving a large hole.
It transformed into a cloud of black smoke and vanished pathetically into the pitch-black night.
Meanwhile, Qin Ming lay on the lawn, his right arm bent at a bizarre angle.
His pain receptors faithfully transmitted the signals: a fractured ulna, at least two broken ribs, and a brain that felt like it had been tossed in a tumble dryer for half an hour.
Lights began to flicker on in the surrounding villas as the wealthy residents were awakened by the loud noise.
“You look quite pathetic, Brother.”
A mocking voice drifted down from above.
Qin Ming struggled—
Against the backlight, Emma stood over him, the boning knife in her hand still dripping with thick black blood.
She tilted her head, her twin tails hanging to one side, wearing an innocent smile that was enough to give any adult nightmares.
“Big brother, it looks like you can't move now.”
The tip of the knife in Emma's hand tapped lightly on his uninjured left shoulder, as if she were looking for the best place to make a cut.
“If my hand just slips a little, you'll never see tomorrow's sun. And no one would ever suspect a nine-year-old girl.”
Qin Ming didn't show the slightest hint of panic.
He even twitched the corner of his mouth into a mocking smile that looked worse than crying.
“You can try, my dear sister.”
Emma's movements halted.
Intuition told her that if she acted now, she would be the one who ended up dead.
“Just kidding, look at you, being so serious.”
Emma's expression changed instantly. She put away the knife, crouched down, and patted Qin Ming's cheek with her small hand stained with black blood, her movements as affectionate as a real sister's.
“What do we do next? That red-faced ugly freak turned the house into a demolition site. The window is shattered, there's a hole in the wall, and the floor is covered in blood and claw marks.”
Qin Ming endured the pain and adjusted his breathing rhythm, letting the sharp stinging in his lungs subside slightly.
“Where's Robert?”
With such a huge commotion, it was simply unscientific that his cheap adoptive father hadn't appeared yet.
“He's been having insomnia lately,” Emma shrugged. “He takes two strong sleeping pills every night before bed, without fail. He probably won't wake up until the alarm goes off tomorrow morning, or until the house collapses.”
Good.
A standard horror movie extra setting—alive just to stay out of the way at times like this.
Qin Ming's mind raced as he calmly issued instructions.
“Go to the kitchen and cut the rubber gas hose on the stove.”
Emma's emerald eyes instantly lit up, like a cat that had found a new toy.
“You mean...”
“An accident.”
Qin Ming looked at the pale moon in the night sky. “What could be more perfect for covering all this up than a localized explosion caused by an unfortunate gas leak? Fire will purify all sins.”
“Great idea!”
Emma licked her lips excitedly and turned to run, but suddenly stopped. “What about Dad?”
“We only need to blow up this corner of the living room to create the illusion of a shockwave.” Qin Ming glanced at her. “Robert is in the master bedroom on the other side of the second floor. As long as we control the amount...”
“Understood.”
Emma lifted her dirty skirt and ran back into the house like a happy little fawn.
She was an expert in this field.
Before long, rustling sounds came from inside the house.
Emma didn't cut the hose directly; instead, she used a small file to grind a crack into the connection of the gas hose, then loosely wrapped it with several layers of household tape.
It looked exactly like an accidental leak caused by old tape peeling off.
Next, she dug an old hair dryer out of the storage room.
She plugged it into the faulty outlet next to the stove and adjusted the angle so the plug was in an awkward half-in, half-out position.
The electricity sizzled at the contact point, producing faint sparks and heat.
It was the perfect delayed fuse.
“Done.” Emma ran back out.
A moment later, a faint smell of mercaptan began to permeate the air.
“Let's get further away,” Qin Ming said. Emma obediently stepped forward and hooked her hands under Qin Ming's armpits.
She had absolutely no sense of how to care for an injured person, dragging him as crudely as if he were a sack full of potatoes.
It made him grimace in pain until they were about twenty meters away from the villa. Qin Ming leaned against a tree trunk and turned to look at the expectant Emma beside him.
“Your turn, Best Actress.”
Emma immediately understood.
She reached out and tousled her neat twin tails until they looked like a bird's nest, grabbed a handful of damp soil to smear on her face, and tore several holes in her expensive dress.
After doing all this, she lay down on the ground, striking a pitiful unconscious pose, even deliberately making her breathing rapid and weak.
“Goodnight, brother.”
“Goodnight, sister.”
Qin Ming closed his eyes.
About ten minutes later.
When the gas concentration reached its critical point, the loose plug sputtered another tiny electric spark.
Boom—!!!
A massive fireball erupted from the gap in the living room's floor-to-ceiling window, the orange-red light instantly illuminating the entire neighborhood.
Alarms blared through the night sky.
Five minutes later, alternating red and blue flashes and shrill sirens approached from the distance.
Everything was going according to plan.
...
The next morning.
St. Mary's Hospital, VIP ward.
The smell of disinfectant filled his nostrils, and sunlight filtered through the blinds onto the hospital bed.
There were three beds in this intensive care ward, with the family of three all lined up.
“Oh, thank God, thank the Virgin Mary, thank every god whose name I know!”
Rob Lowe sat on the middle hospital bed, his head wrapped in a bandage—he'd been hit by a shattered photo frame. He wiped away tears while praying incoherently, “I'm so glad you're both okay. If I lost you, I wouldn't want to live... Heavens, a house can be rebuilt, but you two are irreplaceable.”
The single father cried like a two-hundred-pound child, his nose running and everything.
The police investigation report was already out.
The conclusion was beyond doubt: an aging gas pipe leaked, and a short circuit in an outlet triggered the fire.
A standard domestic accident.
As for why there were so many signs of destruction at the scene? That was caused by the shockwave of the explosion.
A logical closed loop, absolutely perfect.
“Daddy, don't cry.”