Chapter 4

My entire body convulsed, blood and tears mingling as I watched Mom and Dad struggle in the sea of flames.

Agony and despair surged like a tide, drowning what little reason I had left. I trembled on the verge of collapse, broken sobs escaping my throat.

The onlookers pointed at me and laughed.

"Just because this lunatic suffered, she wants others to suffer even more!"

"She's long since transformed into a monster, turning her own pain into a blade to stab at the innocent."

The electric current hissed, and the image abruptly shattered.

Trisha approached Roland, her gaze sharp and cold. "It's still not enough! We must make her relive the pain of that day to break through the memory block! Otherwise, we will never uncover the truth!"

Roland's eyes reddened, his trembling hand hovering midair. He stared at me, crumpled in the chair like a broken doll, his gaze a turmoil of pain and conflict. His shaking hands could no longer hold the needles steady.

Roland's subordinate grabbed his arm urgently. "Chief Turner, half an inch more and the needles will pierce her brain! She'll be brain-damaged!"

Roland stared at my festering temples, the needles unable to advance even a fraction further.

Trisha held Roland's wrist with an iron grip. "Roland, we've already come this far. If you back down now, all of this will have been for nothing! Do you really want Wyatt and Margie to have died in vain?"

Roland's knuckles turned white, bloodshot veins spreading across his eyes. "Wendy, should I believe you?"

The victims' families knelt on the ground, clutching bloodstained photos of their loved ones, weeping and pleading.

"Chief Turner, we beg you to expose the truth! Make all her memories public! Don't let our families die in vain!"

I stared blankly at Roland, my pupils unfocused, just as they had been when Wyatt and Margie dragged me from the burning wreckage years ago.

Trisha suddenly pressed down on Roland's wrist. The needles plunged deep into my brain, and the last flicker of light in my eyes faded away.

The memory flickered to my childhood—Mom holding me in her arms as she fed me medicine. Then, my school years, with me buried in books and studies. And alas, the fire that took my parents' lives left me utterly alone.

There was also a scene of Margie carrying me on her back through a storm after school before it shifted to a scene of Roland slipping a diamond ring onto my finger at our wedding. After that, it showed Wyatt and Margie secretly tucking money into my bag after we were married.

Roland trembled violently as he watched the memories unfold, his knuckles clenched bone-white.

Trisha's phone lit up with a crime alert. She rushed to Roland's side and pressed a knife into his hand.

"Another victim is dead! We can't afford to delay any longer—every minute could mean another body!"

She pushed Roland, still gripping the knife, toward me. "Recreate the scene! Make her relive what happened to Wyatt and Margie!"

Roland's subordinate stepped in front of him and said in a low voice, "If we push any further, her body will give out. If that happened, her memory could be cut off completely."

Trisha cut him off sharply. "If we stop now, we'll never uncover the truth!"

A glint of ruthlessness and madness flashed in her eyes.

Roland's hand, the one holding the knife, trembled violently as the blade carved into my festering flesh.

Scalding tears fell from his bloodshot eyes. "Wendy, why are you forcing me to do this? Who is it? Just who is it that has kept you from revealing the truth even now?"

I slumped in the metal chair, my gaze unfocused and my vision blurred. Yet, the searing pain still racked my body with uncontrollable spasms. Wyatt and Margie had endured this same torment before their deaths.

The memory froze at the moment I pushed the door open with grocery bags in hand.

The blood on the floor was jarring, and Margie's screams pierced the air from within the room.

The grocery bags fell from my grasp, my own scream trapped in my throat.

In the scene, a figure with a knife in their hand stood trembling before me.

The crowd stared in horror and dread at the knife-wielding figure.

"H-How is this possible?"

"The killer is actually—"