Book Synopsis
Book Tags
Donation Rankings
Comment
0 Comments
You May Also Like
墨書 Inktalez
Zhong Kui's Diary
The security guard did not linger at the door; he directly pulled out a key from his pocket and reached to unlock the door. In the blink of an eye, the door was opened.
"Stop," Ouyang Tao suddenly spoke up.
Acne quickly pressed pause, and Ouyang Tao pointed at the guard's hand: "Zoom in on that spot."
After manipulating the mouse a few times, Acne enlarged the position of the security guard's hand. As soon as it was enlarged, we immediately noticed something strange. The key in the guard's hand was not inserted into the lock hole at all. This meant that he had not used the key to open the door; it was as if the door in front of him was slightly ajar, and he simply pushed it open.
Could it be that I hadn't locked the door properly at that time? Or did this security guard have another way to open the door? Or perhaps he just didn't want to raise any alarms and pretended to use a key to open it?
Ouyang Tao looked for a while longer, shook his head with a wry smile: "Let's continue; I can't understand how he opened the door."
He waved his hand, signaling Acne to continue playing the surveillance video. After a while, we finally saw this security guard come out of the room. Just as he stepped out, we couldn't help but exclaim. At that moment, the blur on the guard's face had completely disappeared, revealing his original appearance—the same one I had seen.
Could it be that this security guard's spell had expired? Qingcheng had once told me that such spells could not last too long. Yes, there was also a possibility that this guard revoked the spell upon entering to avoid drawing my attention.
"Pause," I said to Acne.
Acne pressed pause, looking at me in confusion, seemingly wondering why I wanted him to stop.
I pointed at this security guard and asked Ouyang Tao: "Are you sure you haven't seen this guard before?"
Ouyang Tao shook his head firmly: "I'm sure; we definitely don't have this guard."
I frowned, not expecting that Rhinophyma, who had been silent beside us, would interject: "Hey, isn't he wearing Liu the Black's uniform?"
"Liu the Black?" I asked suspiciously. "Who is Liu the Black? How do you know this uniform belongs to him?"
"Liu the Black is one of our security guards from Nanhai. He has dark skin, which is why he's called Liu the Black," Ouyang Tao explained beside me, then curiously asked Rhinophyma: "How do you know he's wearing Liu the Black's clothes?"
"There's a patch on his shoulder epaulet; I sewed it on for him," Rhinophyma chuckled.
"Ouyang Supervisor, please notify Liu the Black to come here." Lingfeng pondered for a moment and said to Ouyang Tao.
Ouyang Tao nodded and grabbed the duty intercom on the table: "This is Ouyang Tao, this is Ouyang Tao, who is in the dormitory?"
After a crackling sound from the intercom, a deep voice came through: "This is Li Jin! I'm in the dormitory, what instructions do you have, boss?"
"Is Liu the Black there?"
"He's in the bathroom!"
"Tell him to come to the monitoring room immediately!" Ouyang Tao put down the intercom and signaled Acne to continue playing the surveillance video.
After clicking play, I saw a security guard's mouth moving as he spoke a few words. Although there was no sound, I knew he was responding that his name was Ouyang Tao.
After answering me, a strange smile flashed across the security guard's face as he turned and walked towards the emergency exit.
"Pause! Pause!" This time it was Lingfeng shouting. After Acne pressed pause, Lingfeng frowned and said, "Can you rewind it a little bit?"
Acne complied, and with each adjustment, Lingfeng either shouted to go back or forward. After three or four attempts, Lingfeng finally shouted, "Stop, don't move it."
The frame showed the moment when the security guard turned to leave. I scanned from top to bottom but found nothing unusual. Instead, Rhinophyma exclaimed, pointing at the surveillance screen: "What is that?"
Following Rhinophyma's finger, my scalp tingled. The light shone directly on the security guard's leather shoes, revealing a silver reflection on the shoe surface that took the shape of a skull. This skull looked exactly like the one on Xie Mengfei/leg.
A loud ringing echoed in my head as I suddenly realized that the reason for Xie Mengfei's death was very likely related to this skull under the security guard's foot. I recalled that when I had been choking the security guard, he had been desperately trying to pry my fingers apart while his feet were kicking wildly. It was at that moment that he had used the skull at his toe to secretly attack Xie Mengfei.
Who exactly is this security guard? Why did he want to target Xie Mengfei?
If this security guard is indeed the old man from the serial rape and murder case, why didn't he kill Xie Mengfei back then? Instead, why did he wait so long and risk being discovered by me to kill Xie Mengfei? If this security guard isn't that old man, then who is he?
Countless question marks suddenly popped up in my mind; it felt like millions of sparrows chirping chaotically or thousands of ducks quacking loudly inside my head.
Just when I was feeling overwhelmed, the intercom on the table rang: "Boss, Boss, this is Li Jin, this is Li Jin, please respond, please respond."
Hearing the voice, it was indeed the same Li Jin from earlier, but his words were filled with panic and fear, as if something particularly terrifying had happened around him.
Ouyang Tao frowned and grabbed the intercom: "This is Ouyang Tao. What’s going on?"
"Boss, Liu the Black is dead!" Due to his urgency, Li Jin's voice was slightly hoarse.
"What did you say?" Ouyang Tao said sharply.
"Liu the Black is dead! He died in the dormitory bathroom!" Li Jin almost shouted.
"I'll be there right away." Ouyang Tao put down the intercom and turned to run. After just two steps, he seemed to remember something and quickly turned back to salute Lingfeng: "Ling Ju, since you're here too, could you please go check the scene?"
"Let's go." Lingfeng didn't hesitate and agreed immediately.
The Security Dormitory was located on the second floor of one of the buildings in the area, occupying three suites numbered 0, 0, and 04. At the entrance of room 0, seven or eight security guards had already gathered and were discussing among themselves. When they saw us approaching, they instinctively made way for us. One middle-aged man with a rustic appearance came up to greet Ouyang Tao; it seemed he was Li Jin.
Entering room 0, it had a layout of three bedrooms and a living room. The bedroom door was open, revealing two bunk beds inside; the upper bunks were for sleeping while the lower ones held some luggage and miscellaneous items. The living room had a television and refrigerator among other things; overall, the room was relatively tidy.
Lingfeng had already called two police officers who arrived even before us and were currently at the bathroom door quietly discussing something.
As I stepped closer to take a look, I noticed that this bathroom was combined with a shower area, roughly five or six square meters in size. Aside from an electric water heater and a showerhead, the only striking thing in the room was a string of colorful towels hanging on the wall.
The bathroom had a squat toilet with thirty-centimeter square non-slip tiles on the floor. On top of the beige tiles lay a person; he was bare-chested with his shorts down to his knees. His skin was dark, and beneath him was a dark red streak of blood slowly flowing into the squat toilet. Following the source of the blood, I could see an open wound on his neck where blood seemed to have mostly drained out. The wound revealed white bone and red tubular cuts that were indistinguishable as either blood vessels or airways.
Clearly, Liu the Black had his throat slit while squatting to relieve himself.
According to Li Jin's account, he had been shaving his beard inside when Liu the Black rushed in urgently. Unable to hold it any longer and disregarding Li Jin's presence, he squatted down without hesitation. Li Jin could only curse as he walked out; he had locked the door behind him. This statement was corroborated by other security guards who confirmed that when Li Jin came out, he was still cursing Liu the Black.
Because of this, Li Jin was quite certain that when he exited, there was no one else inside besides Liu the Black. To be honest, in such a small space with no obstructions at all, I didn't believe anyone could hide inside without being noticed.
When Liu the Black went inside, no one else entered until Ouyang Tao called looking for him. Later, Li Jin called out several times at the door but received no response from Liu the Black, prompting Li Jin to break in.
Lingfeng and I looked at the position of the door lock; it was clear that the door had been kicked open forcefully.
We both turned our attention to the bathroom window. If someone had managed to slit Liu the Black's throat and escape, the only exit would have been this window. However, this window was equipped with a security grill, and the spacing in the middle was only ten centimeters wide. It would be nearly impossible for a person to squeeze through.
While the two police officers were recording statements and analyzing the scene, Lingfeng pulled me outside.
"Zheng Nan, do you think Liu the Black's death could be the work of a Demon?"
Lingfeng's question left me somewhat amused and exasperated. "How would I know?"
"Come on, aren't you a Grandmaster-level Expert? Can't you see that?" It was rare for Lingfeng to curse.
"I became a Grandmaster-level Expert mostly by luck. In terms of experience and foundation, I'm still far behind Kong Xuan. Do you understand the difference between a Town Chief and a Governor? It's about that much of a gap." I sighed bitterly. "I really don't know if this is the work of a person or a Demon."
Lingfeng sighed deeply. "The serial rape and murder case has already claimed six lives, and with Xie Mengfei and Liu the Black added in, that's eighteen lives now. This case will probably attract the attention of the Ministry of Public Security."
I remained silent, feeling somewhat guilty. After all, I had been involved from the beginning but hadn't caught any suspects or even found any leads.
Comment 0 Comment Count