Card Room (Rebirth)

At 10:30 p.m., Yu Hanjiang and Xiao Lou arrived at the scene of the crime.

The local police had sent people to cordon off the scene and they let Yu Hanjiang enter after he showed them his police officer’s card.

This town belonged to a subordinate unit of Binzhou City. The police at the scene heard that the leader of the Binzhou criminal police team actually came here in person and everyone was shocked. Unexpectedly, the case in this small town had alarmed the top boss.

Li Xinyang, the young officer in charge of investigating the case immediately greeted him and spoke respectfully, “Group Leader Yu, why did you come to the scene in person?” He glanced at Xiao Lou and Xiao Lou reached out a hand with a smile. “Hello, Group Leader Li. I am Xiao Lou from the Binzhou forensic appraisal centre.”

The other person was polite. “It turned out to be Professor Xiao. Are you with Group Leader Yu?”

Yu Hanjiang briefly explained, “We happened to come here to investigate a case today. The deceased Xu Kai was related to a murder case that we are investigating. Xiao Li, you can sort out the details of the deceased and hand over the case to me.”

Li Xinyang nodded. “Yes, Group Leader Yu. You can go to the scene first to see… it is a bit weird.”

Yu Hanjiang and Xiao Lou followed Li Xinyang upstairs.

After entering the scene of the crime, they realized that Xu Kai’s death was almost exactly the same as Lin Yiyan’s death. It was just that Xu Kai was probably murdered when he was ready to take a shower because he didn’t have any clothes on.

He was lying in the bathtub, eyes wide with horror and his entire body covered with cuts. There were also ice cubes around him. However, Xu Kai’s house had the heater turned on so the ice cubes had partially melted.

The water from the ice cubes mixed with the blood on the body of the deceased and the water in the bathtub had turned blood red. Xu Kai lay in this pool of blood, dead. The scene was really shocking.

Li Xinyang said, “We just arrived at the scene. It was reported by Xu Kai’s cousin, Zhang Xiaoyu.

He turned his gaze to the side and pointed out Zhang Xiaoyu to Yu Hanjiang.

This Zhang Xiaoyu was the manager of the Whale Internet Cafe. Yu Hanjiang and Xiao Lou had just met him this afternoon. At this moment, he was holding his head and sitting on the bed while trembling. Yu Hanjiang sent a look to Xiao Lou and whispered in Xiao Lou’s ear, “You should do the autopsy first. I’ll go question him to find out the situation.”

Xiao Lou nodded. He put on gloves and leaned over to examine the body.

In the bloody bathtub, the body was a bit puffy from soaking in the water. The murderer was still very meticulous after committing the crime. The blood on the surrounding walls were wiped clean and there were no traces of the blood splashing. All the blood flowed into the bathtub.

Xiao Lou pulled out the plug of the bathtub and drained most of the blood, so that the body was exposed. Then he started to check it over carefully.

Next to him, the forensic doctor of the small town consciously handed him the tools. Some young interns had probably never seen such a disgusting scene. They ran downstairs to vomit and Li Xinyang gave them a fierce look.

Xiao Lou ordered, “Give me a pair of tweezers.”

The forensic doctor next to him served as his assistant and immediately handed over clean tweezers.

Xiao Lou took a long hair from the bathtub and placed it in a sterile, airtight bag for preservation. He couldn’t judge if this long hair was left by the murderer but the evidence found at the scene must always be brought back for careful examination.

The deceased was naked and no other hair was found.

The murder method was similar to Lin Yiyan’s case. The fatal wound was the stab to the heart but the wound wasn’t the same as Lin Yiyan’s one. Xiao Lou lifted the deceased’s body and looked at his back.

The deceased’s fatal wound was a stab to the heart but while Lin Yiyan’s wound was pierced from the front, Xu Kai’s wound was from the back. Therefore, the injury appeared wide on the back and narrower in front. It looked like a sharp knife had directly pierced Xu Kai’s chest.

Xiao Lou conducted a careful examination of the corpse while Yu Hanjiang approached Zhang Xiaoyu. He asked, “What time did you come to your cousin’s house and find his body?”

Zhang Xiaoyu trembled as he replied. “It was 10 o’clock in the evening.”

“Did you contact your cousin this afternoon?”

Zhang Xiaoyu nodded. “I called him at around 6 o’clock in the evening but he didn’t pick up. I thought he went to the KTV again with his friends so I didn’t care about him.”

Yu Hanjiang took Xu Kai’s phone from the table next to the bathtub. “Do you know the password?”

Zhang Xiaoyu took it and unlocked it. Sure enough, there was a missed call at 6 o’clock. It seemed that Xu Kai was already dead at the time.

Yu Hanjiang wondered, “You called him in the afternoon but he didn’t answer. Why did you suddenly come to find him at 10 o’clock at night?”

“I wanted to borrow some money from him… my finances have been tight recently. He didn’t answer his phone so I thought I would come to his house and try my luck.”

Yu Hanjiang’s voice was deep. “He was dead at the time. How did you get inside?”

Zhang Xiaoyu hurriedly explained, “I have the keys to his house because he sometimes goes on trips to discuss business. There is no one to take care of the fish and flowers at home. I live nearby so he gave me a key and asked me to take care of them for him.”

Yu Hanjiang nodded before continuing, “Did you see any suspicious person or vehicle in the community when you entered?”

Zhang Xiaoyu thought about it and shook his head. “No, I-I walked with my head down and didn’t pay attention.”

The cousin was afraid to look into Yu Hanjiang’s eyes when answering the questions. His expression was flustered and his eyes dodged from side to side. He obviously had a guilty conscience. He must be concealing something but Yu Hanjiang didn’t think he was directly related to Xu Kai’s murder.

After questioning Zhang Xiaoyu, Yu Hanjiang returned to Xiao Lou’s side and whispered, “What are the results?”

Xiao Lou answered, “The fatal injury is still a stab to the heart. A long knife directly pierced his heart. Judging from the wound marks, the murder weapon should be the same long knife that killed Lin Yiyan. The other knife marks on his body look like they were left after death.”

Yu Hanjiang frowned. “In other words, the murderer killed him and cut his body again?”

Xiao Lou nodded. “Yes, it is the same as the Lin Yiyan case.”

He raised the head of the corpse, carefully checking the pupils and livor mortis. “In terms of livor mortis, the time of death should be around six hours.”

Yu Hanjiang glanced at the wall clock in the bedroom.

The current time was 10:35 and the time of death was around six hours. In other words, Xu Kai’s death time should be around 4:30 in the afternoon. The time when Yu Hanjiang and Xiao Lou left Xu Kai’s house was exactly 4:30.

The two of them noticed this and felt a chill. In other words, the moment they left the house, Xu Kai was brutally killed inside the bathroom by the murderer.

Yu Hanjiang took a deep breath and lowered his voice as he spoke into Xiao Lou’s ear. “It is very likely that the murderer had already sneaked into Xu Kai’s house and was ready to kill him when we interrogated him. It was just that the murderer was hiding in a corner where we couldn’t see them.”

Xu Kai’s luxury villa was very large with a basement, living room, dining room and garden on the first floor. The second floor had the master bedroom and study, the third floor had several guest bedrooms and the fourth floor was the rooftop.

It really wasn’t easy to find a person hiding in such a large villa without a careful search.

During the time when Yu Hanjiang and Xiao Lou came to investigate him, the main suspect Qiao Xuening was filming with the crew in Binzhou City. Qu Wanyue and their other teammates were watching her. Neither of them expected that the murderer would come to commit a crime in advance. Therefore, they didn’t conduct a detailed search of Xu Kai’s residence.

Moreover, the search of a resident’s house required a ‘search warrant’ approved by their superiors. For example, Zhou Yuanyuan had a very strong motive for committing the crime and they could search her villa after just locking onto her as a suspect.

Xu Kai was just someone with information in Lin Yiyan’s case and not a suspect. The search warrant couldn’t be easily issued. Even the police couldn’t search people’s homes so casually. As a result, the two of them likely missed the killer. If the murderer had been hiding in Xu Kai’s house then they might’ve heard Yu Hanjiang questioning Xu Kai.

They remembered that when they came to Xu Kai’s house, Xu Kai had just woken up. He should’ve been woken by Yu Hanjiang’s continuous ringing of the doorbell. He had walked directly from the bedroom to the living room with sleepy eyes and messed up hair. There was obvious stubble on his face and he shouldn’t have washed.

It made sense to think that the first thing Xu Kai did after Yu Hanjiang and Xiao Lou left was to take a shower.

His cousin Zhang Xiaoyu said that he got drunk last night. It was normal for people with hangovers to take a shower to sober up. After Xu Kai entered the bathroom, he took off his robe and prepared to take a shower. Unexpectedly, the murderer who had been hiding in the villa suddenly took out a long knife and stabbed him in the heart!

Xiao Lou pointed to the corpse. “The difference from Lin Yiyan’s case is that this time, Xu Kai’s heart was pierced from behind. The murderer attacked him from behind and killed him with one blow.”

Yu Hanjiang nodded. “Indeed. The murderer is likely to be a woman. If she fights head on with a tall and muscular man like Xu Kai then she might not be able to gain an advantage. At that time, Xu Kai had just taken off his clothes and was about to take a shower. He should be more relaxed and it would be difficult to guard against an attack from behind.”

After all, no one would think there was a person hiding in their bathroom!

No wonder why Xu Kai’s eyes were so wide that the eyeballs almost fell out. Obviously, he was just about to step into the shower when he was stabbed from behind. He must’ve been shocked by the sharp point of the knife that pierced his chest.

Li Xinyang carefully listened to the conversation between the two people and his face showed he was completely at a loss.

Yu Hanjiang suddenly looked at him. “Do you have luminol?”

Lin Xinyang immediately said, “We brought it. Xiao Qi, go and get it for Group Leader Yu.”

A young police officer grabbed the luminol and handed it to Yu Hanjiang. Yu Hanjiang used it to carefully inspect the scene. The murderer might’ve cleaned up the blood stains but luminol could show them.

Even if the blood stains were wiped clean by the murderer, the hemoglobin would still remain. The moment the ‘luminol reagent’ was sprayed on the hemoglobin, it would oxidize with the reactive oxygen and release blue-purple fluorescence.

Yu Hanjiang sprayed a circle in the bathroom and soon, a lot of blue-violet fluorescent traces were revealed on the walls and the ground.

Xiao Lou looked at the brightest area and walked over, making gestures while talking. “Xu Kai was here when he was stabbed by the murderer and blood sprayed on the wall. Xu Kai struggled for a moment but soon died. Then the murderer moved his body into the bathtub, surrounded him with ice cubes and cut his body.

Everyone understood Xiao Lou’s gestures. It was also consistent with the remaining blood on the scene.

Li Xinyang got goosebumps. “This… What type of hatred is this? It isn’t enough to kill him. They have to freeze the body with ice and cut the body?”

Yu Hanjiang replied lightly, “The psychology of the murderer in this case has been distorted. Moreover, they are smart and can lurk in the target’s house in advance to unexpectedly kill the target. My guess is that they have learned a lock-picking skill or else it would be difficult to explain how the murderer got into both Lin Yiyan and Xu Kai’s houses.”

Mysteriously sneaking into the target’s home and then stabbing them to death in the bathroom…

This murderer simply didn’t lose to professional killers!

6th Anniversary Event Page (Final Submission Date: 15th November)

Proofreader: Fictional Reality