S.C.I. (Volume II) - Case 6: Chapter 12
The Innocent Killer 12 - Provocation
"Some parts of it are really strange." Gongsun furrowed his brows as he hurried over to conduct the autopsy.
"What's strange?" Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang crowded over, puzzled.
"Look right here." Saying this, Gongsun pointed at the zipper on the back of Pang Xiaoqin's evening gown.
"What is that?" Bai Yutang stared at the zipper, only to see a patch of pink color on the exquisite black zipper, which was even shimmering with a crystalline gloss.
"It's nail polish." Gongsun lifted the dead woman's hand for Bai Yutang to see. On Pang Xiaoqin's fingernails, they saw pink nail polish identical to the patch on the zipper, and moreover... a patch had clearly been scraped off her right middle finger, which must have been what brushed against the zipper.
"What does this prove?" Bai Yutang and Zhan Zhao exchanged glances.
Gongsun shook his head helplessly, beckoned over a female colleague from the forensics department, and said, "Take a look and see if anything is strange."
"It is strange!" The female colleague stroked her chin and nodded, saying, "This kind of crystal nail polish takes a very long time to dry completely—at least fifteen minutes... The situation right now is that Pang Xiaoqin put on her evening gown before the nail polish had dried."
The group of grown men at the scene nodded together, humbly accepting the lesson—the analysis made a lot of sense.
"However... this gown of hers looks very expensive at a glance. Normally, people would put on the clothes first and then apply nail polish, right?" the female forensic officer said earnestly. "Just think, if the nail polish hasn't dried when you're putting it on, you'll either scratch the polish or dirty the clothes; neither option is worthwhile."
"Of course, when a woman is dressing formally, she either waits until the clothes are completely on before applying nail polish, or waits until the polish has dried before putting on the clothes."
"That means Pang Xiaoqin originally intended to wait for the nail polish to dry before wearing the dress, but then something happened, forcing her to hurriedly put on her gown." Bai Yutang nodded. "It really is strange. For someone like Pang Xiaoqin attending a grand banquet, how could she allow a smudge to ruin her nails?"
"There's also one more point that is extremely strange." Zhan Zhao swept his gaze around the surroundings. "There are completely no signs of any struggle or fighting at the scene..." At this point, Zhan Zhao suddenly furrowed his brows, seemingly having thought of something.
"What is it, Cat?" Bai Yutang noticed Zhan Zhao's odd behavior and asked, "Did you discover something?"
"I'm going to look at the surveillance footage again!" As soon as he finished speaking, Zhan Zhao ran back to the monitoring room, pulled up the recording, and repeatedly watched the scene of the killer inserting the card into the room himself.
"Look right here!" Zhan Zhao extended a finger pointing at the doorknob in the footage. "Look!"
Bai Yutang leaned closer and stared at the doorknob, suddenly drawing in a breath. "Before his hand even touched the doorknob, the doorknob moved!"
"And look at this!" Zhan Zhao extended a finger pointing at the face of the person in black, saying, "Although it was blocked by the mask, you can still tell that he nodded slightly."
"An Lingli knew he was coming!" Bai Yutang frowned. "Judging by Pang Xiaoqin's actions later... she also knew the killer, and their relationship was quite good!"
"Aiya, what kind of relationship is this?!" Zhao Hu scratched his head. "It's too chaotic!"
"Exactly." Dynasty nodded as well. "Commit murder or arson and there's bound to be a motive; to make someone look like this, to put it bluntly, is to harbor a deep, bone-deep hatred as if they had a patricidal enemy... But right now, everything is here except for a motive!"
"That's right." Ma Han looked at Bai Yutang. "Chief, do you feel that... this case seems somewhat connected to the dismemberment case... and the dismemberment case is related to that ripper case... All the cases are also related to Fang Wo, intertwined in a thousand ways so it's unclear whether they're actually connected or not. Also, this head belongs to An Lingli, while the body belongs to Pang Xiaoqin. When you think about it, you have to separate them into two sides, completely confusing everyone."
Bai Yutang and Zhan Zhao both didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Zhao Hu handed over a cup of water, saying, "Ma-ge, drink some water and catch your breath... You're almost spinning me into a daze."
Laughter aside, everyone felt that Ma Han had hit upon the key point. These few cases, seemingly unrelated, were actually connected. There seemed to be an indescribable link binding them together, making things feel baffling, elusive, and extraordinarily bizarre.
Having cordoned off the scene and collected the evidence, the SI members dragged their exhausted bodies away from the location.
"The autopsy report won't come out until tomorrow morning at the earliest," Bai Yutang said to the others. "Tomorrow looks like another round of consecutive operations, so everyone go back tonight to get a good rest and build up your energy!"
"Understood!" The SI members dispersed.
Bai Yutang and Zhan Zhao walked over to the car, and just as they wanted to open the car doors, Zhan Zhao suddenly let out an "Oh?"
"What is it?" Bai Yutang was puzzled.
"Bai, what is this?" Zhan Zhao reached out and peeled a sheet of white paper off the passenger-side car door. "It was wedged in the car window."
Bai Yutang walked around the car to Zhan Zhao's side, leaned in to take a look, and saw a line of red characters written on the white paper: "Executing justice on behalf of the heavens."
"How absurd!" Bai Yutang took the white sheet of paper and looked at it front and back, discovering that aside from those four red characters, there was nothing else.
Calling over the valet parking attendant, Bai Yutang asked, "Who got close to this car?"
"Oh..." The valet smiled. "Young Master Bai, your car is a global limited edition. Most people passing by will walk close to take a look, and even take pictures as a souvenir."
Bai Yutang asked, "Your parking lot has surveillance cameras, right?" As he spoke, he looked around and indeed saw cameras on all four corners. "Take us to the monitoring room!" With that, Bai Yutang pulled Zhan Zhao, who was already starting to yawn, toward the monitoring room.
After pulling up the parking lot footage from the time of the incident up to the present moment, Bai Yutang drove Zhan Zhao home.
Cats are just like this: when it doesn't want to sleep, you shouldn't even think about sleeping either. It will use its soft paws to bat at your face right beside your pillow, meowing you awake to keep it company. However, if it wants to sleep itself, then no matter whether you flatten it, stretch it out, knead it round, or shape it square, it won't resist at all, simply sleeping in a hazy daze.
The hour was already very late, and Zhan Zhao had been extremely tired over the past few days, so he had now slipped into a semi-comatose state. Leaning against Bai Yutang's shoulder with both hands gripping the seatbelt and his mouth slightly parted, he was sawing logs and sleeping soundly. Looking at that posture, Bai Yutang felt a sense of peril; no matter which angle went wrong, this someone might just tumble right out.
Having finally arrived home, after thinking it over through various angles, Bai Yutang still decided to carry Zhan Zhao inside. Exiting the parking lot, he carefully scooped the person out of the car. Zhan Zhao groggily fluttered his eyes open, closed them again, lazily rolled over, wrapped both arms around Bai Yutang's neck, hummed twice, and continued sleeping.
"Hah..." Bai Yutang sighed. "This cat... treats me like a bed."
Walking up to the door and pondering how to fish out the keys to open it, he abruptly caught sight of a bouquet of flowers placed at the entrance.
"Flowers?" Bai Yutang narrowed his eyes and stared at the bunch of red roses, feeling a strange sense of glaring offense... The red of these flowers was somewhat darkened, making people feel inexplicably uncomfortable.
"Cat." With no other choice, Bai Yutang decided to wake Zhan Zhao up so he could take a look. "Cat."
"Hmm?" Zhan Zhao asked, his eyes hazy with sleep coupled with the displeasure of having his sweet dreams disturbed, raising his eyes to look at Bai Yutang.
"Mmhmm~~" Bai Yutang used his gaze to signal Zhan Zhao to look down at the ground.
Following his line of sight downward, Zhan Zhao caught sight of the roses on the ground, and more than half of his sleepiness instantly evaporated.
"Why is this flower this color?" Bai Yutang light-footedly set Zhan Zhao down onto the ground and asked in a low voice.
"It really is very strange!" Zhan Zhao pulled out his phone and took a photo of the flowers. After finishing, he looked at Bai Yutang.
Nodding, Bai Yutang raised his foot and gently kicked the bunch of flowers. The flowers shifted aside, revealing a shallow pool of red liquid on the ground... blood.
"What is this?" Bai Yutang frowned, squatting down for a closer look, and saw an envelope nestled among the blossoms. The white envelope was stained with mottled blood stains, indescribably glaring.
Reaching out to pull out a tissue, Zhan Zhao covered the envelope with the tissue and pulled it out from amidst the floral cluster.
The flap of the envelope was not sealed shut. Opening it up, he found something inside. Zhan Zhao drew out the contents as well, discovering it was a folded book page, on which a passage had been highlighted with a yellow highlighter—Psychology is a science, a medical art used to cure illnesses and save lives, not an illusion used to manufacture crimes...
"My book?" Zhan Zhao clearly remembered that he had written this sentence in the prologue of his second book.
"Is there anything else?" Bai Yutang stared into the envelope.
Zhan Zhao discovered a plastic bag inside, feeling much like the stamp-collecting bags used to enclose stamps. Inside was a blood-red petal; he couldn't tell what kind of flower it belonged to, except that it was abnormally, brilliantly red.
"What should we do, Bai?" Zhan Zhao asked.
"Forget about it." Bai Yutang shrugged, pointing at his phone. "Anyway, we have the photos. For this kind of disgusting thing, we might as well wait for the cleaning lady to clear them away tomorrow morning." With that, he fished out the keys to open the door, pulled Zhan Zhao out, and shut the door behind them.
After showering and lying down in bed, the two of them faced each other, staring eye-to-eye.
"Still not sleeping?" Bai Yutang asked Zhan Zhao.
"I can't sleep anymore." Zhan Zhao wore a deeply depressed expression. "I'm wide awake from being stirred up by that bunch of flowers."
"Feeling energetic?" Hearing this, Bai Yutang perked up as well. "Then let's do some mind-refreshing and intellect-boosting activities... Poof~"
Before Bai Yutang could finish his sentence, he was struck right in the face by a pillow thrown by Zhan Zhao.
Pulling the pillow away and seeing that Zhan Zhao still wore a thoughtful expression, Bai Yutang put aside his playful teasing and said earnestly, "I told you so... they're coming after you."
"Yeah..." Zhan Zhao had no choice but to concede, looking up at the ceiling and thinking, "I haven't offended anyone. Who would target me, and why kill so many people... What are they aiming for?"
Bai Yutang shook his head and reached out to pinch Zhan Zhao's nose. "My cat, you're sharp as a tack when encountering other people's matters, so how can you be so muddled when it comes to your own issues? Aren't you simply the N1 of psychology?!"
"Who says so?" Zhan Zhao glared. "In literature there is no first and in martial arts there is no second... If you call me N1, I reckon I'll be drowned by the spittle of my peers tomorrow."
"As someone doing psychology, other people struggle for fifty years without achieving what you have in just a few years. As a psychologist, your professional articles actually made it to the top of the bestseller list, an invincible SI psychology consultant, head of the think tank... even though you're the only one in the think tank, and besides, among all psychologists, who is better looking than you... Poof~" A second pillow came flying over.
"That'll teach you to talk nonsense again." Zhan Zhao reached out to snatch one of Bai Yutang's pillows, placing it under his own head. "This case is deeply implicated, and besides targeting us, don't you feel like they're also targeting Gongsun, Big Brother, and Zhao Zhen as well..."
"You're worried... that if he can't cause trouble for us, he'll go cause trouble for our family and friends?" Bai Yutang thought for a moment and said, "Cat, if that's the case, you and that killer must have some intersection. Think about it carefully, who is suspicious?"
"...Speaking of suspicious..." Zhan Zhao seemed to have a sudden epiphany. "I think I might have thought of something."