Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
About Xiao Zhen, Zhao Yu had double suspicions. Was he the murderer, or an accomplice?! Although, when he was investigating at Feng Kuo’s house that day, he didn’t manage to see Xiao Zhen, but he had still redirected his focus onto the person!
Xiao Zhen was Feng Kuo’s non-blood-tied brother, younger than Feng Kuo by two years. Not only was Feng Kuo good looking, his wood carvings talents obtained his father’s appreciation.
Then… Having such a brother, would Xiao Zhen be jealous, and take the measure of murder to frame Feng Kuo?
Try to imagine, the stepmother was a beautiful actress. Look at the beautiful stepmother, who had brought in a non-blood-tied brother and barged into his house. Could Xiao Zhen accept it completely?
If he were to frame Feng Kuo for murder, would it help for him to protect his position in the family that was in imminent danger? Think about it carefully, who could have easily hid the weapon in Feng Kuo’s bedroom? Could Xiao Zhen, who was “family”, easily have done it?
The most important point was, when Liu Jiao died, and left the two drops of blood strokes, would it be that she was writing the word “Xiao”? Don’t forget that it could be the grass radical for the word “Xiao”, as it was required before the vertical stroke. If one were to write it casually, wouldn’t it turn into two drops?
Could it be…The one who killed Liu Jiao and framed Feng Kuo for the murder, was really Xiao Zhen?
Zhao Yu looked at Xiao Zhen’s name for a very long time. He started to ponder about the possibility of this speculation. But, combined with the information back then, Zhao Yu quickly pushed over the few speculations.
Firstly, according to Xiao Guofeng’s confession, Feng Kuo and Xiao Zhen were quite close. Back then, when the family reformed, Feng Kuo was thirteen and Xiao Zhen was eleven. The two of them weren’t kids anymore. Plus, the ages were close, and they became playmates, and were living in harmony.
It was said that, Xiao Zhen willingly gave the room on the second floor to Feng Kuo, and Feng Kuo had always helped Xiao Zhen with his homework. Besides, two two of them had similar hobbies, as they both especially liked wood carving. In fact, they would go together to their family wood factory, to make some carvings.
Although Xiao Zhen wasn’t as talented as Feng Kuo, he still had potential, too. In the end, after Xiao Zhen graduated from high school, he stayed back to help in his father’s wood factory, and he was then a famous figure in the wood carvings field in his own rite!
Besides, not only was Xiao Zhen close to Feng Kuo, he was close to his stepmother Feng Lin, too. Thus, they never had any conflict. Hence, from the point of motive, Xiao Zhen didn’t seem to have any reason to kill Liu Jiao and frame Feng Kuo.
And, the most important point, was that Xiao Zhen had a solid alibi. On the day Liu Jiao got into her accident, Xiao Zhen and his father, Xiao Guofeng, were sending goods to Lingyun city, and they only returned home at about eleven, nearer to midnight.
Besides that, according to Xiao Zhen’s confession in the record, Xiao Zhen had never seen Liu Jiao in person. He didn’t know even Liu Jiao at all. At the scene were Liu Jiao was stabbed, there were obvious traces to point to the fact that the one who committed the crime was someone that she was familiar with!
Furthermore, even if Xiao Zhen really had conflict with Feng Kuo, why didn’t he just direct it at Feng Kuo, instead of killing Liu Jiao? It just didn’t add up. So, from those few points, Xiao Zhen’s possibility to be a murderer seemed quite slim.
Then… If Xiao Zhen most likely wasn’t the murderer, could he be an accomplice?
Then, Zhao Yu suddenly recalled what Xiao Guofeng had said. Even if someone was close to Feng Kuo, it wouldn’t be close, to the point where he would help Feng Kuo breakout from prison, right?
That reminded Zhao Yu of something else! Who would take the risk of being put behind bars themselves, in order to help Feng Kuo breakout from prison? According to Zhao Yu’s understanding, there were only two kinds of people: One was sworn brothers, that were really close, and the other one was blood brothers!
From Feng Kuo’s temperament, and his situation, he wouldn’t have many life-and-death friends. So, the ones who would help him to breakout from prison, would probably be his blood brothers!
Then, he looked at Xiao Zhen. Although they were not real blood brothers, the two of them had been brothers for so many years, that their relationship wouldn’t be weak.
So…. Would Feng Kuo’s accomplice be Xiao Zhen?
If he got it right, wouldn’t it mean, that Xiao Zhen was the kidnapper of Lan Shuping’s daughter? And, that he knew where the hostage was being held captive?
Then, Zhao Yu quickly looked into Feng Kuo’s prison visitor name list. As expected, there were many records of Xiao Zhen’s visitation.
Tsk tsk…
Looking at the name list, Zhao Yu felt that his speculation made sense. Looked like… Next, he had to pay close attention to Xiao Zhen. Just when Zhao Yu wanted to check on Xiao Zhen, Xiao Liu, from team B, suddenly walked in the door.
“Team Lead Zhao, Team Lead Zhao!” Xiao Liu immediately walked towards Zhao Yu, holding a hand phone. He said, “Team Lead Mao wants me to show you this!”
“What is this?” Zhao Yu asked.
“We have retrieved this photo from that parent that was taking a selfie in front of the arts school in the video!” Xiao Liu said, “That parent said that yesterday was the first day his son entered the arts school, and that’s why she took a selfie, as a memory. She even took a video! But… After checking, we couldn’t see Lan Shuping’s daughter from there. It seems that the timing was not right, and we might have missed it!”
“Okay!” Zhao Yu took over the phone and said, “Let us take a look, then! Pass me the phone!”
“Okay!” Xiao Liu passed the phone to Zhao Yu, and turned around to leave.
Zhao Yu turned around to pass Li Beini the phone, who then connected it to the projector, and let everyone watch from the huge monitor. As said by Xiao Liu, although the pixel on the parent’s phone was quite high, it was a pity that the timing was not right, as there wasn’t any traces of Lan Shuping’s daughter in the photo.
According to what Lan Shuping said, his daughter was wearing a white top and a red skirt, and was carrying her drawing board on her back. But, everyone looked at every corner of the photo, yet they couldn’t find any target that fulfilled these characteristics.
Then, there was a female parent that made a video to send to her friends. In the video, not only did she capture the entrance of the school, but she even turned one around in front of the entrance. But, there still weren’t any traces of the little girl.
So, it seemed that the timing wasn’t right! Maybe, when the female parent was taking the photo, either the kidnapper had yet to take action, or the kidnapping had already taken place!
“Mm, hold on…” Li Beini suddenly recalled something. She quickly typed on the keyboard. After a while, she looked up, and told Zhao Yu and the troop, “I compared the video, where the hostage entered the blind spot. According to the walking speed of the hostage… Hey? That doesn’t make sense…”
“Why?” Zhao Yu asked.
“This woman took three minutes to take photos. On the second minute, she was taking the photo, and the hostage had already entered the blind spot!” Li Beini said solemnly. “In other words, according to the estimation of time, the hostage wouldn’t appear in the photos! But, she didn’t, so where did she go then?”
“Is it?” Zhao Yu’s eyebrows were tightly knit. He clicked on the play button again, and replayed the photo on the screen. The other police detectives also opened their eyes wide, to look carefully!
But, after looking for some time, there wasn’t any return. Li Beini calculated on paper with pen, and told Zhao Yu, “Team Lead, I’ve calculated. According to normal speed, the time, where the girl should appear on the photo, should be when the female parent was taking the video!”
“Oh?” Zhao Yu quickly played the video. In order for everyone to look, he put the playing speed at its slowest. It was almost like a photo by photo…
The time past, everyone was looking at the video carefully, and they didn’t even dare blink. In the end, when the video was at the fifteenth second, Zhao Yu finally discovered something, and he quickly clicked the pause button to stop the video on a scene.
Then, he took huge strides before the projector, and pointed at the right top corner, saying, “This… This thing… I think I have seen it somewhere before!”
Everyone heard this, and stood up excitedly. They looked towards the direction where Zhao Yu was pointing. Zhao Yu was pointing at a woman, who was tall, and had her back facing the camera.
“Bro, that is a woman. Why did you say anything?” Li Beini asked in confusion.
“Not the human! That thing!” Zhao Yu pointed at the monitor, and said, “Look, the scarf the woman was wearing, I… I am certain I have seen that scarf before! And… And it is very recent….”
“What? The scarf?”
Everyone looked again, and, on the neck of the woman, was really a scarf.
“Zoom in! Zoom in, bigger!” Li Beini quickly got to the front to tap on the zoom in button, and zoomed towards the scarf!
“What is this?” Zhang Jingfeng was closer to the monitor, so he was the first to see, and exclaimed, “The drawing on the scarf, was a sunflower, right?”
“What?! Sunflower?!” Zhao Yu was shocked, his fingers were shivering, as he said, “I… I remember! I remember… Where I have seen it!”
“From where, bro?” Li Beini asked again.
“Lan… In Lan Shuping house!” Zhao Yu creased his eyebrows and reminisced, “That’s right, it’s in his house!”
