Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
“That’s what I think,” Dou Zili said. “I’ve seen all of the murder scenes. I feel that the murderer must have committed these crimes overnight. Since he killed so many people in one night, it would be necessary for him to use some extraordinary means!”
Hearing this, Wu Xiumin said something secretly in Zeng Ke’s ear. After listening to her words, Zeng Ke nodded.
Although Zhao Yu didn’t hear what she was saying, he could guess that Wu Xiumin had the same question that he did. He was wondering…
Since the murderer wanted to kill these people, why didn’t he or she just poison them? Wouldn’t that save him the trouble of killing people one by one?
“To be honest,” Dou Zili said dejectedly, “I’ve never seen such a tragedy in all my years. It’s so weird!”
“Weird?” Zhao Yu did not quite understand what Dou Zili meant.
“Come on… I’ll show you the crime scenes one by one,” Dou Zili said, while pointing to the depths of the dock. “This case is really… A puzzle!”
While he was speaking, Dou Zili shivered and scratched his ears and cheeks, which seemed very unnatural. He was also still holding the box of cigarettes in his hand, which he almost crushed!
“Come on, have one!” Zhao Yu knew that Dou Zili wanted to smoke now. His withdrawal symptoms were clearly evident. As such, Zhao Yu figured that he must be a heavy smoker.
“Oh, thank you… I’m sorry… I’m sorry…” Dou Zili shakily lit a cigarette after getting his approval.
Zhao Yu noticed that the cigarette this captain had was a Red Plum, which wasn’t a very good quality cigarette. From this, Zhao Yu surmised that the standard income here must be very unsatisfactory.
No wonder his supervisor sent our Special Investigation Group to solve this case…
Allowing Dou Zili to enjoy his cigarette, Zhao Yu did not bother him anymore, but immediately took Wu Xiumin and Zeng Ke with him to the depths of the dock.
After finishing his cigarette, Dou Zili caught up with them and reported, “After receiving the call, the first to arrive at the scene were several policemen from the coastal police station. As soon as they got to the dock, they saw the two terrified survivors! At that time, the two were so frightened that they huddled together and kept repeating, ‘They’re all dead! They’re all dead…’ Then, the police saw the first corpse…”
After taking a few more steps, Dou Zili stopped and pointed to a place that had white lines on it and said, “This is where they found the first corpse! It was a man who was burnt to death. It’s terrible! Your forensics expert has taken the bodies away for examination! Although the body was badly burnt, the two survivors could still recognize that the person was one of their crew members, who was responsible for clothing and props, as well as transportation and so on.”
“Burnt?” Zhao Yu repeated the word as he signaled to Zeng Ke, who quickly turned on the mobile phone flashlight so he could take a picture of the crime scene. On the ground, they could still see some traces of the fire’s remnants.
“Wow…” Zeng Ke said in surprise. “Leader, look at the burn traces. The charred lines drag out for such a length! This clearly shows that the victim struggled for quite some time when he was on fire, right?”
“Yes!” Zhao Yu said. “When you are on fire, the first thing you would think of is to look for water! This man must have wanted to get to the beach, but because the fire was too big, he was burnt to death before he could get there!”
Dou Zili nodded, then asked, “Do you think that this man was set on fire somewhere else, then ran here all by himself? But… If he had been drugged with a sleeping pill, the man wouldn’t have been able to run away, right?”
None of the other three responded to his somewhat contradictory questions, which explained two very different scenarios. This was because they were similarly perplexed and were all lost in their own thoughts.
“Hmm…” Seeing that nobody responded, Dou Zili said, “Sir, this is just the beginning. Come with me!” As he spoke, he motioned for the group to follow him.
As Yongjin Island was an uninhabited desert island, its dock was small. It was basically built with natural building materials long ago. Today, it was old, damaged, and in a sad state.
At the moment, Zhao Yu unexpectedly felt a little hot. Although it was winter, because Yongjin Island was situated near the South China Sea, it was not cold at all.
As Zhao Yu came from the North, he hadn’t properly considered his attire. As such, his usual cotton coat was too heavy for this climate, and he was sweating profusely.
When they arrived at the island’s wet and bumpy dock, they saw more police officers there. The most noticeable thing that caught their eyes were several tents just a few dozen meters away from their right hand side.
Needless to say, those tents must have been the temporary base for the filming crew. As they had to shoot on the island for more than half a month, they naturally needed some makeshift accommodations.
Dou Zhili sniffed at his cigarettes fiercely, while he took Zhao Yu and the others to the tents.
“The second victim’s throat was cut by the murderer!” Dou Zili pointed to one side of the tent and said. “When the policemen rushed to the tent, they saw blood at the door of the tent. Then, when they went inside, they saw the body!”
As the group came to the tent door, because there was still obvious bloodstains on the ground outside of the tent, Zhao Yu and the others did not enter the tent, but only took a look inside via the illumination of the cell flashlight.
“The victim has been identified!” Dou Zili said. “Yes… It’s an actor. His name is… Um… Um…”
He scratched his head, but clearly couldn’t remember. He then rushed over to the policeman next to him and asked for help.
“Isn’t it Xie Hao?” Zeng Ke suddenly asked.
“Right, right…” Dou Zili nodded and looked at Zeng Ke in surprise. “You’re really excellent. How’d you know that?”
Zeng Ke looked at Zhao Yu and said, “Xie Hao is the most famous one in this group. He has had many little roles in numerous mainstream TV dramas! The recruiting of investors and sponsorship for this play was basically all thanks to him!”
Zhao Yu turned his head and looked carefully at the scene in the tent. The bloodstains were indeed a tragic sight.
Zhao Yu also noticed that there were bloodstains on the suitcases and sleeping bags in the tent. There were also clear signs that someone had been rummaging through everything.
“Captain Dou, has anybody touched anything here?” Zhao Yu asked quickly.
“No!” Dou Zili spoke nervously, “Although we don’t come across many murders in our daily work, we still understand the basic principles! As such, no one would dare move anything!”
He then added, “When the two policemen saw the dead person in the tent, they were all frightened! They didn’t have guns, and they were afraid that the murderer was still hiding nearby. So, instead of looking around inside, they went back to the dock and waited for support to arrive!”
After he revealed that, Dou Zili perhaps felt that his words were not quite appropriate, so he hastily added, “You must not be surprised by this, as Quliang is a small place. There are hardly any murders here!”
He shrugged as he attempted to explain, “Anyone else here who saw such a situation would be frightened too! To tell you the truth, even when the criminal policemen came to help investigate, they were all terrified of them, too!”
In just a few minutes, Dou Zili had already finished nervously smoking two cigarettes. He then said anxiously, “I’m still confused. How could something like this happen here?”
