Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Since Jiang Yuecheng explained the situation very clearly, Yang Shaoqun could not possibly reject the collaboration with his team any further.
In fact, it sounded rather serious.
Yang Shaoqun made a phone call during the journey and asked his subordinates to wait at the restaurant directly.
They chose to have lunch at a small restaurant that served home-cooked meals just beside the police station. As they would usually order food deliveries from this restaurant whenever they were busy, they became familiar with the restaurant’s staff members over time.
Zhang Shanfei and the rest were already waiting in the private dining room when Jiang Yuecheng and his team arrived. The private dining room was decently sized that could only fit ten people at most, so it was the perfect size for them to dine in.
Yang Shaoqun made an introduction between these two teams but mainly introduced Jiang Yuecheng and Zhao Yiyang to the team as they had already familiarized themselves with both Qi Youxuan and Wei Muran.
Feng Songwei was on the scene as well, yet she seemed calm and showed no sign of awkwardness as though the incident at the airport had never happened before. Wei Muran was actually quite impressed with Feng Songwei’s psychological endurance.
All of them then sat down around the table. After placing the orders, they started chatting for a while before the discussion of the main topic.
Jiang Yuecheng explained the situation from the very beginning while Zhao Yiyang passed the novel for them to have a look.
“I know it sounds ridiculous, but there are too many coincidences and we’re forced to believe it too. When Dong Zhengfeng—the murderer on our first case—committed suicide in the psychiatric hospital, we knew something was definitely wrong. The psychiatric hospital has stern management and takes care of the patients well, so they wouldn’t allow Dong Zhengfeng to move freely if his mental condition wasn’t under control. Dong Zhengfeng was diagnosed with dissociative identity disorder, so he stayed alone in the sick room with all of his limbs restrained when he was initially transferred to the hospital.”
“After that, his mental condition improved and the second personality didn’t resurface again. Only then did the doctors allow him to leave the sickroom periodically but on close monitoring. Besides, the psychiatric hospital is a special place where you won’t be able to find anything that may injure the patients or inflict self-harm, and yet Dong Zhengfeng was dead. The hospital management couldn’t even explain his death.”
“Doubt persisted in our minds but we were out of ideas, until yesterday when Muran took this novel for us to read. First of all, the first case was the exact same as how the novel described it—how the victim died and the murderer’s final moment—except that the motive was different. Besides, the murderer in the novel mentioned the existence of a psychologist as well. When we were dealing with the first case initially, we had no idea about this novel and thus failed to make further connections or even relate this case to the psychologist,” said Jiang Yuecheng.
Yang Shaoqun nodded, unsure if he was merely assuring Jiang Yuecheng. “This is normal. We won’t be able to make such relations too if we’re in your position. Besides, Dong Zhengfeng was diagnosed with a mental disease, so it’s reasonable for him to consult a psychologist.”
“We’ve finally related the case with the novel yesterday, so we rushed to the prison immediately to look for the second murderer, but he was dead the day before yesterday. Argument with inmates and died accidentally; just as the novel described. Now, about the third case, we can’t get any hint about the motive for murder from the novel but coincidentally, the first victim was found dead at the bottom of a spa in a resort.”
“Meanwhile, the second victim—” Jiang Yuecheng continued the explanation.
“—Died the exact same way as how the novel described,” Yang Shaoqun finished the sentence.
Yang Shaoqun scanned through the table of contents, eager to find the third case and searched for the second victim’s death description in haste. The blood was drained from his face after reading through the contents in the novel.
“That’s unbelievable,” said the overwhelmed Yang Shaoqun after lifting his head.
Wei Muran and the team relaxed immediately after Yang Shaoqun believed in their story.
“That was the reason why we requested to come here and asked for your assistance. We hope that we can locate the mastermind through this case,” said Jiang Yuecheng.
“No problem! Don’t regard yourselves as outsiders. Our very existence is to punish every evil force, right? There’s no discrimination here and everything will be fine as long as we can catch the bad guy!” announced Yang Shaoqun enthusiastically.
Doubt rose in Qi Youxuan’s mind again. How did Yang Shaoqun give his blood, sweat and tears to become a sergeant with his innocent but enthusiastic personality?
The sergeant and corporal in Wei Muran’s team—Jiang Yuecheng and Zhang Ming—were reputed individuals with strong family backgrounds!
The atmosphere in the private dining room became relaxed and peaceful instantly after the situation was explained clearly. Yang Shaoqun and his team were friendly and natural socializers, so they were able to chat happily with Zhao Yiyang after a while.
Jiang Yuecheng was an exception as he was a sergeant and they dared not to be too friendly with him.
Meanwhile, Qi Youxuan, who had eyes only for Wei Muran at all times, was busy transferring food into her bowl.
Although B City was more developed with fresh seafood airlifted on the same day, T City still had the freshest seafood of various choices as it was situated along the coast.
Thus, this lunch mainly consisted of seafood which was fine by Wei Muran. Instead of swallowing those delicious dishes, Qi Youxuan was removing the shells of prawns, crabs, mantis shrimps, and even sea snails without letting Wei Muran do all the dirty work. However, the bachelors in the room were getting jealous of their public display of affection.
The marinated sauce was placed beside the sea snail’s serving dish on the lazy Susan1, and it was inappropriate to constantly rotate the sauce to Wei Muran’s front. Thus, Qi Youxuan asked the waiter to provide ramekins of marinated sauce for everyone but mainly for Wei Muran so that there was no need for her to reach out for the sauce on the lazy Susan every single time.
“I almost forgot that Mr. Qi treats Muran very well after a few days of not meeting each other,” Feng Songwei piped in all of a sudden after being a quiet invisible woman for quite some time.
Feng Songwei’s words felt like criticism.
Yang Shaoqun and his team tried to keep a distance from Feng Songwei after the incident at the airport last time. Even though they were not trying to discriminate against her, at least they would refrain from joking with her or even introducing men for initiation of romantic relationships.
They were genuinely sincere when they attempted to introduce men for Feng Songwei initially, but after realizing her true character, they would be scourging the men if they continued being matchmakers.
Thus, none of them raised this issue afterward.
Feng Songwei could feel some differences even though there was no discrimination during work.
Nonetheless, Feng Songwei remained unconcerned about it since she was not the least bothered about others’ opinions. There was nothing wrong about her finding the love of her life.
Moreover, Qi Youxuan and Wei Muran were not even married, and she had the right to choose her future spouse. Since Qi Youxuan had a crush on Wei Muran, perhaps he could develop fondness toward her too.
Besides, it was normal to find one’s true love only after going through twists and turns in life, and that included being in a relationship or even after marriage.
What if Feng Songwei was Qi Youxuan’s true love and he missed his opportunity? That was the reason why she put effort into this matter.
Qi Youxuan had no idea about Feng Songwei’s theory of true love, but it did not stop him from expressing his annoyance toward her.
He merely replied coldly, “I still have room for improvement.”
Words failed to come out of Feng Songwei’s mouth. Yang Shaoqun was worried about her bringing down the team’s good image and interrupted quickly, “Your public display of affection is mental torture to all the bachelors in this room.”
Zhao Yiyang had no clue regarding Feng Songwei’s issue and her words did not sound inappropriate just now, so he replied, “Hey, let me tell you something. All of us are single and yet this pair of couples always irritate us in the office. It’s fine when there’s no case because Youxuan will return to his company and Muran will stay alone in the department. We can still be friends that way, but when there’s a case, Youxuan will surely come and torture the bare branches. It’s so annoying!”
“Eh? Sergeant Jiang is single too?” asked Feng Songwei as she stared at Jiang Yuecheng with slight interest.
Qi Youxuan had a girlfriend. On the other hand, Jiang Yuecheng was a good candidate as well, since he was a sergeant at such a young age and had a bright future ahead of him.
Qi Youxuan and Wei Muran stared at each other, speechless. Feng Songwei was basically boy-crazy!
Yang Shaoqun and his team were ashamed but Feng Songwei remained unconcerned about it and smiled politely. “I thought Sergeant Jiang should be engaged at this age, that’s really unexpected. Besides, you’re the ideal type for most women and there’ll be lots of women trying to court you, and yet you’re still single.”
Even Zhao Yiyang figured that Feng Songwei gave too many comments on this issue. Judging by the awkward looks on Yang Shaoqun and his team’s faces, Feng Songwei seemed to be lacking in popularity in the team.
It was understandable that Qi Youxuan showed no respect toward Feng Songwei since he had a girlfriend. However, Feng Songwei did not expect Jiang Yuecheng to speak harshly toward her, despite being single and was collaborating with Yang Shaoqun’s team.
Jiang Yuecheng replied coldly, “Any woman who tries to court me won’t give me a good impression.”
“…” The corners of Feng Songwei’s lips twitched uncontrollably and she failed to muster a response since then.
After that, Yang Shaoqun and his team devoided Feng Songwei of any chance to speak in order to prevent further embarrassment.
They would interrupt Feng Songwei whenever she had any attempt to speak.
The crowd finished their lunch in a hurry and returned to the police department without wasting any time since they had a case to solve.
Yang Shaoqun instructed Zou Chengwei to distribute detailed information about the case to Qi Youxuan and his team before saying, “According to Mr. Qi’s reminder yesterday, we’ve investigated the victim, Cao Keya’s personal life. We found out that she had an affair with Wang Jianlei, a director in the internal medicine department.”
