Book Synopsis
Book Tags
Donation Rankings
Comment
0 Comments
You May Also Like
墨書 Inktalez
When Jiang He uttered those words, everyone turned to him, stunned by what he had just said.
"What does that mean?" a police officer asked. "If it's not a person driving, and it's not a ghost driving, does that mean a dog was driving?"
Jiang He replied seriously, "We need to find something to pry open the car door. I smell a strong odor, one that is typically associated with animals. We know that a truck full of pet dogs once drove down from the mountains to Jingping District."
"Moreover, given how cramped the driver's seat is, especially with it being so squished, I can't see the driver inside the cabin at all." As Jiang He searched for tools around him to pry open the door, he continued, "Putting everything together, although this sounds absurd, I'm certain that whoever is in the driver's seat is definitely not human."
Jiang He slowly searched the hillside for tools, picking up one piece of wood after another. After a moment, he finally found a suitable tool—a branch that had been broken off by a car.
He wedged the wood against the car door and used all his strength to try to pry open the dented door. However, Jiang He’s slender frame made it impossible for him to budge it; he quickly became exhausted. Yuan Jun glanced at the door and then at Jiang He before saying, "You step aside; I'll do it."
Jiang He turned to look at Yuan Jun and handed him the stick without hesitation.
Yuan Jun rubbed his hands together and blew on his palms before taking Jiang He's stick. He let out three loud shouts—"Hey! Hey! Hey!"—and with those three shouts, there was a loud crack as the door broke in half and fell to the ground. The door slid down the slope like a snowboard and landed deeper into the ravine with a thud.
"It's not too deep down there," Yuan Jun remarked as he looked up, seeing nothing but darkness.
While everyone was still distracted by the fallen door, Jiang He had already crawled into the driver's seat.
"Be careful!" warned one of the officers. "That tree isn't sturdy; we don't want this car rolling down further."
Unfazed by the warning and seemingly unaware of the danger, Jiang He squeezed into the deformed vehicle. In the back seat, he spotted a mangled black shape that was unrecognizable. Reaching out, he touched something furry and pulled hard. A black corpse was yanked out.
A foul stench immediately filled the air; Jiang He felt something sticky on his hands—he couldn't tell if it was blood or some other bodily fluid. Ignoring it, he continued to pull the body while climbing out.
“Damn!” said the nearby police officer. “This smell is overwhelming.”
As he spoke, several flashlights illuminated Jiang He’s hands, revealing that he was gripping a dog by its neck. His hands were covered in a sticky mixture of red and white substances that looked like blood and brain matter.
Jiang He found a relatively flat spot and placed the dog's corpse on the ground. He casually smeared some of the mixed liquid onto the ground and began to examine the dog closely.
It was a large dog, likely a German Shepherd. The dog was covered in black fur, with only its belly and legs showing a brownish-yellow color. Standing, it would have been about one and a half meters tall. Crouched in the driver's seat, combined with its dark color and the high speed of the vehicle, the police would never suspect that it was actually a dog driving; they naturally assumed it was a person dressed in black.
Xu Yiman had crouched down, using the flashlight's beam to inspect the dog's condition. This was her first time performing an autopsy on a dog. She gently turned over the body and noticed multiple fractures, each with varying directions of force and lengths of time.
“This dog experienced multiple impacts during the car's roll-over. The fractures show clear signs of life response, indicating that this dog was still alive inside the vehicle,” Xu Yiman said as she gently lifted the dog's head. She pointed to a dent on its skull. “This dent is a fatal injury; the cranium has caved in, damaging the brain.”
“It happened almost instantaneously,” Xu Yiman stood up. “So, this dog didn’t die without suffering…”
Jiang He remained crouched beside the dog, not looking at anyone else as he said, “A criminal consultant wouldn’t go through such elaborate measures to break through a checkpoint; he could easily disguise himself as anyone. On the contrary, a dog dealer would require extensive paperwork, which would complicate things for him. I suspect whatever he’s planning is definitely related to these dogs.”
With that, Jiang He stood up. “We need to return to Dragon City immediately and search for that batch of dogs that were brought in. Since his paperwork is complete, we should be able to trace his supply channels—and we need to do it quickly.”
Yuan Jun addressed the nearby police officer. “Even though our roles are different—you’re traffic police and we’re criminal police—the nature of our work is similar. Thank you for your hard work; we’ll take our leave now.”
“Alright, good luck,” replied the officer. “Hope you catch the bad guy soon.”
Jiang He and his team hurriedly climbed up the hillside. Old Shao spotted several flickering flashlight beams from afar and called out, “What’s going on down there? How are things down there?”
Jiang He shouted back, “It wasn’t a person at first; it was a dog.”
"Dog?" Old Shao clearly had not anticipated such a situation.
Jiang He climbed up, holding Guan Deng's hand, and said to Shao the Elder, "That's right, there was a dog in the car. I suspect that the Criminal Consultant controlled the white Hyundai in front using a computer. He tied a dog to the seatbelt and let it break through the checkpoint. Computer control has a range limit, so that car eventually lost control and crashed into the left mountain wall before falling off the cliff."
"Indeed, it was a classic diversion." Confirming his suspicion, Old Shao slowly said, "While everyone was searching for the car that fell down the mountain, he swaggered away. But that car full of pet dogs won't just disappear; dogs can't hide like people can."
"What we need to do now is figure out what exactly he intends to do with those dogs," Old Shao asked.
In the meantime, several people had already gotten into the car. Yuan Jun drove towards Dragon City while asking Old Shao, "So what are we supposed to do now?"
Old Shao looked at the dark night and replied, "It seems we won't be able to sleep tonight. First, we need to find out where those pet dogs came from and where they are now. Second, we need to know what the Criminal Consultant plans to do with these pet dogs."
"Guan Deng, check immediately for any recent news related to pet dogs," Shao the Elder instructed. "Limit the location to Dragon City and the timeframe to within a month. The online crowd doesn't have a great memory; since the Criminal Consultant used the internet for murder last time, it's likely he will do so again."
Guan Deng nodded.
"Look at this," Xu Yiman said as she took out her phone. "Wang Yedan's photos after being strangled have already spread online."
Old Shao sat in the passenger seat and turned to take Xu Yiman's phone to look at the photo. From what she saw, the background of the picture was a coffin, and inside it lay Wang Yedan dressed in a red wedding gown. A distinct purple strangulation mark was clearly visible on her neck.
"This image has been circulating online for quite some time," Xu Yiman remarked. "We just didn't have time to pay attention to it while we were in the village."
Old Shao shook her head. "I knew about this long ago; people from the Forensic Science Division have already been deleting it. We can remove photos posted on public platforms, but we don't know how many people have saved them or how many are circulating them secretly. We also can't predict how most people will react."
Xu Yiman took back her phone and scrolled through it while saying, "The online reactions to this incident are mixed. Most people see it as an obvious crime, but some believe Wang Yedan deserved her fate. The most extreme group even regards her as a messenger of justice."
"Justice Messenger?" Yuan Jun couldn't help but exclaim, "Killing an innocent girl, and they call themselves justice messengers?"
Xu Yiman replied, "I can't understand it either. To them, the rental consultants voted, and based on that vote, they justified the murder. Clearly, the majority agreed to kill Wang Yedan."
"However, the Criminal Consultant didn't kill based on the vote; he had planned the murder long before," Elder Shao said. "The so-called voting and justice are just a facade."
"Guan Deng, immediately release the fact that the Criminal Consultant did not kill according to the vote online," Elder Shao instructed. "Some people won't believe it, some will, but as long as one more person believes it, that's a good thing."
Everyone sighed.
Xu Yiman said, "When I used to watch the news, I always thought that anything that made it to television or newspapers was a fact. But later I realized that no matter what happens, you can't judge it right away because there will always be various twists. But who can know if those twists are true? Living in this age of information explosion, what is real and what is fake?"
Old Shao looked into the distance; the night was like water, enveloping all of Dragon City.
"We're doing just that," Elder Shao said. "Finding the truth and restoring it. Whether others accept this truth doesn't matter anymore. I've been entangled in this for a lifetime, but now I'm no longer troubled by it. What is true is false; what is false is true—these are all parts of this society and each of us."
Comment 0 Comment Count