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墨書 Inktalez
In an instant, everyone crowded at the door. I pulled out my Police Badge to show the Waitress and asked her to find the person in charge of the establishment. Meanwhile, Zhao Mingkun and I began a preliminary investigation and Autopsy of the Three Corpses.
We lifted the towels wrapped around the Three Corpses and saw that each of them was at least wearing a pair of underpants. This reassured us enough to remove the towels completely. Zhao Mingkun and I carefully examined the Three Corpses, but no matter how we looked, we couldn't find any fatal wounds on the bodies. In fact, there were no visible wounds at all.
This made it clear that these three individuals did not die from mechanical injuries.
Mechanical injury refers to damage caused by external forces that disrupt the structure of organs or tissues. Typical examples include blunt force trauma, contusions, fractures, and sharp force injuries, which can include Suicide or Homicide.
Non-mechanical injuries typically involve poisoning, chemical injuries, radiation damage, etc.
In essence, this is similar to physical attacks versus magical attacks in games. The likelihood of mechanical death for these three was quite low. I pried open Zhang Yi's mouth to observe his condition. Upon closer inspection, I noticed that Zhang Yi's tongue had a bluish-purple hue with white spots on it. His lips were bright red.
Previously, when I examined Cheng Lu's corpse, his face also had a slight reddish tint. I leaned closer to Zhang Yi's lips and gently sniffed. A faint scent of Bitter Almonds wafted up; if I hadn't bent down to smell carefully, I wouldn't have detected such a subtle aroma.
I looked up and saw three cups on the bedside tables next to the beds. Cheng Lu's cup was empty, while Zhang Yi's and Sun Shouwang's cups still had about half a cup of water left. This indicated that all three had consumed water. I reached for the cup on Zhang Yi's bedside table and brought it close to my nose; it indeed carried a faint scent of Bitter Almonds.
This confirmed that these three individuals had actually died from poisoning.
At that moment, a middle-aged woman in her forties stepped out from the crowd. She walked in with a furrowed brow and asked, "What happened? What's going on?"
The Waitress timidly stood before her and said, "This is our Boss."
I nodded and replied, "There are dead people."
As she spoke, she noticed the three bodies lying on the beds and gasped, "How did they die? What on earth happened here?"
I turned to the Boss Lady and asked, "Who brought in these three cups of water? There’s poison in this water! If the dosage is sufficient, it could kill someone within a minute!"
As I spoke, Boss Lady looked at the Waitress and asked sternly, "Did you bring this water in?"
Under Boss Lady's intense questioning, tears welled up in the Waitress's eyes as she replied, "After a few guests came in, they asked me to heat a pot of water. I just did what they told me. They said they wanted to soak in the tub first and instructed me to place the water directly on the table after heating it."
"It had been over ten minutes," the girl said with a sob in her voice. "I knocked on the door, but they didn't answer, so I just came in. At that time, they were probably still soaking in the bath. I put the hot water on the table and took the door out with me. I could still hear them discussing something inside, but it was all a buzz, and I couldn't make out what they were saying! I didn't poison anyone!"
I nodded. "Yes, I know you didn't kill them."
I pointed to a double sliding door in the room. "Is the bath behind that door?"
The Boss Lady nodded. "Yes, they requested a four-person room. Our place is different from others; we have pools in the rooms. You'll see when you take a look."
With that, the Boss Lady walked over to the sliding door and pulled one of them open. We then saw that behind the door was a large pool. Steam was rising from it, indicating that the water temperature was still quite high. I stepped inside and noticed several sets of clothes hanging on a rack beside the room.
The space inside was quite large. On the wall directly opposite the door, there was a big color television, suggesting that entertainment options were plentiful.
I turned to the Boss Lady and said, "Check the surveillance footage; who else has been here?"
The Boss Lady's expression changed as she frowned. "We don't have any surveillance cameras in our shop."
"What?" I could hardly believe my ears. A place this big had no cameras at all.
At that moment, Wang Yikai rushed over and leaned close to my ear. "Officer, what kind of business does this place actually do? I mentioned it before. It's precisely because there are no cameras that we get so many customers. This way, whatever you do here goes unnoticed, and even if someone comes looking for their partner, there's no record of them being here."
After hearing Wang Yikai's explanation, I understood. Without evidence, whether it was police raiding for illegal activities or a spouse searching for their partner, it would be easy to slip away unnoticed. However, without cameras, things could easily go missing or unwanted individuals could wander in. For the business owner, this certainly had its pros and cons.
We had no idea who else had visited this establishment or who had mixed poison into the water.
After bathing, due to dehydration, people naturally feel thirsty. Perhaps the murderer had taken advantage of this fact by poisoning the water jug. The three individuals likely never imagined that after just a bath, the water in that jug could turn into lethal poison within minutes. They didn't think twice before drinking from the poisoned cup.
"Can the door be locked from the inside?" I asked again.
"It can!" The woman replied. "Of course it can."
The waitress chimed in, "Since they wanted me to come in with water, the door was just closed but not locked."
I nodded.
From this perspective, the Murderer must have known in advance that these people were coming here. Otherwise, how could the Murderer have thought to use such a method? If one of the three had not drunk water and noticed something was wrong with the others, they might have been able to save each other. But after soaking in the bath, all three would naturally feel parched and drink water.
If we hadn't contacted Wang Yikai and delayed his arrival here, he might have ended up like the Three Corpses, becoming the fourth body lying here.
The Murderer's method of killing is quite simple; even a child could do it. All it takes is to walk in and sprinkle deadly poison into the kettle, and then just wait for them to bring about their own demise. Chloride can be concocted by someone knowledgeable in chemistry.
However, while it sounds easy, upon closer inspection, if there hadn't been careful observation, how could the Murderer possibly know that there were no surveillance cameras here? How could they know that using this method would guarantee their deaths?
I looked at Wang Yikai and asked, "Do you still keep in touch with them often?"
Wang Yikai nodded and said, "We were roommates in college, and after graduation, we all stayed in Dongxing City, so we've kept in touch and often get together when we can."
At this point, Wang Yikai appeared quite emotional: "We've been friends for over ten years. Who would have thought that just like that, three of them would be gone? How am I supposed to face their families now?"
But then Wang Yikai's expression changed as he said, "If you hadn't called me, I would probably be dead right now."
It seemed Wang Yikai had come to understand the situation.
"Do you often come here?" I asked again.
At this moment, it was the Waitress who spoke up. She said, "I've worked here for over a year and have seen them a few times before. However, those three come more often; I don't see this gentleman as frequently."
Wang Yikai waved his hand dismissively. "I don't come here much. Every time I do come, I... I don't engage in those activities."
I understood what Wang Yikai was referring to.
Although three people had died, a clear feeling began to grow within me. This time, the three hadn't seen anything strange or been scared to death. They hadn't gouged out their eyes either. Analyzing this point suggests that the Murderer is indeed human and not a ghost.
Could it be that now it's daytime? The Flying Head Man can't come out to scare people, but the Murderer still wants to kill, so they resorted to conventional means?
The main question now is, what method did the Murderer use in the previous cases?
At that moment, Zhao Mingkun tugged at me and said, "Don't linger too long. We've almost finished our investigation, you know?"
Zhao Mingkun was right; it was just unexpected that the Murderer was one step ahead of us again. We needed to investigate each person individually, but the Murderer didn’t seem to consider this at all. These three individuals were actually the least suspicious; they had merely echoed a few words from Wang Yikai and ended up in this situation.
Did the Murderer not have even a little time for investigation? If there was time to stalk others, couldn’t they spend a bit more time figuring out the truth? If the Murderer had been seeking revenge for Lu Zhiqiu for seven years, why were they so indifferent to the truth of that year? Didn’t they want to understand who really killed Lu Zhiqiu?
As Zhao Mingkun and I walked outside, I said, "The police will be here shortly to take the body for investigation. Remember not to touch anything in the room, especially the water in that pot; it's highly toxic. Wang Yikai, come with us."
Wang Yikai nodded vigorously and said, "Yes, yes!"
He drove us to his home. In the car, Wang Yikai seemed a bit shaky and appeared very frightened.
"How many people have died?" Wang Yikai finally turned to look at us.
I counted in my mind and realized that six people had already died. In just two days, nearly half of the thirteen people were gone.
The Murderer seemed like a perpetual motion machine, never stopping their killing spree. At this rate, it would only take five more days for all thirteen people to be killed by the Murderer. The problem was that we couldn’t find any clues about the Murderer at all; we didn’t even understand how they committed the murders.
There was still so much left for us to investigate.
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