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墨書 Inktalez
I closed my eyes and tugged at my hair. Why did Liang Mei have to disappear at this moment? Over the past seven years, although these thirteen people had each carried their own burdens, nothing significant had happened. Yet, in just one short week, so many had died. What was the trigger?
Even if someone wanted to take revenge for Lu Zhiqiu, why wait seven years? We had previously speculated that the murderer was Lu Xiangyang because of his age; seven years later, he was just about to become an adult and would have developed his own discernment. But if the murderer wasn’t Lu Xiangyang, why wait seven years?
I suddenly realized there were still many questions. We were clearly standing before the truth, yet we couldn’t see through it. This feeling was incredibly frustrating.
It seemed that unless we found Liang Mei, we wouldn’t be able to understand anything.
“The urgent matter is to find Liang Mei; she is the key to this case,” I said.
“But where should we look for Liang Mei?” Zhao Mingkun shrugged.
I fell silent. Where exactly should we search for Liang Mei? She had left everything behind without a trace. Something must have compelled her to leave so urgently.
At this point, we truly had no leads. All we could do was wait.
Around noon, after a simple bowl of noodles, Zhao Mingkun and I sat at home, unsure of what to do next. Just when we thought the day would end like this, an unexpected phone call came in.
Zhao Mingkun raised his phone and slowly said, “Look at this number.”
I glanced over; it was an unlisted number.
I scratched my head and asked, “What’s wrong with this number? Is there something off about it? But it’s strange—who would call you? One of those three women?”
In my memory, Zhao Mingkun’s phone had never rung; she always called others, but no one ever called her. Yet now, someone was actually calling Zhao Mingkun, which took me by surprise.
“Liang Mei,” Zhao Mingkun said slowly.
“What?” I could hardly believe my ears. “Liang Mei?”
Zhao Mingkun nodded seriously. “I tried calling this number several times before, but no one answered. Now, Liang Mei has called back.”
“Put it on speaker,” I said.
Zhao Mingkun activated the speakerphone, and a woman's voice came through: "Is this Officer Zhao?"
Zhao Mingkun glanced at me before responding, "Yes, that's me. Are you Liang Mei?"
"That's me!" The voice on the other end sounded anxious. "I have an important lead to tell you about the murderer from seven years ago."
"What is it?" Zhao Mingkun asked.
I leaned in closer, intrigued. Liang Mei didn’t waste any time getting straight to the point.
"The murderer from seven years ago is..." Liang Mei began.
Neither Zhao Mingkun nor I expected Liang Mei to call us at this moment, nor did we anticipate that she would reveal the truth about the murderer from seven years ago right away. Just as she was about to continue, we suddenly heard a gasp from her side: "Ah!"
The sound was abrupt, catching both Zhao Mingkun and me off guard. Zhao Mingkun's hand trembled, nearly dropping his phone. At that moment, Liang Mei's voice rose higher, filled with a heart-wrenching scream that was laced with pain.
"What happened?" I shouted. "Liang Mei, what's wrong?"
"It's you!"
That was Liang Mei's last words. After that, there was a long silence, broken only by the faint rustling sounds on the line.
Yet the call hadn’t been disconnected; it continued.
Zhao Mingkun and I held our breath, trying to discern any sounds from the receiver, but it was eerily quiet on the other end.
Suddenly, Zhao Mingkun tapped the phone's receiver, signaling me to listen closely for any noise. I closed my eyes; at that moment, my eyes were of no use. Indeed, as soon as I shut them, I heard a sound coming through.
It was a faint sound of someone breathing softly, rising and falling in the receiver.
It seemed someone had picked up the phone and was listening intently just like us.
In just a moment, Liang Mei fell silent. What happened to her? Did she faint, or was she killed by the Murderer? And who exactly is the Murderer? What did Liang Mei mean with the call she made to us? Could it be that she wasn’t the one in danger after all? But why did she have that photo?
Neither side spoke, as if we were performing a silent play. It was too quiet on the other end. Here, we could still hear the occasional honk of cars, but there was nothing from their side. Where could they be? And could the person across from us be the vengeful Murderer?
It felt like an eternity had passed when I heard a beep from the receiver—the call was disconnected.
At that moment, Zhao Mingkun and I finally dared to exhale loudly. We exchanged glances, both unsure of what had just transpired. Everything felt like a dream; it came too quickly and left just as fast. After a long while, I finally processed what had happened.
If my guess was correct, Liang Mei must have been attacked at that moment. She must have known something important, which is why she urgently called us. But during the call, she was likely killed by the returning Murderer. It happened almost instantaneously; she didn’t even have time to utter the Murderer’s name before her demise.
In her last moments, Liang Mei’s tone was filled with surprise; her single utterance of “you” carried so much emotion.
From her tone, we understood that Liang Mei must have recognized this Murderer, which is why she exclaimed “you” in shock. If she knew this person, it was highly likely that they were one of her classmates. At that time, there were twenty people interning at the construction site.
Wait! There were twenty people in total.
Among them, fourteen lived in Dongxing City, but some had left afterward. I had previously focused solely on these thirteen individuals; now that I think about it, that was rather presumptive. Why must the Murderer be one of these thirteen? Why couldn’t it be one of the remaining seven?
Even if those seven had left Dongxing City, they could very well have murdered Lu Zhiqiu before departing. If that were the case, there would still be seven potential Murderers among them. The person returning for revenge might even kill those seven as well.
This would explain why the Murderer took seven years to plan. The Murderer didn’t kill impulsively; they likely didn’t know where those seven who left had gone. To track them down and eliminate them would require a process of gathering information. After dealing with those outside, they would then target the thirteen remaining in Dongxing City—that would be the entirety of the Murderer's plan.
“Call their instructor!” I said to Zhao Mingkun. “No matter how you do it, we need to find contact numbers for the other seven people. This vengeful Murderer could very well be one of them.”
“Understood!” Zhao Mingkun nodded.
Time flew by until afternoon, yet we found ourselves with no leads. Although we knew Liang Mei was in grave danger now, we had no idea where she had gone or what information she had received. This made it difficult for us to take action.
At that moment, Gu Chen called again.
“Gu Chen?” I asked. “Did you find any news about that person I asked you to investigate?”
"No!" Gu Chen said: "That's not the case. A Manager Wang who claims to be Liang Mei's boss sent me QQ. He has a clue and wants to find you! The phone number is..." Manager Wang , what clues does he have? I called Manager Wang and heard Manager Wang say: "Officer Wu, someone told me that Liang Mei's standby computer turned on by itself, so I went over to look and saw Liang Mei sent herself an email. ""Liang Mei sent herself an email?" I said, "What's going on? You put the content of the email on the QQ I told you. Look." "Okay!" Manager Wang said. Due to my current special status, if I log in to my QQ, my IP will definitely be tracked, so Gu Chen’s QQ number is shared by the two of us. I logged into Gu Chen’s QQ, and sure enough I saw the content of an email sent to me by Manager Wang. The beginning of the email is as follows: If you see this email, I am already dead. I frowned and continued to read this email: "Seven years ago, I did two things that I regret the most. One of them was sleeping with Yang Licheng, and the other was filming I took that photo. These two things caused me to have two consequences that I have been struggling with for seven years. One of them is that I have a son, and I don’t regret giving birth to him. One of them is that I saw myself. It’s something I shouldn’t have seen. It will make me regret it for the rest of my life. “To be honest, I don’t like Lu Zhiqiu, but I don’t hate her enough to want to kill her. That night, I had a big fight with Yang Licheng. After a fight, Yang Licheng I just didn’t catch up with Lu Zhiqiu. I was so disappointed at that time. When I was about to leave, I heard something. I followed the sound and saw a scene that I will never forget in my life. There was no one around, Lu Zhiqiu was lying on the ground quietly. I thought I was dazzled.” “The moment Yang Licheng left, I hated two people, one was Yang Licheng and the other was Lu Zhiqiu. I wished these two people would die immediately. But the next moment, Lu Zhiqiu's body appeared in front of me. I was scared and excited. It was the first time I saw a body. I don't know why, I did this in my life, which made me think about it in the future. It’s a move that scares me even when I wake up..."
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