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"That's right!" I hurriedly replied. "These individuals share a common trait, one that we hadn't considered before. I never noticed it until now, but thinking back on the other three women—Zhang Xue, Zhao Pingjuan, and Zhou Moli—they might not be safe after all. The murderer isn't planning to let them go; rather, the murderer knows that these people can't escape."
"What do you mean?" Zhao Mingkun asked, noticing my serious expression and urgent demeanor. "Are you saying the murderer is currently in the process of killing these three? But they all left on different forms of transportation. How could the murderer possibly be in three places at once?"
I shook my head and said, "The murderer doesn't need to be in three places at once; everything has already been planned out. They are in danger—quick, make a call."
Although Zhao Mingkun didn't fully understand at that moment, he followed my instructions. However, after making three calls, no one answered. He glanced at his phone and then at me, saying, "There's nothing we can do; I can't get through. As far as I know, Zhao Pingjuan and Zhang Xue took a flight, while Zhou Moli took a train. Given the time now, they should have arrived at their destinations long ago."
Hearing Zhao Mingkun's words made my heart sink; it became clear to me that these three were likely in grave danger.
"I fear these three may also be dead," I said to Zhao Mingkun.
"How can you tell?" he asked.
I looked at him and replied, "All the university students from Dongxing University share a significant commonality. We overlooked it because they didn't display it outwardly."
"What commonality?" Zhao Mingkun inquired.
I pointed to my own eyes and said, "The commonality is that they all have poor eyesight. Unlike us, who don't wear glasses when we see them, they are almost all nearsighted when looking at books or phones. Of course, I'm referring specifically to those women."
Zhao Mingkun remarked, "That's true; people like Hu Pei and Yang Licheng wear glasses. But I haven't seen any of those women wearing glasses. From this perspective, they must either have had surgery or are wearing contact lenses."
I snapped my fingers and said earnestly, "Exactly! They must all be wearing contact lenses. This also explains why Xing Yafang's behavior was so strange. Many acids and bases can corrode human tissue, but most of them don't affect plastic much—that's why plastic is so hard to degrade; its stability is very high."
"That's correct," Zhao Mingkun nodded.
I continued asking, "Do you know what materials modern contact lenses are made from?"
Zhao Mingkun shook his head; his eyesight was good, so he wasn't familiar with this aspect.
"They're made from silicone hydrogel," I explained. "This is also a corrosion-resistant material that doesn't easily harm the eyeball due to external factors when placed on the eye. Imagine if the murderer poured a corrosive liquid into the contact lens solution. After these people finish gathering and go to the restroom to take care of their lenses, that's when they would unwittingly kill themselves."
Zhao Mingkun's eyes widened in realization as he said after a moment, "So you're suggesting that Xing Yafang spent two minutes in the restroom? That duration doesn't seem long enough for her to use the toilet; it's too short for that. A reasonable explanation would be that she went in to touch up her makeup and treated her contact lenses instead?"
I nodded seriously and said, "We've all seen Xing Yafang's strange behavior in the elevator. At first, Xing Yafang didn't seem unusual, but it wasn't long before she started using the reflective walls of the elevator to look at her eyes. At that moment, we thought she had seen something unclean in the elevator!"
"That's right," Zhao Mingkun replied. "Everyone believed it was a ghost killing people."
I shook my head and said, "I had observed carefully before; Hu Xiaoxue and Liu Ruijie's eyeballs are quite different from those of the others. Hu Xiaoxue and Liu Ruijie had more injuries at the front of their eyeballs, while the others had missing parts on the sides of their eyes. This indicates that the direction of fluid flow in their eyes is different."
"This is the difference between wearing contact lenses and not wearing them," I continued. "Remember Wang Qianduo? She seemed fine when she was talking to us, but there was a problem when she went to put on makeup. I suspect that it was during that crucial step—when she put in her contact lenses—that something went wrong!"
Zhao Mingkun spoke again, "So she was in unbearable pain and needed to bang her head against the glass to relieve the pain in her eyes?"
I nodded, then shook my head again, saying, "I can't say for sure, but it's a reasonable assumption. Sometimes when someone feels itchy, they scratch the itchy spot until it bleeds just to feel some relief. From this perspective, the chemicals that Deng Xuemei used might not be very corrosive, but perhaps once they entered the eyes, they caused an unbearable itch. It's similar to how many people know that picking at scabs hurts but can't help themselves because often, itchiness is harder to endure than pain."
"So..." I gently tapped the table and said, "Those three people were likely already in danger long before. No matter when they used the contact lens solution, that was their time of death. I think Hu Xiaoxue probably thought it would be fun to try wearing contact lenses like her mother did."
I shook my head and sighed, "Thus, the daughter ended up dying in place of her mother. After the Murderer did all this, they wouldn't return to the Murder Case scene again. In their mind, these people were already dead; they were just lingering on."
We fell into a brief silence.
After a moment, Zhao Mingkun said, "But how did the Murderer manage to put the prepared liquid into the lens solution? If it were just one or two people, it might be possible, but with so many people involved, not everyone would have brought contact lens solution when they left. Did they sneak into each other's homes? But this Deng Xuemei from the Biology Department, aside from being close with Lu Zhiqiu, no one else even knows her name."
I furrowed my brow; I truly had no way to answer. I suddenly realized I had been overly optimistic—thinking that finding the Murderer would reveal everything—but now it seemed there were still many mysteries we hadn't unraveled.
At that moment, the manager who had been left aside suddenly exclaimed and said, "Wow! Why are there so many Moths in here?"
Both Zhao Mingkun and I turned around to look and saw that the manager had opened a drawer behind me without us noticing. When he pulled it open, he was startled. At the same time, a plant-like smell mixed with a foul odor wafted out. It was hard to describe this smell; all I could say was that it wasn't pleasant.
"What happened?" Zhao Mingkun asked.
"Look!" The manager didn't think he had done anything wrong as he pointed out, "Look at all these big Moths in here."
Zhao Mingkun and I leaned over to take a look and saw that the drawer contained many large Moths along with a long plant. Deep inside the drawer were also a knife and a bowl used for crushing things along with a pestle.
From examining the large Moths, it was evident that these creatures were likely toxic; they were originally white with large abdomens. The wings of some of these Moths were covered in white powder unique to them. Some of their wings had been removed and no longer had any white powder on them.
The plant had only branches, devoid of leaves. On its branches, I could see tiny thorns arranged in a scaly pattern. I took off my gloves and gently touched them with my fingers; there was a slight sting. If I were to touch against the direction of the thorns, I would likely end up with a hand full of splinters. Looking down, I noticed scratches along the lower branches.
Putting on my gloves, I picked up the knife and examined it closely under the light.
On the blade, I could see fine green and white powder. There was no doubt that someone had scraped the powder from the wings of a moth and from the thorns of this plant.
I lifted the bowl and saw it filled with green and white powder. At that moment, quite a bit of powder was sticking to the sides of the bowl, clearly visible.
It wasn't hard to imagine a scene: someone had caught some moths, found this plant branch, scraped the powder from the moth's wings, scraped off the thorns from the plant, and ground everything into a bowl. It seemed strange; I thought that if someone wasn't bored out of their mind, they wouldn't engage in such bizarre behavior.
Especially for a college student majoring in Biological Engineering at Dongxing University, this didn't seem like a trivial pastime—there had to be a reason behind it.
The administrator looked over and shook his head. "Strange. This wouldn't be some folk remedy, would it? Like using this stuff as a face mask? Or drinking it to lose weight? The more knowledgeable people are, the more they tend to do things that leave others baffled."
While the administrator was just making a casual remark, I imagined a possibility from his words—a potential method for murder.
"This isn't a folk remedy," I recalled an inexplicable death and said, "This is a method of killing that isn't complicated in principle but is quite clever. The technique used by the murderer is something even a well-listening high school student could replicate, yet we just can't seem to think of it..."
"You mean?" The administrator instinctively took a step back. "Is this meant for murder?"
I nodded seriously and replied, "That's right; this is meant for murder, and I also know who this is intended to kill..."
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