Book Synopsis
Book Tags
Donation Rankings
Comment
0 Comments
You May Also Like
墨書 Inktalez
Jiang He paid no mind to the large man sprawled on the ground as he sprinted towards the direction of Li Erdan. The roll-up door had already opened, and all the gamblers rushed out in a frenzy. The police force led by Captain Liu was insufficient; after a brief pursuit, they managed to apprehend only a few individuals. The darkness of the night made their task even more challenging.
Li Erdan was very familiar with this area. He blended into the crowd, weaving his way towards a dark alley on one side, unnoticed amidst the chaos, except for Jiang He, who followed closely behind. Li Erdan exerted all his strength as he dashed down the alley, zigzagging through its depths.
Jiang He reached the entrance of the alley but did not enter. Before coming here, he had studied a map of the underground parking lot. He remembered that there were several bungalows that divided the area into narrow paths, creating a complex maze of alleys with many exits.
If he went in, his chances of finding Li Erdan would only be thirty percent.
Jiang He closed his eyes and rubbed his temples with his fingers. The alley had exits in every direction, but the problem was that each exit led to different places.
The exit on the south side opened up to an open space above the parking lot; Li Erdan had just escaped from there and would not return. The west exit was a narrow road next to a foul-smelling ditch. To the north and east were two highways; the north highway had no shops on either side, while the east side was lined with stores—Night City.
With this in mind, Jiang He stepped into the alley.
After running for an unknown amount of time, Li Erdan glanced back and saw that no one was following him anymore. Leaning against a wall to catch his breath for a moment, he then strolled leisurely onward. Truth be told, Li Erdan had been quite startled. Earlier, in his attempt to evade his pursuer, he had darted left and right through the alley without even realizing where he was.
He looked around to confirm his bearings before heading in one direction.
Emerging from the alley felt like stepping into another world. As he walked down the street, Li Erdan felt uneasy; now that the underground casino had been exposed, he didn’t know where else he could go. Inside the casino, he could scavenge leftovers from others, but outside, he couldn’t very well rummage through trash bins.
Thinking about this made Li Erdan feel deflated, like a wilted eggplant as he trudged forward.
The autumn wind was biting; having lost his coat, he wore only a thin autumn shirt and shivered from the cold. Not far ahead, he noticed a fast-food restaurant where someone had just picked up two cups of hot drinks from the window. The cups were steaming; they must have been coffee or something similar.
Li Erdan thought how wonderful it would be if he could have a steaming cup of tea right now.
As two people brushed past him, one of them presented a cup of coffee right in front of him.
"Want some coffee?" the person said with a cheerful smile.
Exhausted and cold, Li Erdan instinctively accepted the cup of coffee. But in the next moment, something else appeared in his hand—a pair of handcuffs.
The person who handed him the coffee was none other than Jiang He. While Li Erdan was still wandering in circles within the alley, Jiang He had walked directly out from the eastern side of it and arrived at this bustling street. He had bought two cups of coffee not far from the alley's entrance and waited; sure enough, when Li Erdan emerged from the alley, he found himself right beside Jiang He.
Li Erdan was caught.
Captain Liu continued to lead the other detectives in capturing gamblers. There were simply too many of them, and under the cover of night, a significant number had managed to escape, leaving Old Shao feeling regretful that they had only apprehended some low-level henchmen from the casino, while the higher-ups had blended in with the crowd and fled.
However, Old Shao could not afford to dwell on the casino matters at this moment; a murder case took precedence.
“Why did you run?” Old Shao asked slowly, looking at Li Erdan sitting in the interrogation room.
Li Erdan yawned and replied to Shao the Elder, “Can I have some coffee...?”
It was already seven o'clock, and daylight had broken outside. The people in the interrogation room were yawning continuously; the task force members hadn’t slept for a long time.
Old Shao said to everyone, “You all go back and get some sleep. We’ll need everyone busy in the morning.”
A few of them were exhausted and could no longer hold on.
Only Old Shao and Jiang He remained. Old Shao looked at Jiang He and asked, “Aren’t you going back to rest?”
With heavy dark circles under his eyes, Jiang He replied, “Even if I go back, I won’t be able to sleep. It’s just as well to interrogate Li Erdan.”
Old Shao glanced at Jiang He, but said nothing.
The three of them sipped coffee together.
“Alright, Li Erdan,” Shao the Elder said. “You’ve had your coffee. Now tell me why you ran.”
Li Erdan sighed and said, “If you were police earlier, I wouldn’t have run. I thought you were here to settle scores. I don’t steal or rob; why are you arresting me?”
“Don’t steal or rob?” Old Shao looked at Li Erdan, whose shifty eyes betrayed him. He replied, “Li Erdan, we’ve already gathered information about you since we brought you here. Tell me, the clothes from the bodies in the crematorium’s morgue—those were all stolen by you, right? Don’t pretend you don’t know; we found them in your place at Huang Family Shed.”
Upon hearing Old Shao’s words, Li Erdan’s face instantly fell: “You... you all know?”
Shao the Elder: "Why did you run away early this morning?"
Li Erdan gritted his teeth and after a moment said, "Since you all know about my necrophilia, didn't you notice anything unusual about the body?"
Old Shao and Jiang He exchanged glances, and Old Shao spoke up, "It's the large hole in the stomach of your body."
"Exactly!" Li Erdan replied. "Around three o'clock that night, I couldn't sleep at home no matter what. I thought, since I can't sleep, I might as well go to the crematorium. You all know I have a bit of necrophilia. So, I got up and rode my bicycle to the crematorium and arrived at the funeral home."
"As soon as I entered the Body Refrigeration Room, I felt something was off. I noticed that the Refrigerator had been tampered with." Li Erdan said while sipping his coffee. "I knew how many bodies were inside and who was on each level. But then I found out that the innermost layer had been disturbed."
Li Erdan set his coffee cup aside, looking somewhat terrified. "But it was only a few hours after I left that someone had already moved things around."
Old Shao furrowed his brow and took a sip of coffee before saying, "You finish work at six. You left a few hours later, which suggests to me that after work, you didn't go straight home but lingered near the funeral home, right? What did you see? What did you encounter?"
Li Erdan's gaze flickered as he continued, "I opened that drawer and saw a body. You know, this body—I've never seen it before. I pulled open that compartment and revealed a woman's face. Then there were her clothes; you know, she was quite beautiful and wore lovely clothing..."
"So you stripped her of her clothes?" Old Shao asked.
"Yes," Li Erdan admitted. "I took off her shirt, but when I did, do you know what I saw? A large hole in her stomach—a big hole. When I touched the woman's hand, I could tell she had just died not long ago; I knew..."
"And then?" Old Shao prompted.
"I heard noises outside," Li Erdan's face turned pale with fear. "In the darkness, I saw a figure standing in the hallway outside. The moon was very bright that night; I definitely wasn't mistaken—it was a shadow. It stood with its back to the moonlight at the doorway of the hallway, watching me without moving."
Old Shao gently asked, "Who was it?"
"I don't know," Li Erdan replied. "I’m sure he saw me too; we locked eyes for a moment before he suddenly left. My legs went weak; when I stepped outside, there wasn't a soul around. I realized that this body might be connected to him—I was terrified."
"And then you ran away?" Jiang He asked. "What was the reason?"
Li Erdan sighed and said, "There were many reasons."
“Do you know Zhai Qiang?” Jiang He finished his coffee in one gulp and asked Li Erdan.
Li Erdan nodded, “Of course I know him. I was waiting for him that night.”
“So, you admit that during your five years of work, you took most of the jewelry from the corpses, right?” Jiang He fixed his gaze on Li Erdan, as if no subtle movement from him could escape Jiang He's eyes.
Li Erdan mumbled for a moment, unable to say a word.
“Zhai Qiang is gone; what else are you hiding?” Old Shao said slowly, offering this remark.
Only then did Li Erdan respond, “Yes, I admit it. I took a lot of jewelry. But the thing is, if I didn’t take those jewels, they would just turn to dust. The dead are already dead; they don’t need these things anymore. But I still can, so I guess it’s like making a contribution from the dead to the living?”
“You had agreed to meet on Qingchun Road at eight o'clock that night. When Zhai Qiang arrived at eight-thirty, you were already gone. What were you doing at eight o'clock? Where did you use the stolen jewelry?” Old Shao asked slowly.
Mentioning this matter caused Li Erdan's expression to change. He steeled himself and said, “Since you know everything, there’s no point in hiding it anymore. After work, I was playing Fight the Landlord with Wang Da and the others. I lost track of time and when I looked at the clock, it was already nine-forty. I hurried to Qingchun Road to dig for jewelry. When I got there, I saw a car blocking the road and something sticky on the ground; I didn’t know what it was.”
“I didn’t know what had happened, so I just stood there looking around,” Li Erdan continued. “Then a person ran out from the woods; he was driving too fast and crashed into a tree.”
“I saw something sticky on the ground and didn’t know what it was, so I asked him what was going on.” Li Erdan scratched his head and said, “He said he was selling offal; his car almost tipped over and the entrails spilled everywhere. We cleaned it up together and chatted for a bit. During our conversation, since I like eating fatty intestines, he gave me a piece…”
Comment 0 Comment Count