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墨書 Inktalez
Early the next morning, we returned to Lanjing City. The Blue Capital Police had already brought Cao Jiaying to the station. When we arrived, we found her sitting in the interrogation room. From outside the one-way glass, I could see that Cao Jiaying's face was pale, and she was anxiously looking around. For a female college student, such a place was undoubtedly "terrifying."
Captain Li glanced at Cao Jiaying, smiled, and said to me, "Perhaps the truth lies in Cao Jiaying's words. Look at how flustered she is; there's a good chance Zhao Huanghe is telling the truth. Want to make a bet on it?"
Seeing Captain Li's demeanor, he seemed quite confident. After all, based on the evidence, Zhao Huanghe appeared to be the real culprit. However, I wasn't in the mood to gamble with Captain Li. In my view, there were too many doubts surrounding Zhao Huanghe. We only had one day to find evidence that could substantiate whether Zhao Huanghe was indeed the Killer.
Noticing my silence, Captain Li said nothing more and walked directly into the interrogation room. I followed him inside while the other members of the Special Investigation Team waited outside.
When Cao Jiaying saw us enter, she appeared flustered and asked, "What’s going on? Why did you call me here so early?"
Captain Li wore a stern expression, clearly intending to apply pressure on her—a common interrogation tactic. With him acting this way, I had no choice but to remain silent as well. Captain Li tapped his fingers on the table a few times before speaking up. "Cao Jiaying, we already have evidence and know who the Killer is, but there's something the Killer mentioned."
At this point, Captain Li paused and fixed his gaze on Cao Jiaying before continuing, "Is this something I should tell you or will you confess it yourself?"
Cao Jiaying was still just a student and had never encountered such situations before. Seeing Captain Li's serious demeanor made fear immediately flash across her face; it was hard not to notice. Yet she tried to maintain her composure as she looked at us, although her facade was easily seen through.
Suddenly, Captain Li shouted loudly, "The Killer has already confessed; why won't you?"
His outburst startled even me, let alone Cao Jiaying. She froze for a moment before bursting into tears. "I only vaguely saw a shadow of someone at that time; I didn’t realize what was happening that night and thought it was a dream. But it wasn’t until I discovered Zhao Kaifang's body in the wardrobe that I understood!"
"I was so scared! I thought if I spoke up, the police would blame me!" Cao Jiaying sobbed as she continued, "So I kept quiet; I didn’t say anything at all. All I saw was a blurry figure; I couldn’t tell who it was! But it had to be one of the other two people in our dorm."
Cao Jiaying added, "But I couldn’t see clearly who it was. Besides Shuwen Tian and Guan Cuicui, there was no one else! I remembered that Guan Cuicui had an argument with Zhao Kaifang before, so that’s my only guess!"
"Oh! And one day when I went to the bank for my living expenses, I suddenly found an extra hundred thousand in my bank account!"
"An extra hundred thousand? Do you know who called?" Captain Li asked urgently.
Cao Jiaying shook her head and replied, "I don't know who it was, but I immediately realized it was from Killer. My family could never afford that hundred thousand, and no one has contacted me saying they dialed the wrong account. This means it's a hush money from Killer."
Upon hearing this, I quickly sent a text to Mary, asking her to trace where the hundred thousand came from that was transferred to Cao Jiaying's account.
"Later, I carefully observed Shuwen Tian and Guan Cuicui. I hadn't noticed before, but then something struck me," Cao Jiaying said. "I thought, if it really was them, then they must be quite wealthy. But in the end, I found out that both of them actually have quite a bit of money. I hadn't paid attention before, but when I did notice, I realized they had both gotten new phones and new computers..."
At this point, something suddenly flashed in my mind. I immediately asked, "Did they get their new phones or computers recently?"
Cao Jiaying nodded and said, "That's right. At that time, Cuicui and I got new phones together, and Shuwen Tian got a new computer. So I don't know who the murderer is; after receiving this money, I moved out. I'm not sure if they're still living in the dormitory arranged by the school..."
I patted Captain Li on the shoulder, signaling him to step outside with me.
"What's up?" Captain Li asked.
"Didn't you catch anything from Cao Jiaying's words?" I looked at Captain Li and said.
Captain Li shook his head.
I sighed and said, "You might want to call Guan Cuicui and Shuwen Tian in as well. Take what you just interrogated Cao Jiaying about and apply it to them; I think there will be unexpected findings."
Captain Li immediately arranged for personnel to handle it. At that moment, Mary also traced the source of the money. The reason it was so quick to track down was that the money only passed through two accounts. It was directly transferred from Zhao Huanghe's account to Cao Jiaying's account without any intermediaries, which was astonishingly straightforward.
Upon reaching this point, I found myself even more perplexed. Although there was ample evidence pointing directly to Zhao Huanghe, it felt almost too easy. It was as if Zhao Huanghe had deliberately laid everything out for us to see.
Mary noticed my furrowed brow and sighed, "I say, Brother Shao, maybe you're being too sensitive. Perhaps you've dealt with too many serial murder cases, which is why you think this case is similar to those. But you need to understand, this isn't a case we've taken on; we just happened to be at a conference in Blue Capital, which is why we're investigating this matter."
The other members nodded in agreement. Mary continued, "Your thought process still follows that of an unconventional serial killer case, but this one should be just an ordinary case. If you think about it that way, doesn't everything start to make sense?"
Her words held some truth. Was it possible that I was overthinking this case and that the Killer didn't have such intricate plans? But if it were a simple case, why were we spending so much time searching for the Killer? With that thought, my mind became even more chaotic.
Juan Juan patted me on the shoulder and said, "Why don't you take a break? Don't view time as if it's just one day; the closer we get to the conclusion, the more we need to maintain a calm mindset."
I nodded and handed over the interrogation duties to Dezi, asking him to assist Captain Li.
As noon approached, I was awakened. It turned out that the interrogations of Guan Cuicui and Shuwen Tian had concluded, and the police had reached a shocking conclusion: on the night of the body disposal, all three of them had actually been awake. This revelation startled them all, but I wasn't surprised because it aligned with my suspicions.
We could envision a scenario:
It had been over a week since the Killer murdered Zhao Kaifang. For reasons unknown, he decided to lock Zhao Kaifang's body inside his own locker. The most dangerous place could also be the safest; if successful, he would surely clear his name.
So he did just that. He took the body and gently pried open the latch before sneaking into the room. At that moment, he noticed that everyone in the dormitory was asleep. He stealthily opened the locker and quietly placed the already bound body inside. Just then, he sensed movement behind him!
He froze in place, standing before the locker. The three girls who had woken up also dared not move; they didn't know who this person was and didn't even want to look around to see who was missing from their beds. In the pitch-black dormitory with curtains drawn tight, they could not see their hands in front of their faces and could only hear their own breathing.
No one spoke; no one dared to move.
The standoff lasted for about ten minutes, during which the girls closed their eyes, hoping that everything they were witnessing was just a dream. The Killer slowly lowered his head and retreated. When they woke up the next day, the girls tacitly forgot about the incident. None of them mentioned it, until Zhao Kaifang's body was discovered by the Dormitory Supervisor.
They finally understood that on that night when no one dared to speak, Zhao Kaifang's body had been hidden in the closet. They all knew it, but no one dared to think that they had spent an entire week alongside a corpse. This was something none of them could talk about; they began to suspect each other and distanced themselves.
Then one day, each of their accounts suddenly showed an additional hundred thousand yuan. By this time, the police had not contacted them for a long while, and they felt completely disconnected from the case. So they continued to suspect one another but felt justified in using the money for their own desires.
After all, they had said from the beginning that their relationship with Zhao Kaifang was not good. Indeed, Zhao Kaifang was dead—what did it have to do with them? They hadn’t killed her, and they hadn’t even seen clearly who the Killer was. What if speaking out brought them danger? These three naive university students comforted themselves with various excuses to ease their conscience.
In our country’s Criminal Law, there is no crime of failing to report knowledge of a crime; aside from freezing that hundred thousand yuan, all we can do is criticize and educate. After all, they had their own considerations—they were scared, confused, and at the same time greedy. After understanding the situation, Captain Li was responsible for taking them back.
But we cannot know if on those quiet nights one of them would remember that Zhao Kaifang had once been a living person or recall the ghost story Cao Jiaying had told in their dormitory at the start of it all. We also do not know if they would feel regret for their deliberate concealment.
I increasingly felt sorrow for Zhao Kaifang, who transformed from a sensible and lovely girl into someone without friends—so much so that even in death, no one was willing to seek justice for her. It is truly tragic. But is there really any way to avoid such sorrow?
We all understand why she became this way.
An Unsolved Mystery: A mysterious 21st-century Airborne Troops appeared in North America, rescuing an Indian Red-Haired Beauty, indulging in Blue-Eyed Busty Blondes, dominating Wall Street, amassing wealth across America, and initiating a Han Ethnic Colonial Global Model.
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