Luo Wenzhou, carrying the kraft-paper envelope, went to the balcony, opened the window, and lit a cigarette. Luo Yiguo, attracted by the scent of cured meat, was swept by the icy breeze and immediately ran off shivering, tail between its legs.
Before him was the coldest night of the year, behind him an indulgently warm room, and in his hands a final testament, the paper of which had been crumpled.
"I don't know who my enemies are, and I don't know how long they have existed. They have a colossal organization and vast wealth, hold countless privileges and high-quality resources, but they still won't be satisfied. They still have to get what they want in spite of others, placing themselves above the law—I suspect that these people are connected with many murders, even that they've been privately supporting wanted criminals, using them as assassins."
At this point, Luo Wenzhou's hand tapping out cigarette ash paused, lightly trembling in spite of himself.
His gaze swept once more over the words "privately supporting wanted criminals, using them as assassins." In the Zhou Clan case, the killer who had run over Dong Xiaoqing had been a wanted criminal who had obtained a high quality false ID from somewhere and was making his living as an assassin.
Amidst the darkness, there seemed to be a slender thread passing through the thick haze, dimly revealing a fragile structure.
"Jiahui, do you still remember Gu Zhao? My one-time good friend, my brother. To this day no one dares to mention him. He has turned into a disgraceful 'history,' needing to be covered up at the edges of group photos. Though Teacher Fan went astray, he was right when he said that Gu Zhao wasn't that kind of person. There had to be something else behind it.
"Teacher Fan has come to grief, but he did it for the sake of private vengeance. Sometimes I think, why am I doing this? I don't know. I've been working for over twenty years. Reasonably speaking, I should withdraw from the front lines, focus on management, attend meetings and give speeches, not deal with all kinds of criminals every day. I should go on steadily to retirement, see Xinxin graduate and start a family, take care of myself and live out my allotted lifetime. I should pretend that I don't know anything. I truly want it to be that way, to do my duty. No one could criticize me for it.
"But as soon as I close my eyes, I think of Teacher Fan, think of Gu Zhao, think of those who died unsatisfied on National Road 327, and of those children whose whereabouts are still unknown.
"Jiahui, I can't do it. I hope you can forgive me.
"This world is too complicated. Countless sordid things have been accumulating underground for a long time, like chronic illnesses that can never heal.
"But I still think that time is a series of great waves constantly rushing towards the shore. Each time a wave rises it bears down menacingly, but every time it flows out again it sweeps away some of the stains—for example, we now have all kinds of investigative technology; we can detect lies, we can compare DNA. Perhaps very soon the surveillance camera network will be everywhere, covering every corner.
"Perhaps when the next wave hits, all of this will be revealed under the bright light of day. If I'm gone then, please see that day in my place, and hand these things over to those who can continue the investigation."
When Luo Wenzhou finished reading, he exhaled a long breath, carefully folding the letter according the creases that were already there. The letter Yang Zhengfeng had written to his wife wasn't long, but there were a few parts he didn't quite understand. But he understood why Lao Yang had said that he "had the heart but not the ability."
He strove to remember the days before Lao Yang's sacrifice. He vaguely recalled that Yang Zhengfeng had been smoking like a chimney; when others had asked him about it, he'd only said that he was worried about his daughter's university entrance exams, and they, a group of ignorant youngsters, had made fun of him for it…
What had Lao Yang felt then when he'd looked at him?
Had he thought he was useless?
Therefore, like a solitary hero with no one to rely on, the old criminal policeman had walked alone into the darkness on his dangerous path.
Luo Wenzhou stared emptily out the window for a moment, then turned and went towards the study.
Luo Yiguo was just walking back and forth in front of the bedroom door beside the study, looking like it wanted to go in. As Luo Wenzhou passed by, he bent down and lifted its two front paws, hanging them over his arm, carrying the cat into the study. "Don't bother him."
Luo Yiguo meowed and rolled into a ball, settling down on his legs, watching as he logged into the intranet and entered the keywords "National Road 327."
Basically all the material that came up had been scanned in; this had evidently been very long ago, another old case. It was rather hard to read.
This had been a sensational business fifteen years ago—
"National Road 327" was a highway outside of Yan City, detouring around Lotus Mountain, constructed over thirty years ago. It had once been one of the major traffic arteries. Later, it had weathered many changes and gradually been superseded by the land-reclamation highway that passed through the mountain, becoming deserted. Aside from those who were going to one of the few small towns along National Road 327, very few people would deliberately avoid the mountain road to take it.
This case of serial murder had occurred along that desolate road.
The victims had all been short-haul truck drivers—short-haul truck drivers usually went on the road alone to economize, and they had to carry their belongings on their persons. They were comparatively soft targets.
Perhaps the killer had believed in folk superstition, thinking that a person who died by violence would spontaneously develop photographic abilities, recording an image of the last thing they had seen before their death. Therefore, the victims' eyes had been smashed, their condition in death appearing especially miserable.
The body of the first murdered driver had been abandoned beside the truck, having been stabbed a dozen times, with fatal wounds on the chest. Everything he'd had on him had vanished, with not even a penny left behind. The truck's container, meanwhile, had been missing one small-scale refrigerator. Aside from the driver, there had also been a heap of messy footprints at the scene. Analysis showed that they had likely been made by two men and one woman.
Apart from this, there had also been a suspicious bloodstain on a front wheel. Because it wasn't human blood, it didn't attract attention at first.
Less than two months later, there was another similar case on National Road 327.
The killers had perhaps learned from experience. Aside from the eyeballs having been smashed as before, the second victim hadn't been wildly stabbed but had died at one strike. The victim had been short and skinny; he had been crouching in front of the truck's door at his death, and there weren't many defensive wounds on him. According to conjecture, for the sake of his life and safety, he had obediently handed over his property when the knife-wielding robbers had threatened him, not expecting that the criminals would be unwilling to let him go. Entirely unresisting, he had been fatally stabbed from behind.
For the third murder, the killers' criminal methods went up another grade. This time, they had learned to play with the victim. After the victim had been killed with a single strike, they had dug out his eyes and chopped off his limbs, arranging them beside him, so savage that it was infuriating.
The local police had quickly handed the serial robbery and murder case over to Yan City's City Bureau, and the City Bureau had established a special investigation team.
Luo Wenzhou's gaze stopped on the names of the special investigation team's leads, seeing that the team leader was Yang Zhengfeng, while the deputy team leader was an unfamiliar name—Gu Zhao.
Luo Wenzhou frowned, now and then stroking the cat.
If this Gu Zhao was an elder who had worked with Lao Yang and had gone through many cases, why had no one ever mentioned him?
Luo Yiguo had only wanted to find somewhere to sleep. Settling down with difficulty on the litter box attendant's lap, it still had to bear with all this fidgeting, so it hit the litter box attendant's hand with the pads of its paws, leapt off his knees, and ran off.
Luo Wenzhou paid no attention to it, continuing to scroll down.—The special investigation team had found that in all three robberies, the looted trucks' front wheels had small quantities of animal blood on them. Thereupon the special investigation team's manpower had performed a large-scale search along the national road, focusing on areas with a high incidence of accidents where the road was narrow. As expected, near the location of the most recent murder, they had found skid marks and a dog's body.
The special investigation team suspected that the criminals had used small animals as bait, lying in ambush along pitch-black and narrow stretches of road. When the target vehicle drove by, they would suddenly throw out the dog, forcing the truck to slow down, then sending out the gang's female accomplice to nearly get run over, forcing the truck to stop and luring the victim outside.
National Road 327 wasn't a set out of Journey to the West; people seeing a woman on her own wouldn't be very much on their guard. As soon as the victim got out of the truck, her accomplices would come out to implement the robbery and murder.
Through informers, the special investigation team had found a peddler who captured and illegally sold stray dogs. Following this lead, they had in the end determined the killers—the principal offenders were a pair of brothers from a small town by the national road. The older brother was named Lu Guoxin, the younger brother Lu Guosheng. Their accomplice was a female delinquent, Lu Guoxin's girlfriend.
There was nothing worth saying about Lu Guoxin. He was an idle, unemployed young man with a record of imprisonment for robbery.
The younger brother Lu Guosheng, however, was comparatively special; he was a university dropout.
This Lu Guosheng had been frequently absent. Because his conduct had been poor and he had failed out of too many courses, the school had postponed his graduation and withheld his diploma. Afterwards, he'd managed to get hired as an office worker at a small transport company, then got fired because of a fight. He'd become increasingly embittered after returning home and determined to get revenge on society, easily fitting in with his scumbag big brother, plotting out this series of robberies.
Having looted the goods, the three of them spent lavishly, easy come and easy go; when the money was all spent, they started worrying about their next haul. But Lu Guosheng wasn't like the other two; he was a natural anti-social element. He wasn't interested in the pocket change the truck drivers were carrying, but in carrying out murder after murder he'd found the pleasure in it. He was the key figure in this. Of the other two, one was a thug, and the other was bait, attendants at his beck and call.
The police quickly arrested Lu Guoxin and his girlfriend, but Lu Guosheng, the most dangerous one among them, had fled and vanished off the face of the earth.
Luo Wenzhou input the full name "Lu Guosheng" and found that his wanted notice had yet to be removed. Fifteen years had passed, and he still hadn't been caught!
In a society where even a drug-user would be reported by their neighbors, how could a vicious wanted criminal hide for fifteen years?
Unless he had run to some uninhabited place and was living as a hermit… But could a person like Lu Guosheng really have endured the loneliness and the desire to harm?
Luo Wenzhou rubbed the center of his brow, lit another cigarette, and went through the other things in the kraft-paper folder.
The first page in the folder was a photograph—Luo Wenzhou had seen it countless times in Director Lu's office, but Director Lu had arranged this group picture so that one person was hidden by the frame; this time, he was finally seeing it in full.
The fifth person was standing in a corner with Yang Zhengfeng pulling his elbow. He didn't seem very comfortable with the camera. His posture was rather reserved, and his wide grin looked somewhat forced.
Gu Zhao… Was this person Gu Zhao?
Luo Wenzhou tapped twice on the keyboard, searching for "Gu Zhao," but there was very little information, only a sketchy disciplinary report. Luo Wenzhou read through the disciplinary report a few times over, seeing wording like "serious breach of discipline" and "illegal activity." There were no clues as to what this person had actually done.
Aside from the letter for Shiniang and the old photograph, the kraft-paper folder also contained a stack of candid photographs that had come from who knew where.
There were men and women, young and old. They seemed no different from ordinary city residents. Luo Wenzhou thought about it, then scrolled through the wanted notices. In less than half an hour, he had found quite a few people matching the photographs in the internal network's database; without exception, they were all escaped criminals.
Just then, the door of the study creaked open, suddenly breaking off Luo Wenzhou's train of thought. Without looking up, he scolded, "Luo Yiguo, how annoying are you!"
Then the power cable at his feet moved. Luo Wenzhou looked down and saw Luo Yiguo, fangs bared, attacking the power cable; the black cord was shiny with saliva… So who was at the door?
Luo Wenzhou immediately looked at the door, finding Fei Du leaning against the door frame, looking at him.
"I went out to pour myself a glass of water," said Fei Du.
Luo Wenzhou shivered, subconsciously closing the page he was looking at, then, flustered, stuffed Lao Yang's folder in a drawer. He stood up. "I…I'll pour it for you."
Luo Wenzhou only came around after pouring the water—Fei Du was a grown-up, and he had arms and legs; why did he need someone else to pour a glass of water for him? And why had Luo Wenzhou, going online in the middle of the night, acted like he'd been caught committing adultery?
Fei Du silently took the glass from his hands, brushing Luo Wenzhou's fingertips. He suddenly thought, "Me staying here is actually inconvenient for him, too."
He had to get up in the middle of the night and hide in the study when he wanted to look at something in his own home.
Hiding like this under the same roof was a strain on both of them. Why was this necessary?
Fei Du looked down, considering these words, thinking over and over of how to bring it up, but when he'd finished drinking the water, he still couldn't say anything.
He was like a traveller walking through a desert, his whole body parched, and Luo Wenzhou and his little house were like a half-filled bottle of water dropping out of the heavens. Even if it contained arsenic, even if cold intellect was prying his fingers open one by one…he still couldn't bear to let go.
The two of them remained in mutual silence for a moment. Then Luo Wenzhou suddenly spoke. "I'm investigating the truth behind my shifu's death. A new lead has just turned up."
Fei Du hadn't expected him to reveal this; he was startled.
"There's too much involved. The fewer people know, the better," Luo Wenzhou said, looking directly at him. "I'm not eliminating the possibility that this may have to do with you. There are many things I haven't cleared up right now, so I have no way to assess whether or how much I can tell you, so you'll have to give me a few days.—I've been frank up to this point. Does that work for you?"
Fei Du had never seen such a clear analysis of secrecy and candor. He stared blankly for a while, then subconsciously nodded. "That works."
Luo Wenzhou relaxed. Watching Fei Du slowly drink the water, he'd suddenly had a premonition that if he didn't say something, events would happen that he was unwilling to see.
He put an arm around Fei Du's shoulders. "Now you'd better…"
Without any warning, Fei Du pulled his wrist, pushing him. Luo Wenzhou's balance faltered, and he reeled back against the arm of the couch.
Fei Du pressed him against the couch with his knees, tilting his head to look at him. Suddenly, he smiled. "Although, shixiong, you can't expect to get rid of me using only your words?"