The next day, TianZong Mountain.
A Mercedes-Benz Big G jumped across the mountain road. It was cut by countless sharp branches along the way and finally stopped on the side of the road with a bang.
"F*ck…" Yan Xie slammed the car door. He touched the car door and hood with a bit of pain and pulled out Jiang Ting, who had already turned pale: "It's a f*cking punishment to come to this ghost place."
Jiang Ting waved his hands and couldn't speak for a moment. Suddenly he covered his mouth: "Yuck——"
For a moment, Yan Xie thought that he was going to vomit on himself, but then he found that it was just retching. Jiang Ting coughed a few times before he barely suppressed his churning stomach and took a few sips of water.
"Look at you," Yan Xie said with a distressed face, "Don't force it, what are you afraid of? Let's get the certificate if you're pregnant."
Jiang Ting managed to swallow the water in his throat and exhaustedly asked, "Do you know that in this desolate wilderness, people can bury you on the spot and no one will find out for three months?"
Yan Xie: "Oh, you are still putting it on the list; do you not get enough nutrition or betrothal gifts? Would you like to buy two golden dragon and phoenix bracelets weighing half a catty and wear them on your hands?"
The entrances and exits of several major highways in Tianzong Mountain have been checked by the police, and the area where the crime occurred has been cordoned off. They have passed by several checkpoints when driving up the mountain. Knowing that the road was difficult to walk, Yan Xie especially drove out the G65, which had been parked in the city center for a long time. However, the closer it was to the Phoenix Forest, the more rugged and difficult it was to drive. In the end, the big G could only be thrown to the side of the road.
The two of them walked through the woods with unsteady footsteps, supporting each other and trudging toward the fiery red phoenix forest on the top of the mountain.
Yan Xie said: "You'll get six kinds of betrothal gifts through three intermediaries, a palanquin with eight carriers, and the house can also add your name, but you must listen to me when you get the certificate. Let's discuss other conditions, such as whether the banquet will be hosted on your side, mine, or both? If you don't need a dowry, I'll keep it as your private money. I guess I'll have to make up for you."
Jiang Ting held the stone with one hand, and the other hand was pulled by Yan Xie. He gritted his teeth and tried hard to climb up the steep slope, but still staggered down to stand firm.
"It's just that you need to take good care of your body." Yan Xie rambled and lectured him: "Look at you, don't work so hard when handling cases in the future. It's better to raise a dog at home and water the flowers if you have nothing to do, and then go shopping for afternoon tea…"
Jiang Ting held his knees and panted for a while before saying, "Here."
"Ah?"
Jiang Ting raised his chin and signaled, "Execution ground."
Yan Xie looked back and saw that on the top of the steep hillside, not far away, there was lush greenery. The phoenix trees were scattered, and a circle of black and yellow cordon was supported by wooden sticks in the open space, in which the ground was obviously recessed into a deep pit.
——That was the place where He Liang was buried, and Bu Wei and Shen Xiaoqi were attacked.
"Afternoon tea is waiting for me," Jiang Ting sighed, got up, and staggered over.
He Liang's corpse had been taken out and transported away, and even a layer of sand, gravel, soil, and ash at the bottom of the pit had been scraped off. Gou Li personally supervised and transported it back to the Municipal Bureau for inspection. Jiang Ting squatted on the edge of the inverted cone-shaped pit and looked down. Yan Xie walked over and stood beside him, only to hear him say: "The depth is at least one meter."
"Well, to be precise, the deepest part is nearly two meters. The excavated soil is piled up in the Phoenix Forest. The bottom of the pit is covered with thick weeds, fallen leaves, wooden strips, etc. Most of the thin wooden strips have obvious crushing marks."
"Trap? "
"It should be a simple but effective trap. I made it myself when I went hunting in Africa a few years ago. First, I hollowed out the soil, made a load-bearing layer with wooden strips and haystacks, and then piled up floating soil and fallen leaves. Put meat as bait; when the prey walked up, it crushed the fragile haystack and fell into the pit."
Jiang Ting turned his head and glanced at him: "The bait should be water, right?"
"It should be," Yan Xie said, "According to the on-site technical investigator's speculation, Shen Xiaoqi should have drank the bottle of water while standing on the trap. The load-bearing layer under him collapsed because of his weight, then he fell into it unexpectedly and pressed against He Liang."
The two were silent for a moment.
Just thinking about that scene, it was really scary. The ground suddenly collapsed under your feet, and you directly fell in to face the corpse…
Jiang Ting coughed, "Have the nearby footprints and fingerprints been extracted?"
"Some of the footprints are found, and the marker poles are placed near them. But it rained nearby that night, and the scene was in a mess, so there is not much reference value." Yan Xie sighed and said, "At present, it is certain that there was more than one criminal who entered and exited the scene at the time of the crime, which is in line with Li Yuxin's confession, and it should be a kidnapping group appointed by the mastermind behind the scenes."
"Can a group escape?"
"Look at the surrounding geographical environment yourself." Yan Xie pointed helplessly: "This hillside, these bushes, this primeval forest——I can't even say that I'll be able to find a mountain hut to hide in. You can see that most of the grass nests on the ground are about half the height of a person. They can't be found even at a distance of ten meters."
Jiang Ting said casually: "You have it; your field team's work is just rough." Saying that he stood up, but after squatting for a long time, his legs became numb, and he fell into the pit uncontrollably.
"——Hey, be careful!"
Yan Xie was quick-witted and pulled Jiang Ting into his arms a moment before he fell into the pit. Because of the inertial impact, both of them took a few steps back at the same time.
"..."
Jiang Ting's entire face was forcibly pressed into his shoulder by Yan Xie, and the scent of male hormones mixed with a good-smelling perfume rushed to his face. His expression suddenly became a little stiff, and he slowly raised his head and took a half step back. He was about to say something nonchalantly to divert the topic, but found that Yan Xie's eyes were clearly flickering suspiciously.
"You did it on purpose?" Yan Xie said.
Jiang Ting: "..."
"You should have gotten back to the car first. This is the crime scene, the effect is not good here."
Jiang Ting took a deep breath and forced his mind to think about the touching scene at the bottom of the river in Jiangyang County. Half a minute later, his psychological construction and self-cultivation level had been rapidly improved by geometric levels, and he said calmly: "Let's go through the case again first."
Yan Xie squeezed his chin, obviously still very suspicious.
"Judging from the traces at the scene, the footprints of the kidnappers and the two victims came to the bottom of the hillside, respectively, and then the victim's footprints disappeared, and the footprints of several kidnappers deepened significantly. They should have carried the victim to the top of the hillside in this position."
Jiang Ting walked to the place where the yellow pole was inserted not far away, leaned over, and scraped the grass. He observed the dried-up traces in the soil, then followed the marking, and walked back to the pit:
"I don't know what happened after that. It may be that Bu Wei was under the control of the kidnappers or fainted like Li Yuxin, and Shen Xiaoqi went to the trap alone to get water and fell into the pit dug by the kidnappers, causing great damage to He Liang's skeletonized body."
Yan Xie said: "But Li Yuxin's DNA can still be detected from He Liang's fingernails, which is enough to prove who killed him."
"As long as something happens, it will inevitably leave evidence… You see, Shen Xiaoqi's struggle at the bottom of the pit left obvious traces, and the mineral water bottle fell into the pit in the process."
Jiang Ting said and crouched down again; the police had set up rocks on the edge of the pit as a support point. He wanted to slowly climb down to take a look, but was stopped by Yan Xie: "It's too slippery, don't go down." Then he jumped into the pit with a quick swipe.
Jiang Ting gave up calmly and crouched down on top to watch Yan Xie check everywhere. After half a day, he asked, "Did you find anything?"
"Nothing——! What are you doing? Be careful not to fall, and let me pick you up again. Although I don't mind it, don't play the same trick twice!"
Jiang Ting: "......"
Yan Xie felt very good about himself. He stood up and patted the cuffs covered with mud:
"The empty mineral water bottle was taken back by the technical team and tested from the inside out. Even the plastic of the bottle was cut out for laboratory analysis. It was basically confirmed that it was an ordinary bottle of mineral water without any messy drug ingredients. The saliva at the mouth of the bottle and the fingerprints on the body of the bottle point in the same direction, which means that if Shen Xiaoqi didn't feed Bu Wei mouth-to-mouth, then he drinks the whole bottle of water alone, and Bu Wei did not catch it at all, which is in line with the image of the 'betrayal' in the kidnapping case…"
Jiang Ting nodded and said nothing.
"Let's reconstruct the situation at the time of the crime," Yan Xie said, "Suppose the kidnappers chased, induced, or coerced the two victims to come to the vicinity of Phoenix Forest, and then put this bottle of water in the open space, so that Shen Xiaoqi, who had a strong desire to survive, climbed over and drank it by himself, and then fell into the pit. Finally, they woke up Bu Wei and forced her to execute Shen Xiaoqi, who betrayed her, just like Li Yuxin."
Yan Xie climbed up to the ground with the stone and crouched down to see:
"But at this distance, Bu Wei can't reach Shen Xiaoqi anyway, unless she lifts a rock and smashes his head."
"Bu Wei doesn't necessarily have the strength to lift a large rock." Jiang Ting shook his head and said: "And the meaning of killing at close range and using weapons at a distance is completely different. You can see from He Liang's nails that Li Yuxin must have stabbed him to death after a lot of struggle. The method of killing is usually a very important and unchangeable component of execution ceremonies from ancient times to the present."
"So the kidnappers took a lot of trouble to get Shen Xiaoqi out of the pit, just to let Bu Wei stab him to death? Why not give the knife to Bu Wei and get her down? It's obviously more convenient because of her lightweight."
Yan Xie and Jiang Ting stood at the edge of the pit, and they looked at each other, feeling very strange.
Suddenly, Jiang Ting seemed to think of something: "…How likely do you think it is possible that King of Spades was at the scene on the day of the crime?"
"If I were a drug dealer, I would definitely not dare show up when the police closed the mountain. Li Yuxin's confession also showed that the mastermind behind the scenes contacted her through a satellite mobile phone. But it's difficult to say about King of Spades, mainly because I met him once on the rooftop when we were in Hu Weisheng's house, and this drug lord's behavior seems to be…" Yan Xie frowned, thought about his words, and said, "There is a possibility."
Jiang Ting smiled briefly: "I think he wasn't here, and he didn't communicate at the scene on the day of the crime."
"Why?"
"Command Vehicle."
This answer was quite simple, but Yan Xie suddenly realized.
——Several command vehicles were nearby on the day of the incident, and any short-wave signals and satellite communications could not escape the channel monitoring system of the command vehicles. In other words, if someone like the King of Spades, who listened to Li Yuxin's killing of He Liang throughout the whole process, wanted to satisfy his extreme paranoia about the execution ceremony, he could only ask his subordinates to record the whole process!
"It's impossible to carry a camera here in the wilderness, but if the execution process is under the pit, the mobile phone will not be able to record it." Jiang Ting said lightly: "So they can only pull Shen Xiaoqi up, and several kidnappers surrounded the victim Like Li Yuxin killed He Liang at the time…"
"But why were the two victims pushed down by the kidnappers and found under the hillside?" Yan Xie asked suspiciously.
This question is really hard to explain.
Even if they use all the evidence at the scene to try to restore the situation at the time of the crime, they will not be able to grow the eyes of the sky or turn back time to go back to the scene to witness what the victim experienced.
Jiang Ting took a breath and gently rubbed his throat with his gloved fingertips before muttering after a long time, "Perhaps Bu Wei made a completely different choice from Li Yuxin so that she will also be executed… But anyway, it's really strange to fall off the cliff."
Yan Xie was originally immersed in the case, but when he glanced at Jiang Ting and saw him tilting his head slightly and touching his slender and straight neck, he suddenly swallowed his saliva uncontrollably.
Jiang Ting asked, "What do you think?"
"Oh, ah? What?"
Jiang Ting: "..."
The two looked at each other blankly. Yan Xie quickly looked at his watch to hide his absentmindedness: "Let's go, what time is it? It's useless to look here anymore, so let's wait until the victim wakes up and talks about it."
——Indeed, in the current stalemate and unpredictable situation, only when Bu Wei or Shen Xiaoqi wake up can they provide key clues, and it is difficult to make any progress.
Jiang Ting had no choice. It was already past four o'clock at this time, and they probably wouldn't be able to drive back to Jianning City until the evening. The two of them could only walk down the steep hillside cautiously and staggeringly. Yan Xie helped Jiang Ting, who was about to fall, from time to time. It was like driving an off-road vehicle with superior performance down the mountain.
The car bounced up and down on the bumpy mountain road. Yan Xie took out the cigarette case and signaled to Jiang Ting.
"Look at your face." Yan Xie lit a cigarette and said, "I'll go back to the city to invite you to dinner later to make up for it."
Jiang Ting's calm and clear voice when analyzing the case was quite empty at the moment: "If you mention the food again, be careful that I'll spit in your car…"
Before he could finish his sentence, Yan Xie looked at him in horror and stepped on the brakes with a snap.
Jiang Ting's drowsy mind finally remembered that this is the top G65. If he really vomited in the car, he would probably be caught by Yan Xie, and… his kidneys would be sold. So he hurriedly sat upright: "It's okay, I can still——"
The next second, he choked.
Yan Xie didn't open the window, nor did he drive him out of the car, but without hesitation or waiting, he took off his shirt, held it in front of him, and said, "Spit it out."
Jiang Ting: "?"
All of Jiang Ting's desire to overturn the river and the sea was held back when he saw the shirt sign, but Yan Xie didn't care about this at all. He seemed to have turned his body on purpose, fully showing the strong lines of his upper body, and sighed: "The time and money that I've been willingly cheated out by my personal trainer over the years is just for this moment!"
Jiang Ting: "..."
Yan Xie sighed and started the car, his naked muscles standing proudly under the sunlight. Beside him, Jiang Ting held a piece of clothing that was definitely more expensive than the car wash fee with no expression on his face, and he never thought about vomiting again.
Yan Xie just smoked the cigarette, shirtless, and drove the big G all the way back to Jianning, harvesting countless horns along the way. When he got off the highway, he was also chatted up by the beautiful car owner in front of him. He couldn't help but be very self-satisfied. He looked at Jiang Ting several times, which had the meaning, 'look, you're still not in a hurry to take a good look at the goods'.
Jiang Ting covered his face with clothes and pretended to be asleep.
The two did not return to Jianning until more than eight o'clock, and the sky was dark. According to Yan Xie, the past few days have been very exhausting because of traveling. At this time, they should find a good restaurant to have a good meal. If they can't do it, just order a "not shabby" seafood porridge for takeout and let Jiang Ting see what an authentic geoduck looks like. However, he hadn't even decided which seafood porridge takeout was not shabby when suddenly the phone rang. It was a call from the city bureau.
"Hello, Old Gao?"
Yan Xie listened intently for a moment. Jiang Ting stopped pretending to be asleep and lifted his clothes to reveal his face.
"Okay, I get it. I'll check it out later."
Yan Xie hung up the phone, then looked at Jiang Ting and sighed, affectionately and lovingly: "Why can't I even let you eat a good meal? "
"..." The nine heavens divine thunderstruck so hard that Jiang Ting wanted to ask him what Gao Panqing said, but he forgot the words in an instant.
Fortunately, Yan Xie stopped his behavior and gave him the answer: "Old Gao called to say that Bu Wei is awake and her mental state is not very good."
He paused and asked apologetically, "I'll buy you two buns for now, okay?"