The scene of the murder in Manhattan.
Two officers came over carrying hammers.
Rodson took the evidence bag from another officer nearby, using the tongs to pick up the ghost-faced doll from the ground and placed it into Nathan's hands, saying, "Hey! Buddy, don't underestimate anything at the scene..."
Nathan responded nonchalantly, "I know, I know, don't underestimate anything at the scene, right? What's up with you?"
Rodson, examining the ghost-faced doll in the evidence bag, remarked, "Oh God, this thing doesn't seem to be electronic; there's no battery compartment, no charging port."
"Don't be so surprised. That means there's a cell or button battery hidden inside. Toys like these are common now, my son has one!" Nathan didn't take Rodson's observation seriously.
Rodson stared into his eyes silently, making Nathan feel uneasy, "Buddy, what do you mean by that?"
Rodson asked, "Your son has one?"
Nathan nodded, "Yes, my son has one, I bought it for him! The little guy loves it."
Rodson's face showed confusion, "Then let me ask you, this thing appeared in the victim's bedroom, the victim lived alone, a man over fifty years old. Would he enjoy playing with this kind of toy like your son?"
Nathan was speechless...
Rodson, giving Nathan a glance, handed the bag with the ghost-faced doll to an officer behind him, saying, "Go check the manufacturer of this toy."
"Yes!"
Soon after, another police car stopped outside the villa, the medical examiner arrived.
The medical examiner for the Manhattan Police Department was a seasoned woman in her fifties named Alison Harper. She greeted Rodson and Nathan wearing a white coat, "Happy to see you guys..!"
"I see everyone looks quite grim. What, is the situation that bad?"
Bad?
Rodson and Nathan exchanged glances, unsure whether to describe the scene in the upstairs bedroom with that word.
Alison tried to lighten the mood upon seeing their expressions, 'No worries, I've witnessed everything in this line of work. Dismembered bodies? They're practically routine. Go on, tell me!'"
Nathan looked down, saying nothing, while Rodson pointed upstairs, "Oh, madam, you better see for yourself."
Alison nodded, "Alright, I'll take a look."
Watching Alison Harper's back as she went upstairs, Rodson hesitated but then added, "Ah, Mrs. Alison, there's a bucket ready upstairs."
Alison waved her hand dismissively, "Don't worry, I won't need that. You guys are just too young —"
As she reached the door of the main bedroom on the second floor, after seeing the "sliced alive" person, a second, two seconds, three seconds passed...
Being a medical examiner, she didn't vomit, but her complexion changed slightly.
This slightly irked Rodson and Nathan waiting downstairs.
While Alison examined the victim upstairs, the two officers started smashing the floor with hammers downstairs.
Bang!
"Ah!"
"Ah!"
"Ah!"
After a few strikes, with a "thunderous" noise, the shattered stone chips flew, and dust swirled, revealing a hidden basement!
At the same time, a strong stench of decay hit their noses!
After fetching a ladder, the two officers, wearing masks and holding flashlights, carefully climbed down.
The pitch-black basement, where one could not see their own hand, was only illuminated by the officers' flashlights.
The furnishings inside were very simple, with some old tables and chairs and several pots of different sizes on the ground. In the corner, there were also two barrels.
Because the smell was unbearable even with masks, the officers had to cover their noses and mouths as they explored slowly.
Suddenly, one of the officers shuddered. In the beam of his flashlight, he saw a skeleton!
"Captain Davidson! I've found something!"
The other officer immediately turned around, and they slowly approached the skeleton.
It was a small human skeleton, devoid of any flesh, roughly the size of a six or seven-year-old child.
As the officers got closer, thud!
Davidson accidentally kicked something. Upon inspection, it was a notebook.
Taking the notebook, they approached the small skeleton. They then noticed four more skeletons of similar size next to it.
One was slightly larger, probably around eight or nine years old.
"Oh, God!"
The five small skeletons were huddled together, indicating they must have been terrified before their deaths.
The officers were at a loss for words, unable to imagine what these children had endured.
After a thorough search of the basement, finding nothing else, they returned to the first floor of the villa.
"How is it?"
Davidson handed the notebook to Rodson. Reading the two officers' expressions, Rodson seemed to grasp the gravity of their findings. He opened the notebook, which listed names, phone numbers, addresses, amounts. Some names were marked with "buy," others with "sell," and some entries had only addresses with no names or contact information, marked with "abduct."
Rodson counted, "buy" and "abduct" totaled forty-seven, "sell" forty-two.
Continuing, he noticed the notebook's handwriting suddenly became erratic, filled with misspellings and strange symbols, requiring some guesswork to understand.
"That guy left his notebook behind. I've decided to secretly keep it from him. Who told him not to feed us enough?"
"Today, he took away Colin, and we lost another friend."
"That person is cruel, giving us very little to eat each day, even though he promised lots of good food when he brought me here."
"Another friend left today, it was Lily."
"I miss my mom and dad so much... If my mom were here, she'd definitely give me lots of food."
"Hmm, my dad would have beaten that person."
"Days passed, leaving only seven of us."
"Adam was so kind, he hid some food and shared it with me."
"When can we go home? I miss home, miss my mom, miss my dad..."
"Today, Adam was beaten for crying too loudly. That person hit him so hard, and as Adam cried harder, he was beaten more fiercely."
"Today, Adam left too, which is good; he doesn't have to endure the beatings anymore, but I won't see him again."
"Now, only six of us are left."
"Emma was also taken away. When will it be my turn?"
"That person started filling the staircase with dirt, but we five are still here. Won't he let us out?"
"It's so dark; the staircase is blocked. How will he bring us food?"
"Oh, he won't bring us food anymore."
"I'm so hungry."
"I'm so hungry."
"I'm so hungry."
"I'm so hungry."
"..."
The erratic handwriting ended there, with nothing further.
Rodson blinked rapidly, trying to keep the tears at bay. He could hardly imagine the despair of the child who, for several days, wrote only "hungry" in the notebook.
Next to him, Davidson hung his head low, 'I'm afraid this won't be easy to hear, but downstairs we discovered the skeletons of five children, ranging from five to eight years old in age.'"
"They were all skeletal, no flesh left."
"There were no signs of external injuries on the bones. Preliminary judgment, the children either suffocated or starved to death."
Struggling to contain himself, Rodson slapped the notebook into Nathan's chest, lit a cigarette, and walked outside, "I need some air, don't follow me!"
However, just two steps out, a woman's scream echoed from the second floor of the villa!
Rodson immediately rushed upstairs, finding Alison, the most experienced medical examiner in Manhattan, kneeling on the floor in panic, as if she had been greatly shocked, continuously sobbing.
Rodson, trying to calm himself, asked, "Madam, what happened?"
Alison, trembling, said, "Forty-six stabs, forty-seven slices..."
Forty-six stabs?
Forty-seven slices!
Understanding Alison's meaning, Rodson burst out laughing amidst tears, staring at the gruesomely sliced body, his eyes blazing with anger, "Good!"
"Perfect! This is divine punishment, you know. God punishes the demons from hell, and clearly, this guy was one."
"Such relief! This son of a bitch!"
After venting his anger, Rodson asked, "Alison, any other findings?"
Alison, still sobbing, cried out, "He, he didn't die!"
"After forty-six stabs, being cut into forty-seven connected slices, but he was still alive, he didn't die!"
At her last words, Alison was nearly screaming.
Rodson was stunned!
Then, Nathan, who had just read the notebook and ran up in anger with tears in his eyes, exclaimed in shock, "What?!"
...
In Florida, on Yundu Road's pedestrian street.
"Hello everyone! This is Random Street Interviews!"
"Today, we're in Florida's bustling Yundu Road, randomly interviewing handsome men and beautiful women!"
"Wow! I see a very gentlemanly handsome man!"
"Camera! Quick, follow!"
Kate, dressed in white and carrying a white shoulder bag, was walking leisurely down the street when a lovely girl with a microphone suddenly appeared in front of him, holding the microphone towards him with a smile, "Hello, buddy, you're so handsome! Can we do a street interview?"
Kate smiled slightly and nodded, "No problem."
The girl, utterly enchanted, exclaimed, "Wow! You look even better when you smile! What do you think is your greatest attribute?"
After saying this, she quickly added, "Besides being handsome!"
Kate thought for a moment, then smiled and said, "My greatest attribute would probably be kindness."
"Oh?"
The girl's eyes lit up, "Could you give us an example?"
Kate slightly lifted his head, his gold-rimmed glasses sparkling under the sunlight, his smile radiantly sunny.
"For instance, I had a dream where I and forty-six other children of my age were kidnapped."
"After we escaped, the other forty-six kids couldn't wait to take their revenge on the trafficker who had kidnapped us."
"But I was different. I thought, enduring forty-six stabs must be incredibly painful, deadly even..."
"I couldn't bear to see such a human tragedy unfold, so..."
At this point, Kate looked directly into the camera behind the street interview girl, his smile growing even broader—
"So, after he had suffered forty-six stabs, I gave him a breath of life."
girl conducting the interview: "..."
After a two-second silence, the girl's face was filled with immense awkwardness, "Um, awkward! Anyway, buddy, your joke is as cold as a polar vortex! Ha ha!"
Just as she was about to ask something else, Kate slightly bowed towards the camera, smiled gently, and turned to leave.
Kate's smile completely mesmerized the girl. When she snapped back to reality and tried to find Kate's figure in white again, all she saw was the bustling crowd on Yundu Road.
In the vast sea of people, where was that figure in white to be found?