Chapter 114 - 108: The First Chain of Reasoning! The Problematic File

"A school..."

Li Jianye pondered for a moment, then nodded.

"Alright."

With that, he didn’t waste any more time.

He got right into the police car carrying the three heads and drove toward the main station.

Zhaozhou City wasn’t large, and there weren’t many schools within it.

If the killer really was a student...

The workload wouldn’t be too overwhelming.

...

...

Just as Xu Huo had predicted.

That night, at 8:30 PM, it had taken less than twelve hours.

The identities of the three victims had been confirmed, and a neatly compiled report with all their information was placed on the office table in front of them.

Of course, the only thing that didn’t go as expected was...

The workload.

"Goddammit, if I ever believe a single word out of your mouth again that isn’t directly related to the case, I’m a dog!"

At 8:30 PM, an exhausted and overwhelmed Li Jianye was in the office, denouncing Xu Huo’s "crimes."

Zhaozhou City was an undeveloped county-level city, but there were still many schools that matched the lead.

High schools, private high schools, vocational schools, universities, and so on, not to mention various training centers.

Li Jianye had wasted the entire morning. After a full morning of searching, he had only managed to check two universities that were somewhat plausible.

It wasn’t until he searched by the victims’ ages, narrowing the focus to around 19 years old.

An age of 19, combined with their appearance, led him to temporarily rule out universities and regular high schools and prioritize vocational and private schools.

The victims wore makeup, had long hair, and wore perfume.

In a public high school, this would almost certainly have triggered the homeroom teacher’s wrath, so he could quickly rule out that possibility.

Finally, in the city’s only private high school, he spent an afternoon and...

Located the files of the three victims!

"The deceased are named Cheng Yu, Li Xueyan, and Tu Ting."

"All three were nineteen this year, currently first-year university students. We found their records at the Zhaozhou Luyang Private Senior High School."

"According to the files, Li Xueyan and Tu Ting came from well-off families. Their parents are all company employees."

"Cheng Yu’s family background is more exceptional. Both her parents are business owners, and her father is on the board of directors for the private high school."

"The school’s official evaluation in all three of their files is ’excellent’."

"Their life histories are unremarkable. No criminal records with the police, not even any minor infractions."

"They started university in early October, didn’t participate in military training, it’s unclear how they got along with their classmates, they didn’t live in the dorms, they lived off-campus..."

Xu Huo ignored Li Jianye’s complaints. The more he looked at the files, the deeper his brows furrowed.

’This file...’

"It’s very... ’healthy’?" Qian Hua, sitting beside him, looked on with confusion in his eyes.

That’s right, healthy. "Healthy" was the best word to describe the files.

No bad habits.

No demerits whatsoever. Cheng Yu, in particular, had even won various awards and scholarships... not that she needed them.

If you were to judge by the files alone...

She was a very well-behaved girl.

"She didn’t participate in the military training?"

Xu Huo looked up. "Was there an emergency, or does she have some kind of physical condition?"

"Faked being sick," Li Jianye said.

Faked being sick?

’Military training has two purposes. One is to improve physical fitness. The other... is a test of obedience.’

’And Cheng Yu faked an illness to get out of it?’

Xu Huo thought for a moment, then raised his gaze.

"Who were they on bad terms with?"

"We haven’t conducted detailed interviews yet. Judging solely from the files, probably no one."

Li Jianye thought for a moment before speaking.

Looking at the files, the three of them were flawless.

But that brought up another question...

"If they were really as the files described..."

"Why would the killer murder them?"

Xu Huo’s counter-question plunged them all into silence.

Judging by the brutal state of the bodies, the killer wasn’t after sex. Their makeup made that clear.

Was it for money?

Honestly, even back in ’03,

if the killer had kidnapped Cheng Yu and demanded a million from her family... they would have just thought, ’Where did this beggar come from?’

"The killer murdered them but didn’t demand a ransom."

"In other words, the motive wasn’t lust or money. It was..."

"Rage?"

Xu Huo paused, proposing an idea.

"You’ve all seen the crime scene. The killer is very calm. And calm people don’t tend to have major emotional fluctuations."

"The injuries on the bodies indicate the victims’ final moments were anything but peaceful."

"This type of act can only be driven by intense emotions."

The methods used at the crime scene proved this was a Murder.

The motives for Murder are generally a handful of options.

Now, we’ve ruled out money. Add to that the gruesome wounds on their faces and the act of stapling them, which seems like an emotional release...

The probability of rage is high.

"Some people’s minds twist when they’re extremely angry. For example, if you’re torturing someone, you don’t want to see them cry; you want to make them smile while you torture them."

"The killer used a stapler to create a smile. Is that psychopathy, or is it rage?"

A psychopath? It’s possible.

But a calm psychopath who also possesses extremely strong counter-surveillance awareness... a perfectly calm psychopath... they’re not common.

In comparison...

"Rage. Cases born from rage..."

"...are often caused by intense emotions, and intense emotions can only come from conflict."

"And in most conflicts, there’s a right side and a wrong side."

Xu Huo thought for a moment, then methodically laid out his logic.

In an argument, the one who is wronged, the one who is right, the one who gets the short end of the stick—that person is usually the angriest.

Regardless of the emotions that caused the conflict between them,

but...

at the end of the day, for a rational person, the event that sparks the conflict can’t have been a small one.

Especially when it leads to Murder!

As soon as a person starts thinking, they weigh the pros and cons. Only when the weight of the injustice they suffered is greater than the penalty for the crime will they decide to act!

Which means...

"I’m currently constructing the first chain of reasoning."

"That is, the killer likely had some sort of conflict with the three victims."

"This conflict was huge—so huge that it generated a monstrous hatred in the killer, enough to make them murder someone and cut off their head, even while remaining perfectly calm."

Looking around, Xu Huo slowly tapped his fingers.

His fingertips TAPPED on the file.

To be able to generate that kind of murderous hatred and act on it, regardless of who was right or wrong...

barring any unusual circumstances, that’s not something a soft-hearted person could do.

"Yes, three ’good little girls’ who could push a calm person to this point."

Xu Huo turned his gaze to Li Jianye.

"Captain Li, this file."

"Based on this chain of reasoning..."

"There’s a problem with it, isn’t there?"

’A problematic file?’

’Problematic investigation information!’

Suddenly, as if this awakened a fragment of a memory, Li Jianye’s pupils contracted. A memory surfaced in his mind.

’It seemed like, back when they were investigating that case at the crossroads...’

’Xu Huo had said something similar then, too.’

"The victims... who exactly were they in contact with?!"

Xu Huo frowned, his mind racing.

’The level of counter-surveillance at the crime scene isn’t something an ordinary person could pull off.’

’And for the victims to have provoked such a calm person to this extent...’

"The killer’s counter-surveillance awareness is a little too good."

"What’s his identity?"

"And how did the victims get involved with someone like that?"

"What on earth did they do?!"

Finally, looking at Li Jianye, he stared directly into the captain’s eyes.

Xu Huo voiced his final question.

"And also, this file..."

"Where was it pulled from?!"

’Ah, the files. There aren’t many people who can tamper with official records.’

’But, if someone *can* interfere...’

’Tsk, then their identity becomes a whole other puzzle!’