Chapter 288 167: Monkey Tamer? The Monkey Kills!?

"Then why didn't the victims resist? Why didn't they just call the police?"

"There are only two possibilities. One, they were willing to be killed. Two… they were held captive!"

The first scenario was almost impossible.

Sure, some people might be willing to die. But to willingly be paraded around naked with a dog chain around your neck before getting killed…

Even if such people existed, finding five of them was highly unlikely.

And most importantly…

"Even if you could find five people who wanted that, their families certainly wouldn't."

"There are five victims. The youngest is around thirty-five, and the oldest is over fifty, possibly even sixty."

Xu Huo pried open the corpse's mouth to look at its teeth, then shook his head.

"They're middle-aged. This is the time in life when you have the most friends, relatives, and family."

"If one person disappears, a lot of people will be worried sick."

"Let alone five people."

"Based on their appearances and ages, they don't seem related. That means five separate families. If someone from all five families disappeared…"

"Wouldn't their families report them missing?"

Seriously, if anyone goes missing for more than two days, their family will blow up their phone trying to reach them.

If your family can't get through after calling two or three times, the stress would be too much. They'd definitely call the police.

But the police hadn't received a single call.

Plus, the abuse the victims suffered appeared to have been cumulative…

"What I suspect is this."

"The killer might not have controlled just these five people."

"But their entire families!"

Xu Huo frowned. As he looked at the five bodies, he could almost see their families standing behind them.

The killer might be holding more lives in their hands than just these victims!

'Why do I think that?'

'The sweetness. The sweet smell at the scene… it comes from Stockholm Syndrome!'

What kind of condition is that? The name alone can be confusing.

It's basically a form of masochism.

Imagine someone imprisons you, beats and abuses you for an extended period. An indescribable feeling starts to grow inside you, and then…

You fall in love with them.

That's right. You fall in love with your captor.

There was a case in the Bear Country where a man imprisoned a young woman. After prolonged sexual abuse, she fell in love with him.

Does it happen in the Eastern Country?

Yes. Some rape victims end up marrying their attackers. If you exclude those who do it to preserve their reputation, the rest have genuinely fallen in love with their rapists.

It's a twisted psychological phenomenon, but it's real.

The sweet scent from the victims had a hint of bitterness, which perfectly matched the twisted sweetness of Stockholm Syndrome.

And achieving that state most likely requires long-term abuse.

And the implications of "long-term" abuse were exactly what Xu Huo feared.

At this thought, a grim feeling settled over everyone present.

"The five victims' facial features are intact."

"Their fingerprints haven't been wiped either. Run them through the police database."

"I want their files, and I want them fast!"

Xu Huo said, his expression grim.

'If my guess is right, a lot of lives are at stake…'

'The police can't afford to be slow.'

"Got it."

Li Jianye nodded.

The victims' faces were clearly identifiable, so their basic information should be on file. It was just a matter of confirming it.

If he couldn't work backward from the bodies to find their files, he'd be failing his duty as a captain.

He personally led a team to handle it.

Just as he was about to leave, Xu Huo suddenly called out to him.

"Right, also look into the local prostitutes."

As an afterthought, Xu Huo added.

"Prostitutes?" Li Jianye paused, completely baffled.

This case… is somehow connected to prostitutes!?

"Just check it out."

Xu Huo didn't elaborate.

His nose told him that among the faint, lingering scents, he could detect the smell of STDs.

There was also a foul, fishy odor.

It was the same smell he'd detected around Lin Miao back in the Capital City.

If the rain hadn't washed it away, the smell would have been much fouler, much more pungent.

Li Jianye thought for a moment, then nodded and made a mental note.

"Alright, I'm on it."

With that, he turned and left.

Xu Huo then put that aside and turned his attention to the other personnel at the scene.

"What's the status on processing the scene?"

Xu Huo asked.

A Police Chief who had been squatting on the ground stood up quickly, let out a breath, and reported:

"The rain wasn't heavy, so it didn't have a major impact on our investigation of the scene."

"It did make the K-9 unit useless, though. So far, combining our findings with Mr. Wang's statement, this is all we have…"

The Police Chief handed him a file.

It was a crime scene investigation report.

Xu Huo glanced through it.

"There are some footprints at the scene, but they're not just from humans."

"The footprints are strange."

The Police Chief led Xu Huo over to where the prints had been found.

"We found ape prints, but no dog prints."

"Mr. Wang said he saw a dog, but we can't find any dog prints."

"We're trying to figure out if Mr. Wang was mistaken, or if the dog's prints were too small and got washed away by the rain."

There were a lot of prints at the scene.

Marks from the victims crawling, plus ape and human footprints.

All of those were found at the scene, but none from a dog.

The police couldn't find any dog prints.

It seemed like a strange clue at first, but on second thought…

Dogs are small. Their prints are hard to see even on a sunny day. The slightest bit of rain could wash them away, so it makes sense that we can't find any.

Xu Huo considered this for a moment, filing the detail away in his mind.

He then stood up and glanced at the crowd of onlookers.

The rumors about the killer were getting more and more bizarre.

Some said it was a Ghost Messenger, others claimed it was a ghost…

The surveillance cameras had only captured a blurry black shadow, which only fueled the rumors.

Xu Huo paid them no mind, not bothering to correct them.

Just then, a new line of thought struck him.

_Note: The legendary Ghost Messengers have appeared in Jiangsan City. They collect the souls of those who deserve to die, walk the roads, and lead them to the Underworld…_

Xu Huo stood up. He looked at the pale blue screen that had appeared before him, his brow furrowed as he stared at the small, inconspicuous text.

"'Those who deserve to die?' 'Deserve to die?'"

'Ghost Messengers collect the souls of those who deserve to die.'

'But… does 'deserve to die' mean people who have committed terrible sins?'

'Or does it just mean people whose natural time is up?'

'If it's the latter, then this text is just a description, nothing more.'

'But if it's the former…'

'Deserve to die?'

'You wouldn't say someone who died of old age 'deserved to die'!'

'If it really is the former, then that means…'

"Deserve to die? What did these victims do?"

Suddenly, Xu Huo froze. The clues he'd just gathered flashed through his mind, and he narrowed his eyes.

He had smelled an intensely acrid scent on the victims.

It was left by the killer. It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say the killer's rage toward the victims was like a volcano.

It was pure rage.

Combined with the phrase "deserve to die"…

"What did the victims do?"

'Five people. Different ages, different genders, from five different families, and they probably didn't even know each other…'

Xu Huo narrowed his eyes.

'What could these people have done to the same person, or group of people?'

'And why would they do it?'

'Is the killer a monkey trainer? Did he use a monkey to commit the murders? The knockout drug… a monkey could administer a knockout drug…'

'And what about the ape? Could it be trained like the monkey? What role would it play?'

'If the monkey administered the drug, could it also kill? Is the killer really a monkey trainer?'

'And the flute… why play a flute? It could easily wake people up. Isn't that just asking to get caught?'

'Hanging the bodies at a crossroads, putting them right in front of the police…'

'The prostitution angle, the strong scent of STDs…'

Question after question, clue after clue, swirled in his mind.

"This case…"

"What the hell is going on!?"

Xu Huo wracked his brain, but unfortunately, no new clues emerged.

Until…

「January 3rd.」

「1:30 PM.」

A shout echoed through the city bureau, and everyone's spirits lifted.

"We found it!"

"We've identified the victims!"

"The identities of these people…"

Inside the Jiangsan City Police Bureau, officers held the victims' files, staring at the information within.

Their brows furrowed in unison. After a moment, they all uttered the same three words.

"This is weird!!!"