Event Sequence

"This girl’s name is Chu Xin, a second-year student at Third High School in Hangcheng…"

Lin Qinghe continued, "Chu Xin and Zheng Shaotian had, well… a romantic entanglement during the first half of last year.

Zheng Shaotian pursued Chu Xin for several months without success and threatened all the male students at the school, forbidding them from pursuing Chu Xin. Perhaps this was where the conflict began.

At the beginning of January this year, Chu Xin officially started dating her boyfriend, Gu Sheng. The news reached Zheng Shaotian, after which word spread that Zheng Shaotian intended to teach Chu Xin and her boyfriend Gu Sheng a lesson.

Let’s talk about Gu Sheng. He was an orphan who grew up at Xiao District Orphanage in Hangcheng and had never been adopted. He was currently a fourth-year student at Hang City Electronic Technology College and carried fifty thousand in student loans, which he had just paid off last month.

There were several points worth noting. Gu Sheng was the survivor who suffered the lightest injuries in last year’s December 25 major accident. He did not even sustain minor injuries, and after two days of observation in the hospital, he was safely discharged.

None of that was the key point. The key point was that on the second day of his hospitalization, the hospital where he was staying, Hangzhou Central Hospital, was the scene of the murder of the Yao father and son. The killer was Tang Lie, whom we mentioned earlier.

What was even more noteworthy was that during Tang Lie’s pursuit of Yao Xingxing, he kicked open the door to Gu Sheng’s hospital room and stopped there for a while. You must understand that when Yao Xingxing passed that room, he did not stop at all—he went straight past it.

Another point was that when we entered the hospital room, Gu Sheng was lying there alone, perfectly fine."

"Inspector Lin!"

At this point, someone stood up to express his opinion—or rather, his accusation. "Since Gu Sheng was so suspicious at the time, why didn’t you take action then and arrest him?

This person was Zheng Chen, director of the Criminal Inspector’s Office in Li City, Zhejiang Province. He was decisive in his work, or even arbitrary, and whenever he had the slightest suspicion, he liked to let people sample the Cop Bureau Half-Month Package. As a result, many people ended up with black marks on their records and were cursed bitterly by the locals.

"Director Zheng, we can’t be careless in our work, but neither can we act arbitrarily. Arresting someone based on suspicion alone, without evidence, is simply reckless."

Before Lin Qinghe could respond, Director Zhang stood up and rebuked him sternly. Although their older generation sometimes considered matters too thoroughly and appeared hesitant, causing them to miss opportunities, they had never abused the authority in their hands. He had long been displeased with Director Zheng’s conduct in Li City.

Although his actions did not violate regulations, wasn’t arresting people at random lowering the organization’s credibility and cutting it off from the people?

Director Zheng was naturally unwilling to accept this and argued, "The major criminals nowadays are extremely cunning. If we investigate them using the old methods, we’ll alert them right away. By the time we have evidence, it’ll be too late—the criminals will have already fled. In situations like this, we should use decisive methods…"

"All right~~"

Director Qi spoke up. "What are you arguing about? You’re all grown men—what’s there to argue about? I’ll set the tone now. From today onward, no one is to be arrested without evidence. If someone must be arrested, send the specific information to the General Department for me to review personally."

Director Qi had also been frightened by Gu Sheng’s words. Tang Lie alone had caused so much turmoil. If the abuse of authority created more ‘Tang Lies’—and the most likely ones to emerge would be from the Criminal Inspectors—what would they do then?

Rather than play the wise man after the fact, it was better to impose restrictions at the source. In any case, this was the information age, and information traveled quickly.

He did not believe that his eyes had grown dim with age. He could still distinguish whether an evidence chain was rigorous or not. At worst, he would be a little more tired during this period. Once the local special department was established, things would become easier.

"This…"

Director Zheng looked astonished. He really did ‘like’ arresting people. It made him feel as if he held great power. Now that his superior had pulled this move, especially right after he had mocked Director Zhang, he felt extremely uncomfortable, as if he had swallowed a fly. It felt as though he was being targeted.

"All right, sit down. Inspector Lin, please continue~~"

Director Han spoke up. After a moment of dazed hesitation, Director Zheng sat down. Lin Qinghe continued, "Let me clarify the relationship between Gu Sheng and Chu Xin. The earliest traceable contact between them was at the end of December, when they first exchanged QQ Numbers.

The verifiable intimate relationship between Gu Sheng and Chu Xin occurred between January and February. According to their statements, the duration of their relationship matched the investigation’s findings. In other words, they had been together for a little over a month.

After Gu Sheng was discharged, he returned to school. The next day, he obtained an internship certificate from the school. After that, he stayed at Hangzhou Holiday Hotel, sharing a suite with his current employer, jewelry designer Liu Daimei.

Let’s talk about Liu Daimei. She was the second daughter of Liu Chuan, chairman of the Liu Group in Jin Jing City, Jiangsu Province, and the person in charge of the international brand Ofksiolve in China. She was currently establishing the Ofksiolve China studio, which was located in Hangcheng.

This brings us back to Chu Xin. According to them, Liu Daimei’s and Gu Sheng’s acquaintance originated with Chu Xin. Moreover, Chu Xin’s electronic correspondence with Liu Daimei did indeed predate her contact with Gu Sheng, but only by a few days.

In other words, based on our investigation, the time when these three became acquainted was roughly around the end of December. Yet in less than a month, their relationship had already become very close.

Returning to the subject, Zheng Shaotian had declared that he would deal with Chu Xin and Gu Sheng. He should have put those words into practice afterward.

We investigated Zheng Shaotian’s phone messages and discovered that his secondary number had made more than twenty unanswered calls throughout the afternoon of February 2.

After looking into the owner of the phone, we confirmed his identity. This man was named Wang Wan, a local of Hangcheng. He was unemployed and had always operated in the gray areas. On the afternoon of February 2, he disappeared along with four other people. The five had yet to be found, and we suspected they were already dead.

After Zheng Shaotian’s death, a number also began calling his short number repeatedly. This number had likewise made frequent calls to Wang Wan’s number after the second. After investigating, we confirmed the owner’s identity.

Hans Hu, a local of Hangcheng, was unemployed and had long been involved in criminal industries, acting as an intermediary. Based on the evidence currently available, he was suspected of having participated in many serious incidents.

We inferred that he was the intermediary between Zheng Shaotian and Wang Wan this time. At noon on February 3, after the five people disappeared, Zheng Han’s family found him. The two sides got into a dispute, and the matter was taken to the City Police Department in Hangcheng to resolve the conflict.

Then, sometime between one and two in the afternoon on the third, just after leaving the City Police Department, Hans Hu was found dead in the parking lot outside the department. The cause of death was unknown. This lead concerning Zheng Shaotian ended there.

However, the coincidence was that during that period on the afternoon of February 3, Chu Xin and Gu Sheng were inside the City Police Department. They had very likely met Hans Hu."

Lin Qinghe concluded, "Based on the information currently in our possession, we have reason to suspect that Gu Sheng, Chu Xin, and Liu Daimei are all subjects of suspicion."