Chapter 68: Eliminating Suspects

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation  Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

“Xu Lan! Why did you call me to come over! I have many manuscripts to write, I have no time for you!” Shen Xiang said without giving any thought about her image when she looked up and saw Xu Lan smoking on the third floor. Although she was quite fond of Xu Lan before this happened, it was still not enough to replace Wu Wendi’s place in her heart.

Xu Lan invited Shen Xiang up and handed over the photos he was holding, “I want to ask if Xiao Wu had any preference of using ‘0’ and ‘1’ to symbolize a certain code or characters?”

Shen Xiang stared at the photos for quite some time and said, “No!”

“Please think carefully, did she show any abnormal signs recently?” Xu Lan frowned and asked hoarsely.

“Abnormal signs? She was never normal ever since she started getting involved in this case! She spent all day at the police station and continued to analyze information when she got home at night! What kind of codes and clues, was she supposed to worry about them? She even lost her life in the end!”

“What code was she deciphering?” Xu Lan narrowed his dark eyes and asked sternly.

“How would I know what code was it. It was so messy that it makes me dizzy! I’m here to demand justice for Wu Wendi! If the police are still as useless as before, I don’t mind making our relationship worse! I don’t want to repeat what happened five years ago!” Shen Xiang was getting angrier while she spoke, her delicate make-up suddenly seemed quite vicious.

“… I’m so sorry for the way things turned out. We’ll not shirk our responsibilities and will definitely do justice to Xiao Wu! If you’re not that busy, you can stay with us and help out.”

Xu Lan was looking at the clock on the wall when Xiao Li pushed open the door and entered.

“Sergeant Xu, Officer Li is here.”

The meeting room was full of people, only this time, the atmosphere was not as heavy as before. Some could say that they were excited. There was a constant exchange of whispers. Finally, all of them looked at Xu Lan who was sitting beside Hu Cheng, who was also the person in charge of the case.

He announced that he knew the identity of the killer!

“Xu Lan, we’re ready, you can start now,” Hu Cheng said, feeling a little uneasy while he opened his notebook.

“Okay, thank you everyone for trusting me. I’m also responsible for Xiao Wu’s death. Because of me, Xiao Wu fell into the hands of the killer alone…”

A cup of hot water came pouring down from his head!

“Sergeant Xu! Are you alright?” Zhu Jing who was minuting beside Xu Lan sprung up to check on him, “Shen, you!”

Zhen Xiang broke down in tears while she remained in the position from where she splashed Xu Lan. Her delicate make-up had smudged due to her sobbing and her whole body started to convulse.

“No worries,” Xu Lan wiped the water off, his face was bright red due to scalding, “Ms. Shen, I’m bringing justice to Xiao Wu today.”

Xu Lan turned on his laptop and strung the time, method and victim of the crimes together. All of them were directed toward Li Xiu. Once he finished, everybody could hardly sit still as the news was as shocking as thunder. People started to raise doubts and discussions.

“Silence! Let Xu Lan Finish!” Hu Cheng was sitting in the middle, where he used his tobacco pipe to knock on the table to stabilize the situation.

“Officer Li, are you feeling better?” Except for the time when Xu Lan suspected Li Xiu as the killer which gained a surprised look from him, he remained seated on the chair with a stoic composure.

“Inveterate disease, can’t get rid of them,” Li Xiu said while he pushed his frameless spectacles.

“That’s good. If I mentioned anything incorrectly, you’re welcome to point it out anytime, Officer Li,” Xu Lan said while he took out a stack of letters.

Li Xiu lowered his eyebrows and made a welcoming gesture with a gentle smile. It was a gentle motion signaling him to start the show.

“Firstly, I would like to start from the Jingxinyuan case. It’s also the case where the killer had the most slip-ups. This stack of letters was written by the killer to his father,” Xu Lan took out one at a time to show everybody.

There was nothing unusual with these letters, except for their source. Although there were no surveillance cameras at the construction site, after inspecting all of the surrounding intersections, Xiao Xu noticed that a middle-aged man that wore a cap always appeared when Li Kui received the letters.

Xu Lan sent his man to find the middle-aged man, only to understand later that these letters were written on his behalf and were delivered by another person. Following this lead, a guy with the surname Liu slowly emerged to the surface, where he was also tied to the thirty thousand bank card.

At the same time, the appearance of Qiu Ling got everyone’s hopes up. From then onwards, the consensus was that these crimes were not committed by a single person, but an organized crime by a criminal gang. However, even after detailed inspection, they found that Qiu Ling did not play a major role in it. She just helped him to seek for girls and introduce them to the gang. The one she introduced them to was a guy with the surname Liu!

The killer was unusually reckless to leave his semen in the victim’s body. By coincidence, the police found out that the DNA of the semen was a perfect match to the person beside Li Xiu, Lao Liu.

Xu Lan presented the entire chain of evidence before everyone, where all of the information was focused on the driver, Lao Liu.

“Brother Lan, what has this got to do with me?” Li Xiu asked since he still did not understand what was the relation that linked him to that information.

“Hmm, please let me finish,” Xu Lan drank a mouthful of water and said patiently.

The case seemed to come to an end without any doubt that Lao Liu was identified as the killer. Xu Lan also thought that he was the killer involved in these cases, but there was one thing that kept bothering him. He could not understand why Li Xiu’s fingerprints would appear in Jingxinyuan. Furthermore, after further investigations Liu had an alibi at the time when all the crimes were committed.

“So it wasn’t Lao Liu either?” Li Xiu lifted his eyebrows and the corner of his mouth as if he had just heard a joke.

The people in the meeting room also started to get restless. Did they lose the lead again? The bowl of Hu Cheng’s tobacco pipe started to burn again.

“Report!” Xiao Li was standing at the door with a carton box in his arms, while he tried to catch his breath.

“Please come in.”

Xu Lan tapped on Xiao Li’s shoulders and received the carton box from him.

“Of course, the direct evidence that can prove your involvement in the case is your fingerprints in Jingxinyuan. Lao Liu was also your driver, there’s reasonable doubt to suspect you ordered Lao Liu to do it,” Xu Lan shared his thoughts calmly.

Sun Fei disapproved of Xu Lan to show the scratch marks from the victim’s bed in Jingxinyuan, but it was displayed in front of everyone in the end. ·———&?—·, there were two unidentifiable marks separating it. Sun Fei mentioned that he had compared it with all the cipher keys but he still could not figure out what message she was trying to convey.

Xu Lan actually thought that it was very simple. The morse code was characterized by dits and dahs, where each alphabet had its own unique signals. ·——— represented the character ‘J’, while &?—· represented another character. If they treated ? as —·, it would be —·—·, which represented ‘C’.

The whole code would be translated as JC.

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