“Let’s stop here today, and I’ll come to see you next week.” Su Hui closed the book and raised his eyes, he felt that he had more or less already gotten the answers he wanted from Song Rongjiang.

Su Hui ended the conversation, next he needed to go to other places to collect information.

He was not in a hurry to go home, rather after he got off the roller coaster from the prison, he went to Song Rongjiang’s house first according to the recorded address, and met Song Rongjiang’s seriously ill mother.

In the white corridor outside the house, “Murderer” was written all over with red paint, and the word was written layer after layer, and at first, someone painted over it with white paint. Later, the person who splashed the paint became numb, and the person who painted the wall white also became numb.

Those scarlet letters just stayed like this, and they began to gradually mottle.

Su Hui knocked on the door for a long time before someone came to open it. Song Rongjiang’s mother was already bedridden and her clothes were disheveled. Her daily food and drink became a problem, and she depended on the help of the street cadres and aunts. She was even more indifferent to that son and was brought to tears frequently whenever she mentioned him.

Then Su Hui met the neighbors near Song Rongjiang’s house, and then went to Song Rongjiang’s former head teacher.

He unceasingly asked them what kind of person Song Rongjiang was and what he had experienced in his life.

Then he became more and more sure that a girl once existed in Song Rongjiang’s life.

The girl was older than Song Rongjiang.

During the time she met Song Rongjiang, she had short hair, was thin, and had a flat chest. She was taller than boys of the same age. She had single eyelids, widely spaced eyes, and a slightly collapsed nose. She was not pretty, but she looked very unique.

She didn’t talk much, she liked poetry, and she liked to read books.

She had sympathy for the weak and would approach and talk to those who are reticent.

She would listen to the stories of the underdog and subconsciously feel like a savior. But she was always burdened by this situation and may have been ridiculed as the Virgin Mary.

Her attentive listening made Song Rongjiang mistake it for love.

They had an unpleasant affair, but in the end, they cheated and ultimately broke up.

Regarding this girl, some of those interviewed said that they could not remember, and some said that they did not know.

In the end, Su Hui returned to the rental bookstore that had been turned into a coffee shop.

Fortunately, although the place had been renovated and its use changed, the owner had not.

The boss still remembered Song Rongjiang, and took the initiative to mention to Su Hui that Song Rongjiang was arrested for murder this year. The boss felt very regretful and sorry.

Su Hui chatted with him for a while and then asked about the girl.

The boss recalled: “I remember when Song Rongjiang was in junior high school, there was a girl here who was very close to him. That girl was our super member and liked to read books. She seemed to be called Tao Li.”

The time, the description, it all sounded right, they had a lot of time to spend together and shared interests.

Su Hui felt that he had found a glimmer of hope in the darkness: “Do you have her phone number or home address?”

The boss said: “This is all many years ago. Her mobile phone number was changed later, but I remember that super members were registered with addresses.”

As he spoke, the boss took out several thick stacks of information books from under the table. Su Hui coughed and they rummaged through them together.

After a while, the boss breathed a sigh of relief: “I found her address. I don’t know if she has moved. You can go and try your luck.”

Su Hui copied the address on a note, and checked the time, it was past 8:30 in the evening, he held the scepter and the note and still decided to visit.

There were less than ten days to Song Rongjiang’s death sentence, he was running out of time, and he had not yet solved the mystery.

The location where Su Hui lived already deviated from the city center, and the place where Tao Li lived was even more deviated. It was a large old building area, and it was always said that it would be demolished and the residents would be relocated, but it had not yet been renovated.

Su Hui called a car, and the driver took the wrong route. After a while, he stopped in a small alley in front of an old building that didn’t even have a community.

Su Hui went upstairs according to the address. The building had an outdated double-layer security door. He knocked on the door, and a woman in her thirties opened it. It was a neat, white and thin woman, although Su Hui could only see the outline. But the moment he saw her, Su Hui was certain that she should definitely be the origin of Song Rongjiang’s massacre.

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Because she was too close to the appearance and distinctive features of the victims.

The characteristics of the multiple victims *coincidentally reflected the woman in front of him, which is the compensatory killing that serial killers often do.

Show/Hide Note

*(bu yue er tong) Lit: To agree by chance (idiom) – Fig: Taking the same action without prior consultation.

Song Rongjiang had killed repeatedly, all because he wanted to keep this one woman.

Now that the woman had grown up, grown old, and no longer fit his memory, his target had become younger women.

Song Rongjiang wanted to re-enact everything that had happened, and this is his psychological aberration.

“Who are you looking for?” the woman asked in a low voice.

“Are you Tao Li? My name is Su Hui. I’m a teacher at the Huadu Police Academy and a police officer.” Su Hui politely showed his police certificate.

“You… what do you want from me?” The woman reached out and pulled the hair around her ear.

“I want to ask, do you know about the taxi driver murder that happened in Huadu recently?” Su Hui asked this sentence, and he paid attention to the woman’s expression.

Tao Li was obviously nervous.

Su Hui continued to ask, “Do you know a person named Song Rongjiang?”

In an instant, the woman’s face turned pale, and her eyes were full of fear. She hurriedly shook her head, eager to deny: “No…no…”

A man’s voice came from the inner room: “It’s so late, who is it?”

“It’s an insurance salesman…” the woman said, hurriedly going to close the door.

Su Hui stretched out his hand to stop her from closing the door. The woman’s eyes were full of pleading: “He’s going to die… Let me go, I don’t want to hear that name anymore…”

Su replied, “But Pei Weiwei hasn’t been found yet.”

“I don’t know, these matters have nothing to do with me.” Tao Li whispered. At this time, a baby’s cry came from the room, and then came the man’s complaint. The woman looked back, expression nearly at the point of crying.

Song Rongjiang’s affairs are like a nightmare that haunts her, making her feel as if she had a *fishbone stuck in her throat all the time.

Show/Hide Note

*(ru geng zai hou) Lit: As if having a fish bone stuck in one’s throat (idiom) – Fig: very upset and needing to express one’s displeasure.

Su Hui knew that this conversation couldn’t be carried out tonight, so he quickly shoved his business card at her: “I know, recalling him may make you feel uncomfortable, but if you can answer some of my questions, maybe it will be helpful in  finding Pei Weiwei…”

The answers to what they’ve said, where they’ve been, and what they’ve done may lie in those scattered pasts.

The woman didn’t reach out to pick it up, the business card fell to the ground, she gave him one last look, and closed the door anyway.

Before coming, Su Hui was prepared to waste his words, but he didn’t expect it to end so quickly.

Obviously, Tao Li also realized that the victims were similar to her. Now that she had a family and children, she didn’t want to have anything to do with that pervert anymore.

Su Hui understood Tao Li’s fear and dread very well, he felt it was pardonable.

He went downstairs, the long street was dark, and the taxi that had bought him had already left.

Su Hui sighed softly and walked out of the alley.

There seemed to be endless darkness outside, nearly to the point of devouring his thin and frail figure. His eyesight was not good, and the buildings in the distance look hazy in the night, almost unrecognizable.

There was a faint sound of thunder in the sky, it was about to rain.

For a moment, Su Hui was surrounded by a strong sense of frustration. Fortunately, while he was isolating those positive emotions, it was difficult for the negative emotions to affect him more deeply. The frustration quickly disappeared.

Searching for a missing girl in a bustling city of tens of millions.

The police put in a lot of manpower, but nothing.

The same goes for those ordinary people who were still looking for Pei Weiwei, they couldn’t get close to the truth.

Su Hui felt like a warrior isolated and without help, facing an unwinnable war.

Initially, he just thought that he should not watch with folded arms and promised Tan Ju that he would try, but implementing all the processes was much more difficult than he imagined.

He didn’t know what he was looking for, what proof.

He told himself that Pei Weiwei should have died a hundred days ago.

What he was looking for might just be a little hope, maybe just a dead bone.

Su Hui leaned on the scepter and walked in the dark. He walked around for a while, his legs were a little sore, and eventually, he realized that he must have lost his way.

He had poor eyesight, and these inconveniences were magnified in this darkness.

These dark alleys were like labyrinths that looked the same everywhere and never ended.

The lights that were lit in the distance were like fireflies, but the surroundings were extremely quiet, and there was not even a shadow.

He felt as if the whole world was unfriendly.

To make matters worse, a light rain started to fall from the sky, and it gradually showed signs of getting bigger, his bangs were soon drenched.

Su Hui picked up his mobile phone and started to request a taxi. After a few minutes, a driver took the request and asked him where he was, but he was already trapped in those lanes and couldn’t tell where it was.

Read on Otaku translations. Any other site is a no-no.

The driver quickly hung up his phone impatiently and canceled the order.

He called the car for a few more minutes and even doubled the money, but no one cared.

Su Hui thought of booking a car and then flipped through but it showed that it was beyond the normal business hours and had to be booked in advance.

Su Hui reluctantly closed the taxi app, and hid under a small roof, rummaging through the phone address book, thinking about his friends, colleagues, and even those students.

But… it didn’t seem like he should bother people on such a rainy night.

His chest was so oppressed that it seemed like a stone had been pressed against it. Su Hui coughed a few times, but the feeling couldn’t be stopped. He covered his mouth and couldn’t help bending down.

The rain was getting heavier and heavier, it was so big that he was *unable to move a single step.

Just when Su Hui was thinking about it, his phone suddenly rang.

When Su Hui opened WeChat, someone had added him as a friend. The other party’s username was Wei Chi, his profile picture was a snow-white Scotch Collie, and he wrote three words for verification: “Lu Junchi”.

The author has something to say: What about the Captain? Here is a poor little one waiting for you to pick it up and take it home~

TN: 

Imagine being the object of someone’s obsession and delusional fantasy to the point they k!ll others to facilitate their grievances over you! Just thinking about it gives me shivers. And not the good kind! The mind of a psychopath is a scary thing.