Stuck in a Chinese novel

Chapter 28: Investigation

It was a good day for Detective Zhao Hui until his phone rang. Zhao Hui didn't want to pick it up because it was work and he didn't want to work when his shift was over.

However, there was a saying in police. 'A homicide detective doesn't have a shift because crimes and murder happen all the time.'

Zhao Hui picked up the phone of his supervisor begrudgingly and said, "Chief, my shift is over." He was trying to dodge it but from the looks of it, he wouldn't be able to as his chief said, "Get your butt to 'The Club'. A major crime has happened."

Zhao Hui sighed and hung up the phone. He got into his car and drove to the crime scene. Upon reaching the driveway, he saw many ambulances and many policemen at work. A lot of the public tried to see what had happened while the media grilled the police officers for questions.

Some reporters approached him as well and asked, "Detective Hui. What do you have to say about the crime scene?"

Zhao Hui sighed as reporters swarmed him and once he was sure everyone was attentive, he replied, "I just got here. How would I know what happened over here without taking a look first?"

Zhao Hui didn't answer another question and entered the club. As soon as he did, a police officer pointed him towards the manager's room. On the way to the manager's room, he saw three corpses just outside the room, lying a little away from the door. Although there was no forensics to report, Zhao Hui could tell how they had died. One clean shot to the head and they were gone.

He observed them for a little while before he asked the policeman near the bodies, "Where are the forensics? Why is no one taking care of this?"

The policeman replied, "The forensics are inside."

"Why?" Zhao Hui asked, completely confused. If the bodies were here, why were the forensics inside?

"Because there are more inside." The policeman replied.

Zhao Hui understood but asked himself inwardly, 'More? What does that mean?' All his questions were answered as soon as he entered the manager's room. Eight dead bodies lie on the carpet like a work of art. The cause of death, even from a glance he could tell. A straight clean shot to the head and they died where they stood or sat.

"Report." Zhao Hui said to a forensic analyst who was examining the crime scene and securing evidence.

"Report? Well, I don't even know how to begin. The crime scene itself is very simple. Too simple even. But the crime itself is professional. Highly professional.

To the point where I am forced to think that such a perfect crime has never existed before." The forensic analyst kept on rambling while Zhao Hui checked all of the corpses in order.

"How did they die?" Zhao Hui asked.

"If you want to know the cause of death, then that's simple. A clean straight shot to the head before the human body could even process what was happening. But if you are asking about what killed them, then I have no answer." The forensic analyst replied.

He then moved over to one corpse that had a gun in its hand. "You see, all of them died with this gun. All those in this room. The killer first knocked this man out with a clean strike on the neck that fractured the neck, knocking him out. Then he took his gun and in less than twelve seconds, shot six of the other guys. Then he killed that one on the chair after an interval of about five seconds.

Then, he made this guy, whose gun it was, hold it and shot him with it, making it look like a suicide." The forensic analyst explained.

"Not very good, is he? If we can tell that he tried to make it look like a crime scene." Zhao Hui replied. If they could tell at a glance that the killer was someone else, then why bother trying to frame someone else?

"Only he didn't." The forensic expert replied before he continued, "If he wanted to frame this man, he could have simply changed his angle a bit when shooting or knocked this man out some other way. The strike to his neck was delivered expertly which means the killer chose to knock him out like that. There were many other ways. My guess is that the killer is calculative.

He created a shred of evidence that would be hard to create. I mean, can you imagine this all in less than thirty seconds? I believe there was no solid move behind framing this guy besides creating innocence for himself. No judge or jury would believe the facts we have gathered. It's humanly impossible."

After listening to the explanation from the forensic expert, Zhao Hui expertly said, "Then maybe it wasn't a normal human?"

The forensic expert shook his head, "I know what you are thinking. However, there were no traces of Qi. Before calling you, the chief arrived at the same conclusion and asked the old man Wei to see this. He found no traces of Qi. It was done by a normal human."

Now Zhao Hui was extremely confused. He couldn't figure out the crime itself let alone the motive. Since the victims belonged to a gang, it could have been a simple assassination, but who would send such an expert who would no doubt be expensive to kill such small timers?

The more Zhao Hui thought about it, the more he became confused. "What about the CCTV?" Zhao Hui asked, hoping to find something.

"Well, that is where the crime becomes perfect. You see, after killing everyone, the killer accessed the computer. He already knew the code or he bypassed it so that could be a clue. After that, he entered the online server, erased all data from there, and downloaded it to the hard drive while replacing the online server with other data so the data was permanently erased from the online server.

Then he took the hard drive. In my opinion, the killer was thorough through and through." The forensic expert explained that as well.

"However, there are a few things that even he couldn't account for." The forensic expert, for the first time, said something that could be a clue.

"You see, after killing the last person with his own gun, he took the gun of another person and killed the three outside that I expect were the backup. After that, he took all the guns. Now it isn't a big gang so they don't have untraceable guns so if they are used somewhere, you could trace the guns." The forensic expert said.

Then he moved on to another spot and pointed at some browning and yellowish spots on the carpet. "I believe we had a witness. Someone, who wasn't killed here."

"What do you mean?" Zhao Hui asked.

"Whoever was here, wasn't one of these guys. He was an amateur. When he saw the killings, he sh*t and piss himself. Now I can't say anything for sure since a person's data can't be found from these things, but whoever this person was, he or she was a witness. A witness who didn't die. So we could look into the gang history and try to figure out what took place here before the murder.

That could be our solid lead." The forensic expert gave his own analysis from just that clue but Zhao Hui was willing to believe that as well.

Zhao Hui turned to a police officer and said, "Figure out who was here at the time of the murder. Not everyone could have been killed. Ask them what transpired here before the murders. Someone must have seen something."

"Also check the CCTV footage on the streets to see if you find anything strange." The police officer nodded and left.

"Did you find anything else?" Zhao Hui asked the expert.

"Yes. But I don't think it would be of much help." The forensic expert replied.

"What do you mean?" Zhao Hui asked.

"After killing everyone here, the killer also robbed the place. He took gold, jewelry, and money but he left the deeds and property papers here." The expert informed Zhao Hui.

"I get that the property papers can be traced but what about the money and jewelry? It can also be traced, right?" Zhao Hui said.

"Not if one has all the right connections. Gold can simply be smelted to erase the trademark engraved on it and the same could be done with the jewelry by carving out the engravings.

As for the money, if it is exchanged at ten thousand spots at different times at small transactions such as ten thousand yuan, it would be very difficult for even a computer to trace it." An expert replied from the back. It wasn't the forensic expert but he was also at the crime scene.

Zhao Hui nodded at the reasoning. Just as he thought everything was done, the police officer from before came back, "Sir, we didn't find anything solid but one car was seen making its way here but then it was seen away from this place as well as if the car passed this place. Only the interval between both footages is fifteen minutes."

Zhao Hui smirked as he said, "We found our first suspect then, check out who the car belongs to and move in fast."

"Yes, sir." The police officer saluted and left.

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