That night, the investigation teams that had gradually returned to base entered their case analysis session once again.
Following the usual routine, the medical examiner spoke first to explain the autopsy results. Originally, everyone thought it would be the same as last time—”seemingly not done by a normal person”—but who knew this time there would be a new discovery.
“Based on my autopsy analysis combined with calculations from the time point when Lu Yibo’s phone was turned off, he died three nights ago, making it nearly four days now, about one hundred hours. The condition of the corpse is very similar to Ye Jian’s—both suffered vehicular impact and were stabbed with many knives. What differs from Ye Jian’s murder is that Ye Jian jumped into the river and swam away after being injured, while Lu Yibo died on the spot and was then dragged and thrown into the river. Through dissection, I compared the wounds from both incidents and discovered something very strange. Apart from the different number of knife wounds on Lu Yibo and Ye Jian’s two corpses, the direction, dimensions, and spacing of multiple wounds were actually completely identical. This baffled me—what kind of person could stab someone twice with wounds that are completely the same? So I searched through reference materials, searched and searched, searched and searched, but unfortunately, there’s a blank in this area of research—there has never been a case like this before. I then thought of other methods, wondering how these two sets of identical injuries could have been inflicted. You know, I’ve been a medical examiner for over twenty years…”
Regarding Lu Yibo’s corpse this time, Medical Examiner Chen appeared exceptionally excited, rambling on for a full quarter hour about how, after encountering this autopsy challenge, he had exhausted every possible method to overcome all difficulties. Just as he was about to share anecdotes from 1995 when he first became a medical examiner, Zhang Yi’ang finally stepped forward, heroically extending his large hand: “Teacher Chen, time is pressing—please tell us the results first.”
“The murder weapon is an SUV with a very high front end!”
“The murder weapon is an SUV?” Everyone was astonished.
“Yes, the murder weapon is a vehicle!” Medical Examiner Chen straightened his back with a face full of confidence and pride. “This vehicle had a board installed on the front, with several sharp daggers fixed to the board. The perpetrator suddenly drove the vehicle toward the victim, and the daggers on the front pierced into the victim’s body. That’s why both Ye Jian and Lu Yibo’s corpses show traces of being hit by a vehicle, and why some of the stab wounds on their bodies have completely identical directions and dimensions.”
Everyone closed their eyes slightly as images of nail-board carts from ancient battlefields floated through their minds—carts with upright wooden boards at the front covered entirely with thick nails, with soldiers gripping these hand-pushed carts from behind and charging fiercely toward the enemy. Now the hand-pushed cart had been replaced with an automobile, but the principle was the same.
“Are you certain?” No one had ever heard of such a killing method, and they all voiced their doubts in a chorus of voices.
“Of course I’m certain! I’ve been a medical examiner for over twenty years—”
“As long as you’re certain, as long as you’re certain, we’ve always trusted you completely.” Zhang Yi’ang quickly stopped him, and everyone nodded repeatedly. He turned to the others and said, “Then let’s check the surrounding surveillance footage and search for SUVs with knife boards installed on the front.”
“About this…” Song Xing said hesitantly, “I don’t think we can find such a vehicle. If a car has a board stuck full of daggers on its front, such a dangerous automobile—anyone who sees it on the road would call the police.”
“What you say also makes a lot of sense,” Zhang Yi’ang turned back to Medical Examiner Chen. “How was the board attached?”
“It should have been fixed on before the killing and removed after the killing. However, it’s not easy to fix such a board to the front of a normal car. I believe this board was specially designed according to the shape of the vehicle’s front end.”
After everyone discussed and deliberated for a while, they decided to first check the surrounding surveillance footage and screen SUVs that matched the height of the front end.
Subsequently, Zhang Yi’ang raised another point of doubt: “There’s a very strange aspect to this case. Everyone think about it—why would Lu Yibo die by the riverside? What was he doing there alone at night? I believe the most likely reason is—”
“A date, he was meeting some woman!” Song Xing blurted out.
Zhang Yi’ang was about to explain his reasoning process when he was interrupted, and he glanced at him with dissatisfaction: “You already knew the answer?”
“I was just guessing wildly.”
Wang Ruijun glared at him and reprimanded: “All you know is wild guessing, wild guessing. What’s the point of just knowing the answer? Don’t you want to know the solution steps!—Director, please continue your analysis.”
Zhang Yi’ang nodded with satisfaction and continued: “Originally, Ye Jian met someone late at night by the riverside and was killed—Lu Yibo knew about this incident. Although the two locations were different, they were both by the river. Why would Lu Yibo go to the riverside alone late at night? Did he have no sense of alertness at all? Wasn’t he afraid of repeating Ye Jian’s fate? Think about it—if an ordinary person asked Lu Yibo to come to the riverside at night, would he go? He would definitely be vigilant! Therefore, the person who asked Lu Yibo to meet this time must be someone he was familiar with. Being familiar isn’t enough—they also had to make him feel very secure, not sensing any danger. What kind of person could make him lower his guard? A woman, a woman meeting him for a date.”
“Right on target, right on target!” Wang Ruijun praised repeatedly. “I’ve also been thinking about this problem—knowing that Ye Jian was killed while keeping a late-night appointment by the river, why would Lu Yibo repeat the same mistake? As soon as the Director mentioned the woman angle, my train of thought completely cleared up. From the current clues, the killer is male, but the person who asked Lu Yibo to meet was very likely female. We need to first identify the women who had close relationships with him, then trace back to the killer from there.”
Section Chief Xu from the physical evidence team frowned. He didn’t want to disrupt the discussion atmosphere, but to prevent the investigation from going astray, he still cautiously stated the truth: “About this… it’s not necessarily so.”
Wang Ruijun’s eyes widened: “Section Chief Xu, what brilliant insight do you have now?”
Section Chief Xu thought to himself that he hadn’t spoken all evening—where did this “what brilliant insight now” come from? Seeing that Director Zhang’s gaze had also turned toward him, he had no choice but to say: “Uh… today we examined the scene and confirmed that the death location was the first crime scene. We asked around and learned that Lu Yibo’s home is nearby, and recently he would come to this riverside to jog every night around nine or ten o’clock. The corpse was wearing jogging clothes, so… I think it wasn’t that someone asked him to meet, but rather the killer knew his nighttime jogging habit and ambushed and killed him there.”
Wang Ruijun said unconvinced: “Then what about Ye Jian’s case?”
“Before Ye Jian was killed, he was captured on camera looking at a note, so of course someone asked him to meet. This time with Lu Yibo, someone probably knew he went jogging and ambushed him in advance.”
“Then tell me who asked Ye Jian to meet?” Wang Ruijun deliberately posed a difficult question for him.
“About this… if we knew who asked Ye Jian to meet, wouldn’t the case be solved? The work our physical evidence team can do is very limited. The specific identity of the killer still needs to be investigated by you in the investigation team.”
Wang Ruijun snorted and raised his eyebrows: “So what clues did your team find today? It can’t be like with Ye Jian’s case, where you came up empty-handed again. Catching the killer is the work of us investigators, but even a clever housewife can’t cook without rice.”
These words made it seem as if the responsibility for not solving Ye Jian’s case rested entirely on Section Chief Xu’s shoulders. Section Chief Xu lowered his head and said: “Three days have already passed since the incident, and outdoor conditions are complex, so we… we didn’t extract tire prints from the suspect vehicle, nor did we find any suspicious footprints or fingerprints.”
“So that means after investigating all day, you have no leads at all.” Wang Ruijun sighed. He was too far from the other man, otherwise he would have long since reached out to pat his shoulder—Old Xu, you can’t turn in a blank paper every time.
Section Chief Xu, being an honest and straightforward person by nature, blushed with shame all over his face. In his desperation, he thought of one clue: “Today we suspected the killer entered Lu Yibo’s office to secretly install surveillance. We removed the surveillance equipment and asked the higher-level electronic technology police—this type of temporary surveillance can’t trace the data receiver. We carefully examined the door lock and can confirm there are no prying marks whatsoever on the lock—it was opened with a key. We confirmed with the hotel that originally there were three keys in total—one was in Lu Yibo’s possession and has already been found at his home, the hotel security department had two backup keys, and several months ago Lu Yibo took away one of them. We searched his office and home thoroughly but didn’t find this third key anywhere.”
Zhang Yi’ang thought for a moment. There were three keys in total—Lu Yibo’s and the hotel security department’s were accounted for, so naturally the killer used this third key to open the door. He asked: “After Lu Yibo took the backup key, who did he give it to?”
“Unknown, but whoever could obtain his office key should be someone with a relatively close relationship to him.”