The last time they’d spoken, Jiang Hansheng had hung up in a hurry without going into detail about the pocket watch. Wang Pengzhe had been meaning to ask more — but before he could, a knock at the door cut him off.

Zhou Jin stepped into the conference room. When she saw the man beside Jiang Hansheng, she understood at once and recognized him as Wang Pengzhe, Jiang Hansheng’s teacher.

Pushing down her nerves, Zhou Jin stepped forward and greeted him politely: “Director Wang, it’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m Zhou Jin, investigator with the Major Crimes Unit.”

This was the first time Wang Pengzhe had truly met Zhou Jin in person.

She was younger than he had imagined — short hair, clean and dark, bright eyes beneath neat brows, with an air that was sharply capable. Her looks weren’t striking in an obvious way, but her features were the kind that rewarded attention; nothing about them demanded notice, yet once someone’s gaze settled on her, it was difficult to look away.

Wang Pengzhe shot a brief glance at Jiang Hansheng, surprised that Zhou Jin had introduced herself so formally, as though they were strangers.

He looked like he was enjoying himself immensely. His eyes crinkled into narrow lines as he smiled, thoroughly unconcerned with any question of mixing the personal and the professional. “Hansheng is my student — that makes us family. What’s all this formality for? I’ve been hearing your name for ages. It’s good to finally put a face to it.”

Zhou Jin naturally assumed that Jiang Hansheng had already told Wang Pengzhe about their marriage.

Her face grew a little warm. “We should have come to visit you together, Hansheng and I…”

Wang Pengzhe waved her off. “I’m just an old man — what’s there to visit? I came up through criminal investigation myself. I know how grueling the front lines are. Whether you come to see me or not is the least of it. What matters is that you look out for this foolish boy.”

He let out a hearty laugh and clapped Jiang Hansheng on the shoulder. “Isn’t that right?”

Jiang Hansheng felt a headache coming on.

Wang Pengzhe was not at all what Zhou Jin had expected. His humor had a way of putting people at ease without effort.

The tension in Zhou Jin unwound, little by little. She thought: no wonder Jiang Hansheng holds his teacher in such high regard.

Wang Pengzhe glanced at his watch and said to Zhou Jin, “Your mentor’s already filled you in on the case, I take it?”

Zhou Jin nodded.

Wang Pengzhe said, “I’ve come to Haizhou alone this time. Given the gravity of the situation, we’ll need the Major Crimes Unit to assign a dedicated liaison. I’ve thought it over — you’re the most suitable candidate. Additionally, Hansheng will be participating in the investigation as well, in his capacity as my student.”

The chance to work alongside Wang Pengzhe was something countless officers could only dream of.

Zhou Jin agreed without hesitation. “Understood.”

Jiang Hansheng hadn’t yet heard the details, but anything that warranted Wang Pengzhe personally coming to the front lines was clearly no ordinary matter.

He asked, “What kind of case is it?”

Wang Pengzhe looked at him with an expression that carried some unspoken weight, and said quietly, “You’ll know once you’ve seen the scene.”

Zhou Jin got behind the wheel and drove them swiftly to the crime scene.

The address was Unit 1002, Building 22, Lishui Residential Complex.

They took the elevator up to the tenth floor.

The outer perimeter had already been cordoned off with police tape. In the corridor, Zhao Ping from the Major Crimes Unit was in the process of taking a statement from the person who had filed the report. He glanced up when he saw the three of them arrive and raised a hand in greeting.

Zhou Jin gave a brief nod in return, said little, and showed her police badge to the officer managing the cordon.

Bai Yang from the Technical Division handed over shoe covers. “You finally made it.”

Zhou Jin: “Has the body been moved?”

“Not yet. The forensic examiner isn’t sure how to proceed — waiting for Director Wang to view the scene first.”

Zhou Jin suited up first, then lifted the police tape at the entrance of Unit 1002 for Jiang Hansheng and Wang Pengzhe.

The three of them entered the crime scene.

The moment Zhou Jin stepped through the entryway, the smell hit her — blood mixed with the sharp tang of cleaning solution — and her vision swam.

Inside, forensic examiners and technical personnel were already at work collecting evidence.

Various numbered markers had been placed across the living room floor, but the total count was sparse — a clear sign they had not yet recovered much of value.

Zhou Jin scanned the scene. As far as she could see, it was exceptionally tidy — no signs of disturbance, no disorder. The cleanliness was so thorough it bordered on unnatural.

She couldn’t immediately determine where the smell of blood was coming from.

Zhou Jin was still trying to work that out when Jiang Hansheng’s brow furrowed slightly. He moved with purpose, walking directly toward the master bedroom.

In the bedroom, a police officer’s camera clicked steadily as photographs were taken from every angle as evidence. The forensic examiner had not yet bagged the body or arranged for its transfer to the autopsy room. It lay on the bed.

To call it a body was almost insufficient. It was more like a work of art.

The woman’s lovely face was tinged pale and grey. She did not look dead — she looked as though she had simply fallen into a quiet, peaceful sleep.

She was dressed in a vivid crimson gown, a silk scarf tied around her wrists. Rose petals were scattered across the bed around her, and she lay there like Sleeping Beauty, cradled in a bed of flowers.

The scene before them was not gory or horrifying in the conventional sense — it did not reach the threshold of something that would shock the eye on contact. And yet every detail of it radiated a disturbing, almost lurid beauty.

Zhou Jin could see no obvious open wounds on the body. She asked first: “Suicide or homicide?”

Before the forensic examiner could respond, Jiang Hansheng supplied the answer: “Homicide.”

His voice was grave, his expression cold and impassive. He borrowed a pair of gloves from the forensic examiner, approached the body, and turned the left wrist over.

The silk scarf slipped free from where it had been bound — and beneath it, a terrible wound split open, the flesh torn grotesquely outward.

At a preliminary glance, the only wound on the body was this single cut to the wrist. There were no shallow exploratory marks around it — in other words, whoever had made that cut had done so in one clean motion.

What was strange, however, was that there was almost no blood on the bed around her.

The smell of antiseptic and cleaning solution drifted in and out at the edge of Zhou Jin’s senses. She pressed the back of her hand to her nose and frowned deeply.

For anyone with extensive experience on the criminal investigation front lines, the first unsettling impression the body produced would quickly crystallize into something colder and more precise — a chill that drove straight to the mind.

Zhou Jin had been with the Major Crimes Unit long enough. She had never, across any homicide case she’d worked, encountered one so saturated with the perpetrator’s emotional investment — so deliberate in its ritual quality.

Based on the scene as it stood, if this was indeed a homicide, at least two things could already be inferred. First, the perpetrator was methodical and practiced — this was not a first offense; a prior criminal history was likely. Second, the perpetrator had taken careful steps to process the scene afterward — but whether that cleanup was part of a ritual or simply a countermeasure against investigation could not yet be determined. Either way, it would create significant obstacles for the evidence-gathering effort.

Jiang Hansheng did not linger over the body. He turned and looked around — as though searching for something.

The master bedroom had its own attached bathroom. Jiang Hansheng rose and pushed the door open.

Inside the pristine white bathtub, a vivid, deep red pool of blood had filled to the brim.

That was the source of the smell in the air.

Zhou Jin ventured a theory: “Killed her in the bathtub, then moved her to the bed?”

Jiang Hansheng said nothing. He reached up, found the switch, and turned off the bathroom light.

The room dropped into darkness. A heavy atmosphere settled over the air — like the depths of a deep-sea chasm, dense and suffocating, pressing down until it was hard to breathe.

He stood quietly at the entrance to the bathroom, as though sinking into thought.

“…Jiang Hansheng?” Zhou Jin called to him.

A click — and the bathroom light came back on. The light fell across the fine lines of his profile in a pale wash.

Jiang Hansheng looked at Zhou Jin. Something complicated moved through the expression between his brows.

Zhou Jin: “What did you see?”

He gave a smile that wasn’t quite a smile, reached over and briefly gripped Zhou Jin’s shoulder, then said nothing — removed his gloves and returned to the living room.

Wang Pengzhe was already standing there, the unlit cigarette still clamped between his teeth. He asked in a muffled voice, “Got a clear look?”

Jiang Hansheng nodded. “This case is connected to me.”