Netherworld Investigator

NEW NOVEL: First and foremost, I'm delighted to announce that our long-time veteran translator littleshanks has finally launched his new novel, Rise!  Rise is a novel about the esports scene in Shanghai, the competitive gaming capital of China. It follows the story of Lin Feng, a boy who has just moved to the city for his last year of high school. He's a passionate gamer and dreams of being the best professional League of Legends player in the world. The twist? He almost achieved his dream, but failed at the...

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After investigating Jin Baoshan, I assigned Dali to a task. I asked him to wait for Jin Baoshan to get off work, and return home with him to get a facsimile of the contract.

“But it’s only two o’clock now!” he complained. “You want me to wait for him here for four long hours?”

I smiled and suggested, “You can do something else while you wait. For example, there is an internet cafe just across the road. It looks decent.”

Dali got excited instantly. “Right! I’ll wait there then! Xiaotao-jiejie, will I be reimbursed for the money I spend at the cyber cafe?”

“Don’t go overboard with it, okay?” Xiaotao warned him. “The money used for handling this case will all come out of the taxpayers’ pockets, remember that!”

“Yes, sir!”

After leaving Dali here, Xiaotao asked me where should we go next. I told her my pillow was probably ready by now, so we should go get it for me to complete the autopsy.

On the way, I pondered about the case and asked Xiaotao, “Do you think this case is that simple? The victims died so mysteriously, yet the motive sounds so obvious! Wouldn’t he have expected us to question the seller and the buyer of the mansion?”

Xiaotao laughed, “You’re unsatisfied because the case is too easy, aren’t you?”

“No, I just feel like the truth is still hidden somehow…”

So far, we hadn’t figured out how the two victims died. Could someone who was able to cause such puzzling deaths resort to such a simple plan? Surely not!

When I arrived at the police station, my wooden pillow was ready. It was a square block of wood with a groove in the middle where the head would be placed. There were holes all over the wooden block, and each of these holes was connected to the groove in the middle. It was modeled after an object recorded in The Chronicles of Grand Magistrates called the Yin Yang Pillow.

“That’s a strange pillow!” Xiaotao exclaimed. “It sure looks uncomfortable. What is it for, Song Yang?”

“You’ll know later.” I gave her a mysterious smile.

We arrived at the morgue, and I put the Yin Yang Pillows under victims’ heads. I put my ear on one of the wooden pillows and listened intently while letting Xiaotao tap on the side of the pillow. With the fingers of one hand, I blocked the different holes of the pillow, making me look like I was playing the flute.

The holes all had different lengths and widths. As I blocked different holes, the echo produced in the cranial cavity was different too. Through these echoes, I could judge the damages and the wounds suffered by the brain.

The human brain was a very delicate organ, and there were many capillaries underneath the scalp. Because Traditional Coroners never dissected human skulls, they used this method to examine the trauma that a victim’s brain might’ve suffered.

This was another superb invention by an ancestor of mine in the Song family.

However, it was my first time using it, so it took a lot of effort just to get familiar with the tool. After a while, I made a discovery: “The victims were neither burned to death nor burned before death.”

“What do you mean?” asked Xiaotao.

I explained that if the human body was exposed to extreme heat, the water in the brain would boil, causing the brain to expand and swell. Yet, these victims’ brains were completely intact.

Xiaotao stared at the blackened bodies. “Then what’s the explanation for these burns?”

“I don’t know. We should wait to see the results of Xiaozhou’s tests…” I told her as I picked up the Yin Yang Pillows and packed them into my bag.

After examining the corpses, as usual, I burned a few sheets of joss paper in honor of the victims and chanted the Reincarnation Mantra.

We went to the laboratory to find Xiaozhou and found him looking worried.

“There is some kind of acidic substance on the victims’ skin,” he informed us. “But I can’t narrow down what kind of acid it is. Any ideas, Song Yang?”

“Sorry, chemical testing is my weakness,” I replied.

Xiaotao stared at me with surprise, “Are you going to admit defeat just like that?”

“Every profession in the world has its limitations,” I shrugged. “No one is all-knowing. By the way, Xiaozhou, you can stop testing now. Wait till I get more clues and I’ll tell you what you need to do.”

Although I told him that, Xiaozhou still continued to work hard. Xiaotao told me he was a perfectionist. He would never stop working on something until he got the result he wanted.

Xiaotao then received a phone call. After a few words, she hung up and said, “Wang Yuanchao is back.”

“Right! Let’s go see him!”

Wang Yuanchao found the information about the murder case that happened in the mansion years ago, but it was somewhat different from Lao Yao’s version! Ten years ago, a family of three lived in that mansion. Her husband had a quarrel with his wife because of the paternity test. In a rage, the child was pushed down from the stairs and died. The wife hacked her husband with a knife and then hugged her son’s body while crying uncontrollably. Later, she lost her sanity and was sent to a mental hospital.

“You mean the woman is still alive?” I asked in shock.

“She died two years ago,” Wang Yuanchao replied.

“There was no fire in that mansion?” I asked again in confusion.

“No. I checked with the fire brigade. There’d been no fire in that area in the last twenty years.”

I sank into my seat in contemplation. Wang Yuanchao obtained his information from the police and other official authorities. He had access to information that the average person had no access to. The credibility of his sources was also very high.

In contrast, what Lao Yao found online had been mixed with a lot of hearsay. It seemed that the murder case from a decade ago had slowly evolved into a melodramatic ghost story. The ghost of a woman in the house could not be real after all, since the woman didn’t die there. And the account of the fire as reported by the supposed witnesses were unreliable too, since there had been no fires in the last twenty years!

In that case, the death of the two victims had nothing to do with the mansion’s bloody past.

“Why don’t we visit the house again?” I suggested.

“You mean now?” Xiaotao asked.

“No, tonight. All three of us and Dali too. How about we become the Haunted House Busters for a night?”

“What if something bad happens?” Xiaotao worried, still influenced by the horrifying legends that surrounded the mansion.

“If we don’t take the risk, we may never know how the victims died!” My eyes shone with enthusiasm.

Xiaotao considered it and smiled. “Alright! I’ll sacrifice my life for duty if need be!”

Since I was going to stay at the haunted mansion that night, I made necessary preparations for what was needed. I bought some fine flour, some bells, and ropes, then I purchased some medicinal herbs and some tools to make medicinal pills.

I found an empty meeting room and got to work. Xiaotao asked me if I needed any help. I said no, so she went out and did something else.

I chopped the herbs, filtered them, added flour and honey to the paste and turned it into small pills. It was labor-intensive, but these pills could save our lives tonight!

At six o’clock, Dali returned with a copy of the contract and a copy of the mansion’s buyer and seller ID cards. Xiaotao asked the forensics team to look up the background of the man named Ren Facai. A few minutes later, an officer reported, “Captain, Ren Facai has a criminal record!”

Ren Facai had a rich and illustrious criminal record indeed. He was involved in smuggling, money laundering, gambling and much more. Xiaotao laughed and said, “Song Yang, maybe we don’t need to bother staying at the haunted mansion anymore! We’ve got the murderer!”

I shook my head. “No, it’s too early to say that.”

The forensics team continued to search for more information about the man in their database. I stood aside to watch them and marveled at the convenience of modern technology. Whenever the ID card was used, it would clearly be recorded in the database. A fugitive would have a much harder time trying to lay low these days compared to twenty years ago.

The results showed that Ren Facai was currently staying at a hotel in Nanjiang City.

“Let’s go get him now!” Xiaotao commanded. She picked a few officers to go with her, then picked me, Dali, and Wang Yuanchao as well. After arriving at the hotel, we inquired at the front desk, and a porter led us to the room where Ren Facai was staying. When we came to the door, everyone prepared to charge in. We heard the laughter of a woman coming from inside the room. The porter knocked on the door and said, “Sir, it’s room service.”

“Fuck off! Don’t you see the ‘Don’t Disturb’ sign on the door?”  

The porter grimaced and turned to Xiaotao for help. She mimed the words for him to say, “Sir, we just received your parcel, and the delivery man insisted that you must accept it yourself.”

“Fine! Give me a minute!”

After a long time, the door opened a small slit. I saw half the face of a fat middle-aged man. Everyone leaned on the wall on both sides of the door so Ren Facai couldn’t see us. The man asked, “Where’s the parcel?”

“It’s too big to bring up here, sir. You’ll have to go downstairs in person.”

The man’s gaze fell to the floor. I panicked. I just noticed that the light on the ceiling made an officer’s shadow clearly visible on the floor. The man screamed, “Is there someone next to you, you little shit? Fuck you!”

The door slammed shut and we heard a ruckus inside the room. Xiaotao yelled, “This is bad! He’s going to jump out the window!”

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