Translator’s Note:
It’s been months since I last worked on this novel, and this chapter is a newly translated one. Please note that some details from here on might not be entirely consistent with earlier chapters.
Also, a correction: Inspector Qiu Sushan mentioned before should actually be Inspector Qiu Susha (without the “n”).
Early in the morning, Jiayi originally still had a bit of a half-asleep, half-awake floating feeling, but suddenly heard Jiaru say, “Gossip reporters said you B-Group agents are stalker perverts,” and in an instant? she was completely and utterly startled awake.
“Here is today’s Yi Ji’s secret treasure, Hunan fragrant lotus bought from the vegetable market. The chefs all call it Xianglian1湘莲 (Xianglian) refers to lotus seeds from Hunan province, famous for their fragrance and quality; 湘 (Xiang) is the abbreviation for Hunan., the Xiang is the same Xiang as in Hunan.”
“These lotus seeds are much softer and more glutinous than ordinary white lotus seeds, tasting soft and powdery. Put them into the stomach of the Eight-Treasure Duck, first fry and then stew… the most suitable. Much better in taste and aroma than white lotus seeds. Tonight you all…” Yi Jiadong, while organizing the fresh ingredients bought in the morning, nagged his younger siblings.
But Jiayi could no longer hear these naggings. She put down what was in her hands, and reached out to grab the newspaper that her younger sister Jiaru was reading.
Sun Xin glanced at the things Jiayi placed on the table, hurriedly walked over, scooped up the egg that had already been cracked, and with extremely quick skill cracked the shell so that the egg white and yolk flowed into the bowl.
Because his speed was fast enough, even though the egg had been placed on the table after being cracked, not a single bit of egg liquid stuck to the table.
Sun Xin threw away the eggshell, wiped his hands, then wiped the table again, making sure everything was clean and tidy, only then turning around to walk over to Yi Jiayi’s side and craning his head to look at the newspaper in her hand.
【…Miss Gu Xiaolan suspects that the person who has been following her recently may be the same person who followed her a year ago…】
【This stalker not only knows her previous residence, but also knows her latest residence, the issue of public figures’ [safety/privacy] deserves renewed attention…】
【Miss Gu Xiaolan receives love letters from the stalker every week. Our newspaper has obtained a few exclusive love letters, which will be attached at the end of this article.】
【Yesterday, Miss Gu Xiaolan even suspected that the stalker had sneaked into her home, so she fled overnight to stay at a friend’s house…】
After reading through these key lines, Jiayi was already certain that the newspaper was not talking about their B-Group stakeout tracking personnel.
The press very likely did not even know that there was another group of people also paying attention to Gu Xiaolan, but the problem was, when their B-Group was staking out Gu Xiaolan, they also had not discovered anyone else following her.
Was it that person acting even more secretly than the agents, or was there some special technique to conceal their movements?
Jiayi immediately turned to find her own bag, took out a pen, and bent over the table to start writing.
After recording the doubts that had come to mind, Jiayi continued reading the newspaper, skimming through the entire gossip piece until finally reaching the stalker’s love letters.
Jiayi also wanted to know whether this stalker was merely a sisheng fan2 sisheng fan 私生饭: obsessive fans who stalk celebrities—a temporarily over-obsessed star-chaser—or truly an extreme pervert—just how dangerous was this person potentially.
She flicked the newspaper, her gaze falling at the very bottom.
This gossip tabloid really knew how to grab eyeballs, the love letters actually used photos instead of being retyped on a computer by the editors. In this way, the readers’ feelings would be more direct, and the impact would be even greater.
She pressed her lips together and focused on reading:
【Dear Xiaolan:
It has been exactly two years since I met you. From the first time I saw you, I knew we were lovers destined by heaven to be together.
In these 2 years?, slowly watching you grow, I am always happy, but sometimes also feel lonely. Because you are busy with work, the time you spend with me grows less and less. The last time you nestled in my arms and watched Joy Fills Donghua《欢乐满东华》together with me was already more than half a month ago. We were so happy at that time. I even praised you for how beautiful you looked when you smiled, and you rubbed your head against my chin.
But this week you were very naughty. In the new commercial you wore that red spaghetti-strap dress that was so revealing. How could you wear it in front of the public without discussing it with me? So vulgar, I don’t like it.
Also, why are there so many scandalous rumors with those irrelevant bastards? Even though I really trust you, my heart still feels sour. Do you know my heart hurts?
Work is work, but you must keep your distance from those directors and rich men, do you understand? You not only need to do this for me, but also for yourself. Fighting hard in the entertainment industry, with me not by your side, you need even more to take care of yourself and protect yourself.
And ah, you must remember what I told you: none of those who ask you to drink are good people, they all have bad intentions. Do you understand?
As for me, today I ate very delicious pineapple buns, and I really wanted to bring some for you to eat. I don’t know when our next date will be. I really miss your soft lips, warm…】
Gu Xiaolan said she simply did not know the person who wrote the letter. She did not recognize the handwriting, and the things spoken of were all complete fabrications, things that had never happened.
As soon as Jiayi thought of this point, the more she read this letter, the more she felt the back of her spine turn cold, as if a big freezer was blowing hard against the back of her neck.
If there was someone watching her like this all the time, peeping at her every move, and even pointing fingers at her actions, it was truly terrifying.
And moreover…
Jiayi’s brows furrowed tighter and tighter. A person who had stalked Gu Xiaolan for many years—if he discovered that Gu Xiaolan was interacting with other men—would certainly feel very jealous.
The community investors who invested in Gu Xiaolan, the stalker wouldn’t dare to touch.
Director Zhang Jing very likely really had nothing with Gu Xiaolan.
Then, if he wanted to find someone to vent his anger on, rich man Zhao Dongsheng might already be the easiest bone to gnaw on…
No.
Exposing the stalker’s letters like this could very likely enrage him.
If the stalker and the person who killed Zhao Dongsheng really were the same person, then what would a pervert who had already killed someone do next?
Gu Xiaolan’s current situation was probably already very dangerous.
She folded up the newspaper and was about to head out to ride her bicycle to work, but was dragged back by Yi Jiadong.
The awe-inspiring female officer, who had been wearing a solemn expression ready to rush to the battlefield, instantly? turned into a black-market customer, sitting obediently at the table with her younger siblings, eating up the plentiful breakfast.
Weak, pitiful, and helpless.
Even though she only set off after eating an extremely varied breakfast, Jiayi was still the first person to arrive at the B-Group office.
She printed out a few copies of the newspaper page reporting Gu Xiaolan’s stalker incident and placed them at the office door, giving one copy to everyone who came in.
Then each person who stumbled sleepily into the office became fully awake after reading it.
“What kind of pervert is this? If I were Gu Xiaolan, I would be scared to death. That house that the stalker might have sneaked into can’t be used anymore.” Liu Jiaming wrinkled his facial features like watching a ghost film, shrinking his neck, showing a completely rejecting and avoiding expression.
“Although we haven’t been following Gu Xiaolan for 2 years, we’ve been monitoring her recently, and we haven’t noticed any suspicious people stalking or watching Gu Xiaolan. If there were, we wouldn’t have missed it.” Sanfu frowned. How could there be someone else watching Gu Xiaolan and yet not be discovered by them?
This completely overturned his self-recognition as a senior CID investigator. Could it be that he was a very unqualified investigator? He didn’t even know whether the target he was watching was also being stalked by others?
Could the stalker of Gu Xiaolan be the ‘police ace paparazzi team’ of the Hong Kong Police Force’s Criminal Intelligence Division?
Otherwise, there couldn’t possibly be anyone more professional than their CID…
“The advertisement where Gu Xiaolan wore the red spaghetti-strap dress was a recent one, likely only within this past half month. I have a habit of watching TV at night, and this commercial wasn’t one of the previous intermittent ads.” Uncle Jiu pointed at the newspaper and commented: “The stalker saw this ad, felt unhappy, wrote this letter, mailed it out, then Gu Xiaolan received it, and the press revealed it… Pushing the timeline back from that, the stalker probably mailed the letter around five days ago. It’s also possible it was during the period when we hadn’t yet started stalking Gu Xiaolan and were still investigating the multilayer subcontracting leads.”
Fang Zhenyue walked into the office, just in time to hear everyone’s discussion. He already had a gossip magazine of the same issue clenched in his hand, so he didn’t take a copy from the stack Jiayi had placed at the door.
Using the rolled-up newspaper to tap Changjin, he said to Sanfu:
“Don’t bother calling that magazine anymore. They’ll most likely just talk nonsense and not answer properly. You directly bring two uniformed police officers over there, squeeze out of them how they got this news and how much more they know.”
“Yes, sir.” Sanfu accepted the order, jumped up from his chair, and dashed out of the office.
The sound of his footsteps ran off and then returned. The people in the office, hearing this sound, knew immediately that Sanfu had come back again, so they all raised their heads and stared at the office door.
The next second, sure enough, Sanfu poked his head back in and asked Fang Zhenyue:
“Brother Yue, can I call that officer Xu Shaowei from Central District Police Station to go with me to this gossip newspaper office?”
As he spoke, he also waved the newspaper in his hand.
“OK.” Fang Zhenyue nodded.
“Yes, sir.” Another string of loud departing footsteps, and this time they did not return.
“From the letter in the newspaper, what do you all see?” Fang Zhenyue turned back and asked every investigator.
“Psychosis, uncontrollability.” Liu Jiaming was the first to answer.
“Control desire, pointing fingers at Gu Xiaolan’s life. When we were working on the Duzhou Street slope dismemberment case, the killer who captured women, killed them, violated corpses, and then dismembered and dumped the bodies, also had similar behavior.” Uncle Jiu slightly furrowed his brows. He remembered that the killer Zhang Dafu had once said he derived satisfaction and pleasure from the control desire gained while controlling the victim’s life and death.
If that was the case, did it mean that this perverted maniac also had the danger of becoming a serial killer?
“The killer is Gu Xiaolan’s admirer. He can get so much information about Gu Xiaolan. Is it possible that he is a colleague at Gu Xiaolan’s company?” Gary frowned and asked.
Fang Zhenyue did not express any opinion about everyone’s comments but instead turned his head to look at Yi Jiayi, who was still facing her notebook deep in thought.
Sensing Brother Yue’s gaze, Jiayi raised her head, rubbed her fingers over the not-so-smooth paper surface of her notebook, thought for a moment, and then carefully spoke:
“The wealthy man Zhao Dongsheng, who had an ambiguous relationship with Gu Xiaolan, Gu Xiaolan, who seems completely unaware and does not think Zhao Dongsheng’s death has anything to do with herself, and a stalker who is trapped in fantasy and believes he has a romantic relationship with Gu Xiaolan—once these three people are connected by a line, many of the clues we previously investigated make sense.
“Although there is no stronger evidence to prove all of this for now, perhaps we can have an open-ended discussion about it.”
This time there was no heartflow sense3heartflow sense 心流感应, an intuitive psychic connection. Jiayi could not be 100% sure what she was saying was the truth, so she could only attempt to put forward her ideas and did not dare to make assertions.
“Let’s hear it.” Fang Zhenyue nodded, leaning casually against the table closest to the whiteboard.
His calm and steady demeanor showed Jiayi his patience and confidence in her, which gave Jiayi more courage.
“We have already screened everyone in Zhao Dongsheng’s relationship network who could possibly have a motive to kill him. We carefully and thoroughly investigated and ruled out their suspicion.
“Why would that be?”
“Because the real culprit is someone who truly had no ‘intersection’ with Zhao Dongsheng. He might not even have had any substantial intersection with Gu Xiaolan aside from exchanging letters. At least, Gu Xiaolan does not know this stalker and is unaware of his existence.
“Zhao Dongsheng likewise did not know about this stalker’s existence. At the same time, everyone who provided the police with information about ‘Zhao Dongsheng’s interpersonal relationships’ also did not know about the stalker’s existence.
“If Zhao Dongsheng was killed by this stalker, then it is reasonable that Gu Xiaolan is unaware, and it is also reasonable that our investigation has fallen into a dead end.”
“This case looks like a familiar-person crime, but in reality, it is a stranger crime, which is one of the hardest types of cases for us.”
After speaking, Jiayi nervously rubbed her fingers.
Without the heartflow sense, lacking that sense of certainty of “having seen the entire process of the killer murdering,” this feeling of uncertainty during the explanation was very unsettling.
She finally understood why every time Brother Yue saw many clues and thought of many possibilities, he would only observe more deeply rather than speak them out loud.
Because once he spoke, it would influence the other investigators.
If the speculation was off the mark, then she would become the sinner who misled everyone.
This kind of pressure was truly immense.
Fang Zhenyue looked back at her and did not show any expression of doubt toward her speculation. His eyebrows did not move in the slightest, with no tendency at all to draw inward and wrinkle.
This calm and composed expression, waiting for her to continue speaking, was full of encouraging power.
Turning her head to look at the others again, Uncle Jiu and the rest were also focused on listening, without any unnecessary reactions.
Jiayi’s heart grew stronger again. She took a deep breath and continued:
“Standing on the standpoint that ‘the killer is also the stalker,’ we now re-examine the scene at the sharp turn on Shixun Road, and the known circumstances of the entire case. The core points we need to track must focus on these items:
“1. If the killer is a stranger to Gu Xiaolan, why was he able to enter the deceased Zhao Dongsheng’s home?”
“This point leads to the question of whether the killer was also a stranger to Zhao Dongsheng. If he was a stranger, then what kind of stranger could Zhao Dongsheng smoothly open the door and invite into his home?”
“Repairman?” Liu Jiaming frowned and guessed.
Jiayi wrote down this guess in her notebook and answered:
“If it’s a type of household technician, then we can exclude those types of jobs that require driving a truck, a large vehicle, or a special type of vehicle. Because we have already confirmed that the killer drives a medium or small sedan.”
Liu Jiaming showed an expression of realization and nodded.
“2. What kind of person can monitor Gu Xiaolan while not being discovered by us? What is his disguise? Why is it so perfect?”
“Even if during the period when we monitored Gu Xiaolan, the stalker did not approach her and thus we missed him, a person following another for two years without being discovered also requires an extremely strong camouflage.
“What kind of person appears anywhere in the city without seeming abrupt? Sanitation workers? Elderly people out for a walk? Or…”
At this point, Jiayi suddenly turned to look at Fang Zhenyue.
This was originally a reflexive reaction of seeking affirmation when she captured an inspiration, but she did not expect to meet Fang Zhenyue’s expression of similarly catching inspiration, with raised eyebrows and slightly parted lips.
He extended a finger and pointed at Jiayi: “You said during the Ferry Street dismemberment case that taxi drivers know the city routes and go back and forth without arousing suspicion.”
“Even if he parks the TAXI by the roadside to carry out surveillance, he wouldn’t be noticed. In the city, a TAXI is just like a trash can or a building, completely blended in. People don’t even take a second look at the driver; they are like invisible people.” Jiayi nodded forcefully.”
“Mm, now that other clues have all reached dead ends, next we’ll follow this new lead and investigate. The next stakeouts will focus on observing people like taxi drivers and sanitation workers.” After speaking, Fang Zhenyue wrote it on the whiteboard.
“Uncle Jiu, you take Gary and continue the stakeout tracking mission on Gu Xiaolan. Head out now.” Fang Zhenyue stood up and clapped his hands.
Uncle Jiu and Gary immediately accepted the order and left.
“Shiyi, you take Jiaming and go to Central District Police Station. Based on our latest deduction, see if there is any overlooked evidence or laboratory result that can corroborate our speculation. Or, based on the current suspicion about the suspect’s occupation, conduct specialized inspection and testing to see if we can discover any new clues.” After Fang Zhenyue finished speaking and was about to clap his hands again, the door of Qiu Susha’s office opposite suddenly opened.
“A villager discovered a corpse at a secluded spot near Kam Shan in Sheung Kwai Chung, only covered by branches and leaves. Beside the corpse, there was also a half-dug pit… Forensic Officer Xu sir has already arrived at the scene and suspects the deceased is the victim Zhao Dongsheng from our case.” Qiu Susha delivered the report as fast as pouring beans out of a bamboo tube.
“OK, madam, we’ll rush over right away.” Fang Zhenyue immediately accepted the order with a solemn expression.
Jiayi’s eyes lit up, and afraid that Fang Zhenyue would leave her behind, she loudly fought for herself:
“Brother Yue, let me go with you!”
The former her probably would never have imagined that there would be a day when she so eagerly and actively requested to go see a corpse…