Hong Kong is a city where both waking up and going to bed happen a few hours later than in the north. This is to avoid the heat of the day and to extend the active hours of the night.
By the time the sun is already blazing, the city is just starting to wake up.
The back alley behind Da Yu Lane on Bi Street is eerily quiet, with only the occasional truck passing by on the distant road.
On the map, this small square is filled with dilapidated houses covered in tarpaulins, piled high with garbage and miscellaneous items.
A few abandoned houses in the alley have been commandeered by an old man who collects scrap paper, turning them into a makeshift warehouse of broken walls, wooden planks, and tin sheets stacked together like a huge cave hidden within the city.
This junkyard, despite its disarray, is still protected with a layer of wire mesh, as if there are concerns about theft.
The narrow, broken alley, where sunlight can’t even penetrate, is suddenly intruded upon by a middle-aged woman taking a shortcut. She turns past the scrap-collecting shed and unexpectedly encounters a drunkard.
Her previously staggering steps immediately become orderly, and she glances warily at the drunkard, quickly walking around him when they meet.
The drunkard, who hadn’t initially noticed the woman, becomes side-eyed due to her overly cautious and nervous demeanor. After sizing her up, he is angered by her disdain and blocks her way.
“Avoiding me, huh?” He leans in, sniffing his arm, “Do I smell that bad?”
The woman, frightened, tries to run, but he blocks her again, “Do you smell any better?”
After scrutinizing her, he menacingly asks, “Got any money?”
“No, no…” the woman replies, scared, pushing him away.
Angered, the man pulls a knife from his pocket and starts to argue and struggle with her.
As he swings the knife at her, his face still bears the expression of someone half-awake from drunkenness.
His arms flail randomly, more to scare her than to actually kill, eventually cornering her against a wall. His movements with the knife still do not seem genuinely murderous.
When he stabs the woman in the stomach, he continues to ramble drunkenly, and even as he pulls the knife out, causing blood to flow, she collapses in agony. He looks at the knife in his hand, seemingly surprised: she had dodged his knife before, why didn’t she dodge this time?
The drunkard stares at the woman for a while, finally sobering up from the shock.
Panicked, he clumsily wipes the blood off on the woman’s clothes. But facing the woman who had just angered him, he becomes frightened again, avoiding looking at her and accidentally slashing her face in his panic.
He continues to wipe off the blood with her clothes. Suddenly, a noise from a cat or rat knocking over a can startles him, and he bolts up, running away.
In his haste, he doesn’t realize something hits his hand, causing the knife to fly out of his grip.
Still seemingly unaware, he stumbles out of the alley and only realizes what happened when he collapses against a wall and vomits violently.
…
Yi Jiayi had no idea how she managed to complete her work assignment. When she finally came to her senses, her notebook was already filled with crooked text.
[Forensic Fatal Wounds and Other Injuries Report, Registration for Collection the Next Day][Weapon Analysis Report, Registration for Collection the Next Day][Scientific Forensics On-Site Analysis Report, Collection Registered After 3 Days]…[Weekly Progress Summary and Registration, First File Submission]…[After Case Resolution, Gradually Supplement Information and Reports, Register and Integrate into the Files]…
She stared blankly at the records in front of her, gripping the pen tightly, only now feeling her knuckles stiff and numb.
Standing not far away, Lin Wangjiu occasionally glanced at Yi Jiayi, ready to push her outside the moment she looked like she was going to vomit.
He had clearly planned which bin to assign to her in his mind.
Unexpectedly, although the young girl looked naive and well-behaved, she bit her teeth and managed her tasks well, causing him no trouble at all.
She had a good mental fortitude.
When the forensic officer was performing the autopsy, Yi Jiayi leaned tightly against the wall by the door, trying her utmost to maintain the greatest distance from the corpse.
She kept her head down, focusing only on her notebook, never letting her eyes wander, just listening to them talk without letting herself imagine scary thoughts.
The moment anyone seemed like they were about to vomit, she was the first to flee through the door.
She ventured into the coldest area before daring to take a deep breath.
Suddenly feeling a pat on her back, her body stiffened, and Yi Jiayi immediately stood still.
The one who patted her was a twenty-something-year-old plainclothes policeman named Liu Jiaming. He had an unconventional face with long eyes, a high nose, and thin lips, not exactly handsome, but his smile carried a charming air.
He tilted his head, smiling as he observed Yi Jiayi, and loudly said:
“Make sure you’ve properly filed all the documents by date, so no one loses any important files and tries to blame it on us, the Major Crimes Team B.”
After saying this, he glanced sidelong at the forensic officer.
“Stop messing around,” Lin Wangjiu patted Liu Jiaming’s shoulder and added, “But if it’s lost, it’s lost, just file another report, no big deal.”
Despite his casual demeanor, as if he were a mediator, his words implied that if any documents were lost, it wasn’t the Major Crimes Unit’s fault.
The forensic officers who followed out were stern-faced, the younger one looking particularly indignant. However, their gaze swept over the head of Major Crimes Team B and ultimately, they chose to remain silent, adopting an attitude of enduring indignity.
“Based on rigor mortis, the time of death is estimated to be approximately 6 hours ago, deducing the time of death to be around __:__ AM.”
“The fatal injury was to the abdomen.”
“Based on the bleeding and the marks on the wound, the face was attacked without struggle, suggesting it was post-mortem mutilation.”
“The weapon was a sharp object, likely a small dagger.”
“Foreign substances found in the wound are currently being analyzed by the Forensics Department…”
The forensic officer methodically explained each point, while the head of the Major Crimes Team B occasionally nodded in response.
“Sergeant Fang, I will complete the full forensic report as soon as possible and send it to—” the forensic officer looked up at Yi Jiayi.
Lin Wangjiu caught the forensic officer’s glance and immediately patted the dazed young policewoman, “Name?”
“Yi Jiayi.” The young policewoman then regained her composure, and seeing everyone looking at her, added: “Yi as in I Ching, a home suitable for a family as in Ikea, and tranquil as in peaceful mind.”
“Alright, I will send it to Yi Jiayi. She will print it out and deliver it to the Major Crimes Team B in your hands,” the forensic officer said, eventually unable to hold back, he added:
“After the case is solved, Yi Jiayi will collect all documents provided by various departments from the Major Crime Unit for unified archiving.”
Fang Zhenyue had been lost in thought until then, only glancing at the forensic officer when he made this unnecessary additional explanation.
The man had sharp brows and starry eyes, a chiseled nose, and even with an indifferent and lazy demeanor, he still appeared commanding.
His silent gaze was chilling to the bone.
The forensic officer’s throat choked up, unable to voice his frustration, he awkwardly nodded and then turned to busy himself.
Liu Jiaming raised an eyebrow at the forensic officer’s retreating figure before moving closer to Fang Zhenyue, “Brother Yue, the body was found by an elderly man with poor hearing living in the garbage pile. His mind isn’t very sharp. He thought the woman by the roadside had just passed out drunk when he saw her after collecting trash until late last night and didn’t bother.
“After eating lunch and picking some stuff, he saw her again and then called the police.
“The victim’s money and identification were intact, the facial mutilation was probably not to hinder us from identifying her, but more likely out of vengeance.
“Most likely, the perpetrator is an acquaintance with a grudge.”
“Have the nearby residents been questioned?” Fang Zhenyue didn’t respond to Liu Jiaming’s deduction but methodically inquired about the status of the standard procedural completion.
He had been writing a report until late last night, and had just sat down in the office this morning when he was called to provide a different perspective analysis for a special team.
He rushed over in the afternoon hoping to catch a nap at the desk, but ended up dealing with a new case instead.
Both tired and weary, even after downing a large cup of coffee he still felt irritable and looked more fierce than usual.
People around him were all treading carefully, not daring to annoy him further.
“They said they didn’t see any suspicious individuals.”
“We didn’t find the murder weapon at the scene, so we preliminarily deduce it was taken away by the murderer,” Liu Jiaming’s tone was more like casual chatting than discussing a case.
Having seen so many cases, if they were always so tense, they would have been exhausted long ago.
Lin Wangjiu added, “The victim’s name is Zhang Fengyun, a 39-year-old garment worker. From the ticket stubs on her body, it appears she took an early bus from Langfang. I’ve already contacted her husband to see if he has arrived.”
While walking, he complained, “Ah, when someone dies outside, they don’t search thoroughly or investigate properly. They can’t even find the murder weapon; looks like we’re in for a long battle.”
He walked, rubbing his neck and pounding his shoulders, as if he had endured a great hardship.
At the stairwell, as they were about to part ways, Liu Jiaming suddenly turned back, smiling at Yi Jiayi:
“The next time you have documents to deliver, just find me—Liu Jiaming from Major Crimes Team B. If you’re free after work someday, let’s go for some spicy stir-fried crab. There’s a place nearby—”
Fang Zhenyue, who was ahead, turned back to glare, and Liu Jiaming quickly waved his hand, winked at Yi Jiayi, and then ran to catch up with Sergeant Fang, returning to work.
Yi Jiayi stood in the stairwell, watching the back of Fang Zhenyue, and realized belatedly:
Oh, the detective with the biceps bullied by mosquitoes is indeed Sergeant from the Major Crimes Unit.
Stern and unpolice-like, more like an iron-faced judge.
With a pair of fake whiskers and a large pen, he could preside over a court.
She felt like laughing, but then her thoughts shifted, suddenly recalling the movie-like scene she had seen in the autopsy room, and the body that had been dissected and then stitched back together.
Biting her lip and clutching her clipboard, holding a pen, she slowly climbed the stairs.
The heroine of the murder scene she saw was clearly the corpse lying on the cold slab—could that be real, and the man waving a small dagger… was he the real murderer?
Back in the office, after reporting to her supervisor about her work, she distractedly passed the next two hours.
At the end of the day, she peeked into the Major Crimes Team B office, only seeing moving shadows.
Lin Wangjiu stepped out to smoke, and when he saw Yi Jiayi, he waved and then forgot her name, “Yi what?”
“Yi Jiayi,” the young policewoman had to answer again.
It’s just like that for the little people, not easy to be remembered.
“Aren’t you going out on a date after work?” Lin Wangjiu sized her up.
After changing out of her uniform, she still dressed simply, carrying a lunch bag, her hair bun turned into a ponytail, looking like a schoolgirl on her way home, clearly not dressed for a date.
“I’m going home to eat,” Yi Jiayi said with a smile, casually asking, “Uncle Jiu, have you found the murder weapon yet?”
Lin Wangjiu took a puff of his cigarette, savoring the sweet ‘Uncle Jiu’ from the young woman. He was also close to retirement, wondering if he’d manage to retire fully and enjoy his family life.
Shaking his head, he slowly answered:
“Sergeant has asked us to expand the search area and go through it again, we’re about to leave.”
“Oh.”
“What’s the point of working overtime on a case that will take months anyway, might as well go home, drink soup, and sleep,” Lin Wangjiu complained, then seeing the young girl staring at him with big eyes, he straightened his back and seriously advised:
“Always walk on the main roads, not the alleyways, you got that?”
“Yes, sir.”
…
In the parking lot, the slow-moving Yi Jiayi happened upon the Major Crimes Team B, who were striding hurriedly over.
Fang Zhenyue led the team, driving the police car to the crime scene.
Fang Zhenyue shook off the morning’s sluggishness and the afternoon’s impatience; his face now stern, his eyes shimmering with a cold light, he moved swiftly into the car, his posture strikingly dashing.
Only the small motion of scratching his itchy arm slightly deflated his imposing aura.
The police car roared off, spraying Yi Jiayi with exhaust.
She waved her hand and pushed her bicycle out of the parking lot, reluctant to ride it. The old bike was still just that, an old bike, without magically transforming into something better.
She was just not content.
After walking a few more meters, she suddenly took a deep breath and finally decided to give in to her curiosity.
She turned back to the police station to call her brother and tell him she’d be home late due to overtime, then grabbed the half bottle of mosquito repellent from her desk drawer and stuffed it into her pocket.
Head held high, she determinedly ran downstairs and rode her bicycle straight to the crime scene in the back alley of Bi Street.
In the CCTV footage of the crime, she saw the weapon fall from the assailant’s hand when he collided with the metal stairs at the street corner, landing in a cluttered corner a few steps away…
She was just going to take a look…
To see if the weapon was really there, to see if the ‘movie’ she glimpsed while her mind wandered was real or just a hallucination.