My 'Healing' Game-Chapter 67 Photo
67: Chapter 67: Photo
67 -67: Photo
Donghua Ice Factory had been closed for a long time, but its underground ice storage was very clean, as if someone were regularly cleaning it.
“Stay on top and guard the entrance to prevent anyone from coming over and locking both of us inside.
I’ve already notified colleagues nearby, they should be here soon,”
Li Xue, holding her phone, looked around the ice storage and quickly made a discovery.
“What’s that?”
The bright light from the phone illuminated a corner where Li Xue saw an Incense Burner, next to which was a colored photograph of Meng Shi.
“The deceased’s photograph?
Why is there a photograph of the deceased here?
Is someone commemorating her here?”
The underground ice storage wasn’t very large, you could see the end at a glance, and there was nothing obstructing the view, so Li Xue gradually became braver.
She approached the corner and didn’t touch the photograph on the ground; instead, she recorded everything with her law enforcement recorder.
“Did you find anything?”
“I found Meng Shi’s photograph.
Someone specifically came to this place to commemorate her.
Looking at the incense ash in the Incense Burner, that person has been here many times.”
“Is that all?” Han Fei attached great importance to the clues provided by Meng Shi, but judging from Li Xue’s feedback, this didn’t seem to be a very important clue, “Why don’t you come up?
I’ll go down and have a look?”
After pulling Li Xue up, Han Fei jumped into the ice storage, and almost instantly upon entering, he felt an inexplicable sense of familiarity.
Enclosed, chilly, endless darkness kept surging towards him.
Feeling somewhat numb in his limbs, Han Fei remembered his experience at Meng Shi’s home, where the feeling Room 1031 gave him when the old lady lost control was exactly the same as this underground ice storage.
“So that kind of coldness is what the old person felt just before dying!”
He turned on the flashlight function of his phone and approached the corner, looking at the Incense Burner and Meng Shi’s photograph on the ground.
Meng Shi looked very young in the photograph, her hair not yet white.
The person who especially came here to commemorate her seemed to only have this one photograph of her.
“Donghua Ice Factory must be the first scene of the deceased’s death.
The person who came to commemorate her here must be privy to the inside story and have had a close relationship with Meng Shi, highly likely to be one of Meng Shi’s three children.”
“The eldest had set up an altar in his own home; there was no need for him to come all the way to this place.
Aside from him, that leaves only Meng Changxi and Meng Chang’an.”
A cold wind brushed Han Fei’s face.
Although the ice storage of Donghua Ice Factory was designed underground, its ventilation was excellent, which puzzled Han Fei, “Does an ice storage also need to maintain air circulation?”
He followed the direction from which the wind blew to the corner of the ice storage, where a supposed drainage hole in the floor had a gap.
Gripping the gap, Han Fei gave a strong pull and found that the drainage was just for show; beneath it was a passage.
“There’s more below?”
Looking down into the dark, subterranean passage, Han Fei hesitated.
The air became humid, and a faint stench wafted through the corridor.
“The ice storage drain has been hollowed out and connects to the city’s underground drainage system.
Shall we go down and take a look?”
“Let’s wait for backup.
Xinhu used to have an underground pipe network drainage facility, but it was later switched to underground tunnel drainage during the city’s upgrade and expansion.
The system is extensive and complicated, and it’s easy to get lost without a map.” Li Xue had previously been an officer with the Criminal Police Team, and she was experienced.
She would charge forward when it was time, and rarely acted rashly when it was time to think.
After a full fifteen minutes, two of Li Xue’s former colleagues arrived.
Unlike regular patrol officers, they were members of the Criminal Investigation Team.
One of the detectives obtained temporary access to the urban sewage system’s map, and they only then made their way into the underground through the corridor.
The air carried a subtle, strange smell, and the sound of rushing water echoed from the artificial underground river.
They walked along the maintenance path with water, gas, and telecom pipes installed over a decade ago just above their heads.
“If Donghua Ice Factory was the first crime scene, did the murderer move the body through the sewer after killing the victim?”
Li Xue pondered the case, while Han Fei thought about every word Meng Shi had said before; the other police officers around them studied the map.
“Sister Li Xue, the area we’re in doesn’t appear on the map.” An officer zoomed in on the electronic map: “There’s a man-made tunnel dug out right under the ice storage.”
The map of the city’s sewage system didn’t match the actual site, and Li Xue’s group had entered an area not shown on the map, where a hidden “room” had been carved out.
They went through the entrance and both Li Xue and Han Fei could hardly believe the scene before them.
The gloomy cave was furnished with various blueprints and a thick stack of documents about the Refrigerator Corpse Case and the Human-body Puzzle Case.
Some materials had yellowed, revealing that they’d been collected bit by bit over several years.
“Don’t touch anything carelessly!
Everyone, put on gloves!”
The police were even more astonished by what came next: the deepest wall of the cavern was covered in some cut-out photos and pictures involving more than a dozen people, most of whom had their images marked with a black pen in a circle.
Only three people were exceptions; the first was He Shouye, whose photo had been crossed out in red pen.
The second was Meng Chang’an, whose picture had been circled in red, full of puncture holes apparently made by pen tips, which indicated the cave owner’s deep hatred for Meng Chang’an.
The last photo, which no one expected, was very recent and featured Han Fei himself.
On Han Fei’s photo, someone had drawn a question mark in black pen.
“Photos with black circles probably denote those ruled out as suspects, a red cross indicates those who’ve been killed, and red circles might be for those who are next on the list to be killed.
As for the last question mark…”
All the police officers looked at Han Fei, who also felt puzzled: “I felt like I was being followed recently; could the stalker be the guy living in these sewers?”
“That’s likely.
But why did they draw a question mark on your photo?
Did you do anything special while you were being followed?” Li Xue focused on the photo of Han Fei.
“The first time I noticed the stalking was at the filming site of ‘Flower of Evil,’ while I was talking to you on the phone.
I seem to have said, ‘Compared to Meng Changxi, you should really keep an eye on Meng Chang’an, the one who looks the most Harmless.
He might be the one who killed his own mother.'” Han Fei’s eyes suddenly widened: “Right!
It was after I said this that I heard a noise from behind the corner.
It must have been my words that disturbed the follower!”
“From the information the police have right now, all the evidence points to Meng Changxi.
You’re the only one speaking in his defense, thinking the real murderer is Meng Chang’an.” Li Xue looked at the documents in the cave and ventured a bold speculation: “Could the person living in the sewers be Meng Changxi, who disappeared years ago?”
