Volume One (Prequel): The Seventh Reader - Chapter 4: The Second Victim

Youth is a neutral word, representing many flaws: lack of experience, immaturity, impulsiveness, but it also has many advantages, one of which is having plenty of time to forget things that should not be remembered.

More than a month had passed, and there was no more news about the murder case. The name Zhou Jun and that terrifying morning gradually faded from people's minds, from being specific to blurry, and eventually completely thrown into the dusty corner of memory. Days passed by calmly like flowing water, and the once bustling campus, which had been noisy because of a person's death, slowly returned to its previous tranquility, as if a stone thrown into a pond, after the ripples, left no trace. Perhaps, that's how life should be.

It was a Thursday afternoon, after the international economic law class, Fang Mu was about to leave the classroom when Professor Gao, the teacher of international economic law, stopped him. He asked Fang Mu, Zhu Lao Si, Wu Han, and Sun Qingdong to go to his office to help move some things. Although Fang Mu was a little reluctant, he still followed. There weren't many things, just two large boxes of materials and a large stack of books, but they were all very heavy, and carrying them from the faculty dormitory to the administrative building was indeed not a good task. Fang Mu and the others grudgingly carried the things into Professor Gao's office, only to find another person in the office.

Well, this trip wasn't in vain. Fang Mu thought.

She was Liu Weili, a graduate student brought by Professor Gao, a recognized beauty in the law school, tall and slender, with long flowing hair, the dream lover and object of self-pleasure for many students. The beauty smiled warmly at Professor Gao and didn't exchange many pleasantries with the juniors, squatting on the ground and flipping through the materials.

"Oh, you have this book. I specially went to the library to borrow it. If I had known, I would have borrowed it from you. Maybe I wouldn't have to return it," she exaggeratedly pouted.

"Then take it after you finish copying, remember to write a borrowing slip." Professor Gao didn't seem to buy it.

The beauty pouted exaggeratedly, "You guys, help me move these things to the copy room."

The copy room is on the 24th floor! The four of them looked at each other.

"There's an elevator, what are you afraid of? Why make a fuss about such a small task?" With that, the beauty patted Zhu Lao Si's shoulder with the book in her hand. Looking at Zhu Lao Si's expression, he would rather carry the boxes to the 24th floor even if there was an elevator.

Suddenly, Fang Mu remembered a song: "I'm willing to be a little lamb, following her. I wish she would hold a thin whip and gently beat me."

Fang Mu and Zhu Lao Si carried one box each, Wu Han carried the other, and Sun Qingdong carried a large stack of precarious books in front, while the beauty walked behind empty-handed, making a phone call, "You go by yourself tonight, I can't make it. Don't ask, overtime, yes, what's wrong, help my supervisor make copies, okay, that's it."

Finally, they managed to move the things into the copy room. Zhu Lao Si wiped his sweat and smiled, "Sister, working overtime tonight?" "Yes." The sister's tone was not enthusiastic. "Do you need our help?" "No need, you guys go back and have dinner." The beauty waved her hand, pushing them out like little chickens.

Damn, not even a thank you. The four of them entered the elevator, and Fang Mu grumbled discontentedly.

Zhu Lao Si seemed to be still in a daze. When they arrived on the first floor, the elevator shook, and Zhu Lao Si smacked his lips, "What a beauty."

"Look at you drooling, who isn't a beauty?" Wu Han pushed Zhu Lao Si out of the elevator. The four of them walked out of the administrative building, joking and laughing.

The next day, Friday.

It was a cloudy day, with dark rolling clouds covering the sky, occasionally rumbling thunder in the distance. Park Yali, who worked in the Personnel Department on the third floor, threw her bag on the table, took out a few biscuits, and prepared to go out to make herself a cup of coffee.

It was not yet 8:30 in the morning, and most of her colleagues had not yet arrived. Due to the cloudy weather, the light in the administrative building was dim. As Park Yali walked back to her office, the sky suddenly lit up with lightning, startling her, and she couldn't help but look out of the window.

Clang! The coffee cup fell to the ground. The foamy brown liquid silently flowed across the floor.

The people in the elevator ascending slowly could hear a horrific scream from the third floor.

Liu Weili lay dead on the platform on the third floor.

When Ding Shucheng arrived at the scene, the rain had become heavier.

The body was on the platform on the third floor of the administrative building. The technical department colleagues were already busy at the scene. Two were taking photos, and a technician in a raincoat was crouching on the ground inspecting. The body lay prone on the ground, head to the north, from the body shape, it was a young woman, and several forensic doctors were packing up their tools. Ding Shucheng patted a familiar old forensic doctor, "How is it?"

"Oh, you're here. The preliminary estimate is that the time of death was between 9 p.m. last night and 3 a.m. this morning, the cause of death is head and brain injury and extensive internal bleeding. Other details can only be confirmed after an autopsy." The forensic doctor looked at Ding Shucheng, furrowing his brow slightly, and explained, "It suddenly cooled down last night, so we can't give you a more precise time of death. We'll do our best to get results as soon as possible."

Ding Shucheng smiled apologetically, "Thank you."

"No, it's no use." The policeman who had been inspecting the scene suddenly stood up. He looked up at the dark, rainy sky, "The rain is too heavy, there's basically no value in further investigation."

Ding Shucheng also looked up. The 24-story office building stood silently in the rain, with almost every window flashing with confused, fearful, or excited glances. Ding Shucheng scanned the crowd looking out the windows and couldn't help feeling dizzy.

Would a person who fell from this building last night or this morning also feel dizzy?

Ding Shucheng turned to his team and said, "Get to work."

The deceased was named Liu Weili, female, 24 years old, a second-year graduate student majoring in international economic law at the Law School of the Normal University, from Sichuan, and currently living in Room 407 of Building A for graduate students. According to the deceased's roommate, the deceased had mentioned that she was asked by her supervisor to help with copying materials and might come back very late, so staying out all night did not surprise her roommate, as the deceased had a boyfriend in the city who occasionally stayed over. The matter of copying materials was confirmed by Professor Gao and others. Professor Gao was preparing to apply for a national project and needed to copy a large amount of materials. On the night of the incident, Professor Gao was celebrating his mother-in-law's birthday at a hotel in the city until 4 a.m., ruling out the suspicion of him being the culprit.

The deceased's boyfriend was a doctoral student at another university in the city. On the night of the incident, he had originally agreed to attend a farewell party for a friend who was about to get married, but the deceased called to say she had to work late and couldn't make it. The boyfriend attended the party alone and drank at a bar in the city until 2 a.m., then went to a bathhouse to bathe before sleeping in the rest area until 8:30 the next morning, and all these circumstances were confirmed by witnesses, ruling out his suspicion as the culprit.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

The scene of the incident was the administrative building of the Normal University. The building was 24 stories high, with the Law School on the 17th floor and the copy room on the top floor, the 24th floor. The window on the third floor opened onto a platform of about 200 square meters. The deceased was found on the platform. According to the duty personnel at the administrative building, Liu Weili entered the building at around 5:40 p.m. that night, and then several other people entered the building. As for whether Liu Weili left the administrative building, the duty personnel said they hadn't noticed. From 10 p.m. that night to early morning, the duty personnel had patrolled the administrative building four times and found no unusual circumstances.

Through an investigation into the deceased's social relationships, it was found that the deceased was from out of town and had no relatives in the city. Her social relationships were relatively simple. According to the deceased's classmates and friends, the deceased had a cheerful personality and was warm to others, but was a bit vain, longing for a high standard of living, but had a relatively upright lifestyle and no record of associating with bad people. The possibility of a revenge killing could be basically ruled out. Through an investigation of her boyfriend, although Liu Weili was a beautiful woman and had many pursuers on campus, her relationship with her boyfriend was good, and they had planned to get married after her graduation. Therefore, the likelihood of a crime of passion was low.

After analyzing these preliminary investigation results, the first thought that crossed Ding Shucheng's mind was that Liu Weili had died by suicide, or accidentally fallen from a height, and the subsequent autopsy report further strengthened this idea. The time of death was estimated to be between 10 p.m. and 1 a.m., and the cause of death was head and brain injury and extensive internal bleeding. The deceased's clothes were intact, her hymen was old but not torn, and there were no signs of sexual activity that night. The 155 yuan in her pocket and the 600 yuan left in her handbag in the copy room were also intact. The possibility of robbery or sexual assault was also low.

Ding Shucheng read through the autopsy report several times, pondered for a while, and then went to the morgue.

The body was covered with a white cloth, lying quietly on the dissecting table. Ding Shucheng lifted the white cloth, revealing a fair but lifeless body. It had once made its owner extremely proud and intoxicated the deeply loving man. And now it had been violently thrown from the building and ruthlessly dissected. Ding Shucheng looked at the head of the deceased, once beautiful but now broken, the mouth and eyes half open, showing a slightly surprised and hesitant expression.

What are you trying to tell me?

The on-site inspection report that arrived in the afternoon made Ding Shucheng overturn his initial thoughts.

Because the scene was too clean.

The deceased had been to the copy room on the 24th floor before, and the scene was relatively well-preserved. The door was closed during the inspection but not locked (the key was in the deceased's handbag). The copy room was a 5.1-square-meter square room with a Sharp copier, a table, two chairs, and three and a half boxes of printing paper. The copier was still on, and the copied materials were neatly stacked aside. Apart from the deceased's handbag, no other valuable items were found. Suspiciously, no fingerprints were found on the copier, table, chairs, and door handles. According to the results of the body examination, Liu Weili should have fallen from a height above the 19th floor. Therefore, the most likely location of the incident should have been the copy room, where the deceased fell from the window. However, the window of the copy room was tightly closed, and no footprints were found on the windowsill.

It was as if someone had cleaned the scene thoroughly.

After listening to Ding Shucheng's re-report, Xing Zisen seemed very interested and arranged his work before going to the Normal University with Ding Shucheng.

They went directly to the copy room on the 24th floor, and the situation at the scene was basically consistent with the description in the report, except that Professor Gao's materials were taken back with his permission. After a brief inspection, Xing Zisen and Ding Shucheng went to the rooftop opposite the copy room.

The rain had stopped, but the wind was still strong. Xing Zisen and Ding Shucheng raised their collars and looked around the roughly 100-square-meter rooftop.

The rooftop was very clean, empty, with a small pile of sand and a few broken bricks in the corner, probably left over from previous waterproofing work.

Ding Shucheng walked to the edge of the rooftop, where there was no railing, only a cement edge about 16 to 17 centimeters high.

Did Liu Weili fall from here?

Ding Shucheng carefully placed one foot on the cement edge and looked down, feeling dizzy in an instant. He quickly retreated and looked into the distance. This was the tallest building in the Normal University campus, and the entire campus and nearby buildings were all in sight. It was almost time for dinner, and the campus was bustling with groups of people walking around, and several cars were carefully shuttling through the crowd.

Someone came up behind Ding Shucheng. He turned around and saw Xing Zisen squatting on the ground, looking at the ground under his feet.

Ding Shucheng looked down and saw a half piece of brick next to his foot, about half a meter away, and another one.

Ding Shucheng also crouched down and looked for a long time but couldn't see anything. He wanted to ask Xing Zisen, but seeing him so focused, he didn't dare to speak.

Xing Zisen suddenly stood up, turned and walked away. Ding Shucheng hurriedly followed behind him.

Xing Zisen jumped into the corridor from the window and went straight to the copy room. Ding Shucheng entered the copy room and saw Xing Zisen carefully searching on the floor.

"Old Xing, what are you looking for?"

Xing Zisen didn't say anything, almost pressing his nose to the ground, searching slowly.

A few minutes later, probably finding nothing of value on the ground, Xing Zisen turned his attention to the wall, and soon his gaze stopped at a certain place.

Xing Zisen beckoned to Ding Shucheng, who walked over and squatted down, following his pointing finger.

There were several water stains that had not completely dried, slightly darker in color than the rest of the wall. If you didn't look carefully, you wouldn't notice it. From the shape, it seemed like water splashed on the ground and then splashed up.

Ding Shucheng looked at Xing Zisen, who was staring at the water stains, and slowly, a smile appeared at the corner of his mouth.

"Ding, go ask Professor Gao if there's anything wrong with the materials he took back."