Volume Two: Portrait - Chapter 1: The City of Qiang xx
The spring in J city was unbearably hot. Even though the tree branches were still bare and devoid of any green leaves, the temperature had risen to seventeen or eighteen degrees. Sitting in a speeding jeep, Tai Wei impatiently undid another button.
He was restless, not just because of the overly hot spring day, but also because as a police officer, Tai Wei was facing the most challenging case in his ten years on the force.
On March 14, 2002, Chen, a 31-year-old female resident of Apartment 402, Building 32, Pearl Community, No. 83 Taipei Street, Hongyuan District, J City, was found dead in her home. The autopsy indicated that she had died from mechanical asphyxiation between 2:00 PM and 3:00 PM, with clear signs of strangulation on her neck. Despite the absence of any signs of a break-in or theft, and no evidence of sexual assault, the killer had gruesomely mutilated the victim's body using a kitchen knife found at the scene. This brutal crime, along with two subsequent similar murders, had caused a stir in the city.
In a city with a population of nearly two million, homicides were not uncommon, but the heinous and bizarre nature of these serial killings had attracted widespread attention and sparked various speculations. Rumors about the revival of ancient vampires or genetic mutations caused by biological weapons left by the invading Japanese army began circulating. The case drew the attention of the municipal government, which urged the public security authorities to solve the case within a limited timeframe.
A special task force was formed by the city bureau to investigate the case, but after nearly a week, there had been no progress. Just when the task force was feeling desperate, Ding Shucheng, a detective from City C who was on a business trip to J City, suggested a surprising idea: to consult a graduate student specializing in criminal psychology at J University.
Initially, Tai Wei thought he was joking, but Ding Shucheng earnestly shared a story with him.
In the summer of 2001, City C experienced a series of brutal murders, where the victims, all white-collar workers aged 25 to 30, were raped and strangled with a rope on the rooftop of four high-rise buildings under construction. Ding's superior at the time, Xing Zisen, had just been promoted to deputy director of the City C Public Security Bureau. He revealed partial details of the case to the media and promised to solve it within half a month. Soon after, a letter arrived at the special task force's office, suggesting that the killer was a psychologically disturbed individual seeking to satisfy his desires through rape and murder, and likely not older than 30. Xing, intrigued by the letter, assigned someone to investigate the sender's background. Upon learning that the sender was a recent graduate from City C Normal University named Fang Mu, Xing was excited and brought him to the bureau. After a half-hour conversation in the office, Xing personally drove Fang to all four crime scenes. Upon returning, Fang thoroughly examined all the case materials and visited one of the crime scenes late at night. The young man's remarkable deduction left a deep impression on Ding.
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"He is not raping the woman; he is raping the city itself!" Fang had said.
Fang then proposed a plan: first, search all low-end video halls in the city, especially those near construction sites, for a thin, short-haired, right-handed man about 20 to 25 years old, wearing glasses, with a scratch on his left wrist and a habit of wearing a watch on his left hand. Second, search for a person with similar characteristics among the construction workers in the city. Third, search the surrounding towns for a young man who failed the college entrance exam, moved to the city for work, and fits the aforementioned description, especially those from single-parent families with only male relatives. He even predicted that the suspect would be wearing a white shirt when caught.
The members of the task force were skeptical about this seemingly far-fetched theory, but Xing instructed them to follow Fang's provided characteristics. Two days later, a small video hall owner near the train station claimed to know such a person who worked at a nearby construction site. This person, Huang Yongxiao, a 21-year-old high school graduate from the rural area of City C, was the perpetrator of the four rape-murders in City C.
Huang's arrest and his confession brought the case to a close. The citizens of City C praised the police for swiftly solving the case. Xing wanted to reward Fang, but the young man declined. Instead, he requested a private conversation with Huang before his trial.
During their private conversation, which lasted over two hours, Fang took detailed notes and made recordings of their discussion. Although the conversation had little to do with the case, it seemed that Fang was more interested in Huang's life experiences from childhood to the age of 21.
Afterward, Fang became a "consultant" for the City C Public Security Bureau, assisting in solving a kidnapping, extortion, and two other murder cases by providing accurate descriptions of the suspects.
As the translation is quite long, I will continue it in another message.