Attending ex-girlfriend's wedding, arresting the groom's officer on the spot

"Drive," Zhang Hui said to the driver, watching Li Bing being escorted into the car. The police car slowly drove away from the yard, Li Bing's cries gradually being drowned out by the roar of the engine. Zhang Hui stood there, watching the police car disappear down the village road, knowing in his heart that Li Bing's breakdown was not only due to the irrefutable evidence, but also because he could no longer escape the crime he had committed. And this tragedy caused by professional competition would finally come to its conclusion under the judgment of the law.

The lights in the criminal investigation branch's interrogation room were icy cold. Li Bing sat in a metal interrogation chair, his hands firmly handcuffed to the armrests. From the moment he was brought in, he kept his head down, his disheveled hair obscuring his face. Only when officers brought him water would he occasionally raise his eyes, his gaze filled with fear and evasion. Zhang Hui sat opposite him at the interrogation table, a thick file spread out before him—DNA reports, call logs, crime scene photos—each item like a sharp knife, waiting to dissect Li Bing's hidden crimes.

"Name, age, occupation." Zhang Hui's calm yet penetrating voice broke the silence of the interrogation room. Li Bing's Adam's apple bobbed, his voice hoarse and almost inaudible: "Li Bing, 36 years old, veterinarian of Dongfeng Village." His fingers unconsciously rubbed against the armrest, faint traces of black soil remaining under his fingernails—traces from the grassland, indelible evidence of his crimes.

"Where were you on the night of August 15th? What did you do?" Zhang Hui went straight to the point, his gaze fixed on Li Bing's face. Li Bing's body stiffened visibly, and his head drooped even lower: "I... I was sleeping at home, I didn't go out." His voice was deliberately calm, but he couldn't hide the panic in his tone. The way he had collapsed in the yard earlier was gone, and he was trying to cover up his crime with lies again.

Instead of confronting him, Zhang Hui took out the first piece of evidence from the case file—a DNA test report—and pushed it in front of Li Bing: "This is the DNA from the cigarette butt in your farm tricycle, which matches perfectly with the DNA from the skin tissue fragments under Zhang Tao's fingernails; this is the test result for the bloodstains in your truck bed, confirming it's Zhang Tao's blood. You said you were sleeping at home, how do you explain this evidence?"

Li Bing's shoulders trembled slightly, his hands clenched into fists, his knuckles turning white from the force. "I...I don't know," his voice began to tremble, "It might be that Zhang Tao rode in my car before and accidentally left it behind." This explanation, full of holes, felt weak even to himself. After saying this, he lowered his head, no longer daring to look Zhang Hui in the eye.

"Walk in your car?" Zhang Hui produced a second piece of evidence: a screenshot of a call record. "At 4:05 PM on August 15th, you called Zhang Tao using a temporary phone number, saying, 'My sheep are sick, tell him to come to the pasture quickly.' This is a recording of the call after the operator restored it; listen to it yourself." In the recording, Li Bing's deliberately lowered voice came through clearly: "Brother Zhang, I'm a herdsman from the pasture. Several of my sheep suddenly collapsed. Please come quickly, or it will be too late."

Hearing his own voice, Li Bing's body trembled violently, as if struck by lightning. He jerked his head up, his eyes filled with shock, seemingly not expecting the police to have even found the recording of the phone call. "I...I was just joking with him," his voice trembled with tears, all his previous toughness gone, "I didn't mean to hurt him, I just wanted to annoy him, who knew he would actually go..."

"Try to provoke him?" Zhang Hui produced the third piece of evidence: photos of the scene. The photos clearly showed Zhang Tao's body, black canvas fibers, and tire tracks from a farm tricycle. "You lured Zhang Tao to the grassland in a tricycle, got into an argument with him at the foot of the slope, stabbed him in the heart with a dagger, and then drove away from the scene, taking his shoes and tool bag in an attempt to destroy evidence. These traces at the scene completely contradict your confession. Are you still trying to deny it?"

Upon seeing Zhang Tao's body in the photograph, Li Bing's mental defenses completely crumbled. He could no longer hold back; tears welled up unexpectedly, streaming down his cheeks and dripping onto the interrogation record. "I was wrong... I shouldn't have killed him..." His body trembled violently, and a suppressed sob escaped his throat, "He stole my business first, cut off my livelihood, and I acted foolishly for a moment..."

Zhang Hui softened his tone: "Tell me, what exactly happened? Explain the whole story clearly, this is your only chance to get leniency."

Li Bing wiped away her tears, took a deep breath, and began to recount her story haltingly: "I already had a conflict with Zhang Tao. He was skilled, and the herders in the surrounding area all went to him for treatment, while my business was getting worse and worse. On August 10th, I had already arranged with Uncle Wang to treat his sheep, but he went to Zhang Tao instead. I went to confront Zhang Tao, and he said, 'If the customer wants to come to me, there's nothing I can do.' I was furious, so we started arguing, and we almost got into a fight."

“From then on, I hated him more and more. I felt that he was deliberately stealing my business and cutting off my source of income.” Li Bing’s voice was filled with resentment, and a hint of ferocity flashed in her eyes. “On August 15th, I saw Zhang Tao treating sheep in the village, and my anger flared up again. I wanted to trick him into going to the pasture and have a good talk with him. If he was willing to give me his customers, I would let it go. If he was not willing, I would scare him so that he would not dare to steal my business again.”

“I called him using a temporary phone number and lied to him, saying that some herders’ sheep in the grassland had a disease. He didn’t suspect anything and came with his toolbox.” Li Bing’s voice began to choke up. “I waited for him in my tricycle at the foot of the grassland slope. When he arrived, he realized he had been tricked and started arguing with me, saying that I was ‘not doing my proper job and only knew how to do these crooked things,’ and he even pushed me.”

“I got really angry then, I felt like he was looking down on me, so I started fighting with him. He was stronger than me, and I couldn’t beat him, so I took out a dagger from my tricycle—the one I use to dissect animals—intending to scare him. But he lunged at me to grab the dagger, and in my panic, I threw it out, hitting him right in the chest.” Li Bing’s tears flowed more and more, her voice filled with regret. “I panicked then, seeing him fall to the ground, bleeding a lot, I was terrified, so I drove off quickly, taking his shoes and tool bag with me and throwing them into an abandoned mine in the mountains.”

"Why did you take his shoes and tool bag?" Zhang Hui pressed, making sure the details were complete. Li Bing lowered his head, his voice almost inaudible: "I was afraid the police would find me through the shoes and tool bag, so I wanted to throw them away to destroy evidence. I also threw the dagger away in the irrigation ditch west of the grassland, thinking no one would find it." (End of Chapter)