Eyes that are the same as those of evil

Chapter 54 The Ungrateful Wolf 11
It's not possible to go to Jiuqu Village for the time being. Tan Ming met Yu Dong's parents in the interrogation room at three in the morning.

The couple was devastated when they learned that their child had been tortured to death; they wept uncontrollably. A day later, they still hadn't recovered from the grief.

Yu's mother was in particularly bad condition; her eyes were red and swollen, she looked haggard, and she seemed somewhat dazed. Her hair was a mess and she didn't seem to care about it.

Tan Ming, with mixed feelings, asked them, "Why did you kill Fan Zhiquan?"

Mother Yu's expression instantly became agitated. Her eyes widened, and she slammed her fists on the table, shouting, "He's the murderer! He's the murderer, isn't he?! He's the one who killed my son!"

"There is currently no evidence to prove that he is the murderer."

"It's him! I know he's a serial killer. The families of the victims from back then came to ask us. I know he's from Jiuqu Village! If you didn't suspect him, why did you arrest him? But you didn't find any leads, did you? He's been on the run for eleven years without being found, so it's definitely hard to convict him, but he has to pay with his life! He must pay with his life!"

Mr. Yu put his arm around her and whispered words of comfort.

Her excitement deflated, turning her into a tattered balloon that could only touch the ground.

“My child…” she managed to sob, “Why wasn’t it my child who was saved? Xiaodong is not even ten years old yet, I’ve raised him for so long… It was so close, just because I wasn’t watching him properly once…”

The pain is far deeper because the child's death was caused by a person, not by an accidental fall into the water.

Especially after learning that another child had been rescued, Zhu Muyang's parents were even more heartbroken by the unexpected return of their child, and they wished they could kill the murderer immediately.

And then they actually did it.

Tan Ming sensed something was wrong.

There are many stories of victims' parents taking revenge on their enemies, but this case had a major twist before that the victim's family killed the suspect, and it is highly likely that the murderer instigated it, just to kill and cover up the crime.

What about this time? Could it also be instigated by the murderer? If so, does it mean that Fan Zhiquan really knew something that needed to be silenced?

Tan Ming became serious and said to Yu Dong's parents, "I understand your desire to kill the murderer, but since the victim's family has contacted you, you should know that committing murder before the case is fully investigated will result in imprisonment, even if you are a victim's family member. You'll be in jail before the murderer is brought to justice!"

Mr. Yu immediately panicked: "We were so angry we couldn't hold back! We thought he had escaped legal punishment through some trick. Aren't many serial killers very clever? We were just thinking, what if this person escapes and goes on to hurt other children..."

"Who told you that the murderer was Fan Zhiquan? We never said the murderer was from Jiuqu Village. Also, did the idea to kill really just suddenly come to you? Did someone tell you something?"

The couple, their minds clouded by emotions, looked bewildered.

……

By the time Zheng Yan and his group learned the whole story, it was almost dawn in Jiuqu Village.

"So Yu Dong's parents acted purely on impulse, and no one was manipulating them behind the scenes?" he asked into the phone.

Tan Ming said yes.

"The victim's family only asked her about everything that happened to their child from before he disappeared until after he was murdered, and whether she saw anyone who seemed to be the murderer. You can ask Liu Maoshui; he was the one who led the group at the time. Moreover, Yu Dong's parents waited at the police station for half a day. They only impulsively went down and bought a knife to kill him after seeing us bring Fan Zhiquan back and then release him. They were completely inexperienced in stabbing him. The most serious injuries on Fan Zhiquan's body were on his overweight belly, and he was not in any life-threatening danger."

Officer An asked anxiously, "Are you sure? Perhaps Fan Zhiquan knew the murderer, saw him by chance, and was thus targeted by the murderer who wanted to use him to kill? Could it really be such a coincidence that the same thing happened eleven years ago for no reason?"

“Fan Zhiquan said he hadn’t seen anyone suspicious. If the murderer wanted to kill him to silence him, he would definitely need to communicate with Yu Dong’s parents. Apart from the victim’s family, everyone else who had contact with them was still in the orchard, which doesn’t match the direction the murderer fled in,” Tan Ming said on his phone.

Officer An was speechless.

He stayed up all night, but felt even more lost. "What a coincidence?" he murmured.

Tan Ming didn't know what to say, and after a moment of silence, he asked about their progress.

Do you have any good news?

Zheng Yan sighed, "Based on the trace evidence and forensic clues you relayed, we've ruled out several people. Bai Shuang, Huang Wen, and Fan Licheng are still suspects. But Bai Shuang's family has never grown bayberries, and Fan Licheng's shoe size doesn't match. Although Bai Shuang might have touched someone else's bayberry tree, and Fan Licheng might have worn someone else's shoes to mislead us... there's no very conclusive evidence. Now we're planning to conduct a comprehensive search of the entire village, regardless of the group."

This is a big project.

The operators for the major project did not include Tan Jia, a temporary worker.

She was catching up on sleep in her car, with a clay figurine of the "murderer" next to her.

Last night was truly busy. While the criminal investigation team was conducting interviews and interrogations, she carefully observed everyone from behind human cover, trying to find someone in the darkness who could match the murderer in her dream the night before. This was originally supposed to be done by the two survivors, but Zhu Muyang had only just been able to speak in the hospital, and it was even more impossible for that young master Lin Zhiyue.

So Tan Xiaogong spent the whole night working on it and managed to identify a few people who were similar in height, hand size, and build. Fan Licheng was one of them.

She even sculpted a clay figure of the murderer. While it wasn't exactly lifelike, it revealed several key characteristics. When she didn't want to talk, she would show the clay figure to Zheng Yan and the others, who could immediately identify the key points of the investigation.

The police car smelled bad and wasn't very soundproof. She had a headache and a sore neck from sleeping, so she got up, rolled down the window, and looked outside.

"Any good news?" she asked in a hoarse voice, casually pulling out a box of Pocky from her pocket, her smoking posture almost identical to Zheng Yan's.

Xiao Chen held out his hand, indicating that he wanted one too, and said, "Yu Dong's parents almost killed Fan Zhiquan."

This was followed by a series of explanations.

Tan Jia crunched off a piece of biscuit, her thoughts, still half-asleep, drifting aimlessly.

"A new group of victims' families wants to kill someone who isn't the murderer; the family of a victim from eleven years ago killed a newly discovered suspect..."

Officer An knocked on the window: "Don't you also think it's too much of a coincidence? Was there really no one instigating this behind the scenes?"

"No, I wasn't thinking about that. I was thinking, if the person they want to kill today isn't the murderer, then what if the person killed eleven years ago wasn't the murderer either?"

Officer An: "The young man must have been out of his mind from staying up all night, right? It has been confirmed that Fan Yan was an accomplice in taking Lin Zhiyue away and making extortionate phone calls."

Tan Jia was still a little sleepy, and yawned as he casually said, "Maybe he only did those two things."

Zheng Yan stopped twirling the lighter and turned to look at her along with Officer An.

"...Young people really dare to dream big."

Officer An's brain seemed to have been injected with a lot of engine oil, and it started spinning rapidly again. He stood up straight and walked around in circles, getting faster and faster.

"Back then, it didn't take much effort to find Fan Yan because he didn't use any high-tech means to cover up when he took the child and made the extortion calls. In addition, after Lin Zhiyue escaped, he mentioned what the murderer said, which pointed to Fan Yan's family situation, so we were sure he was one of the murderers. Although we didn't get a confession, everyone thought so. But we investigated for a long time and couldn't find any trace of contact between the other murderer and him... What if they had never actually been in contact at all?"

"That explains why Lin Zhiyue was the only one among the group of victims, and why the murderer suddenly joined the extortion process. The two of them were doing their own thing! Fan Yan was the one who accidentally discovered the murderer's crime, so he wanted to use the murderer to 'destroy' Lin Zhiyue. The murderer realized this, and in turn used the victim's family to kill him to silence him, and then pinned all the blame on him!"

(End of this chapter)