The Last Mr. Dongguo

As soon as Cheng Luan returned to his office, Director Xing was already waiting for him. Looking at Director Xing's grim face, Cheng Luan braced himself for a reprimand. Sure enough, Director Xing threw a stack of documents at Cheng Luan and began a barrage of questions.

"What have you been doing? Two people have died in just three days! Two people! Do you know what that means? It means I can take off this uniform and go home to farm, and you can go back to your juvenile detention center. How about that? Satisfied now? Humph! Good thing, everyone's free now!" Director Xing paced back and forth in front of Cheng Luan, who could clearly see spittle flying from Director Xing's mouth. "Take a look at your phone, see what people are saying online. They're saying our police are incompetent, saying Huze City has become a city of darkness. There are even people cheering for the criminals, and people analyzing cases online themselves. I think the netizens' analyses are better than your reports to me. Look at the reports you gave me, all your analysis and analysis, where's the killer? I think you really don't want to work here anymore!" Director Xing questioned for a long time before a cough stopped him. Seeing this, Cheng Luan quickly handed him a cup of tea.

"Cough cough cough, don't think I'll let you off just because you're silent and putting on a pitiful act," Director Xing took the cup and took a sip. "48 hours. I'm only giving you 48 hours. After 48 hours, either you bring the murderer to me, or we'll both go home and farm. Even if we're farming, I won't let you be idle. You decide what to do." Director Xing slammed the cup heavily on the table, turned around, and left.

Cheng Luan picked up the documents from the ground and sighed. At that moment, Bai Xin pushed open the door to Cheng Luan's office.

"Form a team..."

"You're getting more and more rude! Don't you know you should knock first!" Bai Xin had barely opened his mouth when Cheng Luan roared back at him. Cheng Luan was already seething with resentment, and Bai Xin just happened to be in the line of fire.

Knowing Cheng Luan's temper, Bai Xin quickly went back outside and gently knocked on the door.

"Come in, what is it?"

With Cheng Luan's permission, Bai Xin carefully pushed open the door and said softly, "Teacher Bai is here."

Cheng Luan was taken aback at first, but quickly smiled knowingly. He casually pulled his phone out of his pocket, and a WeChat message appeared on his screen: "Is my little Fei fed?"

As soon as Cheng Luan came downstairs, he saw a man dressed in Tai Chi uniform sitting elegantly in the lounge, holding his teapot. When he saw Cheng Luan approaching, a kind smile, like that of Maitreya Buddha, appeared on his round face.

"Cheng Luan, you look like you've lost your soul without Fei Li around?" Bai Sen gently blew on the tea leaves on the surface of his tea, joking with Cheng Luan. "That's not the style of a criminal investigation captain like you."

"Teacher Bai, please stop nagging me. Director Xing gave me 48 hours, and I have to go home to farm when the time is up." Cheng Luan looked very serious. "As you know, I've had my eye on your little vegetable garden for a while now. I'll go over there and help you tend to it. I think that would be a good idea."

"Hmph, you can't solve the case but you're still eyeing my little courtyard. You've got a dream come true. But I heard that Director Xing wants you to help him take care of his yard?"

"Teacher Bai, please stop teasing me. I'm taking excellent care of Xiao Fei. He eats premium dog food three times a day, plus two meals of fruit—he eats better than I do! You haven't seen it, but now you treat me more like family than Fei Li. Haha, Teacher Bai, where's Fei Li?" Cheng Luan didn't see Fei Li, knowing he was deliberately hiding him, so he feigned a fawning tone, "Didn't he come back with you?"

"I've offended the leaders of Fukuyama University, so you'll have to take the blame for that."

A familiar voice came from outside the lounge. Cheng Luan knew immediately that Fei Li had returned. He was as happy as a child and prepared to give Fei Li a big hug.

"However, I just went to your house and saw that the dog food I gave you was still untouched on the coffee table. Xiao Fei's eyes lit up when he saw me, just like he'd seen a savior. I don't really believe you feed him premium dog food three meals a day!" Fei Li, holding a milk cup, pushed Cheng Luan aside, sat on the sofa with a serious expression, and adopted the tone of interrogating a criminal.

"Ah? That, haha, that's what I bought again, the best! The finest! I put it all in Xiaofei's bowl, he probably already ate it all." Cheng Luan hurriedly explained, avoiding Fei Li's gaze and turning to Bai Sen. "Teacher Bai, you know, I treat Xiaofei like a brother. I'm just busy with this case right now, but once we solve it, I'll treat Xiaofei to a good meal."

"And what about me?" It was another familiar voice. This voice reached Cheng Luan's ears, and he rushed to the door to greet it as if by conditioned reflex.

"Oh, my dear lady, how could we leave you out? Here's my salary card, order whatever you like." Cheng Luan greeted Li Mengying with a smile.

"Stop joking. Director Xing and my dad specifically called Fei Li and me back from Fushan to help you." Li Mengying sat down next to Fei Li, glancing at the colorless tea in her cup. "Fei Li and my dad are both easy to talk to. One drinks tea and the other drinks milk. I'll be drinking coffee, though."

"Thank you, thank you, Teacher Bai, thank you, Miss Li. Didn't I tell you? Here's your salary card. I feel much more at ease now. Director Xing just gave me a lecture. So it turns out he had this planned all along." Cheng Luan appeared slightly relaxed, but his face still betrayed his worry, and his eyes held a hint of anxiety.

Cheng Luan's micro-expressions did not escape Fei Li's notice. After a brief joke, Fei Li also put away her smile: "Enough with the nonsense, I want to see all the first-hand information."

In the forensic laboratory, two cold corpses lay silently on the autopsy table. The clearly visible "Y"-shaped suture wounds brought another wave of sadness to Fei Li. Fei Li clasped her hands together, bowed three times to the corpses, and then put on gloves to carefully examine every inch of skin.

"The cause of death is very simple. According to the autopsy results," Zou Wen explained from the side, "I found traces of sleeping pills in the victim's stomach. In addition, the tire tracks collected from both crime scenes confirmed that they belonged to the same tricycle. It is likely that the murderer first tricked the victim into taking sleeping pills, and then used the tricycle to transport the victim to a designated location and kill him."

"I trust your autopsy skills. I want to find something beyond the autopsy results." Fei Li wasn't too concerned about Zou Wen's professional autopsy findings; her white gloves were ultimately left on Wei Li's nails. "Newly done nails."

"What did you say?"

Following Fei Li's gaze, everyone focused their attention on Wei Li's fingernails.

"My new nail art has fallen off," Fei Li muttered to herself.

"I noticed this too. It's possible the culprit scraped it off during the move. We also searched the scene but didn't find any similar nail clippings."

"No, I don't want to talk about how it was scraped off, but where it fell off. Cheng Luan, let's go to the scene."

Although the weather had cleared up, the area around the fishpond was still very muddy, and the yellow warning line had been extended to 100 meters from the center of the scene. Fei Li and the others put on special police shoe covers and moved with difficulty to the center of the scene.

The yellow police markers at the scene restored the original appearance of the incident, with three tire tracks being particularly obvious, extending from the police cordon all the way to the outer edge of the fishpond.

Fei Li crouched down and followed the tire tracks step by step. Suddenly, his eyes lit up, and he used tweezers to pick up a clump of something that looked like soil. Li Mengying followed behind Fei Li and cooperatively handed him an evidence bag.

"What's this?" Cheng Luan took the evidence bag and looked at it for a long time but couldn't figure it out, so he threw it to Zou Wen.

"It should be insect droppings, and the soil it's attached to is a darker color, quite different from the soil around the fishpond," Fei Li explained as she continued to observe.

"You mean, it's possible this was brought here by the murderer or the deceased?"

"The killer knew the victim well, yet couldn't even handle a petite woman like Wei Li, requiring sleeping pills. This shows the killer was extremely insecure about their own strength." Fei Li's answer puzzled Cheng Luan. Seeing Cheng Luan's questioning look, Fei Li continued, "Personally, I suspect the feces were brought to the crime scene by the killer. If so, the original location of this substance must be the killer's safe zone. Therefore, finding this place is not far from finding the killer." Fei Li straightened up, took off her gloves, and gave a clear direction. "The origin of this feces is very important. Zou Wen and I are going to the lab. We'll meet at the analysis meeting this afternoon. We don't have much time."