Chapter 87: Points of Suspicion

Inside the room, their eyes met.

For a moment, it was quiet enough to hear a pin drop.

Yan Jing looked at the woman. The murderous aura radiating from her face was so heavy it snuffed out any other thoughts.

No one could possibly be interested in this face—man or woman—even if, structurally speaking, it was quite beautiful.

Or so he had thought.

But suddenly, the corners of the woman's lips curled. Though fleeting, a distinct charm bloomed across her features.

"I'll call my subordinate over to brief you on the case."

Lu Miao said mildly, "I hope you truly are as good at solving cases as you claim."

Dark Weird Energy surged in her palm, transforming into a bird that flew out the door.

A short while later, An Ze walked in.

Behind him followed another figure—the squint-eyed man, Fan Jue.

"Hello, Boss!"

An Ze saluted, then smiled at Fan Jue behind him.

"This is my boss."

"Hello,"

Fan Jue smiled at the woman.

Lu Miao didn't even look at Fan Jue. She said coolly, "Make him wait outside."

???

Looking completely bewildered, Fan Jue was ushered out by An Ze.

Before leaving, he cast a puzzled glance at Yan Jing on the sofa, unable to figure out why he was allowed to stay.

To this, Yan Jing simply returned a standard smile.

Returning to the room, An Ze looked at Yan Jing in pleasant surprise.

"We meet again! We really do have fate. That clue you provided last time—"

"Swish—"

As if an invisible blade had sliced through the air, An Ze shuddered and immediately fell into Silence.

"Brief him on the current situation,"

Lu Miao ordered coldly.

"Yes, ma'am!"

An Ze puffed out his chest and immediately recounted the background of the explosions and the details of the two bombings that had already occurred.

Yan Jing, who already knew this information, listened to An Ze's description. He frowned at times, looked deep in thought at others, and occasionally nodded as if figuring something out.

"Based on our bureau's current investigation, the victims of the two explosions had no contact with each other, nor did they share any common social circles. Therefore, we're currently leaning toward classifying the culprit as a pathological killer."

"That is, an offender whose mind has become twisted due to mutation or similar causes, and who commits crimes to seek thrills or exact revenge on society."

Just as An Ze was about to continue, Yan Jing raised his hand.

"Wait a moment..."

"What is it? Did you notice something?"

An Ze looked at Yan Jing with expectant eyes.

Lu Miao also put down her book and looked at Yan Jing.

"Officer, you only mentioned two names when talking about the victims of those two bombings."

Yan Jing asked in confusion, "Did these two explosions only injure two people?"

"Shouldn't an explosion of this scale cause widespread casualties?"

An Ze was taken aback by the question.

"Ah, no, both explosions had other victims. It's just that, based on our judgment, those other victims were considered collateral damage. The culprit's primary targets should be Elder Zhang Deshan and Mr. David Chen, whom I just mentioned."

"Then... do you have the files on those other victims?"

Yan Jing asked.

"Yes, we do."

An Ze immediately ran back to his own room to fetch them. When he returned, he was carrying a stack of documents half as tall as a person.

After a flurry of rummaging, he finally dug out a few crumpled sheets of paper—just before Lu Miao's patience reached its limit—and handed them to Yan Jing.

Yan Jing took them and put on a show of examining them carefully.

A moment later, he held up one of the pages.

"The victims of the second bombing, aside from this Mr. David Chen, included this girl named Compass, right?"

"Yes, that's her."

An Ze nodded. "Actually, we still can't completely conclude whether this waitress died in the explosion. Her corpse was extremely mutilated, and the Weird Energy residue on her body all stems from the blast. Even if she died before the explosion, the result would likely look the same."

"After all, according to our investigation, this David Chen seemed to have some unspeakable fetishes."

"However..."

He cupped a hand to his mouth and spoke at lightning speed:

"This is a scandal. The people from the Tower won't let us talk about it, so don't leak it to anyone."

Yan Jing nodded.

He picked up another sheet from the stack of documents.

"Officer, you just said that the victims of the two explosions had no contact with each other, right? But looking at this... it seems the life experiences of these two women share striking similarities."

At this, a bewildered An Ze took the two sheets of paper Yan Jing handed over and looked down at them.

"Orphaned, ostracized, heartbroken, chronically starving..."

By the end, An Ze's voice grew fainter and fainter as fine beads of sweat formed on his forehead.

Indeed, their social circles, areas of activity, and even their past lives had no intersection whatsoever. But if one distilled their life experiences, the similarities were... practically identical...

Previously, their investigation had focused primarily on the two prominent residents with high statuses and higher Tiers. They had assumed these dead service workers were just unlucky collateral damage; they hadn't considered this angle at all.

Suddenly, An Ze felt his hands empty. He looked up in a daze at the woman who had snatched the papers away, his heart skipping a beat.

Lu Miao stared at the two pages without saying a word, her expression completely unchanged.

Yet inexplicably, both Yan Jing and An Ze could feel the temperature in the room plummeting.

Pitch-black, freezing Weird Energy flowed from the woman, pooling across the floor. It materialized into ghostly shadows that waved their arms, struggling to stand up from the dark mire like buried corpses.

"I'm dead, I'm dead..."

An Ze leaned closer to Yan Jing, breaking into a cold sweat. "Sequence... isn't this an ability you can only learn at the Third Stage? Don't do this, Boss..."

Hearing this, Yan Jing's eyes also filled with vigilance. He readied himself to drink a Mental Immunity Potion.

Fortunately, as time ticked by, the ghostly shadows froze in place before melting away like ice. The darkness receded, and light returned to the room.

Holding the papers, Lu Miao ignored An Ze and looked at Yan Jing.

"I haven't fully mastered some parts of my abilities yet."

An Ze's eyes went wide at this, and he almost cried out in shock.

An explanation?! The boss was actually explaining herself to this human?!

Good heavens!

Was he going to be silenced to keep this a secret?!

Lu Miao continued, "You're right. You really are good at solving cases."

With that said, her face returned to its usual coldness.

"Now go collect a roster of the Tower. See whose abilities relate to emotions. Investigate the previous explosion sites again and find evidence solid enough to secure a search warrant."

She kept her eyes on Yan Jing as she spoke, but An Ze immediately understood who the order was for.

"Understood!!!"

The moment he said that, he bolted out the door.

Inside the room, only Yan Jing and Lu Miao remained once again.

Lu Miao sat down in her usual chair, while Yan Jing sat on the sofa opposite her.

"May I read one?"

Seeing Lu Miao pick up her book again, Yan Jing pointed at the few other books on the small coffee table between them and asked.

Lu Miao nodded without saying a word.

Yan Jing picked up a book titled "History of Old Sin City" and began to read.

In the quiet room, only the sound of turning pages remained.

Time passed bit by bit.

"Knock, knock, knock!"

A knock rang out at the door.

Lu Miao stood up to open it. Outside stood a sweating An Ze and the squint-eyed Fan Jue.

"Thirty minutes."

Lu Miao nodded.

Gathering the roster at this speed was considered quite good.

But then, An Ze's next sentence made her eyes narrow.

"B-Boss, I found evidence!"