Chapter 387: Another Victim

Jin Yi Community.

Building 4, Unit 102.

Standing outside the door, the officers immediately smelled a sharp, pungent scent of blood and rot coming from inside.

Everyone furrowed their brows.

Something seems off...

"Do you smell that? It seems like there's a scent of blood," Wang Dachuan said, pointing at the door of Unit 102.

The others all nodded.

The odor was so pungent that anyone with a functional sense of smell couldn't miss it, and of course they did.

The smell was emanating from the room; someone had died inside.

Under these circumstances, no one would willingly open the door for them.

Xu Mo immediately produced a piece of wire and employed his door‑opening technique.

When the door swung open, the scent of blood and rot grew even stronger, assaulting the officers' upper throats.

The room was also swarming with flies.

In the living room lay a yellow‑haired man sprawled in a pool of blood.

For a moment, the officers were all bewildered.

A person is dead?

What's going on? Suicide out of guilt?

They hadn't anticipated such a scene before arriving.

"Team Leader, this... can't be a suicide out of guilt, right?" Wang Dachuan said, gesturing at the corpse in the living room.

Xu Mo said nothing, but stepped forward to examine the body, turning the face‑down corpse over.

The corpse's abdomen bore dozens of knife wounds.

Xu Mo pointed to the wounds; their locations and entry angles indicated this was not suicide but homicide.

"Homicide. This victim isn't the suspect we saw on the cameras; he's also a victim of the suspect we're after. The suspect harbored a lot of resentment toward him—fifteen cuts, each avoiding vital organs, the victim bled out. That's ruthless..."

In fact, once they saw the wounds on the victim's front, even without Xu Mo's comment, the officers realized suicide was impossible; the cuts were too intricate for self‑infliction.

Moreover, even if it were possible, no one would stab themselves a dozen times in a suicide—who has that stamina? A normal person would curl up like a shrimp after the first cut.

At that moment, Xu Mo's phone rang.

"The forensic doctor? Why is he calling—found a new clue?" Xu Mo pressed the answer button.

As expected, Xu Mo was right; the forensic doctor called because he had uncovered a new clue: "Pregnancy line—I found a pregnancy line on one of the body fragments!"

"Pregnancy line?"

"Yes, I just discovered a pregnancy line on a portion of the abdomen that hadn't been opened yet—the victim was pregnant!"

"Got it," Xu Mo murmured.

He glanced at the corpse lying before him.

The male victim was also slight, with yellow hair, wearing tight pants and canvas shoes; his index and middle fingers were blackened from nicotine—a clear sign of a chronic smoker, a typical delinquent.

Putting the forensic doctor's words together, Xu Mo figured it out.

The two victims—a man and a woman—must have been a couple; the woman was young yet already pregnant...

"I know who the killer is," Xu Mo said abruptly after ending the call with the forensic doctor.

The officers perked up and looked at Xu Mo: "Who?"

"The father of that dismembered corpse."

The remark left the officers puzzled.

"Hm?"

"The father killed his daughter? Why?"

"Then who is the yellow‑haired man? Why was he killed too?"

"That yellow‑haired guy must be part of the same family, so he's the son? What the father did—killed both his children."

Xu Mo explained: "The forensic doctor just called; he found a pregnancy line on the dismembered body. You all know a pregnancy line only appears when a woman is pregnant. That corpse was pregnant before death..."

"Pregnant? The forensic doctor said the victim looked young... Ah! I get it!" Wang Dachuan slapped his forehead, realizing: "The yellow‑haired man was the boyfriend of the earlier female victim. When her family discovered she was pregnant, her father, ashamed, killed her, then went to the boyfriend's house and killed the yellow‑haired man who got her pregnant!"

"Exactly, that's what I mean," Xu Mo nodded.

The other officers also felt the fog lift.

The explanation now made sense.

Jin Yi Community wasn't the killer's home, so the murderer left the seafood market at dawn and headed here not to return home but to kill another victim!

At this point, the investigative direction became clear.

Officers always investigate by bold conjecture and careful verification.

Now Xu Mo has offered a very plausible hypothesis; they just need to follow it.

The yellow‑haired man's body hadn't been tampered with, so his identity and records were easy to trace.

Consequently, the officers found the yellow‑haired man's detailed information in no time.

He was expelled for fighting, then worked as an apprentice at a hair salon; his social ties were minimal.

The officers planned to visit the barber shop where he worked and ask his coworkers whether they knew who his girlfriend was.

……

Xia Ji Ba Jian Barber Studio.

Seeing the shop name, Xu Mo's eye twitched; the name sounded like a joke... No wonder the place had no customers!

Inside the barber shop, a few young people with varied hair colors and styles were scrolling on their phones.

Seeing Xu Mo and his party walk in, a few of the young staff in the shop looked up at them and asked, "Getting a haircut?"

"No haircut, we're police officers, here to get some information from you." Xu Mo took out his Police Badge and also produced a photo of Huang Mao: "This person…"

One of the crew‑cut youngsters, upon hearing that Xu Mo was a police officer, sprang to his feet, his attitude was extremely good.

"Hello, officer! You're looking for Huang Mao? He's not here; he hasn't been here all day."

"I know he hasn't come. We're here to ask whether you know his girlfriend."

"We do know her, but… officer, which girlfriend of his are you looking for?"

The police officers: "???"

Well, from what you said, it seems Huang Mao has quite a few girlfriends!?

Xu Mo's face darkened.

"The one who's pregnant."

"Pregnant… there are several of those, which specific one are you after?" the crew‑cut youngster scratched his head.

Xu Mo: "???"

"The skinny little one!"

"Ah! Her…"