Chapter 210: Dead Through and Through

The smell of blood mixed with the scent of instant noodles and drinks rushed toward them, making Qi Fei sneeze several times.

It was a small, square room. A small desk, a single bed, and a chair—that was all the furniture.

A suitcase in the corner was splayed open, with dirty clothes piled messily on top, and some thrown on the floor, mixed with soda cans, instant noodle bowls, and snack bags.

Rather than a rental room, it was more like a garbage dump.

And the deceased lay in the middle of this pile of trash, with his back to them. Beneath him was a pool of blood that had already turned black. Those curled hands and the blue-gray skin visible between the bloodstains reminded everyone that this person was dead through and through.

Qi Fei put on shoe covers and latex gloves, tried his best to avoid the debris on the floor, walked to the side of the deceased, crouched down, and saw his face pressed against the floor tiles.

The man's eyes were wide open, his pupils already cloudy, frozen at the moment of death.

The ferocious expression indicated immense fear at the time of death.

An officer reported dutifully from the side: "The deceased is Hao Weiwei, 24 years old, unemployed. He has been renting this single-story house since last year. According to household registration information, this Hao is not a local. He usually didn't interact with people in the village, and occasionally he was seen eating at the 'fly restaurants' nearby.

This morning, the landlord came to collect the rent, found the door unlocked, and walked in to see that the person was already dead."

Qi Fei looked around. In this place where everything was visible at a glance, the wallet and mobile phone were sitting on the bed untouched. He picked them up and took a look: there were a few credit cards in the wallet, fifteen yuan in change, and a few faded supermarket receipts stuffed in messily. The phone screen was shattered, and oil stains had seeped into the cracks; it seemed it hadn't been repaired for a long time.

Truly a sloppy and messy life.

"The phone and wallet are both here?" Wu Shanqiu said after looking from the side. "It seems it wasn't a home-invasion robbery."

"Hmm, this place is remote, and it's so simple. If it were a random crime, it shouldn't have been the only target. Have the team ask if any other households in the village had anything stolen or were robbed last night." Qi Fei tapped the wallet in his hand lightly and continued to scan the surroundings.

Subsequently, his gaze fell on the desk. A mat so black that the pattern couldn't be seen caught his attention: "Hmm? Is this a mouse pad?" He picked it up to look closely, then pulled open the drawer under the desk, only to see a mouse inside; the scroll wheel was missing, and it looked like it was scrapped.

On the desk, fine blood spots were splattered. If one didn't look carefully, one would think it was a dark red paint pattern.

Qi Fei crouched halfway so his line of sight was level with the desktop. The splatter marks stopped abruptly in the middle, leaving a standard rectangular blank space. Looking up, on the wall directly facing the desk, there were similar fine blood spots, which also left a similar rectangular blank space. It seemed that when Hao Weiwei was murdered last night, there should have been something blocking this area.

"A laptop?" The scene from last night appeared in his mind, and he blurted it out.

"Very likely." Xiao Tao's voice suddenly came from behind, giving Qi Fei a real fright.

"Damn! Why are you like a ghost? Do you not make any sound when you appear?" Qi Fei said, speechless.

Xiao Tao ignored Qi Fei's protest, examined the body on his own, and said, "This person has calluses on the outside of his thumbs, and both wrists have suspected ganglion cysts. It seems he used a keyboard for a long time."

"Heh, but there's no keyboard in this room." Qi Fei said, looking at the neat rectangular blank marks.

"The deceased has multiple stab wounds. Judging from the condition of the wounds, they were all caused before death." Xiao Tao continued to check the condition of the body.

"Strange, the bank cards in the wallet are all there. It seems the murderer didn't do this to force out bank passwords. Then what was it for?" Qi Fei was even more confused after hearing this.

"Hmm?" Xiao Tao picked up the camera, aimed it at the deceased's right hand, took a series of photos, and then said, "The first joint of his right index finger is missing. The wound is neat; it seems to have been caused by a sharp weapon."

Just as Xiao Tao finished speaking, Wu Shanqiu's voice came: "Fei-ge, here!"

Qi Fei followed the sound and looked over. Wu Shanqiu was standing by the window, pointing at a pale red smudge on the outer windowsill.

It looked like something bloody had fallen onto this slightly slanted windowsill and rolled off.

Qi Fei turned back and asked the officers who were still investigating the scene: "Has that severed finger not been found yet?"

Everyone shook their heads.

Qi Fei looked at the position of the body, then at the bloodstain on the windowsill, and walked to the landlord who had discovered the body: "Was this window open when you found the deceased?"

Surprisingly, this short and stout village woman didn't show any shock at encountering a dead person and answered very calmly: "The window was open. The wind was quite strong this morning; I remember the curtains flapping loudly."

Qi Fei sized her up: "You remember so clearly? Aren't you afraid of seeing a dead person?"

"Sigh~" The landlady waved her dark, thick hand. "When someone dies in the village, everyone helps out. Who doesn't see a dead person a few times a year? What's there to be afraid of? It's just that this unlucky ghost died in my house; it'll be troublesome to rent it out in the future." Her tone carried a numbness that Qi Fei couldn't understand, yet it was irrefutable.

Qi Fei looked at the deceased, then at the small window, took a cotton swab from Xiao Tao, and carefully collected some bloodstains from the windowsill: "If this bloodstain tests positive as Hao Weiwei's, then that missing finger of his will probably be hard to find."

"Ah, Fei-ge, what do you mean?" Wu Shanqiu asked, confused.

Qi Fei didn't answer directly. He walked outside, found a wild fruit about the size of a finger, held it in his hand, crouched beside Hao Weiwei's body, and threw it lightly toward the window. The fruit flew through the small window, landed on the windowsill, and rolled off onto the ground outside.

Now Wu Shanqiu understood: "Ha! Fei-ge, you mean this finger was cut off by the murderer and thrown out? Why?"

"It is indeed puzzling. If it were robbery, only the laptop is missing; the phone and wallet are both here. If it were a vendetta, the stabbing positions were all very precise; it doesn't look like a crime of passion." Qi Fei frowned slightly, feeling confused. The deceased's phone, which was lying on the bed, suddenly vibrated twice; it seemed there was a new message.

Qi Fei picked it up and saw a notification: "The novel you are following, 'God of War: Restarting Life,' has been updated. Click to view it now!"

Hao Weiwei's phone had a password. For the sake of the investigation, Qi Fei helplessly did what he had done to the ticketing manager Ge Feng, holding the phone up to Hao Weiwei's face... ===== CHAPTER 211 =====