Chapter 93

Night fell.

Dark clouds filled the sky; there was no moon, no stars.

The wind grew colder with each gust; the half of his body leaning against the car door soon felt as if his bones ached.

Cao Chujun shifted his body, and a series of creaking sounds seemed to come from his lower spine.

His apprentice noticed and whispered, “Master, go rest at the hotel for a while. I’ll wake you if anything happens.”

“I’m not that delicate. I’m old, not dying.” Cao Chujun moved his body again and said, “Wait. When the time comes, let’s get it right the first time—then we won’t have to suffer here anymore.”

Above the High Sky

He felt miserable, but he hadn’t reached the point of collapse.

In his youth, he’d surveilled suspects for as long as a month without leaving the car, let alone changing clothes.

Cao Chujun was captain of the Third Detachment of the Changyang City Criminal Investigation Brigade, nearing retirement.

A fingerprint matched by the new forensic doctor, Jiang Faxin, had pulled Cao Chujun out of his warm office and sent him thousands of miles to the grasslands.

At this moment, he paid no attention to his physical discomfort.

His heart burned with eagerness!

“I know… Master, rest assured. The three men we brought out are all skilled in apprehensions; one’s even a retired soldier.” The apprentice, a veteran detective himself, knew this case was his master’s lifelong burden—and now that a chance had come, he dared not make a single mistake.

Cao Chujun gave a slight nod; he knew he was anxious and tried his best to suppress it.

Every detective carries one or two cases buried deep in his heart—not for any clear reason, but simply because he can’t let them go, always hoping to solve them.

The longer such a case lingers beside you, the more it gnaws at your nerves.

Everyone knows: the longer time passes, the harder the case becomes to crack. And when a detective grows old and retires, the case leaves with him.

New officers can’t invest in it the way he did; they lack the context, the history, the firsthand knowledge of the details.

Thus, these cases become nearly impossible to solve.

Once everyone involved—the victim, the victim’s family, the perpetrator, the investigators—all vanish, the case itself ceases to exist.

Cao Chujun had seen many veteran detectives depart with regret; the more he saw it, the more he refused to leave with the same burden.

But the case had no leads—he could only sigh helplessly.

Then, just as he lost hope, hope arrived.

At the provincial bureau’s fingerprint campaign, a remarkable young forensic doctor emerged from Ningtai County, Qinghe City.

He had matched the very fingerprint Cao Chujun had long given up on.

When the provincial investigation notice arrived, Cao Chujun nearly wept.

He had shown this fingerprint to countless experts.

It had been in the provincial database for years.

Cao Chujun had always believed this fingerprint could never be matched. Yet, at the very end of his career, as he faced retirement, it had given him this final gift—fulfilling his wish.

Cao Chujun gazed out at the neon lights and bustling streets, his heart calm as an old man drunk on wine, simply waiting for one man to appear.

His heartbeat raced.

“He’s out,” the apprentice whispered.

Cao Chujun instantly sat up straight.

Across the street, a drunken figure stepped out of a transparent sightseeing elevator.

“That’s him!” Cao Chujun had seen the photo; he had etched the man’s face into his memory.

He was an old man dressed neatly—a shirt with a vest, hair combed smooth. Though his steps wobbled, he looked like an ordinary elder.

This man, thirteen years ago, on a rainy night, robbed a single mother and, when she resisted, beat her to death.

Cao Chujun still remembered: the victim’s only son, a ninth-grader about to take the high school entrance exam, had stood frozen in shock upon hearing the news.

They said the boy had been a good student, yet he failed the exam. Later, he entered society as a laborer…

No one could understand why someone would kill another for a few dozen yuan.

Back then, the case remained unsolved—there was no motive, no dispute, no surveillance, just a rainy night.

Only after the fingerprint match did Cao Chujun finally glimpse the truth.

A single old thug’s brutality had forced many to bear the consequences.

“Proceed with extreme caution,” Cao Chujun whispered to his apprentice, fearing that if they startled the old man now, he’d vanish again.

Such a man had no home, no job, no ties—he’d disappeared back then, so thoroughly that police never even added him to their suspect list.

And Cao Chujun didn’t want to wait another day.

The apprentice nodded softly, opened the car door quietly, and joined several officers as they crept forward.

“Old Qian!” the apprentice called out, drawing the old man’s attention.

Four police officers closed in from four directions, silent as shadows.

The drunken old man hadn’t even processed what was happening before he was pinned from all sides.

“Police! Don’t move!” they finally shouted the classic line. The apprentice glanced back at his master—and only then did he relax.

If they’d botched this, he’d never forgive himself.

“I… why are you arresting me?” the old thug wriggled.

Cao Chujun now stepped forward, hearing the question, and his lips twitched. “Do you not remember the woman from Gongyuan Alley?”

The old thug froze—his whole body went limp.

Cao Chujun’s grip on the old man’s arm trembled; he fought hard to hold back the tears burning behind his red eyes.

He often dreamed: the boy, under his mother’s gaze, aced the exam, entered high school, then university, graduated, found work, married, brought his mother to live in comfort—perhaps even had minor squabbles with his daughter-in-law, but his clever son always smoothed them over…

He tilted his head to the sky—the dark clouds had parted, and stars sparkled faintly.

…