Chapter 78: Who Did It?

Officer Lu Ka stared at the files on Kent, rubbing his temples in frustration.

Kent’s older brother was a high-ranking member of the Camila Gang; he used his brother’s protection to commit numerous crimes within the Imperial District.

Gambling dens are breeding grounds for conflict, and his hands were indeed dirty. Here’s a tip from an informant: over the past few years, Kent had been recruiting “skilled” dealers from Ovelis State.

Everyone knew why he recruited such people.

Although his underground casino had only four or five tables, those tables generated strong monthly profits.

In other words, every person who lost money could potentially be the killer.

This doesn’t even include the possibility that other gangs, seeking revenge due to his brother, murdered him out of spite.

Officer Lu Ka hated cases tied to gang members most of all. Who knew what motive the killer had? Investigations often consumed vast time, energy, and resources—only to be abruptly shut down just as the truth neared.

Jincheng City, and indeed the entire Federation’s underworld and political sphere, were deeply intertwined; gangs held a crucial position within the Federation’s network of Liyishusong , not merely a “seat at the table.”

Troublesome. Complicated. That was Officer Lu Ka’s thought right now.

As he pondered how to find an entry point to solve the case, someone knocked on the door—it was one of his officers. “Officer, a man named Wei Er wants to see you. He says he’s Kent’s older brother.”

The officer lowered his voice slightly. “The one from Camila.”

Officer Lu Ka’s expression turned thoughtful for just a few seconds, then softened into a faint smile. “Let him in.”

He tidied the documents on his desk, stacked them neatly, and tossed them into the file basket.

To be fair, Wei Er gave a strong first impression—always radiating gentleness—but only those who knew him understood that this was merely one facet of his multiple personalities.

“Officer Lu Ka, I’m Kent’s older brother. They told me if I wanted to see him, I had to come to you.”

Officer Lu Ka pulled out a corpse claim form and stood up. “Yes, this is the procedure for claiming the body. Are you prepared mentally?”

Wei Er shook his head. “I’ve known him for thirty years. No matter what he looked like, nothing would surprise me.”

A simple statement—but the emotion hidden within left Officer Lu Ka silent.

“Come with me.” He opened the door, gave a few instructions to the officer, then led Wei Er toward the morgue.

The morgue was behind the police station and required a cold storage unit.

Current cold storage technology is slightly subpar—extremely noisy—so to avoid disturbing officers’ work and rest, it’s located at a distance.

This gave them a chance to chat along the way.

“You’re brothers,” Officer Lu Ka asked casually.

Wei Er pulled out a cigarette. “Want one?”

He didn’t refuse. Looking at the high-end cigarette in his hand, Officer Lu Ka allowed himself a faint smile.

Wei Er lit the cigarette, walking as he spoke. “We got along well.”

“Strictly speaking, our parents were among the first official Imperial immigrants.”

“We weren’t born yet when they started their business here,” he added patiently, seeing the confusion on Officer Lu Ka’s face. “Fur traders.”

Officer Lu Ka nodded in understanding. Whether in the Federation, the Empire, or elsewhere, the upper classes had a huge demand for furs.

Wearing the pelts of powerful animals was a practice dating back to the dawn of human civilization—a form of natural worship.

Back then, tribal shamans or chiefs would wear feathers in their hair or capes made from animal skulls, hoping to absorb the beasts’ strength.

Even today, they still do it—but now they no longer seek the animals’ power. They do it to display their wealth.

Wealth, sometimes, is also a form of power.

Officer Lu Ka once worked on a peculiar case: a rare albino lion at a zoo in the neighboring state.

Pure white lions were exceedingly rare worldwide. A wealthy man wanted to turn this lion into a beautiful fur coat, but the zoo director refused a $300,000 offer, calling the albino lion “humanity’s collective treasure” and refusing to sell it to a greedy capitalist.

Then the billionaire simply offered $150,000 for the lion’s pelt. Less than two weeks later, the lion was killed by staff and removed from the zoo.

Because the final destination of the pelt led to Jincheng City, Officer Lu Ka participated in that part of the investigation.

The fur trade still yields enormous profits. He could imagine Wei Er’s father had been a successful businessman—but he also suspected something had happened afterward.

He said nothing. Wei Er continued. “After we were born, we always got along. As Imperial immigrants—even though we were born here—we were constantly bullied, so we stuck together.”

“Then, terribly unlucky, my father vanished during one of his frequent trips between the two regions—he encountered pirates.”

“They didn’t admit he was dead, because then shareholders could empty the company before we inherited his shares.”

“In the end, we received nothing but inherited a massive debt that never existed—and the bank was about to seize our home…”

He took a deep drag. That night, the father of a neighborhood brat came to their house. He offered to take them in—but their mother had to pay a price.

The woman refused. He tried to force his way into her private garden. The two boys smashed the old bastard’s skull with baseball bats from the sailing team.

Afterwards, their mother took full blame. A friend of their father defended them pro bono. The court, acknowledging the fact of “trespassing on private property,” respected legal principles and gave her no real punishment—she was acquitted.

Later, a series of problems destabilized her mind. She began abusing psychiatric drugs and ultimately committed suicide a year later. At that point, the entire world was left with just the two brothers.

As Wei Er recounted these past events, it sounded like he was telling Officer Lu Ka how close he and his brother had been—but also like he was reminding himself that his last relative was gone.

“I was sometimes harsh with him, but I swear—I only didn’t want him doing something stupid, something irreversible.”

Wei Er sneered, his eyes reddening. “And still, he’s dead.”

Officer Lu Ka had siblings, but never endured such hardship. He couldn’t grasp the weight and pain of this emotion—only offered a few hollow words of comfort.

The rest of the walk was silent. When the morgue door opened, Officer Lu Ka glanced at Wei Er—confirmed he was steady—then led him inside.

He pulled out a drawer from the freezer. Kent was inside.

Seeing his brother’s skin pale, bloodless, and so severely decomposed he was barely recognizable, Wei Er vomited.

As a high-ranking gang member, he’d killed more than one man and seen corpses and rotting bodies—but he’d never felt such nausea!

He gagged violently, retched, and spat out bile.

The stench of the vomit made Officer Lu Ka step back several paces. Wei Er vomited for a long while, then wiped his mouth with a handkerchief and stood up.

His face was now as pale and lifeless as his brother’s in the ice coffin.

Fighting off intense discomfort—not just from the sight of the decomposed corpse, but from the physiological shock of his brother’s death—he walked to the freezer.

Officer Lu Ka stepped forward. “Is this your brother?”

Wei Er said nothing.

He waited a moment, then asked again.

Wei Er finally snapped back to reality and nodded. “Sorry, this…,” he covered his face, unable to speak. After cursing “Fuck,” he punched the freezer.

The freezer dented inward, leaving streaks of blood.

His knuckles were torn and bleeding—but he didn’t care.

His voice rose sharply, harsher now. “Yes. Yes—it’s this bastard!” He clenched his jaw, stared at Officer Lu Ka, his expression turning icy. “Who killed him?”