Case Files Chapter 53: Campus Suspicions (15)

Translated by Vivian of Exiled Rebels Scanlations

Editor: Addis

 

“Ah!” Lin Bai collided with Li Qiang.

“Watch where you’re going!” huffed Li Qiang.

“Sorry, sorry, I was in a hurry to find someone,” Lin Bai apologized hastily.

“Forget it.” Li Qiang left sulkily.

Lin Bai gave a thumbs up to the empty dormitory hallway and hummed as he slowly strolled away.

*****

“Is this equipment of yours reliable?” Guan Jin glanced at him.

“I guarantee that everything I provide is top-notch! We just have to see where this red dot moves to.” Lin Bai opened the monitoring program. “Look, he’s heading towards the library.”

Ding Ding yawned. “You guys can watch first. I’m sleep-deprived, so I’m going to get some shuteye. I can take the next shift.”

“Here, drink something, I brewed black tea.” Lu YunYang walked over to them, carrying a tea tray.

“Ooh, my favorite, I want to add milk!” Ding Ding sprung towards him.

“Aren’t you sleep-deprived?” asked Guan Jin.

“Seeing good food and handsome men makes me feel very refreshed.”

Guan Jin glared at a certain person who was smiling gently and harmlessly.

After staring for an entire evening, the target hardly moved.

“Say, could your positioning tracker be broken?” Ding Ding’s eyes hurt from staying glued to the screen.

“Even if he broke, my positioning tracker would never!” Lin Bai firmly defended his reputation.

“It’s been an entire evening, how could he have stayed in the library so obediently for so long, it doesn’t seem like he’s planning on going.”

“Yeah, should we withdraw?”

“Wait! What time is it?” Guan Jin suddenly asked.

“Five past ten,” said Lu YunYang, who had been calmly reading a book to the side.

“The library closes at ten!” Only then did Ding Ding and Lin Bai realize this.

“This can’t be right! He must’ve left already. Did you put the positioning tracker in his schoolbag?”

“Yes! I couldn’t put it anywhere in his clothes, and it’s not like he would leave his schoolbag at the library.” Lin Bai was confused.

“Nonetheless, you guys continue monitoring him. I’m going to go to the laboratory building to take a look!” Guan Jin stood up.

“I’ll go with you.” Lu YunYang also stood up and followed him.

“Hurry up!”

*****

Li Qiang trembled as he walked to the door and poked his head in to look around. It was silent and empty, and the people in the building seemed to have left.

That person had told him to come at ten thirty, but he wasn’t that stupid, so he had come first to scout the area, just in case there was a trap.

Li Qiang slowly walked in, turned on the light, and looked around cautiously. There were biological specimens of varying sizes, vials and bottles that were used for experiments, a few sinks, and a large water tank next to the wall. Could someone be hiding in there? Li Qiang became alert and cautiously walked to it. He took out the taser he had brought and used his other hand to abruptly open the iron cover on the large water tank.

It was empty, and there wasn’t even any water inside.

Li Qiang sighed deeply in relief and put down the taser.

Suddenly, two hands silently reached out from behind a large coral model nearby and shoved Li Qiang into the water tank.

“Ah—— Help——” Li Qiang’s horrified voice was quickly muffled by the tank.

The person latched the water tank and calmly took down the huge, heavy swordfish model that had been hanging above the water tank, putting it on top of its cover. They dusted off their hands and listened with satisfaction as the pounding and yelling became fainter and fainter…

*****

The two of them practically sprinted to the laboratory building, and when they arrived, Guan Jin was panting. He pointed and ordered, “You, go up first. I’ll search the first floor, you search the second floor.”

Lu YunYang frowned. “Together.”

“You think I can’t even handle a little kid?”

“If they’re in an unstable state, it’s hard to say.”

“Stop underestimating me.”

“Last time at the hospital, if I was just one step behind, then I might’ve never seen you again, and even just thinking about it now makes me scared. Guan Jin, I won’t let myself make the same mistake again,” Lu YunYang said heavily.

“You’re so——” Guan Jin was at a loss for words, and he could only enter the building with him in resignation.

They searched the first and second floor, but there was no one to be seen. When they arrived at the third floor, Guan Jin suddenly stopped and motioned for Lu YunYang to be quiet.

“Did you hear that?”

“Mn, it was a very light scratching sound. It’s gone now…”

“It came from the east, quick!”

The two of them quickly checked each room in the hallway, and a door with a sign on it that read “Marine Specimen Room” was ajar.

Guan Jin pushed open the door and could sense that there was someone inside.

Lu YunYang flicked on the light switch, and the room was empty. They looked at the water tank and the huge coral.

Guan Jin carefully looked through the gaps in the coral and confirmed that there was no one hiding behind it. The two of them walked towards the water tank.

“I’ll do it.” Lu YunYang moved the swordfish away and lightly lifted the cover.

Li Qiang’s face was green, and he was lying down in the tank, curled up in the fetal position.

“Is he dead?”

Lu YunYang checked his pulse. “His breathing is a little weak, let’s get him out first.”

Li Qiang was lifted onto a table, but he was still unconscious and twitched from time to time.

After Guan Jin finished calling 120, he looked at Li Qiang and said, “He doesn’t seem to have any external injuries, nor does he seem like he was poisoned or chloroformed. Could he have been in there for so long that he suffocated?”

“It seems a little like that, but this place is cleaned at ten and closed at eleven. It’s ten forty-five right now, so he was probably lured in after ten, or else there would still be people here. It’s only been forty-five minutes at most, and this water tank is very old, so it’s not completely airtight, so how could he have suffocated? His situation is a little strange.”

Soon afterwards, the ambulance and police cars arrived. For a period of time in the future, he reckoned that a lot of people wouldn’t dare to approach this “cursed” building.

*****

“Don’t look at me like that, I didn’t want to come at all,” Guan Jin said impassively to Doctor Jiang.

“I also didn’t want to come, but I have to come whenever something happens to you guys because of JingHan.” Jiang Tong walked into the emergency ward unhappily. “Why are there so many criminals? After they’re caught you should let me cure their brains.”

“Then you shouldn’t be a doctor, you should be a prison guard.”

Lu YunYang patted Guan Jin on the shoulder. “Just tolerate him for now, he’s just a little blunt with his words.”

“Keep your distance from me.” Guan Jin inched away in discontent.

“My colleague said that this person went through excessive shock and severe hypoxia, and he has some mild urticaria on his body.”

“Urticaria?” Lu YunYang suddenly realized something. “That means——”

“Probably. He’ll wake up tomorrow, so you guys can come back then.”

“Do you really think it’s interesting to talk in sign language in front of me?” Guan Jin, who didn’t understand at all, said icily.

“Don’t get angry, I was going to explain it to you. Shock, hypoxia, and an urticaria reaction, as well as where Li Qiang was found, can only mean one thing. Li Qiang has claustrophobia.”

Guan Jin blinked. “Is that really an illness?”

“Yes. Just then, didn’t Wen JingHan call and say that that swordfish model was originally hanging on the wall above the water tank? It seems like another accident in which he accidentally fell into the water tank, the cover closed over him, and the model fell onto the cover, preventing him from getting out, and he would’ve died as a result of his phobia and suffocation.”

“This person really is a lunatic.”

“Yes, he persistently creates the illusion that they were just accidental deaths and made the victims’ deaths very painful, just like they’re sacrifices for Gao Yun, who died an ‘accidental’ death.” Lu YunYang raised the phone in his hand. “This is Li Qiang’s, and I took a look at it just now. At nine, he made a phone call to a number that’s not in his contacts. Lin Bai looked into it and said that it’s Fang YuTian’s number.”

“When did you do these things?” Guan Jin glared at him.

“While you were wondering how he ended up in the water tank.”

*****

“How’s Li Qiang doing right now?” Fang YuTian asked Gu Xiang, frowning.

“Not too well. You’re the last person he contacted before his accident. What did he say to you?”

“Nothing much, we were just chatting,” said Fang YuTian, a little absentminded.

“Fang YuTian, Li Qiang went there because someone made him go, so this might not be an accident. Do you know how serious these implications are?” Gu Xiang suddenly became very stern.

This was the first time Fang YuTian appeared a little flustered. “I…”

“Exactly what did he say to you? Right now, I’m requesting information from you. If you don’t tell me everything, then next time, it might be a formal interrogation.” Gu Xiang knew that this person only had his own best interests at heart.

“I don’t know who it was, really… It’s just, Li Qiang probably trusts me more, so he called me and said that someone sent him a letter and told him they wanted to have a chat, and he said that they had a recording of us on the night of Gao Yun’s accident. I didn’t believe that the person would have it, so I advised him not to go, but Li Qiang was worried. He asked me to accompany him, but I didn’t want to take the risk. That person was clearly going to set a trap, so I told him that if I go, the person might think that it was a breach of contract. Anyway, I tried to convince him not to go, but he didn’t listen, and…”

“Why did you go to the warehouse the other night?”

Fang YuTian was silent for a while before saying, “It was actually the same reason. At the time, Wang TianPeng also said that he received a letter, which told him to go to the warehouse by himself to find the USB flash drive with the recording on it. He also consulted me about it beforehand, and at the time, I didn’t think too much of it, so I just told him to go and take a look. Who knew, he had an accident, and only then did I consider the possibility that Cheng JiaoJiao’s death might not have been an accident, and that perhaps someone——wanted all of us to die. Later, I couldn’t help but want to go take a look and see whether or not the flash drive really was in the warehouse. However, I only thought about it and didn’t really want to go in.”

*****

“This person is so arrogant.” Ding Ding sighed. “We still barely know anything about them.”

“Right, why was my positioning tracker in the library’s trash can? He can’t be that keen, that thing is so tiny, and it’s nearly impossible to see in the corner of his backpack.” Lin Bai couldn’t make sense of it.

“Li Qiang said that he found something strange in the side pocket of his schoolbag, so he just dumped it into the trash can.” Guan Jin shook his head. “Bad luck.”

“…How could he do that to me!” Lin Bai felt like crying.