Geschichte über einen Ehemanndiebstahl

Kapitel 105

Upon entering the Mu family residence, they saw a group of constables surrounding the entire backyard. The leader, Constable Huang, immediately stepped forward and bowed to Zhao Ting and Zhou Yufei, saying, "Young Prince, Lord Zhou."

The morning sunlight, like scattered gold, spilled across the simple courtyard. On the grey flagstones, filthy bloodstains, mixed with bits of flesh and blood, ran from their feet all the way to the main house. Duan Chen and the others initially didn't understand why the constables had cordoned off the entire backyard, but now, seeing the scene inside, they understood.

The group walked around the bloodstains and followed Constable Huang into the main house. "Madam Mu is resting in the side hall; some brothers are looking after her there," the constable explained, but stopped at the door, his expression grave. "Young Prince, Lord Zhou, everyone, please allow me to say this first, but the situation inside is truly... appalling. Several of our brothers just vomited this early this morning..."

Zhou Yufei and Zhao Ting both glanced at Duan Chen, who nodded slightly, indicating it was alright. Xiao Changqing and Zuo Xin were also quite bold; along with Zhan Yun, the group had witnessed many bloody scenes since their time at Wanliu Manor, and given the trail of blood in the courtyard, they could roughly guess what was happening inside. The group entered the house one after another, but in the next instant, they all instinctively covered their mouths and noses.

Zhou Yufei felt a burning sensation in his lower abdomen and staggered. Zhan Yun and Zhao Ting each grabbed him, helping him regain his balance. The others also sensed something was wrong. Xiao Changqing fanned himself with one hand and tugged at his clothes with the other, saying, "What's that smell! And why is it so hot..."

Duan Chen felt his legs go weak, a sweet feeling welling up in his heart, and his vision blurred with tears. Zhan Yun forcefully suppressed the heat rising in his chest, but when he turned his head, he saw that Duan Chen's expression was different from usual, with a faint languid look in his eyes and brows, just like after he kissed him last night. As he frowned slightly, Zhan Yun reached out and put his arm around Duan Chen's waist, saying, "Let's all go out first!" and led Duan Chen out of the house.

Leading the woman to a tall tree in the corner of the courtyard, Zhan Yun spun around and leaned against the trunk, cleverly blocking her from view. One arm encircled Duan Chen's waist to support her weight, while the other hand gently stroked the woman's back, softly saying, "Don't hold your breath."

Duan Chen leaned against Zhan Yun's chest, one hand on his shoulder, taking several deep breaths. Her body was still a little weak, but the flutter in her heart was gradually subsiding. Zhan Yun looked down at the changes in the expression of the person in his arms. Seeing that the haze between her brows and eyes was gradually fading and her eyes were clear again, he knew that she had suppressed her emotions and breathed a sigh of relief.

Duan Chen looked up at him, a hint of confusion in his phoenix eyes: "That just now..."

Zhan Yun's lips curled slightly, and a faint gloom appeared in his crescent-shaped eyes: "It should have similar effects to aphrodisiacs, but it's much more sophisticated than those things."

Before he finished speaking, Zhao Ting had already walked over, first looking Duan Chen up and down, then looking at Zhan Yun: "Are you alright?"

Duan Chen frowned slightly and shook his head. The three of them walked back to the courtyard and saw Xiao Changqing and Zuo Xin sitting on a stone bench, Zhou Yufei pacing slowly to the side, and the former constable Huang standing to the side. None of them looked too good.

When Huang, the head constable, saw that everyone had returned, he hurriedly stepped forward and bowed, his face showing both confusion and regret: "Young Prince, Lord Zhou, everyone, I'm so sorry! When we first went in, there wasn't that smell in the room. I don't know what happened..." Fortunately, the smell only made people dizzy and feverish. If it were poison that could kill, his crime would be much greater.

Zhao Ting raised his hand and waved, indicating that he didn't need to say anything more: "This is not your fault."

Xiao Changqing took out a light gray pouch from his waist, poured out a few pills, and then looked at Duan Chen and Zhan Yun: "Little Duan, does this smell the same as the one you smelled at the Lotus Pond in the Stone Mansion?"

Duan Chen took the pill, her brows furrowing slightly. "It tastes the same." But why didn't she feel anything yesterday, yet today...?

Zhan Yun guessed her confusion, cleared his throat twice, and gently replied, "Yesterday, the lotus pond was open-air, and the smell wasn't as strong as it is today, so we didn't feel anything." Actually, there was another reason, but it wasn't appropriate to say it in front of everyone... Zhan Yun thought to himself, anyway, this point wasn't really related to the case, he could just tell Duan Chen about it privately when he got back.

Everyone followed Xiao Changqing's instructions and put the pills under their tongues. Zuo Xin raised an eyebrow: "You know what it tastes like now?"

This time, Xiao Changqing honestly shook his head and blinked, "I don't know the specific ingredients, but you all felt the effects. My medicine can make people clear-headed. Anyway, we'll be out of the scene in a while. At worst, we can just bring the body out for examination!"

Everyone nodded; that was the only way. The water from the lotus pond yesterday had been taken back to Kaifeng Prefecture for examination, and they expected to have some results in the next couple of days. As they were talking, the coroner arrived in the courtyard carrying a small wooden box. After greeting everyone, he instructed his apprentice, who had come with him, to work together, using tweezers to collect the filth and blood from the ground and place it in a small wooden box.

The group went back inside. This time, with pills under their tongues and consciously reducing their breathing, they concentrated and held their breath. Although they still felt slightly uncomfortable, as Xiao Changqing had said, their minds were calm and undisturbed, and they were finally able to properly examine the scene.

By now it was broad daylight, and bright sunlight streamed through the paper windows, making the room much brighter than before. At first, everyone thought the sunlight was too bright, but gradually they realized something was amiss. A thin mist, a faint crimson red, permeated the room, blending with the heavy smell of blood to create an aroma exactly the same as the one in the lotus pond of the Stone Mansion yesterday—a strange, slightly fishy, and unsettling smell.

The group exchanged glances and began to search the room. The room was a mess; the screen lay overturned on the floor, and bloodstains were everywhere, some already congealed into a dark brown. Scattered on the floor were broken pieces of porcelain and strips of blood-stained cloth torn into pieces.

Duan Chen carefully stepped aside the bloodstains on the ground and walked to the bedside. He saw a man lying face up with bulging eyes, wearing only an undergarment, and a large, blood-soaked hole in his left chest. The white gauze curtain beside him was torn in half, covered not only with spurting blood but also with filthy, muddy stains. The whole scene was not only bloody and cruel but also had a nauseatingly filthy quality; no wonder the head constable had said that several constables had run out covering their mouths.

Unlike the previous victims, this person's clothes were not clean, and were stained with blood in many places, suggesting that he had struggled violently before dying. Duan Chen frowned and reached out to pull down the thin shirt covering the victim's lower body, but was grabbed by Zhou Yufei.

Huang, the head constable, waved his hands repeatedly, not caring about embarrassment at the moment, and quickly explained, "We covered him with clothes, but his...thing was...—" As he spoke, he made a cutting gesture with his hand.

Duan Chen recalled the bloodstains in the courtyard, her lips pursed, and she was about to exert force when she suddenly saw Zhao Ting blocking her way. Zhao Ting frowned and said in a low voice, "You don't need to do this dirty work, otherwise what's the point of having a coroner!" As he spoke, he gestured to Zhou Yufei and the constable, signaling them to carry the body out so that the coroner could examine it.

Zhan Yun pulled her arm back, exchanged a glance with Zhao Ting, and then smiled faintly at Duan Chen, implying that they should go along with it. Duan Chen frowned and was about to speak when Zhan Yun pointed to a blood-red object on the bed, gesturing for her to look.

At this moment, Zhou Yufei and Constable Huang had already carried the body out. A large patch of dark red bloodstains was printed on the gray-blue bed sheet, and a little above the bloodstains was a blood-red jade hairpin.

Zhan Yun took out a snow-white handkerchief from her bosom and wrapped the jade hairpin in it, placing it in her palm. Xiao Changqing leaned closer to take a look and couldn't help but frown. The blood-red jade was carved into the shape of a fluttering butterfly—clearly a hairpin only a woman would wear! But just now, when Zhou Yufei and the other man lifted the body, he had watched this object slip from the man's loose hair onto the bed…

The group exchanged glances, then carefully examined every corner of the room before leaving. Duan Chen held a jewelry box in his hand. There were no bloodstains inside, but it was possible that the murderer had taken some items, so he took it out to let Madam Mu take a good look later.

Upon reaching the courtyard, everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Zuo Xin, his expression grim, remarked, "That smell...it was truly bizarre!"

Xiao Changqing stroked his chin, somewhat puzzled: "That's strange. Only these two cases from yesterday and today have this... Could it be that they're not the same murderer as the previous three cases?"

Duan Chen also looked displeased, and after a moment's hesitation, he said softly, "It should all have been done by those two. Because the order in which they chose their targets was the same: a young and beautiful woman, a learned scholar, and next, someone with superb martial arts skills..."

Zhou Yufei just came out of the next room at that moment, his handsome face was a little pale, and his red lips moved indignantly. He cursed under his breath several times before stopping. The constable Huang followed closely behind and rushed out of the room, leaning against a tree and retching. His bent body trembled slightly.

Looking sullen, he walked back to the group and cursed again: "What a damn beast!" Taking a deep breath, Zhou Yufei gritted his teeth and squeezed out a sentence: "Just listen to me, I guarantee you will never want to look at that corpse a second time. Our top scholar's penis was forcibly torn off."

After saying that, Zhou Yufei seemed to have all his strength drained away, plopping down on a stone bench, head down, facepalming, his voice slightly hoarse: "Who the hell is this person! How could anyone be so heartless and insane..."

Everyone was shocked upon hearing this. Duan Chen's face also paled slightly, and his brows furrowed. Seeing this, Zhan Yun quickly said gently, "In that case, let's go see Madam Mu now."

When the group arrived at the side hall, they saw Madam Mu sitting in a chair, her face pale, her hair haphazardly tied in a bun, covered with a thin blanket, still trembling slightly, and her eyes somewhat vacant.

Everyone sensed something was wrong when they saw this. Sure enough, after asking a few questions, Madam Mu did not answer, but only repeated the same few sentences over and over again. At one moment she exclaimed that it was a "monster", and at the next she gritted her teeth and said that it was a "fox spirit that harms people". However, she did not shed any tears. It is estimated that the scene was too terrifying and she was somewhat bewitched.

Duan Chen had no choice but to call over a maidservant who was serving nearby and ask her to check the contents of the jewelry box to see if anything was missing. The maidservant counted the items one by one, then shook her head: "My mistress is always frugal, and she only has a few pieces of jewelry. None of them are missing." Zhan Yun then took out the blood jade hairpin from her sleeve and showed it to the maidservant, but was told that she had never seen this item before.

The group boarded the carriage and headed back home. Zhou Yufei, exhausted from the past few days, dozed off shortly after getting into the carriage. Zhao Ting and Zhan Yun, though in better spirits, remained silent, their faces grim. Duan Chen asked Zhan Yun for the jade hairpin, examining it closely for a long time, and began to formulate his own plan. Xiao Changqing, having washed his hands earlier, rubbed his stomach and pouted, "I say, before we go back to the government office, let's find somewhere to eat something..." This relentless work, without proper food or sleep, would take a toll even on a body of iron!

Zhan Yun smiled slightly and said gently, "Of course." He then lifted the curtain and told the driver a place. It was good that they wanted to eat, but after what had just happened, no one had any appetite…

Author's Note: There will be an update tomorrow at 9 AM!

By the way, has anyone figured out why Duan Chen only reacted to that smell on the second try?

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Chapter Ten: Poisonous Man • Beauty That Could Topple Kingdoms...

The group went into a breakfast shop, ordered some porridge and a few side dishes, and then started talking about the case again. Duan Chen returned the jade hairpin to Zhan Yun, gesturing for him to keep it safe: "This hairpin was probably left behind intentionally by the murderer."