Los ojos de Asura

Capítulo 43

Crimes: Organized crime, murder, drug trafficking

Implementation Date: November 2nd

Executor: Eumenides

Luo Fei stared at the note, his eyes practically spitting fire with rage. In his eyes, it was a declaration of war, a blatant declaration of war from that formidable adversary.

But this time he missed the opportune moment for battle. It was now the dawn of November 3rd, and Eumenides had succeeded as promised. What could be more disheartening than this situation?

"When did you receive this death sentence notice?" After Luo Fei's gaze left the note, it fixed firmly on Ahua.

Ahua seemed prepared for this question. He calmly met Luo Fei's gaze and replied, "Two days ago."

"Why didn't you call the police sooner?!" Luo Fei demanded immediately. His hands clenched tightly, as if he had gathered all his strength but had nowhere to release it.

"Call the police? Ha—" Ahua's nostrils twitched upwards, revealing a complex expression of anger, sadness, and contempt. Then he coldly retorted, "How did President Deng die?"

Luo Fei froze, his accusatory mood vanishing instantly. But Ahua wasn't about to let it go; he added angrily, "Tell me, what are you police officers capable of doing?!"

Luo Fei sighed deeply, speechless at the provocative question. He knew that during the airport shootout, it was Han Hao, the police action team leader, who had personally shot and killed Deng Hua, the person they were protecting. With such a disgraceful record, Ahua and the others had absolutely no reason to trust the police anymore. That's why, after receiving the death sentence notice, they chose to handle it themselves without revealing anything to the police.

Ah-Hua wasn't without such power. His protection of Deng Hua once ensured the latter's safety in the treacherous underworld. If Han Hao hadn't fallen for Eumenides's "using a borrowed knife to kill" scheme, Deng Hua might still be alive today. From this perspective, Ah-Hua truly didn't need the police; in fact, in his eyes, the police were more of a hindrance than a help.

The police missed this opportunity to confront Eumenides head-on, and the bitter consequences were entirely their own doing. Luo Fei, on the other hand, was somewhat of a scapegoat for those who came before him. However, given the circumstances, Luo Fei had no intention of defending himself. He knew the best way to dispel any misunderstandings was to regain respect through his own strength; there was no other way.

So Luo Fei stopped dwelling on what had already happened and focused all his energy on the bloody scene before him.

"Is anyone still in the room?" Luo Fei squinted at the open office door. It should have been the safest core of the fortress, but now it had become a cold, dark tomb.

Ahua took a deep breath, controlling his emotions. He then turned and glanced at the men in black behind him, replying coldly, "Our men have all withdrawn—I know the rules. Since you've called the police, it's your job now. I won't interfere."

Despite being treated coldly, Luo Fei still greatly admired Ahua's attitude. Everyone has emotions and preferences, but as long as one acts decisively and clearly, that is a rare quality of a great leader.

Yin Jian shone his flashlight into the office. The room was large and deep, making it difficult to see everything inside from the outside. He then asked, "Captain Luo, should we go in now?"

Luo Fei hesitated for a moment, then said, "Let's wait a bit... We can go in once the power is restored."

Yin Jian nodded, understanding his captain's intention. The enemy they faced was far too powerful, so every step had to be taken with extreme caution. Entering the pitch-black scene rashly could give the lurking enemy an opportunity to strike.

Luo Fei glanced at his watch; he had been inside the Longyu Building for ten minutes. Meanwhile, Yin Jian proactively communicated with the SWAT technicians via walkie-talkie, then reported, "It should be done in another seven or eight minutes."

Seven or eight minutes. As long as the outside situation is well controlled, this amount of time won't cause significant changes to the existing situation. Luo Fei became even more composed, taking advantage of this time to understand the general circumstances surrounding the incident.

"Please tell me what happened—starting from when you received the death sentence notice," he said, looking at Ahua. His sincere gaze reminded him: we are facing a common enemy.

Ahua gritted his teeth and remained silent for a moment. His gaze changed from dejection to determination, as if he had been gathering a courageous spirit to fight against a common enemy. Then he began to sink into that memory that made him feel deeply ashamed.

"I received this death sentence notice the day before yesterday at noon. It was sent along with an anonymous letter. Because General Deng had just been murdered, I naturally took this letter very seriously. So I immediately contacted General Lin and General Meng, who were also looking for me, because Eumenides had also sent each of them a death sentence notice..."

Luo Fei knew that President Lin and President Meng were Lin Henggan and Meng Fangliang, the prisoners listed on the death sentence notice. Both were veterans of the Longyu Group. Was Eumenides's drastic measures intended to completely destroy the Longyu Group?

Under Deng Hua's management for more than ten years, Longyu Group has formed a monopoly in many fields in the provincial capital. Among them, it is not uncommon for them to bully and dominate the market and use black money to support their businesses. Since Eumenides considers himself the judge of evil, it is reasonable to explain his motive for the killing by saying "eliminating evil completely".

While Luo Fei pondered, Ahua continued his story: "...So we gathered together to discuss countermeasures. They were both very nervous at the time; President Lin even considered calling the police, but I immediately rejected the idea."

Luo Fei gave a wry smile: "Yes, you don't trust the police at all."

"That's only one reason." Ahua narrowed his eyes, a ruthless glint in them. "Eumenides specifically sent me a copy of the death sentence notice; that's blatant provocation, and I have no reason not to accept it! Besides, he murdered General Deng; I dream of tearing him to pieces with my own hands!"

Luo Fei understood Ahua's feelings. Eumenides was a formidable opponent, one that everyone longed to fight. Ahua, naturally, wouldn't easily give up the opportunity to face him. However, Luo Fei also felt somewhat frustrated—this time, Eumenides hadn't informed the police of the killing plan but had instead informed Ahua. Did he think that the police had already lost too much, to the point that he wanted to find a new opponent?

Ahua continued, seemingly oblivious to his own predicament: "Later, both General Manager Lin and General Manager Meng followed my advice: not to call the police, but to rely on the group's own resources to protect them. So we each mobilized our closest brothers, and decided to use General Manager Deng's former office as a shelter."

"Aren't all these people your subordinates?" Luo Fei interjected, noticing that when Ahua mentioned these men, he always said "we" instead of "mine."

"Half of them are my brothers, and the other half are Mr. Lin's men," Ahua explained. "Although we all work at Longyu Group, Mr. Lin also has his own direct departments."

Luo Fei hummed in agreement. It's quite normal for such a large corporation to be divided into several factions.

"This Brother Long is Boss Lin's confidant," Ahua introduced the burly man behind him to Luo Fei. "He and I are responsible for protecting the two bosses."

Brother Long looked at Luo Fei and gave a weak "Hey," as if to say hello. He still seemed distracted, apparently not yet recovered from the shock of his master's death.

To indirectly understand a person's strength, you can observe their friends or their subordinates. Seeing the contrast between Ahua and Brother Long's performance, Luo Fei easily understood why Deng Hua had been able to dominate the Longyu Group for over a decade, his position unshakeable.

"Tell me about the specific details of your protection operation," Luo Fei steered the conversation to the most crucial part of the story.

Ahua's face turned somewhat pale. The phrase "protection operation" was a generous way of saving face for him. In retrospect, it was more like a humiliating farce, a cat-and-mouse game. And now he had no choice but to recount this farce to the police he had once despised.

"The execution date on the death sentence notice was November 2nd. We invited the two bosses to General Deng's office at 8 PM on the 1st. Both security doors were locked, and Long Ge and I each kept one key. We also deployed heavy guards along the 18th-floor corridor—especially at the office door, where more than ten men were stationed. In addition, guards were stationed at all the building's entrances and exits. Hua Ge and I each took two trusted men and waited in the monitoring room on the first floor. There were cameras in every corner of the Longyu Building, so we could see everything inside from the first floor. Of course, our main focus was on the office where the two bosses were located."

As Luo Fei entered the building, he witnessed the tight security set up by Ahua and the others. Even for Eumenides, it would be impossible to break through alone, right? Yet Eumenides' killing spree was successful, and there were no signs of fighting along the way. Could it be that he found another way through?

Ahua seemed to have read Luo Fei's mind and further explained, "That office was specially designed by the building's architect at the behest of General Deng. There's only one passageway leading to the office door on the entire floor. There are no hidden pipes connecting the room to the outside. The only window is located on the south wall of the building, surrounded by smooth, mirrored walls within a ten-meter radius—even the world's top rock climbers couldn't scale it. And every five meters directly above the window, there's a row of sharp blades embedded in the wall, so forget about rappelling down from the roof to the window."

Luo Fei frowned: "If that's the case, how did Eumenides get into the office?"

"I don't know either..." Ahua looked embarrassed and bewildered. "Brother Long and I have been watching the monitor screen since the night of the 1st, never daring to relax for a moment. For more than an hour, everything was normal. But around 11:35 pm on the 2nd, the power in the building suddenly went out."

11:35 PM—close to the last minute stipulated in the death sentence notice. Luo Fei thought to himself, Eumenides must have deliberately chosen this time to strike. After more than twenty hours of arduous waiting, Ahua and the others must be exhausted, and their thinking and reaction abilities must have greatly declined.

"At this point, you should continue to hold the line and not be reckless, lest you be moved around by the enemy." Although the matter was over, Luo Fei couldn't help but remind you.

"We didn't do anything rash. The guys upstairs got flashlights from the fire extinguisher cabinet and kept watch at the office door. I sent two of my men out to the basement to start the building's backup generator."

Luo Fei said, "Okay." Even if he were personally directing operations on-site, he would still follow this procedure. At the same time, he asked, guessing, "Is the backup generator broken too?"

Ahua nodded: "It must have been tampered with... but it did start up for a while, about ten seconds, before it burned out."

"Did Eumenides enter the office after the building had completely darkened?"

"This..." Ahua's brows furrowed, tormented by a series of perplexing questions. "During the ten or so seconds the backup generator was operating, we saw Eumenides on the security cameras. He had already entered the office, and our defenses were completely intact. I really don't know how he got in."

"Is that so?" Luo Fei was also quite surprised, but he remained calm for the time being and continued to ask, "And then what happened?"

"Then the building went completely dark again, and the security cameras stopped working. Since Eumenides had already appeared, Long Ge and I couldn't just sit on the first floor and wait any longer. We ran up to the eighteenth floor as fast as we could, and when we got to the office door, both doors were securely locked, and there was nothing unusual about them. We quickly opened the door and went inside. We found that both bosses had their throats slit and were already dead. But Eumenides had vanished without a trace!"

The Fate of the Death Sentence (24)

"Then there's no doubt about it," Luo Fei said with absolute certainty. "There must be another way to get in and out of this office."

Ahua could only offer a wry smile: "Really, no. I've been responsible for protecting General Manager Deng's safety ever since the building was completed. If there were other passageways inside, how could I not know?"

Talking is useless; to get a definite answer to this question, we must go to the site and conduct an on-site investigation.

As if to complement Luo Fei's train of thought, the lights inside the building finally came on. The light dispelled the suffocating darkness, bringing a sense of safety and warmth. Many people, including Brother Long, wore expressions of relief.

Luo Fei immediately looked into the office. The first thing he saw was a huge desk facing the door. Behind the desk, a window was wide open.

Luo Fei glanced at Ahua beside him. Ahua shook his head and said, "Impossible."

Yes, he had previously emphasized that the window's unique design made it impossible for it to serve as an entrance or exit to the office.

There were some messy, bloody footprints on the floor, some leading all the way to the door. Luo Fei frowned and asked, "How many of you went into the house?"

"Four. Me and Brother Long, and then we each brought a henchman."

Luo Fei grinned, but didn't say anything more. Thinking back to the situation, it was pitch black all around, Eumenides was nowhere to be found, and only four people had entered the scene – that wasn't many. It seemed Ahua still had some awareness of preserving the scene; if that Brother Long had made the decision, a whole bunch of people would have rushed in, destroying all the clues.

Now that power has been restored, all on-site work must begin as soon as possible. Luo Fei looked at his men and began issuing operational orders: "Yin Jian, notify the SWAT team to come in and thoroughly search the entire building, leaving no corner unchecked."

Yin Jian saluted and accepted the order: "Understood!"

Luo Fei then turned to Ahua: "We're not very familiar with the building, so we might need your people to help us out."

Ahua nodded: "No problem."

Then Luo Fei said to Brother Long, "Brother Long, take your men downstairs and have them cooperate with our comrades in taking statements."

Brother Long responded with a long face. After being utterly defeated by his elusive opponent, he had long lost the courage to continue fighting. And the assassination of his master, Lin Henggan, shattered his dreams of rising to prominence. He truly felt that he had never lived such a frustrating life.

"Come with me into the scene to examine the crime scene," Luo Fei said, looking at the forensic doctor and criminal investigation technicians one last time.

Once inside the office, the forensic pathologist and technicians immediately located the target and began their work. Luo Fei, however, headed straight for the window on the south wall. In such a closed room, the fact that the window was so conspicuously open was undoubtedly a major anomaly. Upon closer inspection of the floor, several bloodstains could be seen extending from inside the room towards the window, seemingly confirming some of Luo Fei's suspicions.

But when Luo Fei reached the window, he had to abandon his initial guess. Because when he looked out the window, he truly understood what Ahua meant by "impossible."

No one can pose a threat to the people inside through this window, no matter what method you try!

This is undoubtedly a meticulously planned building. Firstly, its location is exceptional: although situated in a bustling downtown area, the building's south side faces the old city, ensuring an unobstructed view of the space opposite from this 18th-floor office. Within a radius of several kilometers, no other building can rival its grandeur. This guarantees that those inside can easily survey the entire area, while outsiders cannot gain any height advantage from the opposite side.

To prevent intrusion into the window from within the building, smooth glass was chosen as the reinforcing material for the south facade. Furthermore, there are no other windows on the same floor within a ten-meter radius to either side of this office. The entire south facade is designed with a concave curve, creating an inward-sloping wall on the upper floors, making vertical climbing impossible. Moreover, from the twentieth floor upwards, every other floor features a row of gleaming metal inlays, seemingly floor decorations, but after Ahua's reminder, Luo Fei knows they are all exceptionally sharp blades!

One can imagine how painstakingly Deng Hua had evaded the pursuit of numerous enemies over the years. It was this office on the eighteenth floor of the building that provided him with a safe haven, allowing him to remain standing for over a decade amidst the bloodshed and turmoil!

Unless Eumenides had wings like a bird, he absolutely could not have entered or exited the building through that window. Having made this judgment in his heart, Luo Fei could only reconsider the meaning of the open window and the bloodstains left in front of it.

Perhaps Eumenides' first thought after succeeding was to escape through this window. So he went to the window, opened it, and looked for a route. The streak of blood dripping the most near the window indicates that the perpetrator had lingered there briefly. However, he certainly didn't succeed and had to find other ways to escape.

However, this seems out of character for Eumenides. He would have been very familiar with the terrain before taking action, so how could he have made such a last-minute, embarrassing mistake?

Or perhaps the situation at the window was merely a deliberate misleading clue left by Eumenides? This was indeed one of Eumenides's usual tactics in their previous encounters. If so, Eumenides was clearly trying to conceal his true escape route—but where is that escape route?

Luo Fei turned his gaze from the window back and began to survey the interior of the office.

Forensic experts and technicians were carefully conducting their investigation, focusing on the east and west sides of the room. Two single beds were placed against the walls there. Luo Fei clearly remembered that the room wasn't furnished like this the last time he visited; it must have been temporarily moved in for Lin Meng and his companion to rest during their refuge.

The bloodstains on the floor all extended from the bed on the west side. Luo Fei walked towards the bed, observing and analyzing the bloodstains. The bloodstains split into two lines. One line went south to the window, with less blood, mainly circular blood spots, which were probably the victim's blood splattered on the murderer after the crime, and then dripped onto the floor as he walked. The other line was a mess of bloody footprints, extending from the bedside to the office door, most likely left by Ahua and the others after they entered the room, stepped on the victim's blood by the bedside, and then walked around.

Upon reaching the bedside, they saw a bloated, obese man lying on his back. Based on prior information, he was likely Lin Henggan, the second-in-command of the Longyu Group. However, he was already lifeless, his former power and wealth vanished like smoke. What had taken his life was a horrific wound on his throat, long and deep, with an extremely clean surface, clearly caused by a sharp blade. His upper body was leaning off the bed, one arm dangling in mid-air, blood flowing down the arm, forming a large pool of blood in front of the bed.

Upon seeing Luo Fei approach, the forensic doctor said softly, "There were no signs of struggle or resistance at the scene; it was likely a fatal blow. The perpetrator's methods were extremely sophisticated."

To give Eumenides such an evaluation would undoubtedly be superfluous and unnecessary. Luo Fei watched silently for a moment, then turned and went back to the single bed on the east side.

The deceased on the east bed was a tall, thin man. Luo Fei knew his name was Meng Fangliang, and his position in the Longyu Group was second only to Lin Henggan. His fatal wound was also a knife cut to his throat. Unlike Lin Henggan, he was in a semi-prone position facing inwards when he was killed, leaving a large amount of splattered blood on the east wall next to the headboard, while the floor in front of the bed was relatively clean.

Luo Fei went around to the head of the bed, examined the shape of the bloodstains on the wall, and then stretched out his right hand, clenched his fist, and pounded the wall twice.

The technician who was collecting trace samples looked up at him in surprise: "Team Leader Luo, what are you doing?"

Luo Fei shook his head without speaking. He paced along the wall a few steps, then clenched his fist and punched it again. It still felt hard and dull, so Luo Fei shook his head again and continued walking along the wall.

The technician noticed something amiss and exclaimed, "You suspect there's a secret passage in this room?"

"If there isn't one, then it's truly a ghost story," Luo Fei muttered to himself. Since Eumenides could come and go freely despite the heavy guards, and the barrier outside the window was difficult to overcome, there must be other passages inside the house. At the same time, given Deng Hua's suspicious nature, it wouldn't be surprising if he hid a secret passage in his office that no one else knew about.

In the past, when Luo Fei was arresting drug dealers, he often discovered secret passages hidden in the walls of their hideouts. So today, he tried the same method, hoping to make a breakthrough. But things just didn't go as planned. Luo Fei knocked all over the walls, but found no trace of a secret passage. He even squatted down and carefully examined the floor; it was a neatly cast concrete surface, with no possibility of any hidden entrance or exit.

Luo Fei stood in the middle of the room, feeling utterly frustrated and unable to explain anything. He even considered climbing up to the ceiling to investigate, but quickly abandoned the ridiculous idea. Aside from the fact that the ceiling was filled with chandeliers, given the height of over four meters, even if there were openings up there, who could possibly climb up?

Luo Fei had to start exploring other ideas. He quickly came up with some new thoughts, and to test their feasibility, he decided to find witnesses to the incident and learn more about the specific circumstances.

Luo Fei temporarily left the crime scene and took the elevator to the first floor. The monitoring room on this floor had been temporarily set up as the police command center. Luo Fei entered the monitoring room and saw Yin Jian and several criminal police officers sitting in front of the monitor screens, intently studying the video footage taken in the office before and after the incident.

Luo Fei asked, "Where's Ahua?"

Yin Jian turned his head upon hearing the voice: "He led the SWAT team to search the building."