How You Can Sue Me for My Crimes in Dreams

How would the killer know their target was going to a bar?

Murder?

A planned Murder involves staking out the target and learning their habits. If the killer had been watching the victim for several days and knew he frequented bars, they would naturally know the best time to strike.

But that brought up another problem.

If this were Penglai City, that would be one thing. But this is Jiangsan City!

How did the killer track them to Jiangsan City after four years?

Searching an entire city for someone? Heh, that’s not easy. Even if you know they’re in the city, you could search every corner ten times, a hundred times, and still have only a small chance of finding them!

Could you search it a hundred times in four years?

No, but the effect of the cause-and-effect chain was right here: the killer found the victim.

So, let’s work backward from the effect to find the cause!

The killer found the victim and murdered him in a short amount of time, so there must be a reasonable explanation that connects the events.

Murder?

Any planned Murder takes a lot of time. What’s more, the killer would have needed enough time to track the victim from Penglai City to Jiangsan City—without any leads!

There isn’t enough time. Otherwise, why would there be people who spend decades searching for their relatives without success? Everyone would just find their family in four years!

But the result is right here in front of us...

Then we have to revise the theory. The killer must have had a lead that brought them to Jiangsan City, which is how they were able to find the victim so quickly and carry out the murder!

Where did the lead come from?

From the day of the original conflict—from the conflict itself!

”Chinese New Year’s Eve, rape-murder case.”

Xu Huo pointed to the short phrase, the last three words of which carried immense weight.

Those three words represented a miscarriage of justice, a cold case, a murder... a human life!

A human life... Those three seemingly insignificant words signified a debt of blood!!!

A stunned expression appeared on Li Jianye’s face. He’d never thought to approach it from this angle...

The same starting point, but filtered through two different logical frameworks, had led to a path he’d never even considered!

’Is this what it means to be a police academy graduate?’

Li Jianye thought about the greenhorn rookies his superiors had assigned him over the past few years and fell silent.

’They’re not like this at all...’

”Hatred, rape-murder, the police on the cold case...”

Staring at the case file, Xu Huo spoke, the words tumbling out one after another.

”These words...”

”Sound familiar?”

For a split second, everyone froze. Then, the hairs on the backs of their necks stood on end!

Without a moment’s hesitation, Li Jianye grabbed the phone that was still connected to the internal affairs officer.

”Pull up the case file from Penglai City, 19—19990216—6!”

This was the case file number, typically formatted as district code + date + case sequence number for that day.

Of course, this was just one system; the specific format depended on the one used by the local authorities.

”Contact them immediately!”

After speaking, he paused for a moment, then added in a heavy, low voice:

”And make it fast!”

”Yes, sir!”

The voice of the internal affairs staffer came back immediately.

In this day and age, the full capabilities of criminal investigators might be underutilized, but that was limited to those on the front lines. The support staff’s abilities, keeping pace with the times, were quite impressive.

Jiangdong District was Jiangsan City’s most presentable district, and its internal affairs personnel were highly competent.

In less than ten short minutes.

A new file was sent to the laptop.

Along with it was a photo—one that could charitably be called clear.

The subject of the photo was a corpse, lying in a dilapidated temple.

It was the body of a female. Her youthful face was pale and colorless, her eyes dull and lifeless. She was completely naked, her clothes torn to shreds, her lips drained of all color.

Her body was covered in bruises. Her fingertips had scraped against the ground, breaking her nails and leaving bloody marks. The ground was stained with various fluids—blood, or perhaps other bodily fluids.

This happened in Penglai City on the night of February 16, 1999.

Outside, the villagers were a hubbub of activity, eating New Year’s Eve dinner and watching the Spring Festival Gala.

Inside the temple was dead silence. The lifeless body of the girl lay on the ground, staring up at the sky. Her dead eyes looked into the camera, as if staring at you, me, and everyone.

Everyone’s expression darkened. Looking at the photo, an inexplicable rage welled up in their chests.

The heavens kept pouring rain, chilling their skin to the bone, but it couldn’t extinguish the fire burning beneath!

”This kid... she can’t be old.”

Zhao Guang suddenly spoke. They were experienced enough to guess age from appearance alone. Without a doubt, the woman in the photo... was perhaps still just a girl.

No one said a word.

Xu Huo reached out and clicked on the other file.

[Penglai City 19—19990216—6 · Rape-Murder Case · Case File]

Everyone watched in silence.

But the further they read, the heavier their hearts became.

”According to the local doctor’s examination, the victim’s bone age is 13. However, due to severe malnutrition, there is a high probability of delayed bone development, so her actual age is estimated to be around 14.”

”Based on the bodily fluid samples from the scene, the perpetrator is not in the criminal database.”

”Police interviewed the surrounding villagers but found no relevant clues.”

Li Jianye frowned, his voice growing deeper.

”Multiple villagers claimed to have never seen her before, and the police couldn’t find her family. On that day, aside from the people who discovered the body while making offerings to their ancestors, no one filed a missing person report. The police suspected she was from another district and, after communicating with them, searched photos of missing persons...”

”But they found no one who matched her description.”

”It’s as if...”

Li Jianye’s brows knitted together, as if he could finally understand the frustrations of the officers back then.

”This person appeared out of thin air!”

A person who appeared out of thin air, with no family to claim her, no one else to report her missing...

The police couldn’t find any file on her and found no useful leads even after canvassing the entire village.

On top of that, it was during the Spring Festival, a time when police resources were severely stretched thin. There was no way to solve the case.

If she had family who kept pressing the case, they could have generated some public outcry and made the higher-ups pay a little more attention. Maybe then there’d have been a forty percent chance of solving it.

But...

She had no family. Before her death, after her death, and even now, four years later, no family member has ever come forward to claim her!

”To this day, September 2nd, 2003, four and a half years later, the case remains unsolved, sealed away in the archives.”

Li Jianye took a deep breath and fell silent.

No one could have imagined that the rape-murder case from four and a half years ago would resurface now.

And with four lives taken right from the start!

”They... were the killers?”

Zhao Shui’s lips trembled for a moment as he turned his head toward the other rain shelter.

That was the intersection, the focal point of everyone’s attention.

There were four corpses there, their hands nailed tightly to crosses, kneeling with their heads thrown back.

Their vacant eyes were the same as the girl’s in the photo.

”Look at the volume of fluid.”

Xu Huo let out a heavy breath.

”This was a gang rape and murder.”

”There are four bodies here.”

The moment he said this...

everyone at the scene fell silent.

Four years ago.

On Chinese New Year’s Eve, four people gang-raped and murdered a girl their own age in a dilapidated temple.

Li Jianye closed his eyes, sitting on a stool and pressing his forehead against the back of his hand for a long time.

At a certain moment, he suddenly looked up. His eyes focused, and an indescribable aura emanated from him.

”What is the deal with this girl’s file?”

”If those people hadn’t found her while making ancestral offerings...”

”She wouldn’t even be in the police archives today!”