49. Determination

  Gao Cheng said: "There are many kinds of hatred: the hatred of killing one's father, the resentment of losing one's wife, the pain of losing a child. But there is another kind of hatred that is separate from these, quietly growing in an unintended way. A glance, an action, a joke, can all be the source of hatred. When he feels hurt, he has reason to hate. Yu Xiuping must have done something in the past that made him feel hurt, or perhaps it's related to some special and accidental event that they three experienced together."

  When Gao Cheng finished speaking, Du Xiangyuan suddenly jumped up from his chair and pointed at this side, shouting: "It's you, it's you, you're that devil!" Because his hands were handcuffed to the chair, this intense reaction also knocked over the chair, making a loud noise. Almost immediately, the door was pushed open from outside, and a group of police officers rushed in. The same thing happened on the side with the iron bars. The police officers raised their batons and Du Xiangyuan was beaten until he fell to the ground.

  It was just the madness in his eyes that had not been extinguished, staring dead at the high wall, where inside was all hatred and fire.

  Everything came unexpectedly. After Du Xiangyuan was dragged away, the director asked in a flustered tone: "What just happened? Why did Du Xiangyuan suddenly become so emotional?"

  Gao Cheng furrowed his brow, but only for an instant. As he turned to walk towards the door, he casually put his arm around my shoulder and said, "You can re-examine him now, list him as a suspect in the murder case, and strip him of his mental immunity. Because," he paused, using a stern tone that I had never heard before: "Once he's released, he'll become a killing machine."

  Xu Jianglun was standing outside the door, and I happened to see him staring wide-eyed in shock. I believe he wasn't the only one; the detectives behind him had similar expressions. The case was overturned, and everything was re-examined from scratch. By the time we left the police station, the detectives were all back to their tense work.

  Suddenly I thought of something and stopped in my tracks, "I forgot to ask about that marker earlier."

  Gao Cheng said in a light tone, "No need to ask, it wasn't carved by him."

  "Why?"

  "The psychological characteristics are too obvious, Du Xiangyuan seems to be hiding his true nature, but in reality, he is crazy inside. If he wants to leave a mark, it will be in an extremely obvious place, which would showcase his intelligence. This person's mental distortion has reached a level where his psychogenic mental disorder appears to have healed on the surface, but in fact, it has been suppressed deep down, more severe than the other two."

  At this point, I suddenly remembered that day at the police station, when Gao Cheng first revealed his edge, he had previously depicted two men's psychological portraits. The first description was: male, medium build, aged between 28 and 35, with an average appearance slightly above average. His thoughts were relatively meticulous, with a certain anti-detection consciousness; his speech was relatively fluent, able to speak eloquently. This should be Du Xiangyuan. The second description was: male, aged between 25 and 30, physically strong, with arms that may have received special training, ordinary appearance, belonging to the kind of person who would not be noticed in a crowd. This person is obviously younger and more ordinary than Du Xiangyuan, but who is he?

  At that time, Gao Cheng judged with certainty that the two were not the murderers, but had been to the scene. Suddenly and surprisingly, a thought flashed through his mind: whether at that time, he had actually seen through the whole case and knew that Wu Yan's suspicious arrangement was actually a suicide?

  Couldn't help but glance at him carefully, if these were true, then his thoughts would indeed be so profound as to make one feel terrified.

  "Has a flower bloomed on my face? Why are you staring at me like that?"

  I irritably picked up where he left off: "You're good-looking, all right." Unexpectedly, he nodded as if it were a matter of course: "That's the truth."