Chapter 4: Fetishism

  After Guo Yining and Fang Youzhu moved to Wu Hui's house, the thing that Wu Hui has to do every day now is to clean up the trash made by these two people.

  After being taken away, Wu Hui was accompanied by the two of them to the Major Crimes Investigation Unit. Suddenly, he had a feeling of being deceived. The two people claimed they were there to protect him, but why did he feel like they were just freeloading off him?

  "Don't look so gloomy, we two bachelors can't cook, so we have to trouble you." Guo Yining thought taking care of Wu Hui was a great job. Before, after work, he would either order takeout or soak instant noodles. Now living in Wu Hui's house, he could surprisingly eat delicious dinner at night and hot breakfast in the morning.

  Fang You patted his full belly and felt a bit embarrassed, "Wu Ge, I'm really troubling you."

  "I'm telling you, from now on, the two of you will split the food expenses." Zhang Qiang sat in the car without saying a word, not because he agreed with these two people, but because their appetites were simply too big, and if they continued to eat like this, they would surely bankrupt him.

  "Don't be so petty, we're both poor cops, how much money do we have? Not like you, a rich second generation!" Guo Yining said with a smile while driving.

  "Who is a rich second generation, you are a rich second generation, your whole family is a rich second generation. I didn't spend a single penny from my family, all of this money was earned by myself." Zhang Qiang has a very good family background, but he has been independent since childhood and never thought about relying on his family. What he dislikes the most is being called a rich second generation.

  Guo Yining glanced at Zhang Qiang through the rearview mirror, looking furious. "Fine, I'm a rich second-generation kid, whatever you say goes, but can't we just IOU for living expenses?"

  Guo Yining said it was a IOU, but in fact, it meant to write an empty note. Zhang Qiang didn't really ask them to pay living expenses either. It's just that when he saw Wu Hui cleaning up the trash they made in the living room that morning, he felt a bit uncomfortable in his heart. "Whatever!"

  When the four of them arrived at Keli, they happened to run into Wang Hua rushing out. Seeing Guo Yining and the others, he said: "Captain Guo, another body has been found."

  Kuo heard there was another case and didn't even enter the office, he brought a few people to rush to the scene, "Let's go!"

  When several people arrived at the scene of the case, Wang Siting and Yang Rong had already been there.

  "Team leader Guo!" Wang Si-ting handed out several pairs of gloves to them, "Preliminary investigation, the deceased died around 3 o'clock last night."

  The crime scene was found in a bustling downtown area, surrounded by hotels and shopping malls. The killer actually dared to commit the crime in this place, and his courage is getting bigger and bigger.

  Guo Yining observed her surroundings and found that this place was a narrow alley between two large buildings, very small, with no surveillance at all. Why would the victim appear here?

  Wu Hui walked up to the corpse, a transparent plastic bag was covering the head of the deceased, the bag was full of blood, the mouth was blocked by a black object, the black dress was torn open, revealing the chest, a fork was inserted into the chest, the legs were spread apart, both hands were tied behind the back, and the feet were bare.

  The victim's handbag was beside her, with all the documents, mobile phone and money inside. It doesn't seem to be a robbery-murder case. The deceased's name is Zhou Linlin, 22 years old, a local resident.

  Wu Hui saw something in the deceased's mouth and asked Wang Si Ting, who was squatting beside the body, "What is that thing in her mouth?"

  "It should be her stockings." Wang Si-ting pointed at the victim's bare legs.

  "Where were her shoes?" Wu Hui asked as soon as he started examining the body.

  "It's nowhere to be found for the time being, it should have been taken away by the murderer." Wang Siting suddenly remembered something, "There was also one thing missing at the scene of Chen Yirong's murder."

  At that time, Wu Hui was thinking about other things and missed many details on the scene, "What thing?"

  Wang Siting thought Wu Hui would discover it, but unexpectedly he didn't notice that "Chen Yirong's underwear was gone."

  Many serial killers like to collect some personal items from the victims after killing them, as trophies, "collecting victim's items."

  Chen Yiling died in her own bedroom, so it's hard to notice what's missing from the room.

  Seeing Zhou Linlin wearing a plastic bag on her head, Wu Hui guessed the cause of death, "Is the cause of death asphyxia?"

  "Really? I thought you'd think the deceased died from a blunt force trauma to the head." Wang Si Ting found Wu Hui to be quite interesting.

  In fact, this point was also inferred by Wu Hui from Zhou Linyin's stockings, and the previous two murders were committed by the same perpetrator. If it was the same perpetrator, based on the perpetrator's psychological inference, the first two victims died of suffocation, while this one, although severely injured in the head, still believed that the perpetrator would not change his modus operandi under normal circumstances.

  Wang Si Ting gently lifted the upper body of the deceased, pointing to the wound behind, "Although the back of the head has a contusion and laceration, it is not fatal. It only made the deceased temporarily lose consciousness. The real cause of death was due to the plastic bag on his head, mechanical asphyxia."

  "What is the murder weapon that caused the depressed fracture?" Wu Hui found the depressed fracture at the back of the deceased's head to be somewhat unusual, extremely small.

  The laceration on the back of the deceased's head was indeed a bit strange, and Wang Si-ting had some doubts about the shape of the wound. "I'll have to wait until I get back to perform an autopsy to know for sure."

  "Is there a sexual assault phenomenon?"

  "There is, still outside the body, although it has been wiped clean, but DNA was still detected." Wang Si Ting was somewhat puzzled, "You say this murderer is extremely clever to confuse our vision, or really stupid to leave behind DNA."

  "Isn't there any DNA data left at the scene in the database?" The two previous cases found semen on the victim's body, and the results should be out after comparing the data.

  "Not in the database." Wang Si-ting worked overtime last night, with no progress. "This was found at the scene from the victim's head, it should be the same as the other two cases."

  There was a red wig in the evidence bag, and this was another one. The murderer made Wu Hui somewhat incomprehensible. The seemingly carefully arranged crime scene and process, why did he leave evidence everywhere? What was he thinking?

  The previous case was in the suburbs, and this case is in the downtown area. Wu Hui deduced that the murderer lives not far from the scene of the crime, so it can be temporarily assumed that the murderer's residence is between the downtown area and the suburbs.

  Wu Hui and several others returned to the Major Crimes Investigation Unit, putting the three cases together for a careful study.

  Guo Yining looked at the changes in the crime scene. "This time, the murderer committed a crime from the suburbs to the city. What does this mean?"

  Yang Rong poured a cup of hot water, holding it in her hands to warm up. Today, the air conditioner in the office had some problems. Before, she didn't think that having the air conditioner on was particularly warm and cozy, but now that it's stopped working, she realized just how cold it was. "Previously, the murderer chose to commit crimes in sparsely populated suburbs, and we haven't caught him yet. Does he think his methods are so clever that by choosing to commit a crime in the city, he's proving to us that even in crowded areas, we can't catch him?"

  Wang Hua echoed: "Yang Rong's statement is also reasonable, some culprits are becoming more and more rampant because the police can't catch them temporarily."

  Zhang Qiang searched for Zhou Linlin online, and the photos above were mostly sexy and seductive. The words spoken were also extremely explicit. "I think it's because the murderer happened to meet the deceased, and then because the deceased was dressed extremely revealing, so they had a wicked heart and committed the crime on the spot."

  "You say that and I'm not happy, what's the point of wearing revealing clothes and being targeted by thugs? Are you pushing the problem to the victim?" Yang Rong disagreed with Zhang Qiang's statement. Is it reasonable for a woman to wear more revealing and sexy clothes, is she asking to be raped? What kind of logic is this?

  "You're right, it's my fault, I was one-sided." Seeing Yang Rong getting angry, Zhang Qiang immediately decided not to argue with her. After all, a good man doesn't fight with a woman, and Zhang Qiang didn't want to offend his goddess over such a small matter.

  Wu Hui still felt that there was something strange about the case, "The murderer is someone with poor economic conditions, and it's unlikely they live in a busy downtown area. The search scope should mainly focus on suburban areas."

  Guo Yining felt that Wu Hui had something unsaid, "What do you think is wrong with this case?"

  Wu Hui pointed to the photos taken at the three crime scenes, "The three victims all had a red wig and black stockings on them when they were found dead. So I'm guessing that the killer was treating these women as someone he hated, and this person is a woman with dyed red hair who likes wearing stockings."

  Younger women these days don't like wearing pants, even on very cold days they wear black tights and skirts. "This range is too broad, look at all the women on the streets wearing black stockings, take me for example, I have dozens of pairs of black stockings, no matter summer or winter, all are black tights, how can you find them?"

  "Right, it can't be said that everyone who wears black stockings is likely to become the target of a murderer, this is a bit too far-fetched?" Wang Hua doesn't think the murderer committed the crime just because he targeted women's stockings.

  "There's another possibility." Fang had been silent all along because he thought the murderer might have another psychological disorder.

  Yang Rong saw Fang opening his mouth to speak and hastily said: "Don't beat around the bush, quickly say what's possible?"

  Yang Rong looked at him, Fang You felt a bit awkward, he really didn't know what to say, "Have you guys noticed that the three deceased all had very nice legs?"

  "Fang You, we were discussing the case, what were you thinking about? Where did your eyes wander to? I didn't expect that someone who is usually so honest and trustworthy would think like this..." Yang Rong thought for half a day but couldn't come up with a suitable word to describe Fang You. She couldn't believe that Fang You was this kind of person, and she couldn't help but feel a little angry.

  "No, I didn't mean that, what I meant to say is..." Knowing that saying this would definitely lead to misunderstandings, the person who was anxious to explain suddenly couldn't think of the right words, and the more anxious they became, the more they couldn't remember.

  "Are you talking about having a leg fetish?" Zhang Qiang saw that Fang You was so flustered that his face turned bright red, and he quickly helped him out of the awkward situation.

  "Exactly, that's what I meant. Don't get any wrong ideas." Fortunately, Zhang Qiang reminded him, and Fang looked at Zhang Qiang with gratitude.