When Lin Yingxue and I drove back to the village, the team leader had not left yet. At this time, the news of Xiaopang's father's death had spread throughout the village. The villagers surrounding Xiaopang's house were all in a panic, discussing some details of the so-called "copper coin curse murder". Some things were even spread by word of mouth. The originally ordinary murder case became a miraculous ghost story in their mouths, and its excitement was no less than some supernatural novels.
Lin Yingxue and I walked through the crowd and entered Xiaopang's yard, and saw the team leader standing in the middle of the yard, smoking and directing his men, as if he was preparing to carry away the body of Xiaopang's father. Xiaomei, who had not been seen for a few days, also appeared in the yard. She was standing next to the team leader and asking something. When she saw me come in, for some reason, Xiaomei suddenly moved away from the team leader as if she was in high school and was discovered by the teacher for being in love. I was a little puzzled.
The team leader also noticed me coming in at the same time. Originally, he would have been more polite when seeing me, but now he seemed to have the confidence. He pulled Xiaomei back, then looked up at me arrogantly with a look of contempt.
Seeing him like this, I suddenly became curious and asked, "What's that expression on your face?"
The team leader said proudly, "Nothing. Since your special case team is too slow, our director has applied for our local police to take full charge of this case. I estimate that the application will be approved soon. Then you can just watch me perform."
When I heard that it was this matter, I immediately found it a little funny and snorted coldly, "You? With your IQ, I estimate that when I come back next year during the Chinese New Year, there will still be no progress on this case. Let me ask you, you have also been involved in this case these days, why don't you tell me what you think?"
The team leader still looked unconvinced and said, "My opinion is that this case involves some supernatural areas that cannot be explained by science, so it must be treated with caution and no one else must be harmed by it."
"Oh? Then how do you treat it with caution?"
"I have contacted the most famous monk in Chongzhou City. He will come here tomorrow to perform a ritual to help the dead souls to rest in peace and to exorcise evil spirits. We will also increase the number of people patrolling this village and take away all suspicious people for questioning. At least I can guarantee that there will be no more deaths by then!"
When I heard this from the team leader, I just thought it was a little ridiculous, but the villagers around him actually thought that what the team leader did was very good, and some even applauded.
I really couldn't understand what this group of people were thinking, so I immediately said, "There are a total of three copper coins in this case, corresponding to three murders. Now that the three copper coins have taken effect, the murderer will never commit another crime even without protection. How could there be another death?"
"That's not certain. Maybe a few copper coins will appear."
I didn't want to waste time arguing with the captain, so I walked directly to the door of Xiaopang's house and turned around and said, "As a police officer, you keep talking about nonsense about ghosts and gods. Don't you think you're funny? I won't waste my time talking to you. I have thoroughly investigated this case, and I know who the murderer is."
As soon as these words came out, the whole scene instantly became silent. The team leader, who was originally planning to continue mocking me, was stunned after hearing these words. He said in disbelief, "Impossible! It's only been a few days and you already know who the murderer is? Are you lying to us again?"
"I don't have the time to joke with you. Besides, didn't you say that just now? Our special case team is incompetent and we haven't found the murderer for so many days. How come we have found the murderer so quickly now?"
The team leader was speechless after hearing what I said, and all the villagers present looked at me curiously, waiting for me to give them a definite answer. I swept my eyes over everyone present, including the team leader and Xiaopang's family, and finally pointed my finger at the bedroom of Xiaopang's house behind me and said, "The murderer is in this room."
Everyone looked in the direction of my finger. The forensic doctor happened to be walking out of the room. When he saw me pointing my finger at him, he was so scared that he waved his hands and cried out, "It's not me. Why are you accusing me?"
I immediately turned around and found the forensic doctor standing behind me. I felt extremely embarrassed and quickly added, "I'm not talking about the forensic doctor. I'm talking about another person who is in the room right now."
The forensic doctor asked in confusion, "Another person? There's no one left. Besides me, there's only the body in this room. Where did the other person come from?"
"I'm talking about that corpse!"
Not only the villagers around me, but even Lin Yingxue, who had been following me all the time, looked at me in surprise. Fatty immediately became angry, stood up and pointed at me and said, "You are talking nonsense! How could my father be a murderer! And now he himself has been killed, why are you still accusing him?"
Seeing Xiaopang's excited reaction and looking at his now poor family, I really couldn't bear to continue talking. But now that I had already opened my mouth, there was no reason to stop.
The team leader stepped forward and questioned, "Yes, you put the crime of murder on a dead person, and the dead person can't speak, so he has to take whatever you say. I thought your special case team was so smart, but it turns out you are just using this usual method."
I ignored the captain and said directly to everyone: "There are currently three victims in this case, Brother Dong, the captain, and Xiaopang's father. The causes and scenes of death of the three are very similar, making everyone think that this was an accidental mistake that led to the copper coin curse killing. In fact, this is just a murder plot carefully planned by Xiaopang's father."
From the first time I saw the body of Xiaopang's father, I realized that the way Xiaopang's father died was a bit unusual. He was not beheaded like Dong Ge and the others, but he was hanged peacefully on the beam. I didn't understand why before, but until I saw everything in the room clearly and the state of Xiaopang's father when he died, I realized that this was actually because Xiaopang's father couldn't chop off his own head, so he chose to hang himself.
When Xiaopang's father died, the team leader and his men surrounded the entire yard of Xiaopang's home. It was impossible for anyone to break in and kill Xiaopang's father, and Xiaopang's mother obviously couldn't do it either. After all, if she did that, she would be pushing herself to the edge of being a suspect. Even if Xiaopang's mother was the murderer, she would never do such a stupid thing.
When I saw the body of Xiaopang's father, I was puzzled. How could a person who was secretly killed in the middle of the night be dressed and cleaned up before being hanged? Xiaopang's father's expression was very peaceful at the time, without any signs of struggle. No matter how you look at it, Xiaopang's father must have committed suicide. Moreover, there was a long bench kicked to the ground right below Xiaopang's father's body. Judging from the distance at the time, it should have been stepped on by Xiaopang's father when he committed suicide, but he kicked it away.
When I learned that Xiaopang's father actually committed suicide, I understood that the murderer this time was undoubtedly Xiaopang's father, because after Dong Ge's death, Xiaopang's father did not appear at the scene. He had enough time to change his clothes and wash the blood off his body. When the captain died, all of our friends were together. As an outsider, Xiaopang's father could naturally kill people secretly!
But after understanding this, I still couldn't figure out why Xiaopang's father did this, and I also found that the date marked on the calendar at Xiaopang's home seemed to be a long time ago. Why did he deliberately create three cases that seemed to be curses and murders? It was not until I got my father's reminder that I understood this most important link, and at the same time, I also understood how shrewd Xiaopang's father was.
When I said this, I looked at the expressions on the faces of the villagers around me and found that their eyes were full of confusion and disbelief. It seemed that they didn't believe anything I said at all. And I didn't force them to believe it because I hadn't finished speaking.
The team leader snorted coldly, "This is nonsense! How could someone do such a stupid thing? If Xiaopang's father was really the murderer, why did he commit suicide after killing someone? If he didn't intend to live, why did he make the process of his murder so complicated and make himself look completely innocent?"
Xiao Pang also said in a somewhat cold tone: "If it was really my father who killed people, then how do we explain the captain's death? How did the copper coins return to the captain's home before us? Also, why did the copper coins I sold several times return to my room by themselves? This is clearly a curse to kill people!"
Facing two people's simultaneous questioning, Lin Yingxue seemed to think that I was a little overwhelmed. She was about to say something, but I reached out to stop her and said, "I will answer your questions one by one. First, Xiaopang, the reason why the copper coins you sold returned to your room every time is that your father would secretly redeem the copper coins every time and put them next to your pillow while you were sleeping. Since you all lived together, it was really easy to do this. As for why the copper coins we buried when the captain was killed returned to the captain's room faster than us?"
"That's because your father used a trick to make us think that was the case at the time. In fact, the copper coins in the hands of the three families had already been secretly swapped by your father!"