Warm fragrance cloud around

At the beginning of the night when the lights were on, Huixian Tower was just when guests came like clouds, and the sudden screams from the box on the second floor immediately attracted everyone's attention.

Cheng Jiangyun rushed upstairs without saying a word, and Lin Junnuan chased after him one step behind.

The screams really came from their private room. The middle-aged man who was playing the huqin just now fell limply on the ground, and his teenage daughter Ayao cried bitterly on top of him.

The cause of death should be the sharp and thin long needle on the forehead, which was inserted into the man's forehead with great precision, hardly oozing out much blood, and killed him instantly.

Most of the other people in the box were drinking a little too much, and they didn’t realize that such a tragedy happened around them. The only Guanqi who hadn’t drunk a drop of alcohol stood beside the crying A Yao, and he was at a loss. Seeing Cheng Jiangyun came, he found his backbone. , slightly relieved.

"What's going on, did you see the murderer?" Cheng Jiangyun frowned and asked him.

A look of shame appeared on Guanqi's face, "The grown-ups made too much noise, the little ones... didn't see clearly."

Death happens in an instant.Just a moment ago they were still listening to the qin music, drinking and having fun, you let me have a toast, I toasted you a toast, eating and drinking was very enjoyable, a moment later, the qin sound stopped suddenly, screams sounded suddenly, the person playing the qin had already fallen to the ground and couldn’t get up .No one could see whose hand the long needle came from, and from what direction it was shot.

"That is to say, the murderer committed the crime under the noses of all Dali Temple officials, but no one discovered it?" Cheng Jiangyun's face darkened.

Guanqi hangs his head and is speechless, the other people in the box are looking at this side blankly, as if they haven't fully understood the situation yet.Cheng Jiangyun couldn't help gnashing his teeth, let Guanqi pour warm water over them one by one to wake them up, while Lin Junnuan squatted in front of the corpse, comforting A Yao while distracting himself from examining the corpse.

The deceased's eyes were wide open, and his jaws were clenched tightly, which corresponded to the word "death will not rest in peace". A Yao was so frightened by this scene that she could only cry. Lin Junnuan pulled her away with a sigh, and gently helped the deceased close his eyelids. .

The long needle was pierced very deep, Lin Junnuan tried to pull it out with his hands, but he couldn't pull it out, and it was not good for the deceased's daughter to see the bloody and cruel picture, so he stopped his hand. It is better to leave it to a professional assistant to do it.

When the case happened, Ayao was the closest to the deceased. It stands to reason that she was the most likely to witness the murderer, but seeing her eyes swollen from crying and looking like a cute little rabbit, Lin Junnuan couldn't bear it. Open your mouth to cross-examine, I have to say that no matter what era you are in, good-looking people are easy to receive preferential treatment.

Cheng Jiangyun is not a sympathetic person. After sobering up the others, he stayed behind to watch the chess and explained the current situation to them. Then he gave a few instructions to the restaurant shopkeeper outside the door, closed the door to block the outside view, and came to the corpse with a sullen face. here.His whole body was full of anger, which made A Yao unconsciously shrink back behind Lin Junnuan.

"What did you see?" Cheng Jiangyun asked expressionlessly.

Probably also recognized who is in charge in this room, A Yao wiped her face, and said cautiously: "Nu, I only saw Daddy suddenly collapsed and lost his breath. I didn't see anything else..."

"Where were you sitting and what were you doing?"

A Yao lowered her head to think for a moment, sniffed, and moved her body to show the two of them: "My family is sitting on the inside, and my father is sitting on the outside. At that time, my father played a melody, and my family sang along."

"Are the doors and windows open?"

"The door is closed and the window is open."

To put it simply, the box they are in is long in shape as a whole, with two round tables placed horizontally. One side of the round table is close to the door, separated by a screen that is one person high, and the other side is a window facing the street. half the wall.Ayao's father and daughter were facing the round table, kneeling and playing the piano and singing. Ayao sat on the side near the window, and the deceased sat on the side near the door.

At the time of the crime, the door was closed, covered by a screen, and the deceased was slightly turned inward, kneeling and sitting with his back facing the door, which could rule out the possibility that the murderer committed the crime through the door. Either the murderer inserted a long needle through the window to commit the crime, or , The murderer has been in this box all along.

The street facing the window is always full of people, no matter how powerful the murderer is, it is basically impossible to avoid everyone's eyes and commit the murder from the window. In this way, the murderer can only be someone in the box.

After realizing this, Lin Junnuan turned his head and looked at Cheng Jiangyun, both of them saw a trace of helplessness on each other's face.

I don't know whether they should observe a moment of silence for the Dali Temple officials who were involved in the murder case, or whether they should be thankful that they left the box at that time and were not suspected of murder.

***

Except for the deceased and A Yao, there were seven other people in the box at that time, the others were drenched by Cheng Jiangyun, and they learned the seriousness of the matter from the mouth of the chess watcher. Confused look.

All right, how did they become murder suspects? !

At the time of the incident, there was a lot of noise in the box, and basically no one could clearly remember what everyone had done, and even if someone fished in troubled waters, they would not be aware of it.To judge whether they are likely to kill, the most intuitive thing is to start with the murder weapon - the murderer pierced the long needle deeply into the skull of the deceased. It is absolutely impossible to do it with human power alone, and there must be other auxiliary tools like arrows and crossbows.

The only thing Lin Junnuan is fortunate about now is that there is no such thing as internal force in this world that is more unscientific than light work.

Cheng Jiangyun asked the shopkeeper for a spacious room. Everyone stood separately and searched one by one. Even A Yao, he specially invited a female diner to help check. After all, Lin Junnuan's identity could not be revealed.

And Lin Junnuan took the opportunity to turn over all the corners of the box, not even missing the kettle and dishes on the table. If conditions permit, she would even wish to dig three feet into the ground.

Until the night was getting darker and Huixian Tower was almost closing time, the two of them still had nothing to gain.

"Did the murderer quietly throw the murder weapon out of the window after committing the crime?" Lin Junnuan held his head in confusion.

"There shouldn't be this time," Cheng Jiangyun shook his head. "After the deceased fell to the ground, Guanqi has been guarding the window. He didn't find anyone approaching. Before we entered the door, no one else approached the door."

"No," Lin Junnuan stretched out a finger and shook it, and said in a low voice, "Guanqi may also be the murderer, so I can't completely believe what he said."

Guanqi, who stood silently behind Cheng Jiangyun, glanced at her aggrievedly, he heard everything, okay?

"It's impossible, that's impossible. Could it be that the murder weapon can fly away out of thin air!" Lin Junnuan muttered with his mouth puffed up, and suddenly his eyes lit up, "I almost forgot, there is another very important point I didn't find it!"

She quickly ran to the corpse, stretched out her "magic claws" and was about to use her hands on the corpse. Cheng Jiangyun also realized what she meant, and rushed to push her hand away, "Let me do it."

Will the murder weapon that kills the dead be hidden on the dead body?Lin Junnuan waited expectantly for the results of Cheng Jiangyun's body search, but unfortunately, there was no murder weapon on the body of the deceased.However, there were some unusual discoveries.

"what is this?"

Lin Junnuan took a wooden sign found on the body of the deceased. The wooden sign was about half the size of a palm. The words or patterns smelled very pungent, like... the smell of human blood.

She couldn't help a chill, and threw the wooden sign back to Cheng Jiangyun in disgust.

"It looks like a token of some organization, what's wrong with you?"

Lin Junnuan made a vomiting expression, "This brand has been soaked in blood! Human blood!"

Cheng Jiangyun paused, and soaked the sign in a bowl of water. After a while, dark red bloodstains began to ooze from around the wooden sign—layers and layers of blood had condensed on the wooden sign, so it looked like black.

Until the whole bowl of clear water was dyed red, and the color of the wooden sign became only a little lighter, Cheng Jiangyun simply asked someone to bring a wooden bucket of well water, intending to clean the wooden sign thoroughly.

The blood stains on the surface were washed away, and the wooden plaque gradually revealed its original appearance. Upon closer inspection, there was a small flame-like pattern engraved on it. The color was not clear, but it should be red.

"This pattern...seems familiar?" Lin Junnuan rubbed his eyes and took a serious look, "By the way, the dagger that Mingyu used to commit suicide earlier also has this pattern on it!"

Cheng Jiangyun nodded with a solemn face. That's right, the pattern on this wooden sign is exactly the same as the pattern on the previous dagger, red flames, the symbol of red flames.

Although Mingyu's case was settled at the beginning, the origin of the dagger has always been an unsolved mystery. Mingyu's younger brother Feishuang has repeatedly stated that he knows nothing about Chi Yan, and no one knows. Where did he get that dagger, and what does it have to do with Chi Yan.

"This token is also what you said... Chi Yan's thing?" Lin Junnuan asked with squinted eyes. She still remembered what Cheng Jiangyun told her not to worry about it. Miss Lin held a grudge very much.

"should be."

Moreover, if he remembered correctly, this pattern had only appeared on daggers in the past, and it was the first time that the token with the red flame logo appeared in the world.

Could it be that the dead man belonged to Chi Yan?

Cheng Jiangyun couldn't help but pay more attention to the case, and immediately called the deceased's daughter, A Yao, and quietly asked about their backgrounds.

According to A Yao, their family has the blood of the Hu people. Their ancestors were originally from other races. The generation of their great-grandfather began to settle in Dachu and intermarried with people from Chu. Her mother and grandmother were both from Chu and lived in the western border area before. In a small town, her mother died of illness five years ago, and her father took her away from her hometown in grief, singing and begging for food all the way, and only arrived in the capital two years ago.

The father and daughter began to sing in Huixian Tower half a year ago. They had managed to save some money, thinking that they could let their father enjoy the blessings in the future, but who would have encountered such a tragedy.

At the end, Ayao couldn't stop her tears and started to cry.

When they were talking, Lin Junnuan had been squatting beside the corpse, not knowing what he was doing, and suddenly said loudly: "She's lying!"

Others heard the sound and looked over, only to see her excitedly holding the dead man's huqin, her eyes seemed to be shining, "We found the murder weapon!"