The officer taking notes clicked his tongue and said, “How much hatred does it take for this? It’s like wanting to grind the bones to dust. Isn’t that a bit much?”

The forensic doctor shifted into a half-squat to relax his muscles, and replied, “The killer might have harbored intense hatred toward the victim, so they left so many cruel wounds to vent their anger. But it’s also possible…”

The Vault picked up where he left off: “It’s also possible that the killer originally intended to dismember the body to mislead us, but underestimated the difficulty of dismemberment and didn’t know enough about human joints, which led to this situation.”

The forensic doctor nodded.

“Huh?” the young officer said, “That makes it sound like a crime of passion without enough preparation. But the killer deliberately left a pointed note next to Michael Wood, which feels more like a premeditated act of revenge. Or maybe, a frame-up?”

The young officer scrolled back through the photos on his camera and said, “When the killer was mutilating the body, the victim probably hadn’t gone into rigor mortis yet, and the body was posed in a specific way. At the time, the victim’s right hand was holding a Western-style kitchen knife, which was the murder weapon that caused all those wounds. He pointed the knife at his own abdomen, and a note was left half a meter away. All these details are very similar to the previous cases. Also, we just confirmed that the victim, Michael Wood, was one of the witnesses who testified against Nancy Dawson back then.”

Nancy Dawson is the alias of Harry Forrest in this scenario.

The Vault remained silent.

“Sigh, this is already the fourth person. Who knows when it’ll end. If we don’t catch the killer soon, I feel like the media will be out for our heads.” The young officer said gloomily, “But yesterday, two of our guys were stationed downstairs at Nancy Dawson’s place the whole time, and confirmed he never left his residence, so there’s no way he committed this crime. Could it be a copycat?”

Another crime scene investigator walked over and said, “It’s obvious the killer deliberately staged the scene to make it look connected to the previous three cases. But the feel is very different. One is meticulous, the other is rough. It really doesn’t seem like the work of the same killer.”

He tilted his head to examine the body on the ground and said, “But if you insist it’s all imitation, there’s still something about it that can’t be faked. Some details we haven’t released to the public, yet they match up strangely well. That’s not something an ordinary copycat could pull off, right?”

“There are also things that don’t match,” the young officer said. “We never released the content of the notes. The previous three victims held notes that said ‘lie’, but the note next to Michael Wood has a full sentence.”

The Vault said, “Let me see it.”

The young officer replied, “Okay, I’ll go get it from Liu.”

“It should be different from the previous three cases. Even though it looks similar, the level of execution is completely different. The first three scenes were cleaned up very thoroughly, but this time, a lot of clues were left behind.”

Everyone looked over as the trace evidence officer walked over with a case and said, “This time, the killer wasn’t careful, or rather, not professional enough. He climbed in from the back garden, stepped in mud, and didn’t take off his shoes after entering, leaving a lot of footprints. Later, he must have noticed and tried to wipe them away, but in his haste, didn’t do a good job. We collected a complete footprint at the scene. We compared it with all the shoes in the victim’s house and found no match, so it should belong to the killer.”

The young officer came back holding an evidence bag with the note inside, and excitedly speculated, “Could it be that Nancy Dawson knew he was being watched and couldn’t leave, so he hired a killer to commit the murder and stage it to look like a similar case to divert our attention?”

The Vault took the evidence bag he handed over and pinched the thin piece of paper inside through the plastic.

Inside the bag was a note written in red pen, with a bit of blood at the top, and Michael Wood’s fingerprint at the signature line.

The note read: “I pointed the tip of the knife at someone else, and stabbed deeply.”

After carefully reading it, The Vault handed it back to the officer. The young man asked, “Boss, what do you think this sentence means? Is it literal? Who does this first-person ‘I’ refer to—the killer or the victim?”

The Vault lifted her eyelids and glanced at him, then lowered her gaze again.

Not getting a response, the young man kept talking, “Boss, why are you so quiet today? You’re usually pretty talkative, aren’t you?”

The Vault asked, “Where’s the victim’s family?”

The young officer pointed, “Julia Campbell? She’s in the yard, really shaken up. Sister Wang is taking her detailed statement.”

The Vault looked in that direction and happened to see a surveillance camera installed in the corner of the wall. She asked, “Has the surveillance footage been pulled up? Did it catch anything?”

The young officer said, “Yeah, I’ll show you.”

He was about to turn and leave when The Vault spoke again: “I have a task for you.”

He immediately turned back, “Go ahead, go ahead!”

“Since the killer wanted to frame Nancy Dawson, the note he left and the clues at the scene probably weren’t random.” The Vault explained with some effort, “Help me check if, around ten years ago, before or after the Nancy Dawson murder case, there were any police reports related to knife attacks in the vicinity of the crime scene.”

The young officer nodded, “Okay.”

·

The Vault got into the car, holding a tablet. She adjusted her posture, clipped the tablet to the back of the seat, and crossed her arms to watch the video.

The screen was playing the last segment of footage stored by the cameras installed in Michael Wood’s villa.

On the night of the 28th, a little after 10 p.m., Michael Wood returned home. Judging by his flushed face and unsteady steps, he must have drunk a lot that evening.

Michael Wood’s entrance disturbed another person in the house, and soon, Julia Campbell came out of the upstairs bedroom.

When Julia Campbell saw him, she screamed sharply. She yelled, “Michael Wood, do you have any conscience left?!”

Michael Wood glanced at her but didn’t respond, drunkenly heading upstairs.

Julia Campbell kept cursing, her voice not only angry but also hoarse with sobs.

She accused Michael Wood of being ungrateful, mentioned his mother and the hospital, and even threatened to call the police in the end.

Michael Wood ignored her the whole time, went up the stairs, walked right past her, and entered the bedroom.

Julia Campbell followed closely and slammed the door shut.

The wooden door was well soundproofed.

The Vault turned the volume up to maximum, but since there were no cameras near the bedroom, the audio wasn’t clear, and it was impossible to know what they argued about.

About fifteen minutes later, Julia Campbell burst out of the room in a panic. She grabbed her handbag from the sofa, didn’t even put on her shoes properly, and rushed out the door.

The villa fell silent.

The Vault fast-forwarded the surveillance footage.

About twenty minutes later, Michael Wood came out of the bedroom holding his head.

The Vault sat up straight.

Huh? She thought this guy was already dead.

Michael Wood was in bad shape; half an hour hadn’t sobered him up. He nearly fell on the stairs, but managed to steady himself by crouching down.

He stayed crouched on the stairs for a long time, then trudged heavily to the kitchen.

The Vault switched the camera view.

After entering the kitchen, Michael Wood took a bottle of red wine from the fridge and continued drinking at the table.

When he got really muddled, Michael Wood started sobbing. He held his head in his hands, letting out meaningless moans, clearly in pain.

Then he picked up his phone, seemingly to search for something. Maybe he couldn’t see clearly, because he angrily smashed the phone on the floor.

At 12:30 a.m. on the surveillance clock, Michael Wood got up. With his face streaked with tears, he deliberately cut the power to the surveillance cameras.

The most crucial footage was lost just like that.

The Vault: “……”

What’s the point of this surveillance, then?

·

“If I remember right, the boss once had high hopes for the surveillance… She swore up and down it would definitely catch evidence.”

“Wow, from a detective’s perspective, is this case really that confusing?”

“I really thought Julia Campbell was the killer, but she was ruled out right at the start of the investigation? With 80% clue exploration, there shouldn’t be such a big gap.”

“Looking at it this way, the killer’s imitation isn’t very skillful. The media said it was identical, and that Harry Forrest stalked the victim before dying, but the police did nothing. Turns out, the one stalking Michael Wood wasn’t even Harry Forrest. smirk”

“Curious. With modern technology, how many days will it take for the boss to recover the previous clues? Why does this angle feel even harder?”

“Mmm! Is the boss going to interrogate Quincy next?”