Chapter 21

: The Reason for Lost Hand
Translator: 
Nyoi-Bo Studio 
 Editor: 
Nyoi-Bo Studio
Zhao Yu had decided that he would fight Qu Ping and Team B to the death. He always sat attentively at his office desk, carefully eavesdropping on Team B’s every action, even forgetting to use the bathroom.
As he expected, Qu Ping and Team B focused mainly on Zhang Jingfeng and Liang Huan’s newest evidence, and immediately focused on figuring out the source of the one-sided film.
The type of one-sided film was rarely imported. Within a few hours they had already found all of the people who had recently bought the product. Immediately afterwards, they quickly started investigating the buyers. Team Leader Qu Ping almost mobilized the entire team for this.
But when the results from the investigation came back, bad results came one after another. As it turned out, the one-sided film had been purchased by performance groups, some used it for magic, and some for setting up the stage.
Even though not many performance groups purchased it, every group that did purchased a huge amount. According to the distributor, the one-sided films were not cheap, but most people had no use for it. Within the groups they were not guarded by any specific personnel, and were usually thrown in the storage room. Regardless of who they were, workers, other performers, or even audience members, anyone could take some and leave.
Because of the chaotic situation, if they really wanted to continue down this road, the workload was going to be difficult. From the looks of it, this evidence was pointless, and they were back to square one.
Hearing this, not only Qu Ping and her team members, but even the eavesdropping Zhao Yu felt despair.
It seemed like they were still underestimating the culprit’s abilities. This person’s execution and planning were flawless, with no openings at all, he was a genius of crime!
Even though following the trail of the one-sided film was almost useless, Qu Ping did not give up completely. She still left two investigators on the scene to continue the investigation, but everyone else was transferred back to the office.
This time, Qu Ping undoubtedly felt great pressure. If she failed to solve the Lost Hand Case, it was very possible that she would follow in the previous team leader’s footsteps and be forced to resign.
But Qu Ping had already exhausted all of her strength, having already pulled out all of the evidence and thoroughly examining them. But by this point, besides not even having caught the culprit, she could not even give a decent description of them yet. Compared with her spotless record, this was unprecedented.
Soon, it was almost dawn, and despite the team continuing their tireless analysis, the talking slowly died down.
Zhao Yu was the only person in the Team A section of the office. He laid down on the desk for a long time, but heard nothing from the eavesdropper. It seemed that Qu Ping’s crew were at their limit.

Holy Sht
Zhao Yu turned around and carefully stared at his own whiteboard.
On the center of the whiteboard was the number
4.26.
This number represented April 26th. Last year, the first case happened on April 22nd. The second case occurred four days later on April 26th.
Coincidently, this year’s incident had also happened on April 22nd. Thus, the investigators were all worried that this year would repeat the last, and that there would be a fourth incident on the 26th. If a fourth incident occurred, then the consequences would be heavy. The media would surely stir a huge commotion, and the police officers involved would be heavily criticized. Right now, the entire office was covered with a thick gloom.
It was already past dawn on April 25th. If the culprit really was readying for another attack then there really was not that much time left for the police.

But the culprit…who is it?
Zhao Yu scratched his head and continued to ponder the case without stop.
Regarding this case, besides following Qu Ping’s ideas, Zhao Yu also had his own ideas.
He held onto an incomplete idea, feeling that the reason why this case was taking to long to solve may not have been because the culprit was sneaky, but because of Qu Ping’s idea being wrong from the start.
Such as the fact that although Qu Ping and her team had never said it aloud, the team had already come to the conclusion that the culprit was a male! This was because during the first case, the culprit was out in a crowded area but managed to pull the victim into a small electric-supply room in the underground tunnel. Not to mention, chopping off a person’s hand with one stroke took a lot of strength. If the victim was female, then those two things would have been very difficult to accomplish.
But…what if they were wrong? What if the culprit wasn’t a male? What would happen?
Using the BMW one-sided film as an example, the culprit had taken such advanced measures as not to reveal anything, even their own silhouette.
But why would the culprit be so careful so as to not even reveal their own silhouette?
Could it be…that the silhouette would expose something?
Like…exposing the fact that she was…a woman?!
Other than that, Zhao Yu also felt that Qu Ping often had the wrong idea, including the culprit’s motive.
By this point, the culprit had already cut off the hands of three females. But why did he cut their hands off in the first place?
Qu Ping and the team had always thought that the Lost Hand Case’s victims were randomly chosen. They were sure that there were no connection between the culprit and the victim! Their reasoning was sound as the three victims had never met each other. They were not classmates, and never even went to the same school.
Worrying about whether she was wrong or not, Qu Ping had carefully researched if the three victims had any mutual acquaintances. From her research, even though there were one or two mutual acquaintances, they obscure relationships with little investigational value.
Since there were not any relationships between the culprits and the victim, Qu Ping obviously thought that the Lost Hand Case had been done by a mentally ill person. She figured that the culprit had endured some sort of mental trauma, like housewives spending too much money, and got his revenge with this crime.
But Zhao Yu did not think that was the case.
Even though he had not been a police officer before, his ability to judge certain problems was not weaker than any detective in the unit.
The three victims not knowing each other. Their body shape, appearance, height, clothes, hair length, and even job were all completely different. The only similarity among the three was their gender, age, and family’s financial situation.
Zhao Yu felt that if the culprit really had some sort of perverted tendency, then they would at least pick victims who looked similar. If they were cutting people’s hands off because their housewife was a large spender, then they would at least pick victims who looked like their wife.
Not to mention, the information already showed that despite the victims being from wealthier households, they did not really have spending issues.
Thus, Zhao Yu had doubts regarding Qu Ping and her team’s judgement.

What if the culprit didn’t have any mental issues?
he thought.
Due to Zhao Yu’s old, rather special job situation, he had seen many cases out of grudge or revenge.
For some reason, he felt that the Lost Hand Case in front of him felt very similar to case where the motive had been a grudge. The culprit who had chopped off those womens’ hands was not just doing it because of their own interests or issues, but because they were actually out for revenge!
And the reason why Zhao Yu thought that was not just a guess, but because of a very specific reason!