Chapter 39: You seem more human than I imagined

Translator: Abo Dammen

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Case Two: Dance of the Night Charm

The morning rush hour in the city center had passed. The clamor between office buildings gradually subsided, while the morning fog over the suburban villas had just lifted, as if they were in another time zone.

In the kitchen, freshly baked croissants emitted the aroma of butter, intertwining with the scent of coffee—a perfect combination to chase away sleepiness. Xiao Xi crouched on the dining chair, took a bite of a croissant, and said with an exaggerated expression, “I survive every day on this one bite.”

He wasn’t wearing makeup. His uneven skin tone and heavy dark circles made it hard to tell his real age. Most of the other Night Charms looked the same, listlessly yawning. 

Zhu Mingfei placed her laptop on the dining table, her fingers clattering rapidly across the keyboard. Xu Pei glanced over. “Writing an article?”

The article’s title was “Shocking Insider Story of the Vidley Winery.” It mentioned her suspected participants, including bank presidents, real estate tycoons, etc. However, without solid evidence, no reputable media would dare publish it. It could only be posted on gossip websites.

“The public has a right to know the truth,” Zhu Mingfei said, her fingers never stopping as she multitasked. “Superintendent He, Professor Xu, why did you ask us to gather so early in the morning?”

“Wei Tai’s autopsy report is out,” He Yixun sAT opposite Zhu Mingfei, the coffee on the table untouched. “He died from an epileptic seizure.” 

The strange smell Xu Pei noticed before Wei Tai collapsed was a precursor to the seizure.

Some trained working dogs can detect human diseases like cancer. If Xu Pei had received such training, he could have identified that the fermenting chemical smell came from specific gases secreted during an epileptic seizure. It was just unfortunate that Wei Tai wasn’t lucky enough to have someone warn him.

“Is that so?” Xiao Xi munched noisily on his croissant. “Old geezers should just stay in nursing homes. Coming out to play when they’re sick…”

“Actually, sudden death from epilepsy is a low-probability event,” Xu Pei interrupted. “It’s highly likely there was a triggering factor for Wei Tai’s seizure.” 

The typing hands stopped abruptly. Zhu Mingfei curled her fingers, then relaxed them on the keyboard. “Professor Xu, what does that mean?”

“Can I make a hypothesis?” Xu Pei asked.

Xiao Xi put down his croissant. He and Tang Tang exchanged a glance, their expressions turning serious.

Zhu Mingfei half-closed her laptop, adjusted her black-rimmed glasses, and asked in her usual tone, “What hypothesis?” 

“The hypothesis that someone triggered Wei Tai’s epileptic seizure,” Xu Pei said. As expected, he saw several Night Charms present looking slightly uncomfortable.

He didn’t continue, instead taking a sip of coffee. No wonder He Yixun wasn’t drinking it; the fruity notes of these beans were too strong, not the dark roast he preferred.

“Triggered…” Zhu Mingfei looked puzzled. “How can epilepsy be triggered?”

“Tang Tang, what do you think?” Xu Pei looked at the girl trying to make herself inconspicuous. “I remember you were a nurse.” 

Tang Tang visibly tensed. Her eyes darted towards Zhu Mingfei, the plea for help all too obvious. Xiao Xi immediately put an arm around her shoulder and said with a slight edge, “She’s just a nurse, not a doctor. How would she know?”

“Then you should know,” Xu Pei said, his expression complex, his tone deepening. “You were well aware there was a striptease performance last night.”

“Isn’t there a striptease every time?” Xiao Xi pondered, with an “what’s the big deal” attitude. “Could it have turned him on to death?”

Zhu Mingfei snapped her laptop shut, cutting off Xiao Xi’s retort. She took off her glasses and looked at Xu Pei. “Professor Xu, are you suspecting that one of us killed Wei Tai?” 

Not suspecting. Certain.

If it were an isolated incident, perhaps neither Xu Pei nor He Yixun would have thought much of it. But a series of coincidences stacked together could only mean someone did it deliberately.

“The lighting in the hall was very dim last night, but when the striptease started, the strobe lights became extremely harsh and flickering.”

At the time, Xu Pei had felt a bit strange, wondering why a party for old men was set up like a nightclub. But seeing how high everyone was, moving to the rhythm, he thought it was just the usual arrangement. 

“When the frequency of strobe lights is between 15-20Hz, the color is red and blue, and the duration exceeds five seconds, there’s a high probability of triggering photosensitive epilepsy,” Xu Pei explained. “We checked Wei Tai’s medical records. He did have epilepsy, along with some other underlying conditions.”

“Then it was just bad luck, wasn’t it?” Zhu Mingfei quipped. “Striptease with that kind of lighting is normal.”

“But previous parties didn’t use that kind of lighting.”

After learning the cause of Wei Tai’s death was epilepsy, He Yixun and Xu Pei returned to the hospital room to verify this with Shao Hui. According to Shao Hui, previous parties indeed hadn’t been that wild. 

“What lighting to use is the lighting technician’s random decision. What does that have to do with us?” Zhu Mingfei frowned. “Professor Xu, isn’t your hypothesis a bit far-fetched?”

Xu Pei also knew their hypothesis was indeed unconvincing because deducing this result was based entirely on speculation, without any evidence.

But this method of committing a crime leaves no evidence to be found. It’s like someone who runs a red light getting hit by a car—all the traces point to an accident. How can you determine if the driver who hit them did it intentionally or not?

Unless there’s chat records as proof. 

But given Zhu Mingfei’s cautious nature, hiding her workspace so well, she must have deleted such things long ago, or perhaps never left any record from the start.

“Then I’ll make an even bolder hypothesis,” Xu Pei recounted.

“I remember Xiao Xi said, ‘Some old men are so lustful they don’t even care about their lives. Men in their seventies still use air pumps to help them get erect.’ Officer He and I questioned Shao Hui. There was only one man in his seventies in the Progressive Society: Luo En.”

“You said he was so lustful he didn’t care about his life,” Xu Pei looked directly at Xiao Xi. “I reasonably suspect he died in a Night Charm’s bed.” 

Most likely, he got over-excited, leading to a sudden heart attack.

Remembering the day of the funeral, He Maohu had warned He Yixun that Luo En’s death wasn’t so simple. He probably heard some rumors after He Jun’s death, like Night Charms spreading news of the Chief Justice’s death before it was officially announced.

Seeing Xu Pei deduce so much information from just a few words, Xiao Xi also panicked, looking helplessly at Zhu Mingfei. However, Zhu Mingfei remained composed. “I could write ten articles full of conspiracy theories like this in a single day.”

Being labeled a conspiracy theorist, Xu Pei was also helpless because he truly had no evidence; this could only be considered wild guessing. 

“Once is an accident, twice is coincidence, three times can only be deliberate.” Unlike Xu Pei’s indirect approach, He Yixun’s opening statement labeled everyone in the room as suspects. “You are a large organization. The tattoo artist, the lighting technician, are all involved. Even… the housemaid.”

Hua-jie, who was cleaning the coffee machine in the kitchen, fumbled. The tray fell into the sink with a loud crash. She silently turned off the faucet, wiped her hands on her apron, and hung her head without saying a word.

“Qian Kuang’s wife passed away a few years ago. His children aren’t around. Usually, only a housemaid took care of his daily life.” said He Yixun. “When he had his asthma attack, he couldn’t use his emergency medication in time. That could be an accident, or it might not be. If it wasn’t, the housemaid in his home is the prime suspect.”

The last time they were at this villa, Xu Pei noticed Hua-jie took very good care of the Night Charms, even heating milk for them late at night. She seemed less like a maid and more like a family elder. Assuming she was also a participant, and assuming Qian Kuang’s death wasn’t an accident, it was easy to suspect the maid in Qian Kuang’s home might also be involved. 

The domestic service circle in a city isn’t that big. Many aunties are from the same hometown, so it wouldn’t be strange if the two knew each other.

“Officer He, that’s really stretching it,” Zhu Mingfei said with an amused tone. “So, anyone who dies in Binshi is connected to us, is that it?”

“These aren’t ordinary people. They are all senior members of the Progressive Society,” He Yixun remarked. “Your first target was Luo En. You used his heart condition to overstimulate him in bed. Your second target was Qian Kuang, you instigated the maid in his home to tamper with his medication. Your third target was Wei Tai, you used strobe lights to induce his epileptic seizure. And my appearance just happened to become a part of your plan.

“The Progressive Society members came to the party. I had no reason to arrest them. But if someone was killed, the situation would be different. These people would become suspects. I could investigate each of their identities, and you could also expose them. 

“I think your original plan was to eliminate the senior members—Shao Hui is already dying, he wasn’t part of your plan—and then expose the others. But investigating these people’s identities is very difficult because they aren’t as easy to identify as the founding team. However, by creating a homicide in front of me, investigating these people becomes straightforward.

“That’s also why, after Wei Tai collapsed, Tang Tang emphasized he had taken a sip of wine to mislead me into thinking he was poisoned, thus providing a reason to take everyone at the scene in for questioning.

“It’s just that Shao Hui stepped forward and disrupted the plan, forcing you to reconsider.” After laying out the entire sequence of events, He Yixun asked, “Am I correct?”

Zhu Mingfei’s face remained calm. She didn’t respond. The others kept their heads down, silent. 

Although the room was full of people, the air was as still as death.

After a long while, Xiao Xi took a deep breath and said, “All of this was me…”

Zhu Mingfei quickly snapped, “Xiao Xi!” stopping him from acting impulsively. She warned him with her eyes not to do anything stupid, then said to He Yixun, “Officer He, you’ve finished your hypothesis. Can I also propose one?”

He Yixun: “Go ahead.” 

“Let me state beforehand, it’s all hypothetical. Just treat it as a story,” Zhu Mingfei said. “You said our first target was Luo En. Is it possible his death was actually an accident?

“Luo En appeared respectable on the surface, but in reality, he was a lecher. He had a severe sex addiction. The monthly parties couldn’t satisfy him. He often called several Night Charms to his estate to satisfy his vulgar fetishes.

“He forgot his advanced age and couldn’t handle the stimulation anymore. Dying in bed is a fitting end for him.” At this point, she said to Xu Pei, “Professor Xu, on this point, our hypotheses are quite similar.”

Even so, everyone knew this was the truth. 

“That night, three Night Charms were with him: two women and one man. The boy secretly brought a phone and told the other sisters in the group chat that something had happened, the Chief Justice was dead, and the butler wouldn’t let them leave.”

“He kept updating the situation in real-time. He said Qian Kuang, Wei Tai, and Shao Hui had all rushed over. After that, those three vanished without a trace.”

Xu Pei’s heart sank. Under those circumstances, it was impossible for those three to survive…

“Anyway, it’s a case of ‘no body found alive, no corpse found dead’,” Zhu Mingfei shrugged, her tone light, but a deep, unshakeable heaviness lay in her eyes.

A Night Charm began to sob quietly. The person beside her also had a face full of gloom but was forcing herself to hold back her emotions. She nudged the crying girl with her elbow, reminding her that the police were present and it wasn’t the time for tears.

“Hua-jie’s involvement… Perhaps one of the three who were silenced was her child. As for the tattoo artist and the lighting technician, maybe they just couldn’t stand those people’s beastly behavior anymore. Of course, these are all just hypotheses. Just listen casually.” Zhu Mingfei conferred. “As for the rest of the story, Officer He’s version sounds good. I won’t add legs to a snake.” 

Overall, it was quite close to what Xu Pei and He Yixun had thought.

This was a series of crimes involving multiple participants. The deaths seemed like sudden illnesses but were actually meticulously planned. Zhu Mingfei probably learned about these things from Shui-ge and, out of sympathy for the Night Charms and disgust towards the privileged class, masterminded these incidents.

At this point, Xu Pei also understood why these Night Charms didn’t just run away but chose to resist the Progressive Society in this way. Perhaps it was for revenge, perhaps it was out of a sense of justice, or perhaps, it was simply for righteousness.

He glanced secretly at He Yixun, who had his arms crossed, eyes half-lowered as if pondering something, not rushing to state his position. 

In Xu Pei’s opinion, there was no evidence for this case, and it would be acceptable to close it like this. But based on his understanding of He Yixun, this Senior Superintendent would most likely take all the Night Charms back to the station for interrogation…

Just then, several police cars suddenly arrived on the road outside the villa. Xu Pei’s heart sank. It seemed He Yixun’s eyes truly couldn’t tolerate any wrongdoing. It would depend on how tight-lipped the Night Charms were.

Zhu Mingfei stood up frowning, her expression serious. “Officer He, can you arrest people without evidence?”

“None of your concern,” He Yixun retorted, sweeping his gaze over the Night Charms scattered around the room, his voice cold. “Those who want freedom, come with me willingly for rehab.” 

Xu Pei was startled, realizing things seemed different from what he had imagined.

The resistance in the room instantly dissipated. Zhu Mingfei was also frozen in place. Xiao Xi and Tang Tang wore expressions of disbelief.

“I came here to catch junkies,” He Yixun added. “Any objections?”

The police cars left. The house was empty. 

The coffee had gone cold. Half a croissant remained. Hua-jie seemed to have something she wanted to say to Xu Pei and He Yixun, but she also knew some things weren’t suitable to tell the police. She began cleaning up the house alone, where people would no longer return.

“Thanks, Officer He,” Zhu Mingfei said, getting into her battle-hardened red car. “If you ever need help with anything in the future, just find me anytime.”

“Don’t thank me,” He Yixun said flatly. “I didn’t do anything.”

The red car disappeared around the bend in the road in the blink of an eye, as if heralding the final curtain fall on this dance of the Night Charms. 

Xu Pei let out a breath, stretched lazily, and said to He Yixun in a good mood, “I helped you solve another case.”

“What case?” He Yixun walked to the passenger side of the SUV and opened the door. “Get in.”

Alright, fine. There can’t be a case.

Having a case means having perpetrators, and for this case… Officer He didn’t want to catch the perpetrators. 

And precisely because of that, he hadn’t probed deeply into many details of the case, only clarifying the general sequence of events.

The car door closed with a thud. As Xu Pei was fastening his seatbelt, he finally realized something was off—Officer He had opened the car door for him?

What was going on? Was it because he was leaving soon, so he was giving him special treatment?

He Yixun got into the driver’s seat and glanced at Xu Pei. “Why are you looking at me?” 

“Nothing, it’s just…” Xu Pei paused, looking at him as if seeing him for the first time, “…you seem more human than I imagined.”