Li Shuang Jin said he could resolve it and acted very quickly. Within a few days, the guilt for the several bizarre murder cases that had occurred previously was pinned on several gangs causing trouble in Haicheng.
The struggles between those gangs and forces were fierce. Normally, a few deaths wouldn't make the news, and some couldn't even keep their subordinates in check. They might not even know if it was their own people who did it.
Haicheng was not only intertwined with gang forces but also had many foreign influences lurking within. Japanese, Westerners, bankers, churchgoers, and hospital operators. As long as there were financial interests involved, death was unavoidable.
Li Shuang Jin had accumulated many unsolved cases due to his previous injury. Now recovered, he had to clear them up. He spent more than a week at the police station handling cases, while Li Xiao Xian's cooperation with the Westerners also neared its end.
Under Zhu Zhu's persuasion, Wu Xiang registered to practice medicine at a clinic. Having lived for a thousand years, even without spiritual power, she could prescribe the right medicine for many difficult and complicated diseases. Qu Jin Xin followed her closely, her eyes gradually clearing up with each passing day.
Seemingly, everything was developing for the better.
In early winter, another gruesome tragedy occurred in the city.
The Lin Mansion in Guihua Lane, with its sixteen occupants, was massacred overnight. Limbs and dismembered bodies were scattered everywhere. The Lin Mansion was tightly shut, and the fireplace was still burning. In this severe winter, the Lin family had to endure until their bodies rotted and emitted a foul stench before passers-by discovered them.
The Lin family was not a noble or influential family in Haicheng but a declining scholarly lineage. The elder Mr. Lin was a top scholar in the Qing Dynasty, but his son was a merchant who only moved if there was profit. After the Qing Dynasty fell, the elder Mr. Lin, who was "loyal to his lord," died of grief.
The current head of the Lin family had some business acumen but was rigid, conservative, and lustful. After being tripped up a few times, he had reached a point where he had to live off the dowries of his wives and concubines. There hadn't been any news of him in Haicheng for a long time.
He never expected to make headlines even in death.
The dismembered limbs and bodies were pieced together, making up the sixteen members of the Lin family: the head of the family, his one wife and nine concubines, and two sons and two daughters, with two male and two female servants each.
His concubines were all of ordinary disposition and had no children. Only the principal wife, who was a Di Kun, had children. There were no grudges or feuds within the family. The head of the Lin family was timid and fearful, not offending anyone. Coupled with the gruesome scene at the Lin Mansion, the case was most likely the work of bandits.
Many families in Haicheng had been wiped out by bandits or gangs. It was truly rare for a family like the Lin's to suffer such a disaster. Li Shuang Jin decided to visit the scene himself.
The Lin Mansion was located in a remote area. Noble families wished to find a quiet place free from disturbance. However, other families had power and influence, with plenty of guards and servants, most equipped with firearms and ammunition. The Lin family, on the other hand, relied on their wives' dowries for daily expenses and naturally could not afford guards.
When he got out of the car, a crowd had already gathered outside the Lin Mansion. Besides those from the police station, more were his own subordinates. The two elders of the Li family didn't know that he had been ambushed and severely injured last time due to insufficient manpower, but Commander Li knew very well. His sixth brother, whom he had raised as his own son, the apple of his parents' eyes, one incident was enough for him.
A subordinate handed him a handkerchief. The smell in the house had subsided a lot, but a pungent stench still lingered. The odor of decaying corpses was nauseating. Tian Gan's physical constitution was superior to ordinary people, and having too sensitive a nose in such a place was self-inflicted torture.
At the same time, some evidence might be present within these smells, so Li Shuang Jin did not take it.
The room was quite dim, and the cold wind mixed with the bloody stench was quite invigorating. He shook his head. A strange fragrance seemed to drift past. He sniffed hard, and it vanished again.
A corpse lay supine on the Western-style sofa in the middle of the room, a gold-tipped pipe lying beside the sofa. There was a knife wound on the corpse's neck, almost severing the entire head. Blood had splashed onto the off-white sofa and flowed onto the dark floor, all the way to his feet.
At the entrance of the side room, an arm, a leg, and a head. The body was inside the side room, but the head was at the doorway.
Under the stairs lay a leg, and a corpse missing a leg was hanging on the stairs. There was a long gash on its abdomen, and its internal organs had spilled out. The foul odor spread with the wind.
A large saber swung directly at the man lying on his side on the sofa, smoking opium. The man, in panic, rolled to dodge. The saber followed closely. Before the man could jump off the sofa, he was struck on the back of the neck with the blade. The blade was too sharp, and the wielder was strong. The man's head was nearly severed from the side. Blood splattered all around. The man fell backward onto the sofa, the pipe dropping to the ground, blood gushing out...
The maidservant emerged from the side room, saw the scene, and screamed in panic. Turning to run back into the house, the attacker lunged forward with the saber and severed one of her feet. She dragged her body and continued to evade. The person standing up swung the saber with force. She lunged forward, her head severed, and her body, propelled by inertia, continued forward, crashing into the house. The attacker, as if venting his rage, chopped off one of her arms.
The young lady, dressed in a cheongsam, heard the commotion from upstairs and came out. Before she could descend the stairs, she was terrified by the scene below, her face drained of color. Turning to flee, the person with the saber leaped up, climbed the wooden stairs, and caught up with her at the top. The saber swung towards the person clinging to the stairs. The young lady struggled to climb up. That blow struck her leg, and her slender leg fell through the gap in the stairs, becoming the swollen and rotten limb it was now. The young lady cried out in agony, and a saber was plunged into her abdomen, her voice abruptly ceasing. The saber cut open her chest and abdomen, spilling her internal organs...
The horrific murder scene replayed frame by frame in his mind. The images of everyone being killed formed in his mind. Everywhere he looked, it was a bloody and terrifying slaughterhouse.
Only when he saw the death of the last person did Li Shuang Jin's thoughts reach a limit.
It was the attic on the third floor. The last member of the Lin family, the eldest son, had been stabbed to death in the corner of the attic, his posture resembling that of a Japanese samurai committing seppuku.
If the killer had pursued the living person all the way up, the thrown knife should not have been so accurately thrust into the eldest son's abdomen. If not, setting aside everything below, the scene here was more like a suicide than a murder.
Could the so-called killer be the Lin family's eldest son, who committed suicide at the end?
There was only a small window of less than 0.5 square meters in the attic. There were no signs of the window being broken, and it was impossible for a person to squeeze out of such a small opening.
With this suspicion, Li Shuang Jin stepped forward to examine the corpse of the Lin family's eldest son.
The carved small window in the attic had no paper or glass. The cold wind blew in. The degree of decomposition of this corpse was less severe than those below. He reached out and brushed away the stray hair from the corpse's forehead. Beneath the pale, bluish-white skin were some faint black markings.
He tried to wipe them away, but they wouldn't budge. The black markings were embedded in the flesh.
His slender fingers moved upwards, gently lifting the corpse's bruised and reddish eyelids.
"Sixth Master!"