“Student Zhou Wei, could you give me this textbook?”
Lu Min looked at the textbook in his hand. His intuition told him this was a crucial piece of evidence. His tone was exceptionally cold and hard. Although his features remained calm, his voice carried an order rather than a polite request. Whether Zhou Wei agreed or not, he intended to take it.
“I am sorry, but I probably cannot. I have missed too many classes, and I want to catch up,” Zhou Wei replied, refusing the man’s request.
Ying Yulian sensed Lu Min’s intent and immediately followed up on the man’s words. A sweet, apologetic smile played on his face. “I am sorry. My brother is very direct. Actually, it is because my problem-solving steps are always disorganized, and I lose many points I should not. My brother wanted to borrow yours for me to use as a reference.”
Zhou Wei tried to sit up, but Lu Min immediately pressed her back down.
“What is wrong? Do you feel unwell?” Lu Min asked.
He watched Zhou Wei, who had shifted from dull indifference to sudden urgency, and raised an eyebrow. He reached out, his fingertip resting on the nurse call button. Zhou Wei’s gaze shifted toward Ying Yulian. She knew this boy was unnervingly brilliant. In fact, the method of passing messages through marked words in a book was something Ying Yulian had mentioned to her during a group project.
Everyone in class thought this transfer student, who was slightly younger than them, was kind and gentle. They thought he was someone who could get along with anyone. But she had seen Ying Yulian’s face turn cold the moment Lu Min left. She knew the youth was not as harmless as people imagined. She remembered the way the corners of his mouth had lifted when she asked him about it; he had described a perfect, hypothetical way to send messages in an innocent tone.
Why did she follow his lead, only to fail anyway?
“Student Zhou Wei, I am not asking for your permission,” Lu Min said.
Holding the book in one hand and leading Ying Yulian with the other, Lu Min exited the room. Just as the ward door was closing, Ying Yulian caught Zhou Wei’s indignant expression. He blinked in confusion. Why was she looking at him like that? It was just a notebook. Was such a reaction necessary?
The report came out quickly. Just as Lu Min suspected, Zhou Wei and the killer had communicated by circling characters in the textbook to form sentences. Zhou Wei provided the methods, and the killer carried them out. A case that was once closed was overturned, revealing a teenage instigator. This news inevitably became a hot topic for the media.
Lu Min disliked how the media pointed their cameras at victims. He frowned as he repeatedly rejected reporters who wanted to dig for more explosive, eye-catching information. As he walked out of the police station, he felt that the plan did not seem like something Zhou Wei could have devised. She acted more like an executor following a script; otherwise, the implementation would not have been so chaotic.
He decided to visit Zhou Wei again, who was now under strict supervision at the hospital.
“Did you know I was coming to see you?” Lu Min asked. He noticed she had clearly dressed up, as if she had expected his arrival.
“I only knew that you would feel the method was not my idea,” she replied.
“So, who told you to do it?”
“Your brother, Ying Yulian.”
“That is impossible,” Lu Min countered immediately.
Even if Ying Yulian possessed a natural talent for crime, Lu Min did not believe he would teach Zhou Wei how to commit one. After all, Lu Min had seen Yulian’s anxiety over the analysis and his eagerness to help with the work. If Ying Yulian had truly done it, he would have stood aside with a face full of innocent ignorance, watching them struggle while he held the correct answer from a position of superiority. Lu Min dismissed the claim.
“Believe it or not. I am ruined anyway, so what I am saying is the truth.” Zhou Wei let out a cynical sneer at Lu Min’s skepticism. She turned her gaze away and looked out the window.
“You are not ruined. A juvenile convicted of inciting a crime will only be sentenced to a few months and a fine. You have a history of being abused by Zhou Fu. If you cooperate with a medical evaluation, your sentence might be even shorter. You could still make it out to take the college entrance exam.”
“I have no money to pay a fine. I will just rot in prison.”
“I will take care of the fine. You will not rot in prison. After you are released, I will find a foster family for you. You can stay in a welfare home if you prefer. I will sponsor your education. You only need to focus on studying.”
Zhou Wei turned her head. Her dull features softened for a moment. Her lower lip trembled, and after a moment of hesitation, she asked the question she wanted to ask most. “How long will Qi Fu be sentenced? Is it also a few months? Is there any way to help reduce his sentence?”
Qi Fu was the killer who had helped Zhou Wei murder Zhou Fu. Lu Min looked at the hope in the girl’s eyes, then thought of the sentence Qi Fu faced. He recalled the sympathy his colleagues at the station felt for their fate: a victimized girl and a man who wanted to help her escape. Evidence suggested that Zhou Fu was about to commit a horrific act against Zhou Wei when Qi Fu, who had been helped by her before, walked in. Qi Fu already had a conflict with Zhou Fu; he intervened to stop him but accidentally killed him in the process.
“But Qi Fu and I are the victims. Zhou Fu was the one who hurt us,” Zhou Wei said, refusing to give up.
“But a mistake is a mistake. No one has the right to take another person’s life. Right and wrong should be judged by the law.” After saying this, Lu Min turned and left the room.
No matter how miserable their lives were, he could sympathize with their tragedy without condoning the act of murder. In this life, Lu Min had seen the tragic childhood Ying Yulian suffered while locked in a dog cage. But was misery a valid reason to take the lives of others? He might feel pity for the boy who looked at him through the bars of a cage, but he could never forgive or forget the people who died or the things Ying Yulian did in his past life.
His phone rang. It was Chen Shen. “The evidence you found was impressive. I never would have guessed Qi Fu and Zhou Wei worked together using circled words in a book. They are a miserable pair. They almost became step-siblings, but Zhou Fu was an unrepentant abuser. Qi Fu’s mother was beaten so badly she died because they had no money for treatment. Perhaps the revenge for his mother and the brutality against Zhou Wei were the real reasons he killed him.”
“Find a good lawyer for both of them. I will pay for it,” Lu Min said quietly, cutting through Chen Shen’s rambling.
“Brother! Are you finished? When are you coming home?” To Lu Min’s surprise, Ying Yulian’s sweet voice came from the other end of the line.
“Why are you at the police station?”
“I forgot my keys, and the housekeeper is away. I called and messaged you, but you did not answer. I could not get into the house, so I came to find you.”
“Alright. I am coming to pick you up. There are some things I want to ask you about as well.”
“What is it, Brother?”
“The method used in the crime. Did you tell Zhou Wei about it?”