As soon as the body was revealed, the entire crowd erupted in screams!
Su Mingjie was still thinking that now that he’d finally changed his clothes, once the police left, they could continue with the engagement banquet.
After all, they were just guests holding an engagement banquet at the hotel today. Even if a cleaning lady had been caught, it wouldn’t affect them.
Who would have thought…
“B-b-body…” Su Mingjie’s legs went weak, and he stumbled back two steps, nearly falling to the ground.
Fortunately, his fiancé reacted in time, catching him in his arms and saving him from another embarrassment that day.
Of course, the panicked guests at the scene didn’t have the attention to spare watching others’ dramas.
Su Zhisheng’s gaze swept past his good-for-nothing father’s shoulder and landed on the fake young master and his fiancé.
He blinked, unable to hide his surprise.
But he wasn’t marveling at some romantic hero-saving-beauty moment—it was Wei Lingfeng’s extraordinary calmness that caught his attention.
All the guests and staff were panicking over the appearance of the body.
Only Wei Lingfeng, though grim-faced, showed no trace of fear. He even had enough presence of mind to notice Su Mingjie’s state and steady him in time.
Su Zhisheng recalled the information he’d memorized about Wei Lingfeng and had a vague guess.
“Coming back from studying abroad in a warzone really makes a difference—Wei Lingfeng’s mental fortitude is rock solid.”
Noble families were full of messy drama, and the kids often clung together for warmth. Su Mingjie and Wei Lingfeng had grown up together and were very close. Back in the Su household, the fake young master had never missed a chance to flaunt their relationship in front of Su Zhisheng.
Remembering their affectionate video calls, Su Zhisheng figured that while their elders saw this engagement banquet as a business merger, the two of them genuinely cared for each other.
Once he exposed the fake young master’s identity, even if the Wei family was dissatisfied, Wei Lingfeng probably wouldn’t call off the engagement—he’d likely just resent Su Zhisheng instead.
Not that it mattered. The fake young master had it out for him anyway. Even if Su Zhisheng didn’t strike first, the other wouldn’t let things rest.
Su Zhisheng opened the draft folder on his phone and canceled the scheduled post.
He had originally planned to expose Su Mingjie’s fake identity tonight after the engagement banquet, when everyone was still raving about it.
But now that a crime had occurred, he decided to finish investigating the case first, nail his stepmother, and then deal with the fake young master.
After all, the sensational news of a murder at the engagement banquet would spread quickly, and the gossip-loving public would chatter endlessly. He didn’t want their attention split between solving the crime and targeting the fake young master.
Having made up his mind, Su Zhisheng stepped past his seemingly stern but actually powerless father—who could only stand there awkwardly—and went to help the police evacuate the guests.
These noble heirs usually lived glamorous lives, always appearing confident and radiant. But now, every single one of them had turned into a trembling mess, hiding behind their bodyguards like frightened chicks.
The more panicked they felt, the more they vented through anger.
“How the hell does the Zhang family run this hotel? They don’t even notice a dead body on the premises, and they let that suspicious cleaning cart roll right up to us!”
“The security guards in the monitoring room are useless—couldn’t spot anything wrong in time. And the cleaning lady is just as useless, not even checking the cart before starting work… This crappy hotel, I’m never coming back!”
“I was looking forward to Su Mingjie’s record-breaking, money-burning century engagement banquet, but… I guess it really is an unbeatable legend—just not in the way he wanted.”
The speaker’s voice dripped with barely concealed schadenfreude.
Luxurious noble weddings were common, but engagement banquets on this scale were rare. Su Mingjie had deliberately thrown money around to steal the spotlight. Naturally, the guests who had been outshone were more than a little displeased.
Of course, more than complaining, what they really wanted was to leave.
“Officer, we’re just here for the engagement banquet. This has nothing to do with us. Can we go now?”
“Aside from hotel staff and the Su family, the rest of the guests can register at the lobby and then head home to rest…”
Thanks to Su Zhisheng’s tip-off, the hotel had already been surrounded by police.
The hotel owner wasn’t always on-site, but today, with the Su family’s lavish wedding taking place, his whole family was in attendance. Naturally, they were caught like turtles in a jar.
In the crowd, Su Zhisheng’s stepmother, Hu Xiuchun, spoke up with clear dissatisfaction.
“We’re just here to hold a wedding banquet. Cleaning and hygiene are the hotel’s responsibility. Why should we have to stay?”
August had brought one disaster after another for her. She’d just recently been questioned by the police and didn’t want to deal with them again at all.
Su Zhisheng raised an eyebrow. “You’re the one from the Su family who most needs to stay. So get yourself together and prepare to give a statement.”
“What crime have I committed? Don’t slander me casually!” Hu Xiuchun fumed.
Su Zhisheng smirked. “You’re too far away to see the victim’s face. But don’t worry—you’ll get to identify her from photos later.
If you’re really in a rush to figure things out, you can go take a closer look now. Even if you don’t go to her, she might just come looking for you tonight.”
“Nonsense! I didn’t kill anyone! I—” Hu Xiuchun suddenly thought of something, and her voice dropped.
No way…
She had explicitly ordered a low profile, telling those people to stop taking clients.
But thinking about the loans they were carrying, Hu Xiuchun’s confidence began to waver.
Wait—how did Su Zhisheng know?
This wasn’t another one of his exposés, was it? That man was truly her curse!
Hu Xiuchun’s expression twisted with venom, but she did nothing.
The case wasn’t sealed yet. She still held onto hope and wasn’t desperate enough to act recklessly. Of course, the bigger reason was that she couldn’t win a fight against Su Zhisheng no matter how much she hated him.
…
The conference room where hotel management usually held their meetings had been temporarily requisitioned by the police. The officers gathered together the clues collected at the scene for a summary.
Earlier that day, after receiving Su Zhisheng’s message, Xing Tianwei had immediately stationed officers at all the hotel’s exits to prevent any relevant parties from fleeing.
After that, Xing Tianwei and his team, dressed in police uniforms, entered the hotel and asked the front desk to provide room information.
Thanks to the Su family’s exclusive booking, the hotel that day was only occupied by banquet guests. As a result, many travelers whose trips were scheduled for that day—or whose stays would have lasted more than a day—had not checked into the hotel.
The police checked the checkout records and quickly identified a male guest in the target area who matched the description given by the night heron.
Middle-aged, no beer belly, but with a balding crown…
In a country like Huaguo, where middle-aged obesity was becoming increasingly common, such a man wasn’t actually that hard to find.
After locking onto their target, the police reviewed the hallway surveillance footage.
The footage showed the man pushing the body-hiding cleaning cart into the corridor, making it look as though a cleaning lady had simply forgotten to take it away.
Then, he packed his things and checked out in the middle of the night.
The front desk didn’t ask a single question and processed his checkout without hesitation.
After all, the hotel staff had a pretty good idea of what kind of business was being run behind closed doors. Some customers would stay the night after their “fun”; others would leave right after. It was all perfectly normal.
The man in the surveillance footage left the hotel and was last seen on camera near the fountain and flower bed at the hotel’s entrance.
He had killed in a fit of passion and hadn’t taken any precautions to conceal his identity. By hiding the body in the cleaning cart, he had only managed to buy himself a little time.
In late August in G Province, daytime temperatures could reach over 30°C. No matter where he stashed the body, it would decay quickly and start to stink.
Unless he was an idiot, he knew the police would track him down soon. His only chance of escape was to run as fast as possible.
Xing Tianwei quickly issued an internal wanted notice, flagging the man in the national transportation system and elsewhere.
As soon as any new information surfaced, colleagues from the police department could go make the arrest.
At the same time, they were searching the hotel thoroughly and investigating the crime scene—the room where it had all happened.
“Captain Xing, the victim only had one phone on her. The phone she used to contact the killer is missing. We’ve searched the room, the cleaning cart, and everywhere the killer appeared on hotel surveillance, but we haven’t found it.”
“I suspect the killer either took it with him or threw it away somewhere else.”
That phone contained more client lists and detailed transaction records, which would help them identify the customers involved in the hotel’s organized prostitution ring and solve the case more effectively.
Xing Tianwei took a phone call and quickly exchanged information with the customs police.
“The killer was intercepted at customs. He didn’t have the victim’s phone on him either.”
“He insists he was just a regular hotel guest and that the victim shamelessly seduced him. After the transaction, he claims she tried to extort him, and he killed her in a fit of rage…”
“His own phone also showed no evidence related to the organized prostitution case.”
Hearing this, everyone understood what was going on.
“That bastard must have been a regular here. To reduce his culpability, he hid both the victim’s phone and his own burner phone.”
Xing Tianwei’s gaze landed on Su Zhisheng.
“Those two phones were probably thrown away somewhere along the way.”
“Surveillance footage from the streets near the hotel shows that after leaving the hotel, the killer took longer than normal to reach the main road, where he then took a taxi to the airport.”
“There’s too much surveillance at the airport—he’d risk being caught on camera ditching something there. Unlike this luxury hotel, which is remote, surrounded by mountains and water—a perfect place to hide things.”
Given the time it would take to hide the phones and the difficulty involved, it was highly likely the killer had stashed them somewhere in the vicinity of the hotel.
Su Zhisheng looked up at the window. “After all this running around, it’s already dark.”
“But the killer fled right after the murder, which happened at night. If this were daytime, I’d be worried the animal witnesses hadn’t woken up yet.”
Justice has long arms. It was now the end of August, right before the start of the school year. G Province had a university town with many colleges. These past few days, out-of-town students were returning to campus, making it a busy time for travel.
The flights on the night of the murder were sold out, so the killer could only book an afternoon flight the next day. That was why he hadn’t been able to escape in time.
Xing Tianwei was still mentoring Su Zhisheng, so he naturally followed him out of the hotel.
“G Province has many venomous animals that come out at night. Be careful. The killer has already been caught, so there’s no need to take risks just to save time.”
The hotel was surrounded by lush greenery, dense trees, blooming flowers, and a small river alongside the road. The ecological environment here was diverse, which naturally meant a wide variety of creatures—and plenty of hidden dangers.
“Mm.” Su Zhisheng nodded, greeting the waterbirds, hedgehogs, and other creatures he encountered along the way and asking if they’d seen anything.
But he came up empty.
An owl sighed. “I had just spotted some prey and flew off. Can’t help you.”
Just as Su Zhisheng was starting to lose hope, a voice spoke up.
“Hiss hiss, I saw that guy. He was sneaking around, burying something—super shady!”
“But you know what? I got to watch the drama, but the mouse that stuck its head out got eaten by the owl before I could catch it. Sigh…”
Su Zhisheng turned around and spotted a snake.
A rat snake. Non-venomous.
But… help?!