“Dead people? Are you sure?” I was taken aback.

“If you don't believe me, you can go see it yourself!” Ye Shiwen shouted at me in anger.

“Let’s go, Dali!”

When I entered the room, I really found two dead bodies. One of them fell to a position not far from the door, and the other fell at the side of the window. The body was dark and the skin had completely turned into charcoal. My first reaction was that the bodies were discarded here after being burned. Burning was the most effective way to destroy evidence and DNA. But what amazed me was that the clothes on their bodies were intact.

“Dude!” screamed Dali. “There really are dead people in here!”

“It’s not so surprising that someone would choose this isolated place to discard dead bodies. I’ll call Xiaotao now!”

I was just about to pick up the phone when Ye Shiwen and Zhang Yan looked inside the room. Ye Shiwen lowered his voice as if he was afraid of disturbing the dead bodies and whispered, “You’re crazy! There’s no need to call the police! Let’s get out of here now!”

I ignored him.

Ye Shiwen added, “The police are often unreasonable nowadays. They might even catch us thinking we’re the murderers!”

“He’s right, Song Yang!” echoed Zhang Yan. “It’s going to save us trouble if you don’t report it to the police! Let’s get out now!”

I wondered where they got the rumor from. The police usually handled cases quite fairly. There were cases where the person reporting it was detained, but it usually was because the person was indeed a suspect. At that moment, the call went through, and Xiaotao answered me with a languid voice, “Bastard, why are you calling me in the middle of the night? I just fell asleep a few minutes ago!”

“You might not get to sleep tonight,” I replied. “I found two dead bodies.”

At the other end of the phone, there was a scream and a clanking noise. I asked her what happened. Xiaotao sighed and replied, “Damn it, the charger cable caught the mug and it fell and broke! That was my favorite mug!”

I smiled. “I’ll get you a replacement. Hurry! The address here is…”

I turned to Dali. He used his phone to locate our position and told me the address. I relayed it to Xiaotao.

“Okay, I’ll call the station now. You stay there and protect the crime scene!” Xiaotao ordered.

I hung up the phone. Ye Shiwen and Zhang Yan looked at me with a changed attitude. Ye Shiwen asked, “You really do know the police?”

“You still think I’m lying?” I couldn’t help but smile.

Ye Shiwen squirmed awkwardly. “Then… Then I’ll leave now.”

“But your car is broken. Where can you go? Stay here. You may need to give the police a statement later,” I said.

“What? A statement?” Zhang Yan was shocked. “But we’ve done nothing! You have to testify for us.”

I almost laughed. When people hear they need to give a statement or that they need to go to the police station, they often get scared. In fact, most of it was just to assist the paperwork that the police had to deal with.

But in order to appease her emotions, I assured her, “Sure. I’ll testify for you.”

I then told Dali, “Looks like I’ll be busy all night. Can you take the taxi to go back to school and bring my equipment here?”

“Sure!” Dali agreed. “I’ll bring you some food too. Looks like we’ll have to stay up late tonight!”

“Thanks. Be careful on the road,” I reminded him.

“Okay!”

After Dali left, Ye Shiwen asked me, “Song Yang, what the hell are you?”

“I’m a college student. Just like you.”

Ye Shiwen eyed me suspiciously. He seemed a little nervous, probably because of the dead bodies in the room. He was about to light up a cigarette when I stopped him and explained that it would be troublesome if he dropped ashes or cigarette butts on the crime scene. He would have to give official statements at the police station. He was so scared of the thought that he changed his mind about smoking.

Before Huang Xiaotao arrived, I took a closer look at the bodies. From the characteristics of the skin, they were obviously burned, but I still couldn’t judge whether they were accidentally burned or killed. I was afraid of leaving fingerprints, so I didn’t touch the bodies.

Judging from the clothes they wore, the two victims were most probably both males. One was about thirty years old, and the other one was over forty at least. Not only were their clothes and shoes intact, but there were also gold watches and rings on the bodies too. This befuddled me. What was the murderer’s motive?

I searched the rooms and found two sleeping bags in one room. There was a backpack next to it. When I was pondering about them, I heard the door behind me slam shut, and then Zhang Yan screamed.

Only then did I realize that those two idiots had been following me all the time. Zhang Yan stuttered, “W-Who… Who closed the door?”

“Probably just the wind.”

I pushed the door open, but found that the door was opposite the wall, and so it could not have been blown by the wind. The atmosphere in the corridor was very gloomy and oppressive. From a certain corner, I heard a curious noise. It sounded like someone was chewing food. I thought there really was something bizarre going on with this house!

I looked back and saw that Ye Shiwen and Zhang Yan were so scared their knuckles were white and their eyes were wide open. Their appearance almost made me laugh.

“Don’t be afraid,” I assured them. “I’m right here.”

“Did you hear that noise?” Zhang Yan asked anxiously.

“Stop thinking about it,” I comforted her. “If you’re bored, just play with your phones. Oftentimes it’s your imagination that drives you crazy when you’re in this type of place.”

“Are you… Are you not afraid at all?”

“It’s not that scary here. I’ve seen horror movies a thousand times scarier than this.”

After a while, a siren was heard coming from outside. A large group of people came up. Xiaotao saw Ye Shiwen and Zhang Yan and asked, “Are they your friends?”

“Yeah, sort of. I need a pair of gloves, please.”

Xiaozhou handed them to me. I put them on and went straight to work. Ye Shiwen and Zhang Yan followed me with their bulging eyes. I remembered my bet with Ye Shiwen where he promised to call me father if I really knew a police officer. I had an idea to humiliate him on the spot and make him shout ‘father’ a hundred times, but I had more pressing matters at hand. The two dead bodies took all of my attention.

I flipped the body and explained to Xiaotao about how we discovered them in the first place. Ye Shiwen and Zhang Yan were taken downstairs by the police. I told Xiaotao, “By the way, the guy’s car broke down. He needs some water for the car. They won’t be able to get back to the college if you don’t help them.”

“You little bastard,” she reached out and tugged my ears. “You’re using me to go on dates with girls, aren’t you? Tell me honestly, you’re looking for the long-haired beauty of your dreams, aren’t you?”

Xiaotao was very gentle with her ear-tugging, but I played along and answered, “Didn’t I tell you? I was out purely because Dali asked for help! I’ve never been on dates!”

“Ah, well, that’s just like you.”

I started the autopsy and found that the joints of the corpses were all undamaged, yet the bodies had turned to charcoal. I looked at the expressions on their faces. It seemed that they had experienced tremendous pain and torture before they died!