Chapter 21 – Neighbor

When Xie Lin sent the message to Chi Qing, he was sitting in Wu Zhibin’s office.

The two were sitting face to face, but it was Xie Lin sitting on Wu Zhibin’s office chair. He leaned his entire body back in a relaxed position, scrolling through the crime scene pictures on the computer screen in front of him. He looked at the pictures, his expression not changing.

He was usually like this, it gave people the feeling of being rather approachable.

But what he was facing at the moment were pictures of the crime scene, sitting in the office chair as if he was just finding a place to take a lunch break.

Xie Lin studied it for a while with the attitude and posture of being on a lunch break, speaking slowly: “Is the autopsy report out yet.”

Wu Zhibin: “It’s out; it’s been confirmed that the deceased had been sexually assaulted and abused before death. There were traces of struggle in the room, but the murderer didn’t leave behind DNA. We are currently investigating everyone with an interpersonal relationship with the deceased one by one. Other relevant reports are still being investigated, and the results of the fingerprint comparison are expected to be out tomorrow.”

Wu Zhibin also said: “She had a dispute with her boyfriend that night; when we went to look for her boyfriend today— we found he had ran away overnight.”

Her boyfriend was Zhou Bohao, who worked as a bartender in a bar; the two met while working in Kangyang City before. Zhou Bohao’s rent still had two months left on it, yet he didn’t even ask the landlord for a deposit, taking with him some clothes and documents of identification, unable to reach him using any of the contact information.

Anyone who heard about this would think of the four words dreading punishment for crime.

Xie Lin didn’t rush to come to a conclusion.

Wu Zhibin: “Do you have any questions?”

“No questions,” Xie Lin’s gaze fell on the woman’s feet, moving away quickly, speaking as he stood up, “There’s just one thing I’m more concerned about, why are her slippers placed so neatly by the bed? She doesn’t seem like she was arguing with someone, it seems like she was killed…… when embracing someone.”

“If it was the murderer……” Wu Zhibin spoke up to the point, suddenly stopping.

The scene was extremely messy; there was no reason for the murderer to deliberately place a pair of slippers.

Xie Lin spoke: “I finished looking at all the files, I still have something to do, so I have to go out.”

Xie Lin, the “behind-the-scenes consultant,” came over, yet no one realized that he was here to help analyze the case.

Over the years, although Xie Lin already left the Criminal Police Corps, and wasn’t serving as a consultant anymore, Wu Zhibin would still ask him for help with some cases.

Wu Zhibin watched Xie Lin, seeing the young boy wearing a school uniform who was sitting in the conference room surrounded by people in his current appearance. The times have changed; he could only continue to participate in cases while in the dark.

In the General Administration, many people respected him a lot, because, in the past ten years, he had repeatedly solved many troublesome big cases.

Every time he heard such compliments, Wu Zhibin would think of the first time he approached Xie Lin for a case.

The murder scene of the case was very familiar, making people think of the “Miemen Case” from many years ago. Xie Lin had already entered college at that time, relying on that face of his to be an influential figure in school.

They just finished English class at that time; Xie Lin was leaning against the wall in the corridor, surrounded by a crowd of girls.

Wu Zhibin remembered that he was very keen, raising his eyes quickly while laughing and chatting, glancing at him from afar.

“Looking for me?” After the girls dispersed, Xie Lin walked over.

“There’s a case……”

“I’m already not a consultant,” Xie Lin interrupted, “I will also never participate in the investigation of a case again.”

“In addition……” Xie Lin pointed at himself, “Didn’t you hear what they said, I failed the psychological evaluation.”

“I’m a policeman, I judge cases based on evidence,” Wu Zhibin said, “It’s the same with people. If a person could be judged based on a singular evaluation, then I don’t accept the results of this kind of evaluation.”

Wu Zhibin came back to his senses, glancing at him: “Whose reply are you waiting for, I saw you staring at your phone for a long time just now.”

Xie Lin just happened to be looking at his phone; the stubborn and boring man didn’t reply, but Ji Mingrui replied to him seriously: He’s at the entrance of the Tianrui Community, waiting for an agent.

So Xie Lin picked up his jacket and said: “I still have something to do, I’m leaving first.”

“?”

With the car keys hanging on his hand, Xie Lin opened the door and walked out: “Going to steal a customer from a real estate agent, the customer might run away with someone else if I don’t go now.”

Half an hour later, Chi Qing stood in the living room of some rental apartment with a cold expression; the environment of Tianrui Community could be considered passable. The area of the rental apartment was about 100 square meters, the living room layout spacious. The agent had screened it strictly in accordance with his requirements, introducing: “This building is quite nice, two households per floor. The landlord has rented it out a few times before, putting a lot of thought into it this time. The furniture in the living room and bedroom are all newly bought, and the rent is pretty reasonable too……”

His cold expression wasn’t because of the agent, nor was it because there were any problems with the apartment.

But because there was an extra person in the living room who was not supposed to be there.

“The furniture is newly bought,” Xie Lin took a few steps in the living room, as if he were the one wanting to rent a place, “But there are scratches on the wall, there are also issues with the floor, so this rent can’t be considered reasonable.”

The agent: “……Uh, this, it’s been rented out before, so it’s inevitable that there are traces of use.”

Xie Lin: “Mine doesn’t.”

When Xie Lin said this, the person he was looking at was Chi Qing: “It’s the first time being rented out, nevermind the furniture, even the floor is brand new, no one else has stepped on it aside from the decorators, so you can move in with your bags.”

Chi Qing already had a headache from all the voices, but seeing him made his head hurt even more.

“Why did you come here.”

Xie Lin: “I’m not here to steal people, just waiting for you to finish signing the contract with him.”

Chi Qing: “……”

It was probably also the first time the agent came across this kind of situation; he stood in the living room at an obvious loss.

Chi Qing met the agent for the first time at the entrance of the community, realizing that the face was different from the one on the “Anjia” platform. Before he could ask, the agent took the initiative to say: “Zhou Zhiyi– Zhou-dage has something to do, so he asked me to come over to take you to see the place; don’t worry, this area is also my expertise.”

Aside from that sentence, Chi Qing also heard another few sentences: [It’s my first time coming to this place, I haven’t memorized all the characteristics of the apartment Zhou-ge gave me; if you asked me what facilities are around later, I can’t say anything, and how much is the rent, six thousand or seven thousand? I also don’t know what exactly Zhou-ge has to do that’s so important, does this count as mine or his if this turns out to be a success?]

This little agent who had been pulled aside to take the customer to see the house had not expected to run into his own opponent.

The little agent gritted his teeth: “How about this, I’ll help you negotiate with the landlord, there should be room for about five hundred in the bargaining.”

Xie Lin: “You can lower it by five hundred?”

The agent said “ah.”

Xie Lin: “I’ll lower it by a thousand.”

The agent: “I……” He couldn’t lower it anymore; the landlord might come and hit him if the price was lowered anymore.

The agent thought sadly, surely this can’t just be fooling with him.

Xie Lin stole the customer and won the initial victory, then went a step further, taking the initiative to introduce: “The environment of mine is good; the most important thing is that it’s quiet, there’s an empty space downstairs where no one lives……”

Before whenever Xie Lin said anything, Chi Qing didn’t pay attention to a single word spoken, but when he caught the word “quiet” this time, his expression finally loosened up a bit.

Chi Qing: “Quiet?”

Xie Lin realized that he finally spoke the keyword after speaking for almost half the day.

Xie Lin’s vacant apartment was approximately five or six kilometers from there. The distance of five or six kilometers crossed the old city, at a place with a good environment, very small population, and a big park around the community.

The surrounding environment was indeed quieter than where Chi Qing originally lived; there were three communities crowded on one small block where he lived originally after all, the flow of people multiplied by three.

There weren’t any issues with the house, and as Xie Lin explained, the new house was quiet, and the distorted voice in his ears decreased in volume.

Aside from the unsatisfactory landlord, there was no fault to be found with the house.

Chi Qing made up his mind, beginning to make demands: “First, the rent is based on the market price; there is no camaraderie between me and you, so there is no need for a friendship discount.”

“Second,” Chi Qing paused slightly when he said this, “What’s the situation with the neighbor.”

He hadn’t heard anything for the fifteen minutes since he entered; the neighbor seemed to probably not be there today.

If there was a large family living there, his ears wouldn’t be able to take it.

“The neighbor……” Xie Lin pinched the ring between his fingers and turned it, saying, “There’s only one person living next door; he’s quite a person of quality, a very nice person, and won’t make any noise at all.”

It didn’t take much time to sign a lease contract, and it also only takes a day to find a moving company to pack up and move.

Chi Qing stood by the door wearing black gloves, ready for the movers to finish moving everything, then spray disinfectant on everything that had been touched to sterilize them. Just as he was lowering his eyes and wondering if there using disinfectant spray was enough, the door lock on the neighboring door opened with a “bang”—

The “of quality and very nice” neighbor was wearing a sweater, leaning against the door while looking at him, the person’s eyebrows and eyes slender, the tails of his eyes slightly raised; he seemed to have just woken up, his hair still a bit messy.

Xie Lin: “Morning.”

“……”

Chi Qing stared at this neighbor, then began to recall what was written in the lease cancellation clause of the lease contract.

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Note! The next chapter will be V, please take a day off tomorrow to save the V chapter, update on the 21st, thank you for the support~

Translator’s Note: As per the author’s note, the following chapters will be paid content. Please support the author by buying the chapters on JJWXC! I haven’t determined what I will do in regards to the tls of the paid chapters but once I decide on it, I will let you all know~