Chapter 87: Identify the Murderer
Translator: Transn Editor: Transn
Gu Shenwei and Zhong Heng came to Southwall Tavern to meet Tie Hanfeng. In front of Commandant Zhong, Tie Hanfeng did not complain too much about how his apprentice had gone into action without his permission. He only stretched and said, "Huh, I'm lucky to have such a capable apprentice. Look, he cracked the case all by himself."
Gu Shenwei did not respond to his mentor's remarks. He simply told Tie Hanfeng all of his findings.
The tavern did not serve alcoholic beverages in the morning, Tie Hanfeng could only lick his lips repeatedly during the conversation. "So, the siblings weren't the witnesses to the murder, but they're actually the murderers? Such cruelty!"
Hearing that, Gu Shenwei felt upset and nearly opened his mouth to retort. In his view, the siblings did the right thing, but his mentor seemed to disagree. He could not understand why his mentor showed acceptance instead of contempt for Pot-bellied Buddha's deeds.
Zhong Heng did not mind the attitude Tie Hanfeng held toward the siblings. The two began to chat, sharing lots of common topics, such as drinks, the weather, and beautiful women. After that, they began to talk about Golden Roc Fort and the Meng family in North City. Gu Shenwei heard a scheme in their seemingly trivial and superficial small talk and was filled with righteous indignation.
"So, that's it?"
"Yes, that's It."
After ending his conversation with Tie Hanfeng, Zhong Heng left the tavern.
Tie Hanfeng picked up an empty cup to check if there was any liquor left and then threw it to the ground disappointedly.
The waiters on the day shift came to their table one after another, politely asking them to leave. Tie Hanfeng had to take his apprentice to find another place to stay. Not long after they left the tavern, he took his apprentice to a shabby brothel.
Everyone inside the brothel was sleeping, but Tie Hanfeng just went directly into a bedroom without a care, as if he owned this place. He picked up the sleeping prostitute from her bed and threw her out together with her quilt. The prostitute shrilled and cursed him for a while before finding another place to sleep.
This was the first time Gu Shenwei saw his mentor lie down on a bed. Tie Hanfeng said to his apprentice, "Get some rest. Just help yourself."
Gu Shenwei, who had just begun to have respect for his mentor yesterday, got disgusted by him again. He would never want to touch anything there, so he just stood in the room and asked querulously, "Is the problem solved?"
"You little bast*rd have really grown up. Come on, tell me what you've heard."
"It sounded like you're going to use the siblings as scapegoats."
"Scapegoats? They have a motive to kill Pot-bellied Buddha and Ju Gaotai, and now they've fled in fear of being punished. They hired you to kill their father and at the same time, took the chance to set you up to be identified as the prince's murderer. That's the whole story, but don't get too excited about that. We must find the siblings and send them to the Jus' residence, dead or alive."
Evidently, Tie Hanfeng just wanted to give the Stone Kingdom a reasonable explanation and did not care about who the real murderer was. Hearing what he said, Gu Shenwei began to realize what Zhong Heng meant by "solving the problem".
Slave Huan, an ordinary killer apprentice, had been Zhong Heng's first choice for the prince's murder.
Nevertheless, Tie Hanfeng seemed to have figured out a way to ensure his apprentice's safety. Given that, Zhong Heng had to find another murderer to appease the Stone Kingdom within three days.
Fortunately, now he had enough evidence to accuse Xu Yanwei and her brother of killing Pot-bellied Buddha and Ju Gaotai. No one would doubt Xu Yanwei's motive to kill her terrible father and her whoremaster who had often sexually abused her. Besides, no one would care much about a prostitute and a thief or stand out to speak for them; which made them an even better choice as the perpetrators.
Zhong Heng just wished to close this case as soon as possible without offending any powerful people in Jade City. Compared to the truth, he cared more about both his career and his future.
He needed to solve this case properly, since it was not a simple case at all and, many local powers had gotten involved in it. Zhong Heng and Tie Hanfeng believed that they had already found a solution to make every party satisfied, but Gu Shenwei still refused to accept it.
"No, I can't agree," he blurted. Even he himself could not tell whether he was demanding justice or simply enjoyed refuting his mentor. He intuitively felt that he did not want to frame the siblings.
"Do you really believe that they're innocent?" Tie Hanfeng asked curiously.
Gu Shenwei was speechless. He realized that he had focused too much on condemning Tie Hanfeng and Zhong Heng's sneaky scheme and unethical behaviors all this time and neglected a simple fact, which was Xu Yanwei did have the motive to kill Ju Gaotai.
"Do you know that Ju Gaotai borrowed a large sum of money from the Meng family? Now, no one knows where the money had gone. It must be the siblings who stole the money."
"We still have time. We can find the real murderer."
Tie Hanfeng finally lost his patience. He jumped off the bed and landed beside his apprentice, shouting, "F*ck! Who do you think you are? I fulfill my duty to figure out a way to save your f*cking life, and you want to play the hero? If you fail to find the siblings before tomorrow night, you'll be dead. I'll cut your head off and give it to the Stone Kingdom, contending that you killed the prince, the prostitute named Shen Yanshi, and all the b*tches that died recently in Pleasure Alley. Don't blame me for that!"
Surprisingly, Tie Hanfeng's words did not irritate Gu Shenwei. Instead, it somehow calmed him down. He was unable to refute his mentor and was well aware that he was just a nobody in Jade City, who could not ensure his own safety, let alone protect someone else.
"No matter what, we have to find the siblings first."
Tie Hanfeng thought his apprentice finally gave in. He snorted loudly and returned to his bed.
At noon on the next day, Zhong Heng invited them to lunch. During the meal, he kept apologizing that he should have invited them to a better restaurant in North City.
After spending a quiet afternoon, Tie Hanfeng invited Zhong Heng to dinner in a similar restaurant in South City.
Zhong Heng brought three officers with him, and Tie Hanfeng also invited another friend to the dinner. During the dinner, they chatted casually about many things except for the murder case and the missing siblings.
For them, everything had already been settled beforehand. They just needed to wait for the siblings to fall into the trap to solve the case.
After the dinner, Tie Hanfeng did not return to Southwall Tavern to spend the night. He brought his apprentice to a mid-priced brothel. Since South City had no hotels, they had no other choice.
Gu Shenwei had to put up with really loud sex noises most of the night and could not fall asleep until after midnight. In his sleep, he dreamed about many weird scenes that he was too ashamed to mention to anyone.
The next morning, they still did not receive any news of the siblings.
Tie Hanfeng was unusually quiet and often looked at his apprentice profoundly. Gu Shenwei had no doubts of what his mentor had said. He believed that Tie Hanfeng would kill him without any hesitation, if he could not find the scapegoat today.
"I want to go to the Jus' residence again," Gu Shenwei said to his mentor.
"What for?"
"Since you have to hand me over to them today, dead or alive, I decided to go there myself."
Tie Hanfeng felt suspicious, but he still agreed, for he reckoned that his apprentice would not play any new tricks on him.
They invited Zhong Heng to be their witness and came to the Jus' residence together in the afternoon.
This time, only the minister came out to receive them. He looked worried, since he was faced with many troublesome problems; such as how to send Prince Ju Gaotai's body back to the Stone Kingdom, how to help the younger prince get everyone's support, and how to pay off the princes' debts in Jade City. The debts were the most problematic. In recent days, many people had come to him asking for money. The Stone Kingdom was a small country, it was no easy job for the minister to raise money in order to pay the princes' debts.
He kept complaining to them about these problems, without mentioning anything related to the murder case. He even treated Slave Huan, the main suspect very politely.
Everybody was waiting for night to fall.
Soon, evening came. Seeing the guests meet only one messenger in the whole afternoon, the minister knew, without asking, that the siblings were still nowhere to be found.
"Ahem, well..." he said reluctantly.
In that moment, he saw Tie Hanfeng and immediately swallowed back his words. The killer put on a smiling expression but still failed to mask his grumpiness, which scared the minister a lot.
"It's almost time, we have to surrender the murderer," the killer apprentice, who had remained quiet almost the entire time, suddenly stood up and said calmly.
Tie Hanfeng was shocked. Zhong Heng looked at the teenager sympathetically. The minister was greatly surprised and said, "Yes, it's almost time, but we still have some time left before the deadline..."
"Minister, I hope that you can invite the prince to come out. He should meet the one who killed his elder brother."
The minister stood agape. He had never expected this to happen. Just at this moment, Tie Hanfeng abruptly stood up and shouted, "Yes, he must come out to see the murderer of his elder brother."
The minister trembled and looked to Zhong Heng. Unfortunately, Commandant Zhong declined to give him any response. He forced a smile and said, "Yes, you're right, but I have to ask His Highness first. He's not yet fully recovered from the grievance of his elder brother's death."
After a while, the prince came out, followed by a group of servants and guards. Among them, Gu Shenwei spotted the dead prince's guard, who was also surnamed Ju. He glared at Slave Huan the moment he saw this teenager.
The prince was a young man in his early 20s and looked thin and sad. After he took a seat, he slightly nodded to the guests to greet them and then snuggled down in his seat like a patient.
"So, you've already caught the murderer, have you?" The minister stood beside the prince and asked.
Gu Shenwei turned to bow to Zhong Heng while deliberately avoiding his mentors' eyes. "Commandant Zhong, please allow me to surrender the murderer right here."
Zhong Heng exchanged a glance with Tie Hanfeng as he nodded and said, "That's a good idea."
Gu Shenwei glanced around and saw some people walking about near the door. "The murderer is among us. I hope we can close the door and all the windows to prevent him from escaping," he required.
"Huh? I think there's no need to..."
Looking at Tie Hanfeng and Zhong Heng, the minister felt awkward and decided to remain silent on this matter. He did not understand why they had suddenly changed their plan.
"Close the door and the windows. Ask everyone outside to stay clear of this place."
The prince became intrigued and gave the order. He straightened his back and looked at the killer apprentice with interest.
When the servants left their position to shut the door and windows, Tie Hanfeng pulled his apprentice's sleeve. "Relax, Shifu. I'll take care of this matter," Gu Shenwei whispered.
This was the first time Tie Hanfeng heard Slave Huan call him Shifu, after he had adopted him as his apprentice. He seemed to feel somewhat touched and sat in his seat again silently. He stopped faking his smile and decided to leave the matter to his apprentice.
After that, Gu Shenwei nodded to Zhong Heng. He reckoned that the commandant had probably already guessed what he was planning to do. After all, it was this man who inspired him to think of this solution.
Now he intended to solve the problem instead of revealing the truth.
The servants hurriedly returned to their positions. Everybody was curious and could not wait to see what the main suspect in the murder case was going to do.
"He's the murderer. Disarm him right now to ensure His Highness' safety."
Gu Shenwei pointed at the guard surnamed Ju.