S.C.I Mystery Series Volume 6 Chapter 34

The Card Murderer 34 – Another Person

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Finally, a day after the crime, after being bombarded by all sorts of information, just as the case had started shifting from a suspense thriller to a full-on horror film... they were finally able to return for a case analysis meeting.

Even someone with a super-brain like Zhan Zhao was starting to struggle to recall how the case had developed to this point.

Whether it was a ghost story or a matter of memory confusion.

At present, the identity of this bandaged woman was possibly that of a female driver involved in a traffic accident that had occurred before the incident at the rehabilitation centre.

Whether she was dead or alive, Bai Yutang had told Jiang Ping to look into it. If they could identify the woman, there was still Zhou Li, who was currently being held hostage.

Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang left Bai Ye and Zhao Jue to continue "researching" Old Tu and left the hospital room to return to the SCI office.

Just as they reached the hospital entrance and were about to get into the car, Bai Yutang's phone suddenly rang.

Bai Yutang glanced at the screen, it was a call from Yang Fan. He found it a little strange – Had something happened to Liu Jing?

Bai Yutang picked up the call, and upon hearing the news, he immediately grabbed Zhan Zhao. "Cat, Liu Jing's awake!"

Zhan Zhao was surprised – Really?!

Bai Yutang nodded and gestured at his phone – Yang Fan said she was already conscious and able to speak.

"Finally!" Zhan Zhao thought Heaven must have had eyes at last, they could finally get some answers.

The two of them hurriedly turned back and returned to the hospital wing to see Liu Jing.

As they stepped out of the elevator, they saw Father Liu at the door of her ward, looking around. When he saw the two of them coming, he quickly waved.

Zhan Zhao observed Father Liu's expression and frowned slightly – There is something strange about the look on his face.

When the two of them reached the door to the ward, they saw Yang Fan and two doctors standing by Liu Jing's bedside, looking at the examination report.

Liu Jing was lying in bed with her eyes open.

Auntie Liu was holding her daughter's hand and talking to her.

Liu Jing looked awake, and judging by her reaction to Auntie Liu, she seemed to be in a clear state of mind, though she also appeared to be a bit agitated.

When they saw Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang enter, Yang Fan and the two doctors came over to the door.

One of the senior doctors was someone Zhan Zhao recognised, Dr. Shen, a leading expert in neurosurgery.

Both doctors looked grim.

Zhan Zhao looked at their expressions and asked, "Is something wrong? Retrograde amnesia?"

In fact, Zhan Zhao had already been mentally prepared for that possibility. After all, Liu Jing had suffered a severe head injury and had also been frightened and traumatised, so incomplete memory was possible. However, retrograde amnesia could recover over time as her body healed.

But Dr Shen shook his head. "It's not amnesia, on the contrary, she's very eager to talk. As soon as she woke up, she said someone had murdered her husband and attacked her, and she wants the police involved..."

Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang exchanged a glance – We'd better hurry...

But Dr Shen raised a hand to stop them, signalling that they shouldn't be in such a rush.

"You're an expert yourself, take a look at this first." Dr. Shen handed Liu Jing's brain CT scans to Zhan Zhao.

Zhan Zhao took the two scans and glanced over them, frowning. "A brain tumour?"

Bai Yutang was momentarily confused and looked at Zhan Zhao – What? Liu Jing has a brain tumour?

"Not sure whether to call it a blessing in disguise or say she's just incredibly lucky," said Dr. Shen. "If it weren't for this incident, it might never have been discovered... She needs to undergo surgery immediately to have the tumour removed."

Bai Yutang turned to Zhan Zhao. "Cat... what does this have to do with the case?"

Zhan Zhao frowned. "She had a tumour but hadn't noticed it, this kind of condition can affect her judgement and memory... She might have experienced hallucinations and confused them with reality. Abnormal symptoms caused by brain tumours can vary, amnesia, auditory or visual hallucinations, delusions, sleepwalking, cognitive disorders, emotional instability..."

Bai Yutang frowned at Zhan Zhao – So coincidental?

Zhan Zhao didn't have a better answer – This isn't necessarily good news for us, but for Liu Jing, it is a fortunate thing. If she hadn't been injured this time, it might never have been discovered.

"But what she remembers about what happened during the incident might not all be inaccurate, right?" Bai Yutang asked.

All the doctors nodded.

"Then we should still ask," Zhan Zhao also felt that, coupled with the evidence from the scene, they could judge whether what she said was reliable.

The doctors explained they were just there to give them an update and then left with Father Liu to discuss the surgery.

Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang entered the ward.

As soon as Liu Jing saw the two of them, she became agitated and cried out, "Yuancheng was murdered! Yuancheng was murdered!"

Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang asked together, "Who did it?"

"The devil! The card devil!"

The moment Liu Jing said those words, both Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang were stunned... The devil?

Bai Yutang looked at Zhan Zhao – Is this the tumour talking?

Zhan Zhao frowned... The card devil was the antagonist in Mingdi's novel The Devil's Game, a surreal character made entirely of playing cards... a devil who could control people's fates.

That's right, in Mingdi's novels, sometimes the killer wasn't even human. While others might turn to quantum mechanics when things got complicated, he would just start making things up... As long as the romance bits were written well, that was all that mattered.

"There was a woman!" Liu Jing said excitedly. "There were two killers! No, they weren't people! Not human!"

"There was a woman too?" Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang exchanged a glance. The evidence collected at the scene pointed only to one man, was there a woman as well?

"Did you recognise her?"

Liu Jing shook her head. "She was wrapped in bandages! She was in pyjamas, wrapped in bandages!"

Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang silently nodded – There it is! The bandaged woman has finally arrived, though late.

Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang asked Liu Jing to recount in detail what had happened.

Liu Jing began describing what had taken place on the night of the murder.

That night, Liu Jing had waited in the café but Zhang Yuancheng never showed up, so she wrapped herself in a shawl and returned to the villa.

Just as she entered the villa, she saw a humanoid creature made entirely of playing cards, trying to attach Zhang Yuancheng's head to its body.

In extreme terror and confusion, Liu Jing let out a scream and suddenly felt a sharp pain at the back of her head, as if someone had struck her.

She had turned around abruptly and saw a woman with her head wrapped in bandages, holding a hammer and attacking her.

At that moment, perhaps driven by sheer survival instinct, she had dashed out the back door and into the woods, running and running... until she burst out onto the roadside and flagged down a taxi, thinking only of getting home...

Liu Jing said she had been in such a daze then, she couldn't even tell what was real and what wasn't. Had Yuancheng truly died? That playing card man was clearly a character from a novel, and no matter how she looked at that bandaged woman, she just didn't seem human...

Just then, she received a call from Lao Chen, who said Zhang Yuancheng had messaged him and that he would pick her up at the entrance to the neighbourhood. He also asked if she was alright.

In Liu Jing's head, one sentence kept repeating – Zhang Yuancheng told Lao Chen to wait for her at the entrance to the neighbourhood.

After that, Liu Jing had calmed down. She felt very tired and drowsy, thinking it must all be a dream, and once she fell asleep, it would be over... So she went home and lay down.

It wasn't until she woke up and found herself at home, opened the door, and saw Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang talking to her mother and Lao Chen in the living room... that she realised none of it had been a dream!

So she had taken out her copy of The Devil's Game, intending to tell Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang who the killer was... and fainted.

......

After hearing Liu Jing's account, Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang were sceptical about the reliability of the two murderers Liu Jing claimed to have seen, one a card person and the other a woman wrapped in bandages... and it was the bandaged woman who had attacked her.

Everything seemed somewhat far-fetched, making one wonder if she had been hallucinating due to illness.

But aside from the portion concerning the crime itself, everything else, including how she had escaped, the phone call with Lao Chen, and her condition after returning home, was all extremely accurate.

Bai Yutang glanced uncertainly at Zhan Zhao – Was it only the part during the crime where she had hallucinations? The rest of the time she was normal?

Zhan Zhao frowned as well, uncertain. But there were still quite a few things they could ask Liu Jing about besides the events of that night. For instance...

"Where's your notebook?" Zhan Zhao asked.

Liu Jing looked a little confused. "What notebook?"

"Don't you usually carry a notebook with you?"

"Notebook?" Liu Jing shook her head. "I used to use one, but I switched to a tablet ages ago..."

Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang looked at Liu Jing, still uncertain. But all her colleagues had said she had a habit of using a notebook?

It wasn't just the two of them, Auntie Liu also looked at her daughter with a puzzled expression.

Zhan Zhao noticed the hesitant look on Auntie Liu's face. It seemed that... Liu Jing did in fact have the habit of using a notebook.

Zhan Zhao stroked his chin. This was clearly a sign of cognitive dissonance... Liu Jing no longer used a notebook, having switched to a tablet. But her brain, at certain times, would forget about the change and continue using a notebook. In other words, the Liu Jing who used a tablet and the Liu Jing who used a notebook were like two different people... almost like parallel versions of herself.

Zhan Zhao's mind went to the bandaged woman from the Sparrow Tunnel version of the legend... Was this all just coincidence? Why did there seem to be some kind of connection?

"Have you been investigating the student disappearance case from half a year ago, at the abandoned hospital near Sparrow Mountain?" Zhan Zhao continued asking.

Liu Jing seemed entirely bewildered and shook her head. "What ruins?"

"Then why did you want to divorce Zhang Yuancheng?" Zhan Zhao didn't press the previous topic but moved on.

"He was seeing someone else!" Liu Jing looked genuinely aggrieved as she said this.

"Do you have anyone specific you suspect?" Zhan Zhao asked.

"He's been all mysterious lately, and some of his clothes and pants aren't ones I bought for him. He'd never buy that sort of thing himself... It's obvious some woman gave them to him!" As Liu Jing spoke, she pounded the blanket in frustration. Clearly, she still had feelings for Zhang Yuancheng, she was both angry and heartbroken.

Auntie Liu, feeling distressed, comforted her daughter.

Zhan Zhao didn't ask further. He signalled to Bai Yutang... Let's step outside and talk.

Bai Yutang followed Zhan Zhao out.

Zhan Zhao reached back to close the door, letting Liu Jing rest in the room for a while.

"Cat?" Bai Yutang asked Zhan Zhao, "So Zhang Yuancheng did cheat?"

Zhan Zhao frowned and spoke in a low voice, "It might really just be a misunderstanding!"

"A misunderstanding?" Bai Yutang didn't understand.

Zhan Zhao took out the photo showing the silhouette in the ruins, suspected to be Zhang Yuancheng's affair partner, and asked Bai Yutang, "This doesn't look like Zhou Li, does it?"

Bai Yutang nodded.

"Does it look like Liu Jing?"

Bai Yutang was slightly taken aback. "Now that you mention it, the figure does resemble her a bit, but the hairstyle and temperament feel different... Wasn't this sent to Liu Jing?"

"Liu Jing doesn't remember her habit of using a notebook either," Zhan Zhao said. "Because of the brain tumour, she's experiencing cognitive dissonance, almost like a split state, there are things she's done during certain times that she herself doesn't remember."

Bai Yutang began to grasp it. "So... the person he was having an affair with was actually her?"

Zhan Zhao held up the photo. "Also, she herself doesn't know she's ill, but her other state, the one when she's using a notebook, might know."

"She's trying to find a way to tell herself..." Bai Yutang also understood. "So she mailed the letter to herself? Including that notebook, it was the same idea?"

"Does it make sense?" Zhan Zhao asked.

Bai Yutang thought for a moment and nodded. "It makes sense."

"The one investigating the missing student case at the ruins was also the version of Liu Jing who uses a notebook," said Zhan Zhao. "She might have uncovered something, which is why someone attacked her and Zhang Yuancheng."

"Cat..." After sorting out the logic, Bai Yutang raised a new question. "Then if Liu Jing undergoes surgery to remove the tumour... which Liu Jing will remain, the one who uses the notebook, or this one?"

Zhan Zhao also found the question a bit tricky. "This isn't a case of split personality, it was caused by the illness. If the lesion is removed, the split might disappear as well. No one knows if she'll remember everything, forget part of it, or forget it all."

"Can we meet the Liu Jing who used the notebook before the surgery?" Bai Yutang asked.

"It would be ideal if we could..." Zhan Zhao, however, had a bad feeling. "What I'm worried about is that the attack may have damaged Liu Jing's brain, and the Liu Jing who used the notebook might already be dead."

Bai Yutang found it hard to accept. "Dead?"

Zhan Zhao spread his hands. "It's like having a watch that runs slow by two minutes every hour, and then one day someone suddenly hits it with a hammer... No one knows if the watch will stay the same, run faster, or run slower... it might even end up being on time or just stop working altogether."

Bai Yutang held his forehead – He never imagined he'd come across something like this.

‿︵‿︵ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ・❉・ ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ‿︵‿︵

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Translator Notes

Please feel free to comment any mistakes I made so I can improve and do better as I go through the book.

Translated: April 24, 2025 by Angel

Edited: June 23, 2025 by Soojin