S.C.I Mystery Series Volume 6 Chapter 45

The Card Murderer 45 – Catch Everything in the Net

---

Ma Han and Zhao Hu drove Zhao Jue to the Pei family's villa.

They had just stopped the car when they received a call from the SWAT team, saying they had arrived near the villa.

Ma Han glanced at the villa, which had particularly tight security measures, and at the large crowd of reporters gathered at the front gate, and felt it was extremely "secure".

Zhao Hu also turned to ask Zhao Jue, "Is the Pei family also a target? Who is the murderer trying to kill?"

Zhao Jue looked at the Pei family's villa through the car window and said, "Everyone in the Pei family is a target... they were chosen as scapegoats."

Zhao Hu and Ma Han both frowned. "Scapegoats?"

"Mhmm." Zhao Jue nodded. "The reason the murderer's face is wrapped in bandages is that anyone can be the murderer."

After saying that, Zhao Jue urged Zhao Hu and Ma Han to go quickly to the back entrance to meet up with the SWAT team.

Zhao Hu drove the car to the rear entrance and found the door locked.

As they got out of the car, the SWAT vehicle also arrived.

Zhao Jue stared at the two large garbage bins by the back door, then signalled to Zhao Hu and Ma Han, who were just about to press the doorbell, to climb over the wall.

The small squad of heavily armed SWAT officers looked at Ma Han and Zhao Hu – Is this considered unlawful entry?

Ma Han noticed that Zhao Jue was still staring at the garbage bins, so he reached out and lifted the lid to take a look inside, then winked at Zhao Hu.

Zhao Hu and a few SWAT officers peered into the bin and all frowned.

Inside was a corpse, and judging from the clothing, it appeared to be a security guard.

Given that there were no reporters around the back entrance, it seemed there had originally been guards driving people away.

It was unlikely that only one guard had been stationed there. With a single body found in the garbage bin and the villa's interior being eerily quiet, with no signs of disturbance, it indicated a problem within the security team itself.

Ma Han, Zhao Hu, and the entire SWAT team were all experienced, and they turned to look at Zhao Jue – Zhan Zhao previously instructed them to follow Zhao Jue's lead, but at this moment, was it better to break in or knock on the door?

Seeing that everyone was looking at him, Zhao Jue waved his hand, signalling – Hurry up!

Just as Zhao Jue was urging them on, a "du... du..." alarm suddenly sounded from inside the villa.

This alarm tone was different from the usual urgent alarm.

Iron grilles began to descend slowly above the doors and windows around the villa, seemingly indicating that the internal security system had been activated.

The reporters gathered at the front entrance were also stirred, speculating why the Pei family would activate the security system... in broad daylight...

Zhao Hu and Ma Han had already climbed onto the garbage bins and over the wall into the yard, charging towards the door.

Zhao Jue watched as the SWAT team followed suit and scrambled in, then raised his wrist to check his watch... shaking his head – I told you to hurry up, yet you're still dawdling.

Fortunately, the SWAT team was well-equipped, and before the security door fully closed, they jammed it with a load-bearing post.

Zhao Hu and Ma Han entered the interior of the villa through the back door.

Almost at the same time, the internal alarm sounded inside the villa, the security system had detected a failed door closure.

Zhao Hu and Ma Han charged through the villa, afraid they'd arrived too late and the Pei family would be wiped out.

But when they burst into the living room, they saw the entire Pei family sitting calmly on the sofa, surrounded by several bodyguards who stared wide-eyed at the people who broke in.

Pei Tian had been drinking tea and was startled, while Pei Xiu and Pei Yun also looked shocked.

The two sides stared at one another. Ma Han and Zhao Hu looked past the sofa at the security personnel...

At that moment, there were three adult males in security uniforms in the living room. One was standing beside Pei Tian, seemingly talking to him; another stood behind Pei Xiu with one hand in his pocket; the third was positioned at the staircase.

Zhao Hu and Ma Han fixed their gaze on one of them. "Don't move."

......

Near the campground, Bai Yutang and Zhan Zhao followed the red dot on the phone screen showing Bai Ye's movements.

Bai Ye had previously moved to the old Pei family residence and was now on the move again, heading back.

Bai Yutang and Zhan Zhao ran towards the Pei family's old residence but couldn't see Bai Ye anywhere.

Yet at that moment, the phone screen showed that their location had overlapped with Bai Ye's red dot.

The two instinctively looked down – and sure enough, there was a tunnel!

Bai Yutang signalled to split up. He instructed Qin Ou and Xiao Fei to take part of the team to the old Pei residence and search for the tunnel entrance, while he and Zhan Zhao, along with Luo Tian, Mingdi, and the rest of the SWAT team, followed the red dot representing Bai Ye.

When they reached the campground, they saw that the red dot was heading in the direction of the ruins. Bai Yutang again split the team, Luo Tian took part of the SWAT team to the villa where Zhang Yuancheng had been killed, with orders to focus the search on the bathroom and look for the tunnel entrance.

Finally, Bai Yutang, Zhan Zhao, Mingdi, and a few SWAT officers ran in the direction of Bai Ye's movement. The destination appeared to be the hospital ruins.

......

Qin Ou and Xiao Fei searched the ruins of the Pei family's old residence.

The ruins were covered in scorched earth. After the old house had burned down, it had evidently undergone some level of clearing, and now it looked more or less like a patch of wasteland.

The SWAT team scanned the ground using thermal imaging equipment and was shocked to see "corpses" lying all over the underground.

But Xiao Fei calmed down and analysed the situation. If there were heat signatures, they weren't corpses, they were alive...

Qin Ou, with more experience, remarked that judging by the way they were lying, it was more likely they'd all been knocked down by Bai Ye.

After some searching, they indeed found a metal door that looked like a vertical shaft entrance.

However, this kind of iron door required a specific hexagonal key to open.

Xiao Fei spread his hands at Qin Ou. Without the key, there was no way to open this type of door.

Qin Ou looked down at the ground and gestured, "Since it's flat ground anyway, we might as well just dig a hole and blast it open!"

Qin Ou was the most experienced in this area. Xiao Fei pointed to the ground, meaning – Go on then!

......

By the time Bai Yutang and the others reached the vicinity of the ruins, they heard a muffled boom in the distance like thunder, and the ground trembled slightly.

Bai Yutang looked back. Smoke was rising in the air some distance away. He nodded and said to Zhan Zhao, "Quite flashy."

When there was no response, he turned around to look.

There was Zhan Zhao, propping himself up on his knees, panting. "Isn't there a car? Why did we have to run so far on foot?"

Several nearby SWAT officers were all looking at Zhan Zhao with concern. Mingdi pointed to the step counter on his sports watch, indicating – It's not even five kilometres, that tiring?

Bai Yutang patted Zhan Zhao and opened a bottle of water for him.

Zhan Zhao glared at him while drinking – Did you do this on purpose?! We could've split up back at the campground, but you chose to run back and forth!

Bai Yutang pointed at Mingdi beside him – Cat, look, he's a writer too, but he goes to the gym regularly. Not only does he type fast, he runs without getting tired.

Zhan Zhao stood there drinking, intending to rest a bit before snapping back.

Just then, three people ran out from the ruins of the hospital building.

Mingdi spotted them at once. "Min Min!"

Leading the way was Gao Min, followed by two women who looked exactly alike. It was Pei Wen and her twin.

Bai Yutang immediately noticed that only the three girls had run out, Bai Ye wasn't there.

Gao Min looked excited and pointed behind her, "Ban... bandage! The bandaged woman! A conspiracy! It's all a conspiracy!"

Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang went over as well. Bai Yutang led the SWAT team into the ruins while Zhan Zhao handed the water bottle to Gao Min, who was nearly out of breath.

Gao Min took a few gulps, then passed the bottle to Pei Wen, stamping her foot as she complained to Zhan Zhao, "It's an organised gang, Dr. Zhan! You must catch them!"

"How many people are inside?" Zhan Zhao asked.

"Loads!" Gao Min gestured at Zhan Zhao. "But they've all been knocked down..."

Pei Wen took a sip of water and had finally caught her breath too. It looked like the girls had followed Bai Ye all the way here.

"My family!" Pei Wen grabbed Zhan Zhao and said that her family was in danger.

Zhan Zhao gestured for her not to panic, they'd already sent people over.

"No!" Pei Wen said urgently, "Kevin! Kevin's one of the bad guys!"

"Kevin?" Zhan Zhao thought for a moment. "Your bodyguard?"

As he spoke, he made a very tall gesture – The giant?

Pei Wen and her twin sister both nodded.

Zhan Zhao frowned and pulled out his phone to send a warning to Zhao Hu and the others.

......

Meanwhile, inside the villa.

Ma Han and Zhao Hu stared at the bodyguard standing behind Pei Xiu, instructing him to take his hand out of his pocket.

Seeing he'd been exposed, the bodyguard had no choice but to slowly raise his hand, revealing a thin copper wire wrapped around the hand that was hidden in his pocket.

Pei Xiu instinctively touched his neck and quickly backed away – That was close!

Ma Han ordered the SWAT officers to take every member of the villa's security team back to the police station, not a single one was to be left behind.

The other guards obediently cooperated. Meanwhile, the villa's anti-theft system was deactivated, the blaring alarms stopped, and the heavy iron gate slowly began to rise.

Now that the security alert had been lifted, Pei Tian clutched his chest The old man looked like he'd suffered a scare, and his chest was hurting.

Pei Yun quickly went to get his medication.

Pei Xiu helped his father lie down while asking Zhao Hu, "My sister..."

Zhao Hu told him someone had already gone to rescue her. At the same time, he pulled out his phone, intending to check on the situation with the captain's team.

Almost as soon as Zhao Hu took out his phone, a message arrived from Zhan Zhao.

Zhao Hu glanced at it and immediately looked up, asking Pei Xiu, "Do you have another private bodyguard?"

Pei Xiu hesitated. "Uh... you mean Kevin?"

Just as Pei Xiu looked around for Kevin, a shrill scream came from upstairs.

Ma Han dashed towards the stairs. Halfway up, he started backing down again, motioning for whoever was upstairs to stay calm.

Zhao Hu noticed Ma Han signalling behind his back and immediately had two SWAT officers lie in wait at the stairwell.

Everyone downstairs stood on high alert. Ma Han retreated to the ground floor. Opposite him, Kevin was coming down the stairs with Pei Yun in his grip.

Kevin was unusually tall, while Pei Yun was slender as a noodle by comparison. Kevin had one hand gripping a knife and the other clamped around Pei Yun's throat. It felt like he could snap her neck with one squeeze. The sight was terrifying.

Pei Tian, who had already been suffering from chest pains, now looked on the verge of a heart attack.

Pei Xiu was furious too. Kevin was a bodyguard he'd hired at great expense, who'd have thought the mole had been right under their noses? No need to ask, Pei Wen's abduction was almost certainly connected to him as well!

Pei Yun, on the other hand, looked remarkably composed. She raised her hand and tossed the medication she was holding to Ma Han.

Ma Han caught it, and Pei Yun gave a slight nod towards Pei Xiu. "Give Dad the medicine."

Ma Han passed the medicine to Pei Xiu, who was by the sofa.

Pei Xiu took the medicine, took out a pill and placed it under Pei Tian's tongue... Pei Tian began to recover a little. Slumped on the sofa, he pointed a trembling finger at Kevin. "Let my daughter go!"

Kevin held the knife in one hand and Pei Yun in the other. He eyed the SWAT officers hidden on both sides, demanding that everyone back off.

Zhao Hu and Ma Han looked at the current situation and felt it was a bit difficult to handle.

The main problem was Kevin's sheer size. If they forcefully attempted a rescue, it could easily result in Pei Yun being injured or killed.

At this time, the best course of action would be someone sneaking up from behind and grabbing the arm holding the knife... but given Kevin's strength, it feels like only someone with Luo Tian's strength would be able to tear his arm away in one swift move. But Luo Tian wasn't there...

Zhao Hu and Ma Han exchanged glances again, Zhao Jue didn't seem to have come in with them...

Just then, the two suddenly stared behind Kevin. And they weren't the only ones, the same wide-eyed expression appeared on Pei Tian's face, as well as the father and son on the couch.

Kevin sensed something was wrong and had just started to turn his head when, all of a sudden, someone appeared beside him and twisted his knife-wielding wrist sharply backwards...

Everyone clearly heard a crisp crack.

Immediately followed by Kevin's scream.

At the same time, Ma Han and Zhao Hu lunged forward, one pried Kevin's hand off Pei Yun, the other pulled her free.

Kevin's face twisted, like he was a wounded beast, and he began to struggle violently.

Zhao Hu saw the person who had twisted Kevin's arm wave a hand at him, so he quickly stepped aside.

The person who suddenly appeared behind Kevin was not Zhao Jue, but Bao Zheng in a suit.

Ma Han and Zhao Hu, now off to the side, watched Bao Sir – He grabbed the bear-like Kevin, kicked him sharply behind the knee, and lifted him clean off the ground.

There was a whoosh, followed by a thud... Kevin, as massive as a mountain, was slammed to the floor and knocked out cold, his eyes rolling back.

Bao Sir straightened his tie and glanced at Zhao Hu and Ma Han, who were still stunned. "All this trouble just to catch a few bodyguards..."

Almost at the same time, a rapid burst of flashes lit up outside the window.

Coincidentally, when the security system was shut down earlier, the burglar-proof windows had risen, and the curtains had automatically drawn open as well.

The reporters gathered outside, cameras of all shapes and sizes trained on the villa, had been dying to get a glimpse of what was going on inside, and happened to capture this exact moment.

By the sofa, Pei Xiu leaned over and patted Pei Tian on the chest, whispering, "Dad, maybe we should give up on Jiang Nan. Uncle Bao's way more handsome than you, I don't think you stand a chance!"

Pei Tian, who had just managed to catch his breath, immediately started gasping again, clutching his chest.

Pei Yun went over and shoved Pei Xiu, telling him to stop saying such brutally honest things that might kill their father and to get out of the way!

At the back door, Zhao Jue stood leaning against the porch with his arms crossed, watching Bao Sir, who was receiving the adoring gazes of the crowd. "Ever since Bao Xiao Hei started dating, everything's been going smoothly!"

With the situation under control, Ma Han received a call from Zhan Zhao, told him about the situation on their end, then turned to the Pei family and nodded. "Pei Wen's been rescued."

The entire Pei family breathed a collective sigh of relief.

Bao Sir asked Ma Han about the situation.

Ma Han said everyone had been taken in, and the captain told them to head back.

Bao Sir nodded, and the group began heading outside.

Zhao Jue frowned. "Are you sure you got everyone? Didn't one fish slip through the net?"

Just as he said this, his phone buzzed. He grabbed it and glanced at the screen.

Zhao Jue sneered, "Now that's more like it."

With that, Zhao Jue beckoned to Ma Han and Zhao Hu, signalling, "Let's go catch the last big fish, I want to catch this one myself."

–––

Authors Note:

Previously:

Zhan Zhao's editor, Gao Min, works for a magazine where her colleague, Zhang Yuancheng and his wife Liu Jing, went to a holiday villa in the Sparrow Mountain camping area to discuss their divorce. The trip ended in tragedy: one was killed and the other was seriously injured.

SCI intervened to investigate and discovered that the suspected "murderer" used the victim's cell phone to communicate with Zhan Zhao through coded messages.

As the investigation progressed, SCI found striking similarities between the modus operandi and the plot of a newly published novel, The Devil's Game, written by the author Mingdi.

As the investigation deepened, more individuals involved in the case turned up dead.

Wang Qiu, the taxi driver who took Liu Jing home; Fang Jie, an old classmate of Wang Qiu; and the wife and daughter of Lao Chen, Mingdi's editor, who were killed years ago; and "Cotton Candy", the magazine's illustrator. All of them were either perpetrators or victims. The string of cases bore certain similarities: the murderers all died in high-risk "suicides", purchased vehicles far beyond their financial means before death, and left behind diary-style suicide notes.

These incidents pointed back to a mass killing that had taken place years ago at the ruins of a hospital near the campground. Other mysterious cases had also occurred around the ruins, such as missing students on an expedition. None of these cases had ever been solved.

Zhao Jue had previously investigated similar cases, and Bai Ye happened to know Tu Zi, one of the survivors.

Through Zhao Jue's investigation and Tu Zi's memories, SCI zeroed in on a mysterious figure known only as the "bandaged woman", a being who seemed to hover somewhere between human and ghost. She appeared to be the true culprit behind the current case.

As SCI investigated her identity further, they uncovered a series of suicide cases within the influential Pei family, who happened to own the publishing house.

The complex murder case revolved around Mingdi's novel and the so-called "curse" of the Pei family. As the key figure in the case, the "bandaged woman" points to several medical rehabilitation institutions suspected of conducting illegal drug trials years ago.

Zhou Li, the magazine's receptionist, was kidnapped and later released. Her abnormal "performance" led SCI to uncover that Zhang Yuancheng, Wang Qiu, and Fang Jie had once participated in some kind of ritual connected to the summoning of the bandaged woman.

The key breakthrough came from Liu Jing, whose head injuries had left her with a brain tumour and split personalities. One of her alternate personalities had been secretly investigating the bandaged woman and the related cases involving the ruins. This ultimately led to her being targeted for murder.

Liu Jing mailed out a critical notebook containing her investigation findings, which had been hard to find, and these notes became the key to solving the case. Gao Min and the youngest daughter of the Pei family, Pei Wen, were also kidnapped as a result.

The notes were accidentally sent to Lin Ruo, Mingdi's childhood friend and neighbour, who also happened to be an old acquaintance of SCI.

After learning the full contents of the notebook, Zhan Zhao and Zhao Jue were finally able to identify the real culprit of the case.

‿︵‿︵ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ・❉・ ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ‿︵‿︵

Previous Chapter | TOC | Next Chapter

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: May 3, 2025 by Angel

Edited: July 1, 2025 by Soojin