S.C.I Mystery Series Volume 6 Chapter 101

The Culinary Murderer 53 – Siren's Wing

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By dusk, Bai Ye had returned with Guan Xiaoyue, Qian Lin and Wen Xiaorou.

Bai Yutang came back almost at the same time, arriving with Xiaofei.

The SWAT team and the fire department had combed through nearly the entire factory, yet still had not found a trace of the other missing girls.

Jiang Ping carried out a preliminary confirmation of identity. Among the three girls they had found, none of them was the one Xiao Ai and Nana had mentioned before, Lele, Dong Xinle.

Moreover, although the identities of the three rescued girls could all be confirmed, not one of them had been reported missing, because none of them had any family. So, unless they spoke for themselves, it was difficult to determine when exactly they had gone missing.

Bai Yutang was terribly anxious and demanded that Bao Sir approve a search of Shi Yanshuo's villa.

Even Fei Mu did not stop him this time, after all, this was a matter of life and death.

But Bao Sir asked Bai Yutang, "When you found those people, Shi Yanshuo was tied up in the factory. If you go to search his home now, not only will you alert him, but what if you fail to find anyone?"

Bai Yutang scratched his head and muttered, "Then what should we do..."

"Tsk." Bao Sir looked at him helplessly. "Be flexible, I'm only stopping you from going in openly."

Bai Yutang tilted his head at Bao Sir. "Then how do we go in discreetly..."

Bao Sir waved a wedding invitation on the desk. "Isn't his wedding this Saturday? The day after tomorrow is Saturday. He got kidnapped today, let's see if the wedding can even go ahead. They must be busy preparing for the banquet now. Whether or not it happens, it'll be utter chaos. You've got so many experts and so much high-tech equipment, just investigate discreetly! Do I need to teach you that?"

With Bao Sir's reminder, Bai Yutang suddenly thought of a plan.

His older brother had said that Shi Yanshuo had come to him for help. Later, perhaps Cat could give him a call. That guy's family was powerful and wealthy, if he wanted to hide two people, it would not be easy to find them! If the two girls were still alive, then there had to be a reason for keeping them alive. If they acted rashly and cornered him, they might end up causing their deaths instead.

Fei Mu also tugged at Bai Yutang, meaning – Consider the long term!

When they returned to the office, they found everyone sitting there staring at each other.

Guan Xiaoyue and Qian Lin were studying Bai Chi's milk tea, and the others did not seem to be discussing the case either.

Bai Yutang walked in, glancing at Zhan Zhao with some confusion.

Zhan Zhao gestured towards Bai Ye.

Bai Ye and Wen Xiaorou were standing behind Jiang Ping, watching the computer screen. Jiang Ping was searching for images, seemingly of some sculptures and tattoo designs.

Xiaofei was sitting on the sofa, having a staring contest with Mwah Mwah.

Most dogs would instinctively avert their gaze if stared at, avoiding human eyes. But Mwah Mwah was different – its eyes were covered by fur! So Mwah Mwah was the best at playing the no blinking game, panting and wagging its tail while staring straight at Xiaofei, competing to see who blinked first.

Bai Yutang walked over to Zhan Zhao's side, and Zhan Zhao handed him a bottle of water.

Bai Yutang had been busy the whole afternoon and was indeed thirsty, though he had forgotten about it himself. Taking the water, he drank a few mouthfuls and felt the heat inside him ease a little. Then he asked Zhan Zhao, "Any progress?"

Zhan Zhao also took his water and drank a few sips before launching into a rapid-fire explanation. He recounted how Wen Xiaorou had recognised that Yu Hui was an imposter, followed by his own conjectures about Guan Xiaohong and Tan Wen's situation back then.

The sheer volume of information left Bai Yutang standing there, processing it for a while. When he finally digested it all, he asked, "What is the Siren's Wing?"

Zhan Zhao shrugged. All he knew was that the Siren was a legendary sea demon.

Bai Yutang sighed and shook his head – Always making things so flashy and fanciful...

At that moment, the elevator doors opened. Issel and Eleven came out carrying fishing gear and a water tank.

Bai Ye glanced into the tank and found the catch to be pretty good.

Uncle Chopsticks pointed at the fish for Gongsun, suggesting that they would use these for practice later.

Gongsun examined them and noted they'd caught different species.

Uncle Ye asked where they had caught them. Issel said it was at the same spot they had sailed to last time... and so Uncle Ye and the others gathered together, starting to discuss fishing matters.

Bai Yutang sighed again and looked at Zhan Zhao – Shouldn't we hold a meeting?

Zhan Zhao pointed at Eleven – We were about to meet earlier, but Uncle Ye said to ask Uncle Chopsticks about the Siren's Wing.

"Ahem."

Bai Yutang cleared his throat.

Uncle Ren turned around, and Bai Yutang and Zhan Zhao narrowed their eyes at them – Talk about fishing later, the case, the case!

"Oh..." Bai Ye motioned to Eleven, "Siren's Wing."

Uncle Chopsticks had already received a call from Bai Ye earlier, so he had a general idea of the situation. But this matter did not seem easy to explain.

"This Siren's Wing is an organisation."

Everyone nodded, guessing – What sort of organisation is it? Pirates? Assassins?

Eleven paused, then spoke, "A chef organisation."

Everyone was stunned.

"What?" Gongsun, who had been studying the fish species, lifted his head. The others also looked equally incredulous.

"Chefs?" Zhan Zhao even wondered if he had misheard.

But Uncle Chopsticks was clearly not joking. He had anticipated their reaction and nodded firmly. "That's right, chefs!"

"Why would chefs form an organisation?" Bai Yutang was puzzled. "What would they do after organising?"

Bai Jintang found it a little amusing – Did they organise themselves to take part in culinary competitions?

"Chefs are indeed chefs, but it depends on where they come from, right?" Eleven went on. "They are chefs on pirate ships."

"Oh..."

Everyone's scepticism immediately turned into curiosity, and it suddenly felt rather intriguing.

"The story is that there was a man, the head of the Siren's Wing, who was originally a cook and ran out to make a living. Because he owed gambling debts, he went to work as a labourer on a ship to avoid the debt... It was only after he boarded the ship that he realised it was a pirate ship. The life of a labourer on a pirate ship was certainly not easy. But he was quick-witted and told the pirates that he had cooking skills. It just so happened that the cook on the ship was sick, so the pirates asked him to cook a meal. As it turned out, his skills were excellent. With all his frying, stir-frying, roasting and braising, he cooked such delicious food that the pirates ate like kings! From then on, he became the head cook on the pirate ship, and gradually his status rose."

The others had not yet figured out what this had to do with the Siren's Wing, but he continued...

"Pirates, there must be more than one ship, right..."

Everyone in the office looked at Uncle Chopsticks – No, Jack only has one ship, and Luffy only has one ship.

Eleven rolled his eyes. "Pirates are simply thieves of the sea. Land thieves don't live in cars, do they? Of course they had hideouts on shore, and they acted in gangs! Watch fewer films and anime!"

Bai Ye and Issel urged him to get on with it and cut the nonsense.

Even on pirate ships, people got by, and in the underworld, they all went by nicknames, so he gave himself an alias.

On the plank bed, the cook slept in aboard the ship, carved into the bed board with a knife by someone unknown, was an ugly image of a mermaid with wings. The cook asked the older pirates what it was, and they told him it was a "Siren", a sea demon.

So the cook gave himself the nickname "Siren".

As mentioned before, pirates all had shore bases and families. When they disembarked from the pirate ship and returned to their base, they lived like ordinary islanders.

Siren also settled down on the island.

The island was relatively isolated, the living conditions were poor, and there was usually little entertainment. People simply gathered together for idle chatter.

Because of this strange name, Siren was often teased.

One of the crew members told him, "Their ancestors were also pirates. At that time, maritime traffic wasn't as developed as it is now, and there were more people hunting pirates. At that time, pirates were almost rampant at sea, and they could plunder vast fortunes! Legend has it that our ancestors once robbed a batch of priceless treasures. But a split occurred among the pirates, and some of them, seeing the money, became traitors and killed the other pirates. But after everyone was killed, they couldn't find the treasure... It turned out that the captain had long sensed the danger, and he sealed the treasure in several statues of the Siren's Wing and blew a hole in the ship."

When the ship began taking on water and started to sink, those treacherous pirates searched for a long time but couldn't find the treasure. As the water poured in quickly, they had no choice but to flee in lifeboats.

Once ashore, the group thought it over and realised the treasure might have been hidden inside the stone sculptures. Those sculptures had always been kept in the captain's cabin. One of the traitors had seen the captain open one before, it was actually a sealed jar disguised as a sculpture.

The traitors immediately returned to search, but by then the ship had already sunk. They tried to salvage the vessel. While attempting the recovery, they suddenly encountered a storm, and their ship also sank. Only a low-ranking underling who had been left on the island survived.

Over time, as the tale spread, it became more and more mysterious, turning into the story that the ship had sunk because it had met a sea demon.

"At sea, the most famous kind of vessel is, of course, the ghost ship. But hardly anyone actually goes looking for ghost ships." Eleven chuckled. "What people truly search for are those so-called treasure ships, ones with coordinates and bearings in the legends, the ones with higher credibility! Siren went around asking questions on the island, piecing together all sorts of clues, and in the end, he really did find the location of that sunken ship. So, he began to set things in motion... First, he recommended several of his own brothers to the captain. Since their family had been cooks for generations, all the brothers had excellent skills. The pirates were probably all food-lovers, and thought the more brilliant chefs, the better... The result was that one night, under a dark and stormy sky, the cooks prepared a sumptuous feast. They added a little extra ingredient to the food and poisoned the entire island of pirates and their families."

......

Everyone had been listening with a gossiping mindset as Uncle Chopsticks told the story, but by this point, they were a little speechless. "This legend isn't very kind to foodies!"

"And then?" Bai Yutang asked.

"After that, the group went to look for the sunken ship. But guess what happened..." Eleven smiled faintly. "Someone had beaten them to it. The ship was said to have been salvaged by a recovery team. There were many statues and artworks on board, which had already been auctioned off. As for information on the salvage team, all that was known was that they had a man with an anchor-and-rudder tattoo on the back of his head, the 'Dutchman'."

Everyone glanced at one another – So that's how it is...

"Originally, this matter shouldn't have spread. After all, everyone was dead." Uncle Chopsticks continued, "But Siren and his group were rather careless in how they handled the bodies. After killing all the pirates, they looted the wealth and then carried the corpses back onto the pirate ship, set the ship on fire, and sailed back to the mainland. But before the corpses on the ship could be burned completely to ash, the vessel sank. The bodies floated to the surface of the sea and were soon discovered by a passing fishing boat. The fishermen were shocked to see so many floating corpses on the sea, and immediately reported it. The coast guard in that region had been searching everywhere for pirates, so they quickly traced the direction from which the bodies had drifted. Using the currents, they located the wreck and the small island. When they went ashore to search, they actually found a little boy in the forest."

Hearing this, everyone was shocked. "You mean there was a survivor?"

Eleven nodded. "Mmhmm. That little boy was the captain's nephew. It was said the captain had high hopes for him, wanting him to grow up to be a proper sailor, a captain even, not a pirate. At that time, because he had made a mistake, the captain punished him with solitary confinement, only allowing him to eat dry buns each day. So he hadn't eaten the poisoned food. The kid was a bit of a slippery one. Every night, he would sneak out to play... That night, he witnessed the slaughter of the entire island. He clearly saw how Siren and his men disposed of the bodies and how they escaped. He told the coast guard everything, even giving detailed descriptions of Siren and his brothers. And so, a global manhunt for these pirates began... Even though the ones killed were pirates, it was still hundreds of lives. Besides, pirates have friends, and their friends are rarely good people... With the boy's testimony, the pirates' friends began seeking vengeance for their fallen comrades. And pirates, of course, have money. That was how the permanent bounty for their extermination came to be..."

Everyone finally understood why Eleven knew so much.

"This matter, from the time the bounty was issued until now, has been going on for about thirty years." Eleven said, "Most names on the permanent bounty list are wanted criminals, in other words, extremely dangerous villains. Their bounties are usually very high. Some friends of mine once investigated these individuals thoroughly. They discovered that these Siren brothers, despite carrying such heavy charges, still couldn't keep quiet. They roamed the world searching for the Siren's Wing statues. Later, they even married and had children. But around a decade ago, these brothers suddenly vanished into thin air. At the time, there was a rumour that I had killed them... Many people asked me, but I said no, it wasn't me. Then another rumour spread that it was BaileyYang who did it, but Yang also denied it... Thinking back on it now..."

"So they were the ones who attacked Tan Wen's family back then? Children can't remain without identities forever, they would need papers. And perhaps Tan Wen was targeted because she resembled one of their children?"

"And Tan Wen's parents ran a noodle shop, while the Siren family were cooks, so it would have been easy to impersonate them!"

"That makes sense!" Fei Mu slapped the table. "Those Dutchmen with the tattoos were laundering money for Shi Yanshuo through maritime transport. So it's possible that Shi Yanshuo's parents' generation was the first to find the sunken ship with the Siren's Wing. This time, the fake Yu Hui's honey trap was also aimed at the Siren's Wing... But why did Shi Yanshuo fall for it?"

"Perhaps because of that scar on Yu Hui's neck." Zhan Zhao rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Each has their own needs, so like two peas in a pod, they clicked!"

‿︵‿︵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: September 2, 2025 by Angel

Edited: October 27, 2025 by Angel