S.C.I Mystery Series Volume 6 Chapter 124

Special Files – Collector 09 – Holiday Cabin

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Zhao Jue stared at the new email on his phone for quite a while. No matter how he looked at it, it was just an ordinary promotional email.

It was a supermarket voucher, discounts on fruit, household goods, clothes, shoes and socks, plus vouchers, cashback deals, prize draws and all sorts of offers...

After studying it carefully, Zhao Jue found that the durians looked quite good, and the chainsaws were on sale too. Speaking of which... why on earth was a supermarket promoting chainsaws?

The twins said there was a newly built holiday cabin at the campsite, where they could stay in the mountains for the entire holiday. Bai Yutang and Bai Ye then considered bringing more supplies along.

Zhan Zhao noticed that the two of them had subtly similar interests and even tended to think along the same lines.

When Zhao Zhen heard there was a house to stay in, he started wondering whether to bring Lisbon along too. The cat and the little lion could both be sent to the "nursery", but Lisbon was a bit troublesome, he would have to be sent back to the old house, so it might be more convenient to just bring him along.

The twins flipped through the rental contract and nodded, saying there was no clause prohibiting pets.

Zhan Zhao was still rather puzzled. "Wasn't that land bought by Big Brother when he built the amusement park? Why isn't the holiday cabin part of the Bai Group?"

The twins nodded repeatedly. "The land does belong to the Bai Group, but they only built the amusement park and the film city. The vacant land in the mountain area was rented out to several different companies, some built resorts, some organised off-road races, and some opened farm stays. We just collect the rent. But if there's a good project, we'll invest in it as well. Take this off-road race, for example, it's sponsored by the Bai Group. And the outdoor barbecue special for the cooking competition is sponsored by the resort."

Zhan Zhao remembered that the summer camp organised by the psychology department at X University also listed cabin 21 in the resort area as its address.

So he asked the twins, "Which cabin are we staying in?"

"Cabin 20." The twins said that they were really lucky this time. It had been fully booked, and they were supposed to sleep in tents, but somehow a family suddenly cancelled their booking and even gave up their deposit.

Zhan Zhao looked at the resort map and found that cabin 20 was right next to cabin 21. What a coincidence...

Turning around, Zhan Zhao glanced at Zhao Jue, who was strolling out holding a document folder.

Swaggering, Zhao Jue climbed onto the RV, tossed the folder onto the table, and flopped onto the sofa to sleep.

Zhan Zhao followed him into the RV, took a look, then casually stole the folder and ran to sit in Bai Yutang's vehicle.

Once everyone had packed up, they set off in a convoy towards the campsite.

There was a large box on the back seat of Bai Yutang's car. When Zhan Zhao turned to look, he saw it was his newly purchased drone. The package had arrived that morning, and he hadn't even opened it yet.

Bai Yutang was in high spirits as he drove, planning to study the new drone together with Uncle Ye and the others once they reached the cabin.

Zhan Zhao opened the document folder and pulled out the thick stack of papers inside, flipping through them roughly.

Bai Yutang had seen the same folder earlier and asked, "Are those all X University's research projects?"

"To be precise, they're research topics from Wu Wen's students," Zhan Zhao replied, frowning as he read through the pages, then suddenly sighed.

"What's wrong?" Bai Yutang had been thinking that since it was a rare holiday, Zhan Zhao could finally relax and have some fun, but it seemed there was quite a lot going on. Not only a pile of overdue manuscripts, but also this psychology professor's coursework...

"Ai..." Zhan Zhao seemed tired. He tossed the document folder onto the back seat, reclined his chair, and grumbled in discontent.

Bai Yutang thought the posture looked a bit like Luban rolling on the floor when it got too hot.

Muttering under his breath, Zhan Zhao complained, "Replacing final exams with a murder mystery game for the summer camp is already absurd enough, but he actually divided the students into several groups, with each one researching a serial killer, and all of them are the type kept in the T Zone! Where does he even get that kind of confidence?"

Having roughly grasped the situation, Bai Yutang asked, "Cat, are you worried something might go wrong?"

"It feels like something's already gone wrong!" Zhan Zhao sat up, raised his seat back, and reached behind to grab the document folder, but couldn't reach it. Hugging the backrest, he stretched his arm as far as it would go...

Bai Yutang looked helplessly at the rearview mirror, watching Zhan Zhao struggling to reach, and thought perhaps they should switch to an electric car. Uncle Ye's new one seemed quite nice.

After some effort, Zhan Zhao finally managed to retrieve the document folder he had so casually thrown aside. He opened it and pulled out the papers.

On several of the documents, there were big red crosses drawn in bold pen.

"Xiaoxue was already the third to die," Zhan Zhao said. "Two others from the T Zone died last month as well... both were high-level inmates and severely ill patients."

At this, Zhan Zhao clicked his tongue again, his expression growing even more irritated. "I just looked carefully at the experimental records for those few cases, they were all somewhat similar to Xiaoxue's."

"Similar?" Bai Yutang didn't quite understand. "Did they all try to escape too?"

Zhan Zhao nodded. "The thing they all had in common was that they were highly intelligent, whereas those students were basically rookies. When an old fox meets a rookie, of course the rookies are going to be manipulated... But what's strange is that in every project, the inmates were clearly the ones in control, the students were completely led by the nose, and yet..."

"In the end, it was the inmates who ended up dead?" Bai Yutang also found it odd. "How did the other two die?"

"The first two, one died of illness, and the other fell to his death. On the surface, they looked like natural and accidental deaths, but on closer inspection, neither case makes sense!" Zhan Zhao analysed the two medical records. "The one who died of illness had a chronic condition that required long-term medication, but from the day he entered the experiment, he stopped taking his medicine on his own, and he died within half a month. The one who fell was even more bizarre. He relied on a mobility aid to walk, yet somehow dismantled one of the bolts from it himself. Then, when he went down the stairs, the aid broke, and he fell to his death..."

Bai Yutang frowned. "That sounds like suicide..."

"Exactly. Just like Xiaoxue, all backed by surveillance footage, all shown to be their own decisions, their own actions... But in reality, they were all trying to escape, and they were close to succeeding!" Zhan Zhao muttered under his breath.

Bai Yutang gave a slight smile. "Like some kind of punishment?"

Zhan Zhao looked at him. "Punishment?"

Bai Yutang nodded. "They saw hope, only to die at that very moment, and by their own hands."

Zhan Zhao rubbed his chin. "When you put it that way... it does seem that way. But with so many suspicious points, why didn't the hospital investigate?"

"Perhaps they thought it didn't matter if they died," Bai Yutang said. "Many people believe the inmates in the T Zone are faking illness to avoid the death penalty, they think those patients never received the punishment they deserved for their crimes."

Zhan Zhao put down the documents and thought for a moment. "In fact, these people really were patients, it's not something one can simply fake... well, most of them."

"So there are some who fake it?" Bai Yutang was astonished.

"That depends on the case, for example," Zhan Zhao gave an example. "Suppose someone with abilities comparable to Zhao Jue pretended to be a patient... even if I were one of the doctors involved in evaluating him, we might all end up being deceived."

"So it depends on the skill of both the evaluating doctor and the patient?" Bai Yutang nodded towards the documents. "If the doctor isn't competent, or has some personal motive, then mistakes could happen too, right?"

"Uh..." Zhan Zhao found it difficult to give a definitive answer. "Theoretically, nothing is absolute. But now there's a fairly complete evaluation system in place, and it's not just one or two doctors making the judgment..."

The campsite was in the suburban mountains, not too far from the city, just over an hour's drive.

Zhan Zhao lowered his head to study the documents, but before long, he felt carsick. Lying in the passenger seat, he grew increasingly nauseous, and Bai Yutang casually tossed the papers from his hands onto the back seat again.

After feeling dizzy for a while, Zhan Zhao finally recovered a bit. He sat up, opened the window, and looked out at the scenery. They had already entered the mountains and were driving along the winding road upward.

On both sides of the road were forested areas, and faintly visible among the trees were a few paths marked out with fluorescent tape, probably part of the off-road racecourse.

Driving a little further, the campsite came into view. The holiday cabins were built deep within the dense forest, and the further the car went, the more secluded it felt. In areas where the trees grew especially thick, there was even a faintly eerie atmosphere.

After watching for a while, Zhan Zhao muttered to Bai Yutang, "The twins must've rented out this area because it looks inauspicious."

"Inauspicious? You don't even need to guess," Bai Yutang laughed at his remark. "When the twins first bought this land, they went to the police to check the records. There'd been quite a few murders in this area. They rented out the zones where incidents had happened and built the amusement park on the parts where nothing had occurred."

Zhan Zhao was speechless. "Which mountain doesn't have a few deaths? They're just seeking psychological comfort... Everyone else checks feng shui before building houses, they check criminal records. That's one way to be unique."

"Well, Big Brother's constitution is rather special..." Bai Yutang said, as the lead RV ahead of them turned down a slope into the campsite, and he followed suit.

The so-called holiday cabins were a series of detached villas, decorated to look like wooden cabins, though on closer inspection, most were only imitation wood.

"This architectural style..." Zhan Zhao couldn't help but shake his head. "It looks just like the film set next door, completely tacky..."

Bai Yutang also thought the houses were rather ugly. The overall design was oddly "clawing" in shape, with windows and doors that resembled a pair of eyes and a wide-open mouth. Seen at night, they'd probably look quite frightening.

The cars ahead had all pulled over, and Issel got out to look for their way.

Bai Yutang also noticed that the house numbers on these cabins were extremely "well hidden" and not obvious at all.

After searching for quite some time, Issel finally figured out the layout and returned to the car.

Just then, a vehicle happened to drive out of the resort area, passing right by Bai Yutang's car.

Bai Ye kept his eyes on that car until it drove through the gates.

Bai Ye turned back. Zhao Jue wasn't in his car, after staying up all night reading documents, he was probably exhausted and had been sleeping the whole way in the RV.

The car that had just driven out was the same one they'd seen near the hospital the previous night, with the same four people inside.

Bai Ye wasn't sure whether Zhao Jue had seen it, and continued driving forward.

In Bai Yutang's car, Zhan Zhao had also kept glancing back at the car that had just passed them.

"What's wrong?" Bai Yutang asked, following the lead vehicle through several turns, left, right, then left again, until he was nearly dizzy. The cabins on all sides looked exactly the same.

"The car just now," said Zhan Zhao. It looked a bit familiar, as though he had seen it somewhere before.

"This model's quite common, isn't it?" Bai Yutang saw the RV in front finally stop, so he pulled over as well, leaned out of the window to check the road ahead and behind, and looked around at the nearby cabins, trying to memorise the location as best as he could.

After scanning the area, Bai Yutang noticed a peculiar detail, the cabin numbers were all placed away from the intersections.

Logically speaking, the numbers should have been visible from the intersections, so drivers wouldn't end up on the wrong road and have to turn back... Who designed this? A mistake? Or deliberate?

After some effort, they finally found their holiday cabin, number 20. There was a large open space in front, enough to park all their vehicles, including the big RV.

The twins didn't come along, so they had given Bai Ye the keys.

Everyone got out of the car. Inside the RV, Bai Chi nudged Zhao Zhen and pointed at Zhao Jue, who was still fast asleep with Lisbon in his arms, asking whether they should wake him.

Zhao Zhen wasn't sure whether Zhao Jue would be grumpy if woken, so after thinking for a moment, he decided it was better to let Lisbon sacrifice himself as a pillow for a while longer. He pulled Bai Chi out of the RV instead.

Once everyone had left, Lisbon started wagging his tail, slapping Zhao Jue's leg with a "thump, thump". The so-called king of beasts groaned in protest, urging Zhao Jue to get up.

With a creak, Bai Ye opened the cabin door.

Everyone looked up at the sky helplessly. The door clearly had an electronic lock, yet it was set to make the sound effect of an old castle gate opening, as though a swarm of bats might fly out at any moment.

Fortunately, the inside was fairly normal, just an ordinary holiday home.

Everyone began moving their bags inside. Zhan Zhao, however, didn't go in, he walked over to the fence and looked across.

Next to cabin number 20 was number 21, and there was someone standing at its door, a man wearing glasses, scholarly and mild-mannered in appearance. It was Professor Wu Wen.

When he saw Zhan Zhao, he smiled slightly, adjusted his glasses, and nodded politely.

Zhan Zhao nodded back.

Wu Wen didn't say anything further. After greeting him, his eyes shifted past Zhan Zhao, focusing on something behind him.

Zhan Zhao turned to look and realised Wu Wen was watching Bai Ye and Bai Yutang, who were unloading the luggage from the RV.

After observing them for a moment, Wu Wen's gaze suddenly moved towards the door of the RV.

Just then, the door opened.

Lisbon jumped down, shaking his fluffy white mane and trotting forward a few steps, nudging Bai Chi, who was dragging a suitcase, with his big head.

Following Lisbon out was Zhao Jue, yawning as he went.

Zhao Jue stretched, feeling stiff and slightly sore in the neck from his nap.

Zhan Zhao had intended to ask Wu Wen about the details of the summer camp assessment, but when he turned back... he only saw Wu Wen's back as the professor turned and went into cabin 21.

‿︵‿︵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: October 26, 2025 by Angel

Edited: November 26, 2025 by Angel