Chapter 113: The Investigation Continues

Wang Zixuan said, “When the two Xu Miaohans had their falling-out, they arranged to meet at home again. One of them killed the other with a knife. Naturally, then, the only fingerprints on the weapon would be Xu Miaohan’s.”

Little Deng slapped the table. “It’s not just their fingerprints that are identical. Their DNA is exactly the same too. There definitely won’t be any trace belonging to anyone else at the scene.”

Xiao Deng, sitting nearby, listened thoughtfully before interjecting, “Then what about the evidence? Evidence is what we need. If two Xu Miaohans entered the same apartment building, they must have left some kind of trace behind.”

After Xiao Deng finished speaking, everyone fell silent, unable to think of what else this could mean.

After a long while, Little Deng and Xiao Deng spoke at the same time.

“The stairs. The elevator.”

They hurried back to the surveillance room to find Duan Peng, the resident technology expert. When they reached the footage showing Xu Miaohan looking at something, Hao Yingjun suddenly called for it to be stopped.

“Professor Duan, please pause it here. Look carefully. Xu Miaohan wasn’t frightened by anything. She noticed the camera inside the elevator. That’s why she turned around and left.”

Wang Zixuan said, “The floor where Xu Miaohan’s family lives isn’t very high. She often uses the stairs, too. That was one of the details we overlooked during the investigation.”

Wang Zixuan glanced at Xu Miaohan stepping out of the elevator on the monitor, then looked at the photograph in his hand. He fell silent for a moment.

“This person may not be Xu Miaohan at all. Precisely because she wasn’t the real Xu Miaohan, she had no idea which floor she lived on. She only began hesitating when she reached the correct level. It’s very possible that she usurped the other woman’s life—and killed the real Xu Miaohan.”

The footage of Xu Miaohan entering the elevator, looking at the camera, and stepping out was played over and over on the large screen. Just as Wang Zixuan finished speaking, it happened to pause once again on the image of Xu Miaohan staring at the camera.

Little Deng said, “It would be more accurate to say that she killed herself.”

Hao Yingjun kept watching the replay. No one knew how many times he had gone through it when, all at once, he seemed to notice something.

“Professor Duan, could you enlarge it a little more? Her mouth keeps moving. It looks as if she’s saying something.”

Hao Yingjun watched the screen, repeatedly imitating the movements of Xu Miaohan’s mouth, trying to determine what she was saying. But the more he imitated her, the more it resembled a song they had always sung as children at the orphanage. He did not mention this to the others.

Once they had watched nearly all the footage, they returned to the conference room and continued their discussion.

“Creating a duplicate of oneself voluntarily is unquestionably illegal,” Wang Zixuan said. “If discovered, the Supermarket will deport the offender from human society. We previously asked Zhou Ning to investigate deportation records from major cities, but we couldn’t find a single person resembling Xu Miaohan. If this earthworm spirit truly created a duplicate, it can only mean that she hid herself extremely well.”

Hao Yingjun’s mind was in turmoil, and helplessness seeped into his voice. “If Xu Miaohan really did create a duplicate, then it must have happened in the summer when she was eighteen. She couldn’t make a decision back then, so she split herself in two: one half stayed here to work as a teacher, while the other went to the capital to study music. That means the music academy in the capital may be our only lead.”

The atmosphere grew oppressive. Everyone seemed uncertain whether they should continue investigating.

Xiao Deng said, “Do you think we might be making this far more complicated than it really is? Would anyone truly agonize over whether or not to go to college?”