Locked-room Mystery

Not even the brilliant autumn sun was enough to chase away the chill from the room where the body was lying. The large room did not become any warmer even though there were so many people inside.

Song Caitang stood in the middle of the room and frowned slightly.

The livor mortis was strange, the way the knife was stabbed into the body was strange…

That wasn’t all.

There was something wrong with the victim’s right hand too. It wasn’t curled up naturally. The thumb, index and middle fingers were pressed very hard together, as though he was holding onto something.

Unlike how bodies would go into rigor mortis, this was more likely a cadaveric spasm. The victim, Liao Xingjian, had a spasm in his hand the moment he died, so he was stuck in this position permanently.

Cadaveric spasms were a unique form of rigor mortis and there was no way to fake it. Without the ability to relax, the body would remain in this position…

Song Caitang asked, “Was he holding anything when the body was found?”

Zhuang Qingyu shook his head. “No.”

“You were the first one to discover his body?

“Myself and Xin Yongwang,” Zhuang Qingyu pointed at Xin Yongwang, then lowered his gaze and sighed after he glanced at the body. “It was because the next day was the wedding and the groom hadn’t appeared even after we waited for so long. Xin Yongwang came to look for me and we both came over to hurry Xingjian. We didn’t expect to find him like this.”

Song Caitang looked at Xin Yongwang. “You didn’t notice anything either?”

“I don’t think so,” Xin Yongwang bent his head to think. “If there was something, I wouldn’t have missed it.”

Song Caitang lowered her gaze.

So… was it that Liao Xingjian tried to grab hold of something before he died and failed, or had he grabbed hold of it but the item was removed and hidden by someone else?

Ye Nan’s eyes were slightly red as she looked at Song Caitang. “Are you able to confirm Xingjian’s cause of death?”

Song Caitang frowned and did not answer immediately.

Ye Nan seemed a little anxious. “We are all martial artists and we can see that even though the dagger was stabbed into his chest, the amount he bled wouldn’t be enough to kill him. Was he frozen to death then?”

Song Caitang shook her head.

“When someone is frozen to death, most of their skin would be very pale, their bodies would be curled up and the pores on their skin would shrink and turn into what we often call goosebumps.”

Also, his penis and nipples would have contracted.

But that was not the case for this victim, so she could not say that he had frozen to death.

She turned to the rest in the room, her gaze quiet. “I’m afraid I’ll have to cut the body open in order to get an accurate answer.”

But it was obvious that Liao Xingjian’s body had been overly frozen and it was too hard to cut into at the moment, so they had to wait for the body to defrost first.

And she didn’t want to sit around and do nothing while waiting.

“The victim was a groom-to-be and someone of high status, so after this incident, I assume a preliminary investigation has been conducted. Can I meet with the suspects and any others connected to the case?” Song Caitang paused, then explained, “I would like to sort out the sequence of events leading to the victim’s death.”

Ye Nan nodded. “Sure.”

She glanced at Xin Yongwang.

Xing Yongwang nodded. “I’ll arrange for that immediately.”

Song Caitang wasn’t going to waste the time it took to gather everyone either.

She made another request, “I would like to take a look at where the victim was found. Is that possible?”

Ye Nan glanced at the body as though she was reluctant to leave, but the rest of her did not hesitate. She held an arm out to show the way. “Please come with me, Miss Song.”

Everyone in the room walked out with them and Guan Wan also put her paper and brush down to run after them.

She didn’t want to be stuck alone in the room with a dead body!

The body had been found in his own study.

Ye Nan took a key out, unlocked the lock hanging on the door and opened the door. A musty smell wafted out of the room. It had been quite a while since someone entered.

Song Caitang asked, “Nobody has gone in all this time?”

“I locked it up immediately after what happened,” Ye Nan’s voice was as cold as the frost on a cold autumn’s night. “I felt it might be important to do that.”

“You did the right thing.”

Song Caitang walked into the room.

Inside, the windows were shut fast and the sunlight could only come in through the grilles. The whole room was well lit.

An artistic painting of nature with simple lines hung on the wall, and the calligraphy on it was in a bold and clean font. Each word was clearly written and wasn’t in cursive font.

The study was very large. There were many shelves and they were filled with valuable items and scrolls.

Just as Ye Nan described, the entire room was very clean and neat except for the desk.

The desk was a mess, as though someone had done this on purpose. Stacks of papers had slid off and fallen all over the floor. The inkstone had also fallen onto the floor and splattered everywhere. A drawer beneath the table had toppled over, so blank paper, scissors, paper cutters and other stationery was also strewn all over the floor.

And less than a foot away was a pool of black, dried blood.

Song Caitang stopped to look at the place in detail for a while before asking Zhuang Qingyu, “When you and Xin Yongwang entered, the place already looked like this?”

Zhuang Qingyu nodded. “That’s right.”

“What time was that?”

“Close to 5 am.”

Song Caitang nodded.

Zhuang Qingyu explained, “We might be martial artists who don’t care about certain formalities, but there are many things a groom has to do on the day of the wedding and he could not afford to arrive so late. Xin Yongwang and I went to look for him in the bedroom first but failed to find him, so we headed for the study.”

Hua Rong raised his hand at this point. “When the body was discovered, the doors and windows were all locked, and I heard that Pavilion Master Zhuang and Head Hall Master Xin had to force their way in. Could Brother Xingjian have killed himself?”

Song Caitang turned to look at Zhuang Qingyu. “The doors and windows were all locked?”

Zhuang Qingyu nodded. “That’s right. When we called out to him from outside, there was no response, so we had no choice but to use a thin blade to push the lock on the inside of the door out of its catch, then we could go in.”

“The windows were locked too?”

“Yes, they were locked from the inside.”

Song Caitang frowned.

This turned out to be a locked-room mystery…

Hua Rong had a youthful yet dreamy look in his eyes as he threw Ye Nan a quick glance. “Maybe he felt sorry for the bride…”

He might have thought that he had hidden his thoughts well, but the way he glanced at her made them very obvious.

Ye Nan shut her eyes and clenched her fists.

“That’s impossible,” Zhuang Qingyu was very confident. “Xingjian and I have been friends for many years, and he’s not the type who would kill himself.”

The room fell silent again.

Song Caitang listened to what they said and sorted out how they were related while taking a close look at the rest of the room.

From the way the room was furnished and the way the items were placed, she could tell that the victim was an organized person who liked simplicity.

She discovered many scrolls and books on the various shelves. The victim seemed to enjoy sorting information and wrote his processes down.

For example, he would write down what he needed to do during this particular period of time, what he had prepared, what the plan was, how the plan went, whether it was completed on time and so on. Every detail was recorded in great detail. If anything was missed out in between, he would quickly add it in.

She felt like she could practically imagine what the victim had done over the last few years by reading these scrolls.

Song Caitang asked Ye Nan, “The victim enjoyed writing down what he did every day?”

“He was probably afraid that he would forget…” Her voice was distant and there was a deep sorrow on her face, as though she had been reminded of something that had happened in the past.

That lasted for only a moment and she pulled herself together. She tried to cover it up, “Well, many things happen among the sects and clans of the martial arts world.”

Just then, Xin Yongwang had just finished making arrangements and returned to the room. When he saw the sadness on Ye Nan’s face, he walked over to pat her on the shoulder and looked at her with great concern.

Song Caitang looked at the things on the shelf. “Has the victim used this study for a long time?”

The furniture and style of the interior did not look new, and looked rather old.

Ye Nan seemed upset by this question and buried her face in her hands.

Xin Yongwang sighed and explained, “Liao Xingjian is not related to the Ye family by blood, but he’s the orphaned son of a good friend of the elder sect leader. The elder sect leader is a kindhearted man who didn’t want his good friend’s son to end up on the streets, so he took him in and brought him up. Liao Xingjian grew up with Young Mistress, so not only does he have his own study in Night Sanctum, but he also has his own courtyard, his own stable, his own martial arts training arena… it’s been more than 20 years.”

Song Caitang narrowed her eyes.

That was strange.

Everything in the room looked fairly old and there were clear signs that someone had used the place for many years. But the scrolls here only had records for the past few years and nothing earlier than that.

When she checked more carefully, she realized the scrolls contained records for only the past three years.

Forming habits was a strange thing, because once formed, they were hard to change. If the victim had such a habit since he was a child, then his records from back then should still be around. If they disappeared suddenly, it would be very obvious and everyone would wonder why they were gone.

The people in the room were supposedly people close to him and people who knew the victim well. But they didn’t look surprised or puzzled by what they saw. Could it be…

The victim only formed this habit three years ago?

If that was so, why?

What happened to him three years ago?

She had just started her investigations, so there were many unanswered questions. The murderer might be among the people here, she couldn’t just share her observations with them.

She needed a longer time to observe everyone and a lot more information.

She checked the doors and windows carefully.

There were no marks on them.

If this was a locked-room murder, the murderer would have to use some contraption to lock the doors and windows to make it look like the victim had killed themselves, like a string or something, and would leave some traces behind. But after checking again and again, she didn’t find a single trace.

They were completely clean.

That was strange…

“Miss Song, I’ve gathered everyone in the main hall, so if you’re done looking at the study, you can start your questioning anytime,” Xin Yongwang reminded her.

Song Caitang nodded, scanned the room one last time and memorized everything she saw. “Let’s go then.”

The group arrived at the main hall and took their seats. The servants served everyone tea and Song Caitang took charge of sorting out the sequence of events.

Besides Ye Nan, Xin Yongwang, Zhuang Qingyu, Hua Rong as well as Xi Rui, there was another man and woman present. They were dressed like servants and were young people she did not recognize.

It was the first time she was seated in the chair reserved for the most important guest, but she did not look uncomfortable and did not look frightened at all. She consoled Guan Wan with an assuring glance, and kicked off the session.

“I’m not very familiar with everyone here, so I will need each of you to tell me how you are related to the victim and when was the last time you saw the victim.”

She smiled faintly, then scanned the group before stopping at Zhuang Qingyu.

“I heard someone call you Pavilion Master Zhuang, so I’m a little curious. Are you alright with going first?”