Chapter 37

Chapter 37

Wen Miao had been completely won over by Nan Mu’s reasoning, and she quickly stepped into the role of a detective. “Then who could it be? One was a college student who spent all his time at school, and the other was a patient who lived in the hospital year-round. What kind of grudge could they have possibly provoked?”

Nan Mu snapped his fingers and drew three boxes on the table. “In most homicide cases, a suspect’s motive rarely falls outside of three categories. The first is a crime of passion.”

“Was Xiao Shu in a relationship?”

Nan Mu recalled what Gu Zhiyu had told him. “I’m not sure, but Gu Zhiyu said the only girls Gu Zhishu had contact with during that period were you and a girl named Zhaodi.”

“Zhaodi…” Wen Miao repeated the name as she searched her memory, confirming she didn’t know her. “Do you have her contact information?”

Nan Mu took out his phone, navigated to his call logs, and handed it to Wen Miao. “I managed to get through once, but for some reason, she hung up almost immediately. Since then, no one has picked up.”

“Let me try.”

As Wen Miao spoke, she pulled out her phone. Just as she was about to dial, she remembered that she had removed the battery herself.

“Why did you… change your phone?”

Nan Mu looked at Wen Miao’s phone in surprise. It was an old-fashioned candy bar phone; unlike modern smartphones with built-in batteries, its battery could be removed by taking off the back cover.

“Yeah.” Wen Miao quickly pulled a lithium battery and a SIM card from her pocket, installing them one by one.

Once it was assembled, she dialed Zhaodi’s number.

A cold, automated female voice answered from the other end. “I’m sorry, the number you have dialed is currently powered off. Please try again later…”

Wen Miao frowned and tried again, refusing to give up, but she was met with the same message: “I’m sorry, the number you have dialed is currently powered off. Please try again later…”

Just then, the owner of the barbecue stall brought over their food. Nan Mu reached out to take it and added, “No one’s going to answer. I’ve tried several times before.”

Wen Miao had no choice but to hang up. However, she didn’t put the phone back in her pocket immediately. Instead, she pried the back cover open again, removed the battery and the SIM card piece by piece, and finally stuffed the whole pile into her pocket.

Nan Mu watched this with curiosity. “What are you doing?”

Wen Miao looked at him. “Remember the Motorcycle Man from that night?”

“Yeah?”

Wen Miao thought for a moment, deciding to omit the part where the Motorcycle Man had called her by name and told her she couldn’t escape. She offered a different explanation instead. “After I went back, I thought about it over and over. If the attacker only targeted us because we were alone, his specific focus on me was very strange. But if he was coming for me specifically, why didn’t he strike elsewhere? Why there? You have to realize, that was a place I went to on a whim; it’s not somewhere I would ever go normally.”

It was true. Unless the person had been tracking them the entire time, how could he have known for certain that the two of them would appear in that specific spot?

Wen Miao pointed to the phone Nan Mu had placed by his hand. “So after I got back, I gave my phone to Wen Xin to check. But there are so many smart apps nowadays; any one of them can determine my location by tracking GPS, accessing chat logs, or scanning photos… So, I just left that phone in the dorm.”

Nan Mu felt a chill run down his spine. At that moment, he suddenly realized a very important fact: Wen Miao’s death was by no means a simple murder case.

Think about it-what kind of person would be able to, or even have the authority to, access a citizen’s private app data? This person would either have to hold a very high position with immense clearance, or be a high-level executive at a well-known software development conglomerate.

“Do you know…”

Nan Mu hadn’t finished his sentence, but Wen Miao already knew what he wanted to ask.

“If you don’t count the professors and deans at school, then no,” Wen Miao said decisively. “In fact, as I told you last time, I don’t even know who would have such a motive against me.”

“Xu Lei…”

Nan Mu’s attention had already shifted entirely to Xu Lei.

Wisdom Biotech Company, a famous listed enterprise in City A.

Xu Lei was a Nobel Prize in Physics winner who commanded absolute prestige.
If it was him, he seemed to perfectly fit all the criteria mentioned just now.

Wen Miao was a bit surprised. “Is there something wrong with Professor Xu Lei? This seems to be the second time you’ve mentioned him.”

Nan Mu recalled what Wen Miao had told him before-she had hardly ever seen Xu Lei, and beyond basic greetings, the two had no deep connection.

“Why do you keep bringing up Xu Lei?”

Wen Miao remained curious.

Nan Mu didn’t know how to explain that he had witnessed Xu Lei murdering her with his own eyes.

“Maybe it’s just a gut feeling…” Nan Mu paused, then suddenly looked up at Wen Miao, his tone earnest. “Can you promise me one thing?”

“Hmm?”

The words swirled in his mouth, but in the end, only one sentence remained. “You must… stay wary of this man, okay?”

He didn’t want to lie to Wen Miao, but there were so many truths he simply couldn’t voice. His hesitation became a lump in his throat, a sharp bone he couldn’t swallow. It reached a point where Wen Miao could see an emotion in his eyes that could almost be described as sorrow.

Wen Miao had originally wanted to ask why, but seeing him like this, she changed her mind and simply gave a serious nod. “Okay.”

The two fell silent for a moment.

Nan Mu said, “I suddenly had a thought. Wen Xin said others could track your location and chat logs through a mobile app. Can Wen Xin retrieve the chat logs between Gu Zhishu and Su Yu? If he can, then we might know exactly what happened before they disappeared.”

“He probably can. I’ll go to the school tomorrow and ask Wen Xin,” Wen Miao agreed immediately. “But speaking of crimes of passion, I always felt like Gu Zhishu wasn’t the type to get involved in those kinds of things.”

“You can know a person’s face but not their heart. How can you be so sure?”

“Gu Zhishu was a very rational person.” Wen Miao had no intention of debating Gu Zhishu’s character with Nan Mu. “You said earlier that a suspect’s motive generally falls into three categories. The first is a crime of passion. What are the other two?”

Nan Mu had already locked his sights on Xu Lei, but since Wen Miao asked, he had to continue. “The second is revenge, and the third is material gain.”

But it couldn’t be revenge. If it were revenge, the killer should have watched him waste away, tormented by illness in his final days. Killing Gu Zhishu now seemed more like a mercy. Therefore, Nan Mu ruled out revenge first.

As for material gain… how could someone who went straight to the hospital after high school, never truly entering society and only attending university for a few months, be involved in a conflict of interest with anyone?

The only person with a potential interest might be Gu Zhiyu, but that was an answer Nan Mu had already dismissed.

Seeing Wen Miao still deep in thought, Nan Mu looked up at the clock on the wall. “It’s getting late. Don’t you have classes tomorrow?”

“Yeah.” Wen Miao also glanced at the time and saw that it was indeed late. “Let’s head back and rest for today. I’ll come find you again in a couple of days. You really need to let your body recover.”

“Alright.”

Nan Mu stood up, settled the bill, and hailed a taxi. He insisted on dropping Wen Miao off at the school first before returning to the hospital.

He passed the nursing station on his way back to the ward. Nurse Xiao Ai was on duty tonight. When she saw Nan Mu, she looked shocked. “Why aren’t you resting in bed? Why are you out so late at night?”

Nan Mu gave an awkward smile. “I was a bit hungry, so I went out for a late-night snack.”

“You can’t do this next time! Don’t think that just because a mild concussion doesn’t look like much, nothing will happen. If something really goes wrong, it’ll be a huge problem!”

“Yes, yes, I definitely won’t dare to do it again.”

“If you’re going to be this disobedient, I’ll have to check your room every day from now on.” Nurse Xiao Ai looked stern. “I’ll let it slide this time! If this happens again, I’ll have to tell your attending physician! You wouldn’t want to undergo another full-body checkup like the one you had when you first arrived, would you?”

Nan Mu swore to the heavens that he wouldn’t do it again. Only then did Nurse Xiao Ai relent, escorting him all the way back to his ward and watching him lie down before she finally left.