Chapter 481: Chapter 452: Bruises on the Back_1
"The boy weighs seven pounds and eight ounces and is very handsome. Xiaoyu instructed that Zhou Ning must be the first to see him."
He Shancun said this as he leaned in, explaining to the old man how smoothly everything had gone while showing off photos and videos of his son. The old patriarch was overjoyed and waved Zhou Xiaojun over in a hurry.
"Go to my room and get the paper money for Shancun. Let him write his name on it himself, and then go to the crossroads to burn it. You must tell your parents and family about this so they can also bless the child’s safety."
He Shancun was stunned for a moment, his mouth stretched into a tearful smile, clearly moved by the old man’s concern. Without wasting any more words, he quickly went to get the paper money with Zhou Xiaojun.
The old man gave Zhou Ning a look.
"It’s too late now, Momo shouldn’t tire herself out going back and forth. Go sleep in the guest room opposite Xiao Ning on the upper floor. No one will bother you on the third floor, and you can tidy up whatever you need in the morning."
Before Zhou Ning could object, Xia Momo had already smiled and nodded her head.
"Okay, I’ll listen to grandpa. Then I’ll help you go upstairs to rest!"
After taking his blood pressure medication, the old man was helped upstairs by Xia Momo. Just then, He Shancun returned from burning the paper money. He dove into the kitchen where Uncle Two was already busy preparing an assortment of ingredients for making soup, one holding the cookbook and the other getting ready, both bustling with activity.
Zhou Ning did not disturb them and went straight to the third floor. As he reached the guest room door, Xia Momo came out without waiting for him to knock, gesturing for Zhou Ning to be quiet. Then she gently bit his lip, not with much force, but the gesture was enough to ignite something in Zhou Ning. The parts of him that had been quiet for a while began to wake up, and he grabbed Xia Momo’s hand.
"So you’re playing with fire, huh?"
Two small dimples appeared on Xia Momo’s smiling face, and she tilted her head playfully.
"The guest room doesn’t have pajamas. I took one of your shirts. I hope you don’t mind. Just saying goodnight to you! See you tomorrow!"
With that, she closed the door with a bang.
Zhou Ning sighed and shook his head as he returned to his bedroom. He had been exhausted from all of today’s activity, but after sleeping for a while at Xia Momo’s home, he now seemed to have lost the urge to sleep. Opening the window, he lit a cigarette.
At that moment, Zhou Ning felt very reflective. The baby had felt so soft in his hands, his nearly transparent fingers. Such a child, enveloped in love from birth, experienced such happiness.
Yet some children, their lives cruelly snuffed out before they ever beheld the beauty of this world and tasted its most brutal evil.
As he thought, Zhou Ning fell asleep, and in his dream, the face of the man with the scarred eye was fierce. Zhou Ning was not standing opposite him, but seemed more like an observer, standing for the first time beside the scarred man, Wang Guanli.
Huangmao, skinny to the point of being skeletal, was now clearly discernible at Wang Guanli’s side, slightly shorter in stature. Up his arm holding the hunting rifle, the sleeves were rolled high, revealing needle marks densely packed along his veins, new and old overlapping, clearly a drug user.
All sounds seemed absent, yet by watching their lips, Zhou Ning had no trouble guessing what they were saying, as this dream had persisted far too long already.
The fog on Huangmao’s face seemed dispersed as well. The protruding cheekbones, the hooked nose, the pockmarked diamond-shaped face, and the narrow eyes shaded by flabby skin creating a triangular effect—though this did not seem to be his eyes’ natural shape. Notably, there was a conspicuous notch on his right ear.
It was a sharp, triangular notch that looked as though it had been left by a piercing weapon. Just as Zhou Ning was about to get a closer look in the hopes of making out more detail, the shrill ringing of a phone tore him from the dream.
Opening his eyes, Zhou Ning’s heart was racing. He calmed his mind before grabbing his phone, noticing that it was already day and the caller was Xia Momo. He quickly got out of bed to answer.
"Hello, are you awake?"
"Yeah, I just wanted to tell you that I’m heading downstairs to go home and freshen up. I’ll drive straight to the municipal bureau. You don’t need to worry about me. I saw Uncle Two and He Shancun preparing to leave when I came down. They made breakfast, so be sure to eat up before you head to work."
Zhou Ning exhaled.
"Okay, I’m getting up now."
"Wait, are you not feeling well?"
Zhou Ning hastily coughed.
"Not at all, I was just too excited last night. I couldn’t sleep much. After all, I’ve promoted to being an uncle, and I’m still not quite used to it."
"Fine then, as long as you’re okay. Hurry up and get out of bed."
After hanging up, Zhou Ning quickly washed up and stood at the window, straining to remember the dream from the night before. Perhaps owing to his treatments with Doctor Shi, he felt surprisingly calm. Maybe soon he would remember even more.
Zhou Ning didn’t linger and quickly went downstairs, just as He Shancun was about to leave, pointing to a table full of food.
"I’m off to deliver food, then heading straight to work. There’s breakfast on the table, everything’s there. Everyone has eaten except Zhou Xiaojun, and my mother-in-law said there’s no need to leave any for him. Gotta go, can’t let my wife and mother-in-law stay hungry!"
Zhou Ning touched his forehead, bemused by He Shancun’s joy as he carried out a pile of food containers, grinning ear to ear.
"Drive safely. The maternity nurse will be coming soon, right? Tell Aunt Two not to tire herself out too much. Once the nurse arrives, she should come back to rest a bit, she can return in the evening."
"Understood, quit nagging. My wife is hungry."
Having said that, he turned and left without looking back. Zhou Ning shook his head, finished breakfast, and quickly made his way to the technical department. Upon entering the office, he found himself to be the last to arrive. Xia Momo was sitting in front of the computer, chatting with Liu Yufei.
"Mrs. Fei is here!"
Liu Yufei glanced at Zhou Ning and waved her hand.
"Congratulations, I heard you’ve become an uncle. I had Mr. Xia help me with some research, don’t worry, we won’t overwork your significant other."
Zhou Ning glanced at Xia Momo, who quickly waved her hands.
"It wasn’t me who said it, just check the Moments!"
Zhou Ning looked puzzled, but seeing everyone smiling, he opened WeChat on his phone. He never touched Moments, never even posted an update. Upon entering, he saw He Shancun had posted more than a dozen updates: showing off breakfast, his child, and pictures of Zhou Xiaoyu leaving the delivery room just the day before.
There were so many comments below that he had to flip through pages to see them all. Zhou Ning sighed silently, checking the timestamps of the posts. That guy had started showing off in the car on his way back yesterday, hardly sleeping at all throughout the night, posting updates now and then. He had just visited the hospital, posting several more updates in a row.
Liu Yongxin patted Zhou Ning’s arm and gestured toward Xia Momo with a nod of his chin.
"You guys should hurry up too, don’t let He Shancun outdo you. The way he flaunts things can indeed be irritating."
Zhou Ning hummed in response, and seeing Xia Momo steal a glance over, he said softly,
"We’re close too. The wedding is set for the National Day holiday. We’ll send out invitations later, but start saving up for the gift money. Don’t come up short when the time comes."
Everyone laughed, and Liu Yongxin patted his side pocket.
"The red envelope has been ready for a while, and not just one. You should learn from Xiaoyu and her husband. Look at their speed—wedding and baby, all done within a year. That’s what I call efficiency."
Zhou Ning saw that Xia Momo was a bit embarrassed and quickly changed the subject, waving his hand at Zhu Xingxing.
"Let everyone know to send over the thawed body. We’re going to perform a second external examination. Mrs. Fei, do you have any other arrangements?"
Liu Yufei, holding the printed material, had already approached Zhou Ning.
"No, that’s all. I will take Mr. Xia and the materials he printed and go directly to the modeling schools and agencies in Qindao. Since we think this individual might be a model, we’ll start searching in that direction. Given such height, it’s rare to find in other professions. The few people we’ve found really don’t seem to match at all."
Zhou Ning nodded and glanced at Xia Momo.
"I trust Mr. Xia’s judgment. These three are still the key search targets. It’s not just about having height and physique in this line of work; looks are essential. With natural shortcomings, people naturally seek other methods, and nowadays, many opt for cosmetic surgery."
Liu Yufei shook the material in her hand and nodded earnestly.
"Rest assured, Director Zhou, I’m taking this case seriously. We’ve also put people on Zhang Bo and Mrs. Zhang. We’re going to check his ex-girlfriend now. Although no images were left on the surveillance, we can still find traces."
After speaking, Liu Yufei left. Zhou Ning led the others to Autopsy Room No. 2. The bodies of the two children were now placed on two autopsy tables, and their cold temperature could be felt as one drew near.
Indeed, after a night of freezing and thawing, some previously undetected changes had appeared on their bodies. On the outer side of the upper arm, there were large swathes of reticulated bruises, dense and intricate, easily mistaken for a single bruise if not inspected closely. However, these marks were clearly left by a window screen.
Zhou Ning lifted the girl’s arm, and Mr. Zhao, holding a camera, came over and quickly took pictures.
"These are marks from the arm striking a screen window!"
Zhou Ning didn’t say anything, while Liu Yongxin nodded.
"It seems so, but the location is a bit peculiar. Typically, impact sites are on the outer side of the elbow or the lower side of the forearm, because people instinctively raise their arms to protect their heads in dangerous situations, similar to blinking—an instinctual reflex, unrelated to age.
"For this little girl, on the outer side of the upper arm, such a large child, weighing barely over twenty pounds, it would be hard for her own weight to bounce off an invisible screen and leave such extensive marks."
Liu Yongxin did not continue, but everyone present knew what he left unsaid—that someone must have forcibly pushed the child against the screen window to leave such marks.
Zhou Ning’s examination did not pause. The girl had a faint imprint of a collar around her neck, and the boy had a horizontal bruise on his forehead that looked like a purple-red line. No other marks were found, especially on the wrists and ankles. Zhou Ning looked up and around until his eyes met Sun Gaotie.
"Are there any test reports we haven’t seen yet?"
"Yes, the reports for the oral cavity and under the nails of the deceased have come out. No foreign DNA was found in the oral cavity, but DNA from Mrs. Zhang and Zhang Bo was found under the nails, though no skin tissue was present. Mrs. Cui said this doesn’t really mean much."
Zhou Ning understood it all without a word and gestured for Zhu Xingxing and the others to turn over the two children’s bodies, so they were face down on the autopsy tables. As they turned the girl over, those around her autopsy table let out gasps of surprise.
"Ah, bruises!"
Zhou Ning quickly moved closer and saw that indeed there was an odd-shaped bruise on the girl’s back, resembling a snowball hitting the center and spreading outwards. Seeing this mark, Zhou Ning’s breath hitched.
