Xue Yunxin felt like these twenty minutes were the longest in her life.
She could now understand why she felt like she was sitting on a bed of nails.
“Have you seen the news recently…”
“You’re referring to that ‘Jack’, right? These events have had everyone spooked. Each rumor spread by the students is worse than the last.” Jiang Qinglan bit the straw just within Xue Yunxin’s line of sight.
She’d just mentioned that she was a professor at North City University, and the victim was a student there…perhaps she knew Chen Xiaoyun?
“Let me ask, do you know Chen Xiaoyun?”
“Chen Xiaoyun, the girl who was killed?”
“You know her!” Xue Yunxin, in a sudden burst of excitement, nearly lept out of her chair. This ‘Jack’ had strung them along for a month, the crime scenes all completely clean. The last victim had been killed in their own home, the scene showed no signs of a struggle, and there were no fingerprints. Even the murder weapon was missing. The victim’s tongue and teeth had been plucked out, the legs and arms cut off and placed in a pot to boil into soup. When the police arrived, the smell that greeted them was not, in fact, the smell of bloodied flesh, but the pleasant aroma of meat.
Thinking back to that moment, Xue Yunxin’s whole body shivered. What kind of person could do something like that?
“I don’t, I just heard the name mentioned by the crowd of onlooking students.”
“Ah, true, she studied Information Engineering, not German.”
“Did you know, the words left behind by Jack, they’re German.”
“What did you…just say? The words left behind by Jack?”
“Weibo is going crazy about it. You haven’t seen it?” Jiang Qinglan took out her phone, finding the Weibo post to give Xue Yunxin a look.
“…I thought it was French. What does it mean?”
“For my true love.”
“What?”
“For my true love. That’s the meaning. I am a German teacher, after all.” Jiang Qinglan said with pride: “This much I can say with confidence.”
For my true love? Ah…it couldn’t be the so-called relapsing chuunibyou?
“Thank you, Qinglan! This could be a breakthrough. I have to leave, I was only given twenty minutes.” Xue Yunxin stood up. Her time was up, and since she now knew the meaning of the note, there was a lead at last: “Thank you. Once this case wraps up, I’ll treat you to a meal!” With these words, Xue Yunxin ran out of the shop, completely missing the inexplicable smile on the person behind her.
“Uncle Chen! I’m back!” Xue Yunxin crossed the security tape, running up to Chen Kun.
“Mnnn…just on time. How was the chat with your little classmate?”
“Fruitful. Qinglan is a professor of German at North City University. She helped me translate the note left by Jack.”
“Xiao Yun, I know you want to solve the case. But you and your classmate only talked about murderers instead of boyfriends. It’s no wonder you don’t have friends.” Chen Kun felt a vague sense of frustration. He’d given her twenty minutes, but she’d gone and rambled about murderers with a classmate she hadn’t seen in ages. Do girls these days not talk about romance and boyfriends, instead having chats about chuunibyou killers?
Chen Kun understood this girl’s disposition only too well. She was just like her father. No matter the situation, both of them were all business. For a man, this was fine, but for this girl, everytime she opened her mouth, all she talked about was murder. At this rate, she’d never get married!
“It was the only suitable topic…” Xue Yunxin felt a little wronged. She’d never been good at talking with others.
“People have already been arranged to check the meaning of the note.”
“For my true love.”
Chen Kun stared at Xue Yunxin, a cigarette in his mouth: “What?”
“The note left behind by Jack means ‘for my true love’.”
“Eh, could it be that his girlfriend dumped him, and now he’s retaliating against society?” Chen Kun blew out a ring of smoke absent-mindedly. This kind of name, Fog-Slicing Jack, was extremely chuunibyou, a name that would bring someone handsome to mind because of trope-filled stories. What the hell kind of name was that?! He disliked it immensely.
“Dumped by a girlfriend? Uncle Chen, what if this Jack is a woman?”
Chen Kun huffed a laugh: “Xiao Yun ah, you’re so smart.” With this said, he left to take care of his own tasks.
Xue Yunxin pondered for a bit, then finally laughed to herself. Right, the first victim was a fat shut-in. His body weight was over two hundred at a glance, and he never left the house to do anything, but his body was discovered next to a river in the city outskirts, far from any traces of civilization. If the killer was a woman, how did she take away the body?
After all, the police had checked all of the surveillance footage nearby, but the deceased was not seen leaving the house. According to his mother, the victim hadn’t even left his room in two years, so leaving the house was out of the question. She would simply put some food out next to his door every day. In the days leading up to the murder, there was no unusual activity. If the police hadn’t notified her, the mother would have even thought he was still in his room.
“Yunxin, come lend a hand!” Li Yang called Xue Yunxin over, holding a body bag.
“What did you and Chief Chen talk about?” Li Yang was carefully putting the corpse into the body bag. He’d also been a policewoman for a while, and nothing could freak him out much anymore. A group of newbies watched from a distance, but none of them dared to come closer.
“Look at those newbies over there. We shouldn’t have brought them with us. Half a day later, and they still don’t dare to come over.” Li Yang and Xue Yunxin wrapped up the body, preparing to put it in the vehicle to bring back to the precinct. They’d sealed off the crime scene, but they couldn’t stop rumors.
“When we were newbies, we were the same. And, they had to deal with something like this just as they started.”
“Our Miss Xue is really too understanding. Chief Chen is making us keep the students under observation tonight. Ai, looks like we won’t be getting any sleep. Say, this Jack, why is he killing people?” Li Yang shook his head, but when he looked at Xue Yunxin, she was staring off, thinking something over.
Li Yang stopped asking his questions, tactfully starting the car and setting off.
Actually, Xue Yunxin had heard Li Yang’s questions, but she just didn’t want to respond. Her mind was completely occupied by that statement: “For my true love.”
It had almost been three months since Xue Yunxin had arrived in North City, and for the first two months, everything had been fine. Only in the past month, with the killer Jack on the loose, did her life have a sense of urgency. And…she’d bumped into Jiang Qinglan!
Jiang Qinglan…
I really wasn’t ready to meet you like that…
Once she and Li Yang returned to the precinct, they submitted some reports, then went back to North City University without a meal break. The students were, surprisingly, normal about the whole thing, going to class and living their lives as they usually did.
This must be what they call “the ups and downs in people’s lives aren’t connected.”1
The sound of Chen Xiaoyun’s parents’ sobbing, their devastated expressions, and especially their appearance as they kneeled on the ground, grabbing at the officers’ uniforms, still echoed in Xue Yunxin’s mind, causing her no small amount of distress.
“This time of life, being a student, really is wonderful.” Li Yang handed Xue Yunxin a cup of coffee: “Here, have some. We won’t be getting any sleep tonight.”
“Thanks.”
“Slow down, be careful you don’t burn yourself. You’re still so formal with me.”
Li Yang leaned on the car door, looking at the students hurrying about: “This makes me think of when we were students.”
Li Yang and Xue Yunxin went to the same university, but Li Yang was two class years above her. Thinking about it, they’d known each other for a while. Back then, Li Yang would always get in fights and cut class, so no one expected Li Yang, that good-for-nothing, would become a police officer.
“It was great to be a student. The only thing you have to worry about is going to class, studying, dating, and the like.”
Xue Yunxin laughed. When she’d been a student, she’d holed up at the library almost every day, not leaving even under pain of death, to the point that, in her almost twenty-seven years, she’d never been in a relationship.
“Hey, look over there, isn’t she pretty? She’s looking at me, too!”
Xue Yunxin followed Li Yang’s gaze and looked over.
Jiang Qinglan…
Jiang Qinglan didn’t wait for Xue Yunxin to finish what she was doing before she walked over.
“Yunxin.” Jiang Qinglan called out her name softly.
“You guys know each other?”
“She’s…my classmate from junior high.”
“Oh! That’s crazy. Hi, I’m Li Yang, from North City’s criminal investigation unit.”
“Jiang Qinglan. Yunxin, you haven’t left yet?” Jiang Qinglan looked at Xue Yunxin. It’d soon be winter, and the days were growing colder and colder. She was quite worried about her big officer.
“The police uniforms aren’t thick enough, let me give you my jacket.” Jiang Qinglan said, taking off her windbreaker to give it to Xue Yunxin. She was only wearing a sweater underneath, wouldn’t she be cold? Xue Yunxin quickly returned the jacket.
“Don’t worry, our uniforms are warm…It’s so late, and you haven’t gone home yet?”
“I had a few extra classes today. When I left just now, I saw you here.” Jiang Qinglan gave her a smile.
Xue Yunxin looked down at her watch: “It’s almost eight o’clock…let me take you home.”
Jiang Qinglan was slightly dazed by the offer, then switched her gaze to Li Yang, looking like she wanted to ask something. However, she responded: “I wouldn’t want to trouble you.”
Understanding Jiang Qinglan’s intentions, Li Yang interjected: “It’s no trouble! How could it be? Xiao Yun, take Jiang Qinglan back in the car. Two girls walking around at night by themselves, this just wouldn’t be safe!”
Xue Yunxin hadn’t had a chance to say anything when Jiang Qinglan agreed for her: “Then, thank you Officer Li. Yunxin, let’s go.”
Jiang Qinglan got in the passenger seat. Xue Yunxin started the car and, with directions from Jiang Qinglan, began to drive her home.
Xue Yunxin was a heavy sufferer of seasonal allergies. While other people’s allergies could make their noses’ stuffy to the point they couldn’t smell anything, Xue Yunxin’s were different. Her nose would start aching at the slightest scent.
“Qinglan ah…Your perfume smells really nice…”
“Hmm? Ah, it’s new. It smells nice?” Jiang Qinglan brought her wrist up to Xue Yunxin’s nose. Of course, she knew Xue Yunxin’s nose wasn’t that good, and her wrist didn’t even have any perfume on it. If you asked her what her intentions were, she’d say that she didn’t have any.
Xue Yunxin sniffed emphatically. There isn’t a scent…it’s probably just a problem with my nose.
Jiang Qinglan’s wrist tickled as Xue Yunxin exhaled a breath. Her eyes curled in delight. How long has it been since the two of them were so intimate?
Jiang Qinglan took her arm back, looking forward. After a long while, she said: “Why did you run off to North City? It wasn’t because you were hiding from me, right?”
“How could you ask something like that?”
“You said it yourself, Yunxin ah. You wouldn’t leave me. But you suddenly disappeared ten years ago, without a word. In my eyes, you’re here because you were avoiding me.”
These words made Xue Yunxin’s heart sink. She abruptly planted a foot on the brake. Fortunately, this section of road only connected to an old residential area, so there weren’t any cars on the road. Otherwise, she’d have been cursed at for sure.
“Don’t worry, I don’t blame you, Yunxin. Even if you killed me, I would never blame you. After all, you’re my Uriel2, the one I love most.”
1 Quote by Lu Xun. Full sentence is “人类的悲欢并不相通， 我只觉得他们吵闹”. I don’t know if there’s an official translation for it, but it’s something like “the ups and downs in people’s lives aren’t connected, I just find them bothersome.” It’s referring to how someone could be celebrating next door to someone who is suffering; the happiest moment of someone’s life and the lowest point of another’s can occur simultaneously.
2 Uriel: An archangel that’s commonly seen holding the “flame of love,” and represents service to the needy. Pretty much, JQL is saying that XYX is the love of her life.