Chapter 288: Damn… That’s Twisted

“Huh?” A look of shock and confusion appeared on Jiang Xin’s face. “Officer, what are you talking about?”

“The price of everything in this world keeps going up, except for people.” Xiao Yu’s smile vanished, and he looked coldly at Jiang Xin. “They just keep getting cheaper and cheaper.”

“Uh!”

Jiang Xin froze, genuinely stunned this time.

“There was a time when all I wanted was to catch every bad guy out there,” Xiao Yu said, shifting his gaze to the crimson morning sun on the horizon. “To make the world a little cleaner, the air a little fresher, and maybe even some people a little purer. But back then, I turned into a monster, a machine, I didn’t even know what I had become.”

In his past life, even Xiao Yu himself didn’t know what he had turned into.

“Officer, I don’t understand what you’re saying.” Snapping back to her senses, Jiang Xin looked at Xiao Yu with a hint of fear. “If there’s nothing else, I—”

“Can you tell me how you managed to chop a living person into nine pieces with just nine strokes?” Xiao Yu turned his head to look at her, his smile carrying a hint of mockery. “And, how did you make three living people maintain such an ecstatic, blissful, and satisfied expression right before they died? I’ve racked my brain trying to figure it out, but I just can’t. Oh, right. Before I came to see you, I ran an experiment. I have to say, that double you hired is useless. I had him take a bone-cleaving knife and show me how to split a beef shank. It took him four strokes to get through it. Tell me, isn’t he a total waste?”

“Huh? What double? What beef shank?”

Jiang Xin appeared terrified, lowering her head as if gripped by fear.

But the moment her head dipped, her eyes—once filled with a sheen of panic—flashed with coldness and killing intent.

“The fact that I’m standing in front of you, saying all this,” Xiao Yu’s tone dripped with mockery.

“What’s the point of keeping up your disguise? Do you think all the clues can’t be traced back to you? That none of the evidence connects to you? Or that having someone else take the fall for those cases means you can sit back and relax?” he added.

“Isn’t that the case?” 

Jiang Xin slowly raised her head, her expression cold and calm. Her eyes gleamed with an icy light as she stared directly at Xiao Yu. 

“You’re not wearing a recording device, are you? And you came here alone, didn’t you? Even if you know everything, what can you possibly do to me?”

“Hah, do you think I’m beneath you?” Xiao Yu let out a derisive laugh. “So, you’ve admitted it?”

“Admitted what?” Jiang Xin laughed as well, countering with a question of her own. “There are no clues, no evidence, nothing. What am I supposed to admit to?”

“Evidence? Clues? Denial?” Xiao Yu grinned, baring his teeth, and shook his head. “Not necessary. As long as we name you as a suspect, the police will nail you down for life.”

Jiang Xin’s body jolted violently, as though struck by lightning, her face turning rigid.

Her eyes flashed with a fierce and unmistakable killing intent.

After a long pause, the murderous glint in her eyes faded. Looking at Xiao Yu with a complex expression, she asked, “How did you find me out?”

“Do you remember that day when we talked at the clinic?” Xiao Yu didn’t hold back. “When you walked me out, we happened to run into Liu Yunwei. At first, I didn’t pay much attention to him. He’s not the kind of man who stands out. But just as I was about to leave, something about his demeanor suddenly changed. It was a certain aura, one I found oddly familiar. Yet, when we went to apprehend him later, that aura was completely gone.”

“That puzzled me,” Xiao Yu continued. “An aura is typically something innate or cultivated over time. Once formed, it’s difficult to make it disappear. But in Liu Yunwei’s case, that aura was gone as if it never existed.

“Then, I noticed something interesting. It seemed like someone deliberately shaped that aura in Liu Yunwei, but he himself resisted it. Yet, he couldn’t defy that person. So, when he was around them—maybe out of habit, or perhaps fear—he had no choice but to display that deliberately cultivated aura.”

At this point, Xiao Yu’s gaze turned cold as he stared at the stunned Jiang Xin. “There were only four people present that day. Aside from the receptionist who is now dead, that leaves only you. You’re the one who gave him that perfect aura, weren’t you?”

Jiang Xin’s expression shifted repeatedly as she locked eyes with Xiao Yu. 

After a long pause, she sneered, “I thought he was smart. Turns out, he’s just a useless fool.”

“No, he’s actually quite intelligent,” Xiao Yu replied calmly, shaking his head. “He just wasn’t a perfectionist. That’s not who he was. And yet, you insisted on molding him into that type of person. Did you really think that was possible?”

“Exactly.” To Xiao Yu’s surprise, Jiang Xin agreed with him. “That’s why he was only fit to be a stand-in, to take the fall for me and die quietly.”

“Why kill them?” Xiao Yu fixed his eyes on hers.

“The answer is simple,” Jiang Xin replied nonchalantly. “At the time, I did like him, so his girlfriend had to die. Jiang Xiuran liked me, so he had to die too. Yu Xue had a fling with him, so she definitely had to die. The things I like, no one else can touch. The people I don’t like can’t touch me either. And since Liu Yunwei made a mistake, he has to die now as well.”

Xiao Yu’s mind froze.

No, he wasn’t just stunned—he was shaken by what she had said.

The things you like, if others touch them, they have to die?

If someone likes you but you don’t like them, they have to die too?

The things you like, if they touch someone else, they also have to die?

And in the end, even the things you like have to die alongside them?

‘Damn, that’s twisted.’

As Xiao Yu stood there in a daze, an intense sense of danger suddenly overwhelmed him. Every nerve in his body screamed, warning him of imminent peril.

It was the kind of danger that made him feel like a child walking a tightrope, on the verge of falling and shattering into pieces.

And then, he saw Jiang Xin.

Somehow, at some point, she had stepped right in front of him.

“You have to die too.” Her expression was calm as she spoke. “As long as you’re dead, no one else will ever know.”

Xiao Yu, “…”

‘Seriously? Did I manage to make her hate me so much I’m next on the list?’

He realized something very bad at that moment.

Just now, he’d been completely caught up in Jiang Xin’s words, distracted by her reasoning. He hadn’t even noticed when she had approached him.

The most frustrating part? As Jiang Xin spoke, she silently pulled out a scalpel and aimed it directly at his abdomen.