Chapter 403: Clues Begin to Emerge 

J City, a residential building.

Building 43, Unit 2, Room 302—suspect Che Yu’s family home.

Before college, Che Yu lived here with his parents in a modest two-bedroom apartment.

At this moment, the elderly couple sat in the living room, sobbing in each other’s arms.

After Che Yu’s suicide, the police immediately informed the family.

Per regulations, once a death was confirmed by medical personnel, the relevant departments must verify the identity and notify the next of kin as soon as possible. However, in some cases, especially involving abnormal deaths or a lack of leads, notifications were not always made right away. Especially if verifying the deceased’s identity proved difficult.

Two Group Two members were currently speaking with the grieving parents, trying to gather information on who Che Yu had interacted with in the days before his death.

The focus now was: Where did Che Yu learn Muay Thai?

The person who taught him might be the real suspect.

At the same time, the five-year-old family massacre was being reopened for investigation.

As Xiao Yu had deduced. If both recent and past cases were part of the same sinister, ritualistic string of murders, then it was very likely that the same person committed both. And the motive was clear: to extend one’s life.

“After speaking with the suspect’s parents, they said Che Yu had been interested in Muay Thai since high school. But they didn’t know who had taught him. They only remembered that one night five years ago, Che Yu didn’t come home. When he returned the next day, he seemed deeply shaken and fell ill for a whole week before recovering. Cross-checking the dates, that just so happens to match the timeframe of the massacre five years ago. It’s very likely Che Yu was connected to that case back then.”

A Group Two team member gave their report to Xiao Yu and Wang Dong.

“He was only in high school at the time, wasn’t he?” Wang Dong frowned.

“That’s not unusual.” Xiao Yu didn’t find it strange at all. “Che Yu would’ve been fifteen or sixteen then. There’ve been plenty of murderers younger than that.”

To quote something from his past life:

At fifteen, I already had a ‘mature weapon’ and could fight on my own. As for whether that weapon was… proper, who knows?

“Hey, Brother Wang, did you have a girlfriend back then?” Xiao Yu grinned mischievously, his look toward Wang Dong clearly teasing.

“Me?” Wang Dong straightened his back proudly. “Back in the day, I was suave and handsome. The girls were all over me. Couldn’t keep them away.”

‘Tsk tsk tsk. Look at this guy, acting all smug.’

Xiao Yu gave him a half-smile, not bothering to poke holes in the boasting.

Seeing that look, Wang Dong’s face flushed a little red. He knew his bragging had gone a bit off-track. Still, he felt it was a tasteful kind of exaggeration.

After all, what man doesn’t enjoy puffing up his feathers once in a while?

“Are you the one going off-topic here?” Wang Dong quickly shifted the blame to Xiao Yu. “So what’s next?”

“Keep digging.” Xiao Yu shrugged. “Since we’ve gotten this far, we have to find out who taught Che Yu Muay Thai. His family doesn’t know, but his classmates probably do. Come on, we’ve all been through that age. We know how that mindset works.”

Wang Dong nodded.

Just like earlier, guys love to show off. Especially when they’re young.

Back in the day, if Che Yu really learned some solid moves, there’s no way he wouldn’t have shown off to his classmates.

So the investigation turned to Che Yu’s high school years. Specifically, classmates who had been close to him.

And sure enough, they found something.

Several former classmates recalled that back then, Che Yu had indeed been bragging about his Muay Thai. He loved fighting and had gotten really good.

Some were even envious and asked where he learned it from.

Che Yu never gave a clear answer.

He only told them: A big bro took a liking to me and taught me.

“‘Big bro’?”

Xiao Yu savored those two words.

From that phrase alone, he could estimate this so-called ‘big bro’ wasn’t much older than Che Yu. If the age gap were too large, he wouldn’t be called a big bro, but a mister.

So the age difference was likely within ten years.

In other words, five years ago, this person would have been at most twenty-five or twenty-six. Possibly even younger.

That became the next starting point.

If the massacre five years ago and the current ritual killings were connected. And both were carried out as life-extension rituals. Then could this “big bro” be the true culprit behind both?

But realistically, why would someone in their mid-twenties need to extend their life?

Unless something was seriously wrong with their body. Or they were doing it for someone else.

Remember. 

The victims learned of the haunted house’s location from Che Yu. Was it possible that this “big bro” had instructed Che Yu to lure them there?

But Che Yu never imagined he’d become a target too.

He probably realized too late that this “big bro” wasn’t just killing the others; he wanted to kill him as well.

So Che Yu ran. Hid.

If that was the case, the pieces fit together. And it confirmed Xiao Yu’s earlier theory: Someone used the Golden Cicada Shedding Its Shell misdirection method.

At the time of the crime, it wasn’t just six people present. It was eight.

Big Bro, Che Yu, and the six victims.

That “big bro” must’ve been hiding in the shadows while Che Yu and the others filmed the Plate Spirit game.

Then the killing began.

If the theory holds, maybe Che Yu was the one who killed two of them. Then the candles went out. Total darkness. That was when “Big Bro” emerged and killed the remaining four.

In that chaos, Che Yu realized something was very wrong and fled.

If this line of reasoning is correct…

Xiao Yu felt a chill crawl down his spine.

‘What a meticulous plan.’

This “big bro” clearly had a frighteningly high IQ. He left no trace behind in either the current case or the one from five years ago.

If Xiao Yu hadn’t been suspicious about Che Yu’s suicide, hadn’t dug back into the old case and rediscovered the signs of ritual sacrifice, hadn’t followed the trail from Che Yu to this mysterious “big bro”…

These two cases might’ve become cold files.

One would be ruled a family massacre. The other dismissed as a supernatural tragedy.

To orchestrate all that… what kind of mind does it take?

As he digested these grim possibilities, Xiao Yu forced himself to suppress all negative emotions.

The real question now was—how do you find this “big bro”?

If the motive was life extension, then the one most desperate to live was someone already close to death. So Xiao Yu decided to keep digging through Che Yu’s past. Investigating everyone he had interacted with.

Who among them was seriously ill? Who was dying?

That would lead them straight to the truth.