Chapter 70: The Case of 'Imprisonment'!

"Hahaha!"

"Interesting, kids these days are so precocious!"

On the roof of a residential building next to the vegetable market, Uncle Wang tilted his head, pinning his phone between his ear and shoulder, and slowly lowered his binoculars while sighing.

"Old Wang, where are you? Why don't I see you?"

Er Dan's voice came from the phone.

He looked around the scene but didn't see anyone, so he asked curiously.

"I'm on the roof of Old Niu's house. This guy still has the habit of leaving his key under the flowerpot by the door."

"What!?"

"You went into his house? His house has already been rented out!"

Uncle Wang was stunned, then turned around and stood on the second floor, leaning over to look into the courtyard.

When he saw a red dress on the clothesline, his heart skipped a beat.

Old Niu's wife had died long ago, his son was working hard in the provincial capital, and his daughter-in-law certainly wouldn't come to live here alone.

"When did this happen?"

"It was rented out last month. Get out of there quickly, don't get mistaken for a thief!"

"Right, right, right!"

Uncle Wang glanced inside the house, then quickly headed down the stairs, running toward the courtyard gate in great strides.

Just then.

The sound of crying suddenly rang out from inside the house.

"Mom!!! Dad!!!"

"Waaaah!"

Uncle Wang paused mid-step, thinking to himself that he was in trouble.

The child in the house must have been frightened by a stranger like him.

It wasn't right to just leave while the child kept crying, but going in to explain might scare the child even more.

He was instantly caught in a dilemma.

"What's wrong? Why is there a child crying?"

Helplessly, he explained the current situation.

"What should we do then? Maybe call the police? That way we can clear things up."

"Call the police!?"

He had specifically avoided the scene and gone to the trouble of climbing onto Old Niu's roof just to avoid any entanglement with the police. Calling them now was absolutely out of the question!

"No way!"

He refused immediately, and then Chen Mo's face popped into his mind.

After saying a quick goodbye, he hurriedly hung up the phone.

"Xiao Chen, do me a favor."

A moment later.

Chen Mo, who was about to head back to the police station, turned back.

The first thing he said upon meeting was, "Something's not right with you!"

He had personally said he wouldn't come to watch, yet he had snuck over anyway.

"Hehe," Uncle Wang rubbed his face, looking a bit embarrassed.

For a moment, he didn't know how to explain.

His expression was like this: ^_".

"Mom!"

"Waaaah!"

The sound of crying came from inside the house once again.

Chen Mo raised an eyebrow.

"I didn't break in. This is a friend's house, but I didn't know he had rented it out. Here's the key."

"I think I scared the tenant's child."

Chen Mo thought to himself that Uncle Wang was indeed unlucky.

He couldn't even watch a scene in peace. This time there was no case, but he almost got mistaken for a thief.

"I'm a bit exhausted."

As he spoke, he sat down on a stone stool to the side and looked up at the sky.

Who would have thought that the period of greatest ups and downs in life wouldn't be during the struggles of youth...

...but during retirement.

Day after day, this was more mentally draining than when he was working.

Fortunately, Xiao Chen was here to back him up this time; otherwise, he would have inevitably ended up giving another statement at the station.

"I'll go in and comfort the child first."

Chen Mo stepped inside and pushed open the living room door; the sounds of crying and sobbing grew louder.

He determined the direction and walked into the room on the left.

However, this crying didn't sound like the kind from facing a bad person; it sounded more like a cry of grief.

—Creeeak.

He pushed open the half-closed door.

The scene inside made his breath hitch.

There was a person lying on the bed and another on the floor. A five or six-year-old girl was clutching a doll, large teardrops streaming down her cheeks. One of her hands pulled at her mother's hand on the floor as she cried and tried to pull her up. But seeing the woman's pale face, Chen Mo knew she was likely dead.

He then looked at the middle-aged man on the bed. The man's eyes were closed, he reeked of alcohol, and blood was oozing from his body from top to bottom.

It looked as if countless small holes had been drilled into him with an electric drill, and blood was seeping out of every single one.

He stepped forward and was about to reach out to check for breath when he discovered that the man's entire body was almost completely covered in steel nails.

His eyes, mouth, stomach, and even his limbs were pierced with iron nails that glinted with a cold silver light.

The nails were embedded so deeply that they wouldn't have been noticed without getting close.

[New melon 'Imprisonment' detected. Consume it?]

[Melon Name]: Imprisonment.

[Mission Rating]: C-.

[Mission Reward]: 1-9,000 melon points.

[Mission Deadline]: 24 hours (countdown started).

C-?

Does that mean above D+ but below C?

Whatever. C-rank cases aren't that easy to come by anyway.

As long as it's above D-rank, he'll take it.

"Little sister, I'm a police officer. Can you tell me what happened?"

As he asked, he sent a text to Long Hao, who replied with an "OK" instantly since it was near the start of the shift.

"Mom, don't leave me."

The little girl just kept crying and said nothing.

He was already mentally prepared for this outcome.

After all, she was only about five years old. Even adults find the death of their parents hard to accept, let alone a child.

Helpless, he could only softly comfort her while patting her small back.

He didn't know if the gesture would help, but in his previous life, he'd seen mothers on the subway do this to soothe crying children.

"Mom doesn't want Xixi anymore, and Dad doesn't want Xixi either."

Lin Xixi threw down her doll and threw herself into Chen Mo's arms, crying loudly.

Before long, the T-shirt on his chest was soaked with tears.

Looking at the middle-aged woman lying on the floor, Chen Mo's brow furrowed slightly.

Because he saw many injuries on her.

There were new injuries, and many old ones that hadn't healed yet.

He turned back to look at the fists of the man lying on the bed, whose body was covered in nails.

There was blood on them, likely belonging to Xixi's mother on the floor.

So?

Did they have a conflict and get into a fight?

"Waaaah."

No.

The child's crying kept echoing in his ears, making it impossible for him to calm down and think.

He'd better wait until Captain Long arrived with his team.

At the door, Uncle Wang felt a headache coming on as he listened to the crying from inside.

It's just comforting a child, why is she crying harder and harder?

As expected, young people just lack experience!

He considered whether he should step in himself.

But he was afraid of making things worse.

After all, the child started crying because he suddenly appeared in her home.

Just as he was thinking, sirens wailed in the distance.

Wuu-waa, wuu-waa.

Looking toward the entrance of the vegetable market, he saw three police cars speeding toward them.

"Where did another case happen? These are troubled times."

He muttered with a sigh.