Chapter 663: Embalmer
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
It was just past four in the morning, and Zhao Yu was in police car, speeding towards Xiang Ling in Bai Ling City. Although Zhao Yu had not slept the entire night, he was alert and extremely excited.
This was because he had just received a great lead! The police had already contacted the head of the funeral parlor in Xiang Ling, who had verified that there was an embalmer that looked like Li Fei staying in their funeral parlor!
According to the head of the funeral parlor, although their funeral parlor was a national nonprofit, due to the lack of experienced embalmers who were available in the workforce in the recent years, they had no choice but to hire externally. One of these hires had been the person who looked like Li Fei.
The head of the funeral parlor said that the person’s name was Xia Lianxi, and that he was in his sixties. This so-called Xia Lianxi claimed that he was a retired embalmer, who used to work at Le Ping Funeral Parlor. He claimed that, after retiring, he had returned to his hometown to get a part-time job. Hence, he went in for the interview and got his current position.
The head of the parlor said that he had good workmanship. In fact, not only were the families of the deceased happy with his work, the higher ups in the funeral parlor even looked upon him with favor. However, regarding the procurement of the Hydrazine Enamine, the head of the parlor had no idea about it!
Receiving such news, it no doubt gave Zhao Yu and his team reassurance that they were indeed on the right track!
We must be right this time!
So… Mr. Xia Lianxi…Who are you really?
Li Fei must have used this name when he worked temporarily in Le Ping Funeral Parlor back then too. Plus, from the testimony given by the head of the funeral parlor, it looked like Li Fei might have procured the donation of the Hydrazine Enamine without the acknowledgement of the funeral parlor!
But, why would he do this behind their backs? Could it be that the b*stard was really researching about how to turn dead bodies into resin dolls?
The head of the funeral parlor said that Xia Lianxi rented a single story house near the funeral parlor. He apparently lived a secluded life. He didn’t seem to have any friends, and, as his work always kept him busy, he mostly slept over at the funeral parlor.
It was common knowledge that the funeral parlor would take in the deceased the night before the funeral, then have the body cremated the very next morning. Apparently, Xia Lianxi had worked during the night before. Everyone wondered if he had return home yet. If not, he may still be there!
Of course, the police detectives were fully armed and prepared just in case. Captain Sun had divided his men into two groups, intending to close in on both locations, his home and the funeral parlor!
Tsk tsk…
Still in the police car, Zhao Yu felt the car speeding up as he caught a glimpse on the sun that was slowly rising in the sky. He was anxious and had a strange feeling.
Although he was getting closer to the moment when he would finally arrest the murderer, which people had been anticipating for twenty years, Zhao Yu still felt that something was not quite right.
Why would he be in a funeral parlor?
And, why does it have to be a funeral parlor that is so close to Bai Ling?
In Zhao Yu’s prediction, he had imagined that Li Fei was someone who would hide in an unknown luxurious house and carry out his hidden wicked business in the shadows there! Although a funeral parlor was a place that aligned with Li Fei’s temperament, being an embalmer was an occupation that required one to constantly expose himself to the public. As there were so many people who came and went in a funeral parlor, it no doubt increased the danger of his identity being exposed.
Tsk tsk…
Was there some hidden reason why he had chosen the occupation of an embalmer?
Was it because the occupation allowed him to get in touch with dead bodies more often, so that he could conduct more experiments?
Or, maybe he did it to be near the cremation equipment, so that he could easily destroy evidence…
The moment Zhao Yu thought about destroying evidence, he couldn’t help but think of another difficult facet to this conundrum. Sine Li Fei wasn’t insane like Tao Xiang, he just might not be persuaded to admit to his crimes. This could be very problematic, as there wasn’t any direct evidence for the Headless Female Corpses Case that could prove that Li Fei was the murderer!
Of course, this could be dealt with later. Right now, their main concern was to arrest Li Fei!
Xiang Ling was neither too big nor too small of a city. There were only two main highways that ran through it. As the funeral parlor was a place that cremated dead bodies, it naturally couldn’t be built within the city. Hence, when the police detectives entered the suburban region of Xiang Ling, they could immediately see the towering and puffing chimney of the funeral parlor.
Captain Sun was a very experienced policeman. So, in order not to alert his enemy, he made careful arrangements with his men. He first told them to surround the place, then instructed them to rush towards the funeral parlor altogether.
At the same time, the people who were supposed to close in on Li Fei’s home were ready and waiting. Both groups of people bombarded their targets simultaneously.
Zhao Yu’s specific role as team leader provided that he naturally didn’t have to participate in the movement. So, he waited in the car.
After about ten minutes had passed, Zhao Yu suddenly realized that something must have gone awry. According to his own experience, they should be able to simply arrest someone in two minutes tops! However, it had been ten minutes, so there obviously was a problem!
As expected, Captain Sun returned to the car after a few more minutes, clearly in distress. He told Zhao Yu that they didn’t find their target in the funeral parlor or Li Fei’s house!
“D*mn it!” Zhao Yu was beyond disappointed. As they had the element of surprise working in their favor, he couldn’t figure out what had gone wrong.
What is going on?
“Team Leader Zhao,” Captain Sun said regretfully, “We entered the embalmer’s workshop just now and saw the dead body that the head of the funeral parlor was talking about, the client from last night that he had been working on the for parlor officially. From the looks of the dead body, he appears to have already finished the job and left! However, we are checking the surveillance video in hopes of finding out more clues!”
“Can we locate him via his phone’s GPS?” Zhao Yu asked.
“He turned off his phone, so we couldn’t locate him!” Captain Sun said. “Team Leader Zhao, I’m worried that Li Fei was on his way home when we were surrounding his house! If that is the case, he might have spotted us and fled! We have to hurry and expand the scope of our search area!”
“Don’t panic!” Zhao Yu quickly waved his hand and said, “We shouldn’t be panic at such a crucial moment! Tell the group who is at Li Fei’s house to stay vigilant. I’ll go in and check out this place first!”
Then, Zhao Yu quickly walked into the funeral parlor and checked it out. As he was worried that Li Fei would hide in some hidden corner of the funeral parlor, he immediately activated a device called Life Detector.
The device could detect all signs of life that happened to be nearby. If Li Fei really were hiding there, he wouldn’t be able to escape its detection!
Also, since Zhao Yu knew that Li Fei was a thief, he checked places like the ventilation ducts and so forth. In the end, he even checked the air conditioned morgue drawers!
However, after checking the whole place, the Detector didn’t emit a single peep! It seemed that Li Fei was really not there!
“Police officers, have you found him yet?” When Zhao Yu left the funeral parlor, the head of the funeral parlor brought a few associates to the scene.
Before Captain Sun could reply, a police officer ran over and shouted at the head of the funeral parlor, “What’s going on here? Besides the one in the main reception hall for memorial services upstairs, none of your other surveillance cameras seem to be working!”
“Oh! I’m so sorry. There was a huge truck that sent goods over two days ago. They accidentally broke the cable, and we have yet to repair it!” After the head of the funeral parlor replied, he suddenly realized something, so he quickly asked, “Why would you need those anyway? Is he not here? Then, he must be at his home! Police officer, who is this Xia Lianxi?”
“Sir, I saw that the hearse is gone!” A worker from the funeral parlor had just noticed the absence of their company vehicle. “Do you think Xia drove it away?”
“Eh? Yeah…” the head of the funeral parlor said. “Fellow police officers, Master Xia often drives our hearses!”
“Hearses?” Zhao Yu creased his eyebrows and asked, “Didn’t you say that he lives somewhere nearby? Why would he drive and not just walk?”
“Mm… He says he often goes back to his old neighborhood or something like that. Sometimes, he would even takes the hearse for a whole day or two,” the head of the funeral parlor replied.
Sh*t!
Zhao Yu quivered, as he suddenly thought of their theory of his transporting corpses a thousand miles away!