Chapter 13 Campus Forum
The "campus forum" is a virtual forum used by students at the university where the incident occurred. Its content is very lightly regulated and is usually discussed by fans of celebrities, with few people paying attention.
But that morning, a post titled "Is it a policeman or a murderer?" caused a huge sensation on campus and even on many social media platforms with large user bases.
The post was divided into two parts. The first part was the poster's account of his detailed eavesdropping on the task force's analysis process, while the second part was a video.
In the first few minutes of the video, nothing can be seen. One can only hear a man talking to himself, but the content of his speech is more explosive than expected. Soon after the voice stops, some light appears on the dark screen, and then a figure appears.
The person who spoke was suddenly Wang Zheng.
The students were actually not unfamiliar with Wang Zheng. When the task force left early in the morning, hundreds of students gathered in front of the auditorium, so he was recognized the moment the video was posted on the forum.
And the most surprising thing in the entire post is the video in which Wang Zheng describes himself as the murderer and the process of committing the crime.
The whole thing fermented very quickly, and by the time Huamei received the news, it had actually already caused a sensation on campus.
"Why are you so careless?" Huamei frowned, looking unhappy.
"This matter can be big or small..." Gu Xia was also in a depressed mood, and his voice was particularly low: "Now that the Internet is so developed, it will soon cause a bad impact on society. We must take some measures."
"Do you think it will be effective?" Wang Zheng's expression was relaxed. He knew very well that the measures taken by Gu Xia were nothing more than deleting the online posts, or even using some tough measures to force the poster to repost a clarification post.
"This is the best way." Gu Xia continued: "Now is the stage of investigation and evidence collection. This will make it difficult for us to collect evidence."
"What if I don't think so?" Wang Zheng suddenly said, "I still don't know the murderer's motive or method, but there is no doubt that the murderer's method is something that no one can imitate. I think there are two reasons why he pursues the ultimate method of committing the crime."
"First, he is a perfectionist and is used to doing everything to perfection."
"Secondly, he doesn't bother to imitate, let alone let others imitate him. If the media comes out to confuse people at this time, I think he is likely to commit crimes again!"
"Then we should solve this problem." Gu Xia disagreed with Wang Zheng's proposal. "We have no clues now. If the murderer commits a crime again, it will be difficult for us to catch him."
"I agree with Professor Gu Xia's proposal." Huamei advised: "Wang Zheng, if you are exposed at this time, it will increase the difficulty for us to handle the case, and... the identity of the deceased is not that simple."
"Huh?" Wang Zheng was a little confused.
"The deceased, Chen Shuai, was 19 years old and a student at Southwest University." Huamei said this and suddenly changed the subject: "But when I went to check the student's psychological files today, I checked his address book by the way. Guess what I found? His father is the secretary of the Provincial Party Committee of our Southwest Province!"
"Provincial Party Committee... I understand. If Lao Zhang takes charge personally, nothing good will happen." Gu Xia seemed to understand something and sighed, "I still insist. Let's eliminate the negative impact first and then continue with the case."
"It's too late." Wang Zheng shook his head. "The Internet is more developed now than you might think. A piece of hot news will spread through various platforms within ten minutes. The more you block it, the more likely it is to arouse public curiosity."
"We have a network team." Gu Xia said confidently.
"Professor Gu, I ask you to believe me this time. After this case is exposed, I believe more cases will surface." Wang Zheng looked at Gu Xia sincerely and said.
“What do you mean…?” Gu Xia guessed something and suddenly felt a chill down his spine.
"That's right." Wang Zheng nodded and said, "The murderer was able to use this special method to remove the deceased's ribs, which proves that this is definitely not an isolated case. The murderer must have rich surgical experience and had some contact with the deceased and had gained the deceased's trust. Otherwise, it would be difficult for him to succeed so easily."
"Okay." Gu Xia nodded, agreeing to Wang Zheng's request.
"Let's go through the campus posts first."
Wang Zheng stretched out his hand to Huamei, who rolled her eyes several times, but finally couldn't resist Wang Zheng's gaze and took out the tablet computer she had been trying out from her bag.
As soon as the computer was turned on, the content of the post was displayed on it. It was basically the same as what Huamei said, except that the number of people who replied to the post exceeded 100,000 within a few hours.
In addition to college students, netizens from all over the country flocked to the site.
"Is this Young Master Murong the one who posted?" Gu Xia pointed at an unusually active user on the screen and asked.
Wang Zheng nodded, then began to stare at the messages without saying a word. He seemed afraid of overlooking something, so he would stay on each message for a few seconds until he was sure that there was nothing he wanted, and then he would slide the scroll wheel to turn to the next page of messages.
Soon it was late at night. Huamei and Bai Ling found a corner to rest, while Wang Zheng and Gu Xia were still staring at the forum. In the whole day, they had only read less than half of the replies, and most of them were meaningless. Some were even registered specifically to curse people.
"Take a break." Gu Xia patted Wang Zheng's shoulder, walked to the window alone, and lit a cigarette. "Do you really think this post is useful?"
Wang Zheng nodded, reached out for a cigarette, and said silently: "Although the Internet is virtual and messy, it often exposes some useful information. Instead of looking for clues aimlessly, why not give it a try."
"The murderer left very few clues." Gu Xia sighed.
"Yes." Wang Zheng sighed, "At first I thought it was a revenge killing, but after empathy, I don't think so. In my opinion, the murderer seemed to be specifically after something on the deceased, so the deceased's behavior of changing clothes, I suspect, is to satisfy some quirks of the murderer."
"Then why didn't the murderer deal with the body?" Gu Xia was a little puzzled. "According to the time of death, when the perpetrator arrived at the crime scene, the victim had been dead for more than two hours. The murderer should have had enough time to disguise the body and send it away."
"I think the murderer deliberately left the body at the crime scene." Wang Zheng thought, "The murderer's behavior is like when we watch TV dramas, every time a supporting character dies, the scene always flashes by, and only our brain reacts to the death message, but our eyes don't see it."
"What do you mean?" Gu Xia became confused.
"Hearing is deceiving, seeing is believing." Wang Zheng said, "The murderer may just want to see with his own eyes that the deceased died in a stage play style. This will not only satisfy his own psychological needs, but also allow him to take away the deceased's belongings."
"What a pervert." Gu Xia shook his head and pressed the cigarette butt firmly on the windowsill.
"It's really perverted." Wang Zheng also crushed the cigarette butt. "The clues we have now are very messy. Not only do we need to sort them out, but we also need new clues."
Ding Dong!
While the two were talking, Huamei's tablet suddenly rang. This was a reminder software she had specially set up. As long as someone replied, a reminder tone would automatically be heard, making it convenient for Wang Zheng to monitor the activities on the forum.
"What a bunch of night owls." Wang Zheng smiled bitterly, turned around and looked at the tablet screen, but his expression suddenly turned ugly.
"What's wrong?" Gu Xia asked quickly.
"The moderator who posted the message seems to be in danger." Wang Zheng pointed at a new message.
At the bottom of the forum, there was indeed a new reply from Young Master Murong, with only two words on it, "Help!".
