CHAPTER 143: 89. LOVE HAS ALWAYS BEEN SUCH A THRILLING AND BREATHTAKING GAME (10,000 WORDS)_6

If once it was still worth sympathy because of love, then when love begins to be twisted by the darkness inside, love itself becomes nothing more than an excuse for crime.

Love should be the purest and most sacred emotion in this world. If love is hijacked by a twisted heart, then it is no longer love and no longer worthy of cherishing.

Shi Nian felt cold, and hurriedly rubbed her arms with her hands.

In such an August, she felt cold not because the temperature suddenly changed, but because the human heart made her feel chilled.

.

Tang Yanqing took Shi Nian out to the tea room. He took two eggs from the refrigerator, cracked them into a microwave meal box, and then put them in the microwave. When he took them out, they were two steaming poached eggs.

"Eat something." She didn’t miss any subtle little actions of his.

Shi Nian held the convenient fork and lowered her head: "Thank you."

"Mm-hmm," he sat down dissatisfied: "I don’t like hearing you say that."

Shi Nian didn’t know what to say, so she could only hang her head, taking small bites of the poached eggs, slowly finishing them.

He handed her some hot tea again.

Shi Nian hurried to hold it in her palms, the warmth spreading through her hands, slowly filled her whole body, making her feel much better.

She then looked up and asked him: "Mr. Tang, how did you think it was Jack who did it?"

Tang Yanqing gazed into her eyes: "Do you remember he was the first to discover S’s death?"

Shi Nian nodded.

"Then do you remember how he described what he saw to you?"

Shi Nian certainly remembered, and then she slowly repeated it word by word.

He listened contentedly, with a slight smile: "See, his words are full of flaws; every narrative he gave was actually an admission of his true identity as the murderer."

"Why?" Shi Nian was also shocked.

She didn’t hear any flaws at all!

She then recalled Jack’s words from beginning to end once more but still didn’t understand, so she looked to Tang Yanqing for help.

Tang Yanqing smiled: "How about this, you recount the incident where Jack strangled your neck."

Shi Nian’s breathing trembled, she slowly closed her eyes: "...At that moment, I thought I was going to die. I couldn’t breathe, and couldn’t even shout."

His hand gently covered hers, patting the back of her hand softly: "Hey, that’s enough, recalling it to this point is enough."

He didn’t want her to recall such painful memories again.

Shi Nian opened her eyes, slightly startled: "But what does this have to do with the flaws in Jack’s words?"

"See, when you describe such a terrifying event, you first give a subjective emotional description. Because you first want the other party to understand your feelings at that moment, to empathize with you."

Shi Nian nodded.

"But think about it again, Jack didn’t do this. He first said he was going for a morning run, then specifically explained his route downstairs, followed by a detailed description of his feelings in front of Zhou Guanghan’s door—only then did he reach the main point."

Shi Nian squinted her eyes. Indeed, Jack, although appearing panicked, organized his language so methodically and logically.

"So his panic was an act, and his statement was pre-designed. After he committed the crime, he had to let people find out in time, and it was best to be discovered on the morning after S had a conflict with Spicy Girl, to shift suspicion to others."

"But Zhou Guanghan’s room hadn’t been visited for a long time, and he worried others wouldn’t discover it. So, he decided it was better to be the one to discover it himself, this way he could also clear his own suspicion—after all, usually, people’s thinking wouldn’t suspect the discoverer."

Shi Nian nodded: "I remember now, after he spoke upstairs, when everyone in the dorm went down to the 4th floor, he didn’t come down. Zhong Kui said he was scared, but I think he was actually taking the opportunity to avoid police scrutiny."

Tang Yanqing snapped his fingers lightly: "Exactly. Reason and emotion, in dangerous events, only emotion-led narratives are often true, while reason-led narratives are mostly meticulously planned lies."

Shi Nian squinted her eyes: "I’m now very curious, when you recorded his statement later, how did he retell the story of what happened then."

Tang Yanqing satisfactorily smiled: "Smart. It was at that time that I basically confirmed he was the murderer—when facing us, he gave an even more detailed, thorough, and calm account. He even went into detail about getting up in the morning to drink a glass of honey water before washing up in the bathroom."

"He wanted to use fragmented and real details to embellish his subsequent lies, he wanted his narrative to sound real and believable. But in fact, this was just to cover up the truth."

"Then...when he said he saw Marina holding a white candle to Zhou Guanghan’s room, was that a lie meant to lead me, wasn’t it?"

"This is actually not false." A voice answered from the side, and Shi Nian looked up to see that Jia Tianzi had finished questioning and came out looking for something to eat.

Jia Tianzi’s blue eyes stared at the empty meal box in front of Lan Ya: "Poached eggs!"

Shi Nian blushed: "I’m sorry, Mr. Jia, I ate them all."

Jia Tianzi sat down and stuck his tongue out at Tang Yanqing, panting: "Young Master Tang, make me two poached eggs too? I’m starving."

Tang Yanqing rolled his eyes: "You want me to serve you? Dream on."

Jia Tianzi complained to Shi Nian: "Look at him, look at him, how can he be so unfair?"

Shi Nian, embarrassed, hurriedly got up, intending to make some for Jia Tianzi. They were just microwave poached eggs after all, she could manage.

Tang Yanqing let out a hum and pressed her to sit back, glaring arrogantly at Jia Tianzi: "This is an exception."

Watching him skillfully make poached eggs, Jia Tianzi could only sigh quietly in his heart.

Did Shi Nian realize that this kind of treatment, even after being Tang Yanqing’s partner for four years, going through life and death a couple of times, was something he couldn’t even imagine?

Shi Nian actually sensed the strange gaze from Jia Tianzi and quickly cleared her throat to ask: "Mr. Jia, why did you say Marina’s white candle incident wasn’t fake?"

Jia Tianzi laughed and nodded towards Tang Yanqing with his eyes: "That was your Professor T’s arrangement."

Shi Nian suddenly realized: "Then it means Mr. Tang deduced that Jack was the killer, so he discussed it with Marina, intentionally setting a trap to lure Jack to reveal the entire case himself!"

"Exactly." Jia Tianzi beamed: "You have no idea, being partnered with your Professor T makes my job as a detective easy. I only need to handle recording statements at the end, nothing else to worry about."

Tang Yanqing put the poached eggs in front of Jia Tianzi: "Does eating still not stop your mouth?"

Jia Tianzi unceremoniously stuffed a whole poached egg into his mouth, but with a big mouth, he could still talk to Shi Nian.

"Normally, tonight’s things like crawling under beds or into closets to wait for the killer to fall into the net, he used to only leave to me, he never did them himself. But tonight, the young master didn’t even mind getting his clothes dirty and took the initiative to go under the bed with me. The sun practically rose in the west this time, Shi Nian, don’t you think that’s strange?"

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