Chapter 349: The Thread is Clear! The Truth of the Fierce Ghost

It all circled back to the same question.

The killer… was it a person, or a ghost!?

If it was a person, based on what they knew, there were no viable suspects.

The only one, Zhang Jiayu, was now believed to have died long ago based on the latest clues.

Once he was dead, the trail went cold. There were no other leads to follow.

That left only the fundamental question of the case.

Was it a person… or a ghost?

“It can’t actually be a ghost, can it…”

Sun Jian paused, a strange expression on his face.

The police had encountered many bizarre cases that were difficult to explain.

You might go your whole life without seeing one, or you might run into a major one right off the bat.

Could this case… be one of those?

“Tell me… is it possible that under certain circumstances, people’s minds can become bound together?”

Xu Huo suddenly spoke up, looking at the two of them and proposing something completely out of the blue.

Mental binding?

Li Jianye’s brow furrowed.

‘Minds can be bound together?’

Honestly, the mind itself—this concept of ‘consciousness’—is something science can’t yet explain.

How could you possibly find an answer by building a hypothesis on something science can’t explain in the first place?

“What do you mean by mental binding?”

Sun Jian asked after failing to make sense of it.

“It’s exactly what it sounds like.”

“Under specific conditions, people’s consciousnesses, their minds, become bound together, as if they’ve become a single entity. They rise and fall as one,” Xu Huo explained.

Unfortunately, the two men still didn’t quite understand.

It couldn’t be helped.

The mind, consciousness—it was intangible, something you couldn’t see or touch. Any attempt to explain it felt vague.

Why?

Take an example.

A battery and electricity. If we assume a battery can generate electricity, can we then say that the battery *is* electricity?

No.

So, can the physical structure of the brain be equated with the ethereal concept of consciousness?

If not… then where does the mind exist?

Countless scientists and philosophers, one after another, have tried to explain it based on physical matter or existence in a higher dimension, but none have been able to offer a conclusion satisfactory to the public.

Let alone two detectives whose expertise lay elsewhere.

“You’ve thought of something, haven’t you?”

Li Jianye’s eyes suddenly narrowed.

He didn’t understand the question, but he understood Xu Huo!

In criminal investigation, questions are formed from information.

Looked at another way, you can only pose a question once you have some information!

‘So, what was the information that formed the basis for Xu Huo’s question?’

“I have, but I still need more information to verify it.”

Xu Huo’s brow furrowed. He didn’t hide it and simply nodded.

Li Jianye couldn’t even understand the question he’d posed, so telling him the information would be pointless.

“Get Shen Fei and drag him to the interro—scratch that, let’s just go to the detention room.”

Xu Huo paused, changed his mind, and turned to head for the detention room.

The two men behind him exchanged a look, sighed, and followed.

It was already very late.

From the looks of things… they’d probably be working overtime again.

But that wasn’t a problem.

If working overtime meant solving the case, Li Jianye would move his home into the city bureau.

「A moment later.」

The police arrived at the city bureau’s detention facility.

The conditions in the detention rooms were quite good, some of the better ones. There were padded beds and iron doors, though the food was still nothing special.

At this time, there was only one police officer on duty in the facility, dozing off.

When he saw the three figures at the entrance, the officer jolted awake, immediately standing up to greet them.

“Captain Li, Advisor Xu, Officer Sun.”

“Yeah. Thanks for your hard work.”

Li Jianye nodded, then paused and asked:

“Where’s Shen Fei?”

“Detention Room Five. I’ll take you.”

The police officer pulled a set of keys from his desk, stood up, and led them inside.

There was no privacy in the detention rooms. The iron doors were barred, so the interior could be seen clearly from the outside.

The other rooms were occupied. Some inmates were fast asleep, while a few others, seeing the police, crowded by their doors as if to watch a show.

In front of Detention Room Five.

Li Jianye peered through the iron bars and his brow furrowed.

He couldn’t see anyone.

“Under the table.”

Xu Huo sniffed, speaking toward the solid, box-like table.

Li Jianye’s expression darkened, and he immediately had the officer open the door.

CREAK~

The door opened.

Inside the bare room, Li Jianye walked to the table, reached under it, and pulled.

A moment later, like squeezing a pimple, Shen Fei was dragged out from the small space.

Compared to before, Shen Fei was in even worse shape.

His eyes were bloodshot and his mind was stretched taut, like an arrow nocked on a drawn bowstring.

And that arrow looked like it could snap at any second!

Even after being pulled out, he didn’t have the strength to speak. He just trembled, slowly tried to crawl back, and squeezed himself into the corner under the table, shaking uncontrollably.

Li Jianye was exasperated, his brow creased in a frown.

“How long has it been since he slept?”

“We don’t know. A conservative estimate is at least three days.”

The officer shook his head and sighed.

Sleep was something the police couldn’t force, unless they gave him sleeping pills or used ‘physical assistance’.

Unfortunately, both were against the rules.

However, an exception could be made for the former. If Shen Fei really couldn’t take it anymore, they would find a way to make him sleep.

If it came to it, an injection of anesthetic would also work.

Li Jianye’s heart sank.

Three days without sleep…

Honestly, after two days without sleep, a person would basically be delirious. They’d have trouble hearing what others were saying, their thinking would become rigid, they’d space out from time to time, and they might even suddenly pass out!