Eyes that are the same as those of evil

Chapter 188 The Murderer Tan Jia 7
At 4 a.m., the gig market was already bustling with people, many of whom were awake and waiting to be selected in the darkness.

They were like a flock of withered geese, desperately needing to be fed. When they saw someone driving a van passing by, they all stretched their necks and turned around to follow. When someone shouted, "Three strong guys, please!" they immediately became excited, raising their hands and shouting "Me! Me! Me!" while desperately pushing forward.

The boss, who was recruiting, stopped several people who were trying to squeeze into his car and shouted, "No one over 55 years old." Immediately, a group of people in the crowd turned off their cars and lay down numbly again.

Zheng Yan and his group were in the car behind that van, looking heavily at the huge crowd in front of them.

There were even elderly people with completely white hair and hunched backs.

After the van had hired enough people and left, Xiao Chen released the brakes and let the van slide forward a short distance. The people, thinking he was also hiring, immediately surrounded him, vying to introduce their skills.

They didn't respond until the car reached a less crowded area, then they opened the door and started asking around.

"Do you recognize Wen Jinbing? He's the man in the photo."

Few people responded. Some looked up, but it wasn't their business, so they lay back down on a straw mat and closed their eyes to sleep.

The pressures of life have weighed heavily on everyone's shoulders, and fatigue and numbness are written all over their faces, making each face and each person seem ruthless and indifferent.

But someone pointed them in the right direction: "I remember this guy was waiting in that spot with two slightly younger guys who were tanned dark."

Tan Ming found the two people in the crowd.

"Brother Wen? What happened to him?"

Zheng Yan said directly, "He's dead."

The ashes from the two men's cigarettes fell onto their trouser legs, and the pungent smell of cheap cigarettes mixed with the paint odor on their clothes, making one's eyes sting.

"Dead? How did he die?" they asked after a long while.

"The investigation is still ongoing, so I'm asking if you have any leads. Do you know if he sold the phone?"

The phone is with the technical team, and they're investigating it. But it's just an old-fashioned phone that costs a few hundred yuan. Besides making calls and receiving text messages, it has no other functions, and the clues they've found are limited.

On the contrary, his act of selling his phone is quite thought-provoking—keeping the phone at least allows him to make calls and contact people at any time, and it's only worth a few hundred yuan. Selling it wouldn't give him much purchasing power, so why did he have to sell it when he decided to commit murder?

Wen Jinbing was determined to perish together with his enemy, so he abandoned everything and planned to burn his boats.

Also, where did the money from selling the phone go? The deceased didn't have a single penny on him when he was found.

Wen Jinbing's "coworker" shook his head and said he didn't know.

"Brother Wen rarely uses his phone, and we haven't seen him for two days. He settled the money two days ago and we don't know where he went."

"Settle the wages? Approximately how much?" Zheng Yan pressed. "A little over two thousand, I think. He hasn't earned as much these past few months as before."

"Do you know what he usually does with the money he receives? Does he deposit it in the bank, spend it, or send it home?"

“He used to send money home. There was someone who lived near his hometown, and they would bring him things and money when they went back. But now his family is all dead, and no one uses his money. I don’t know if he’s saved it.”

When the topic of Wen Jinbing's entire family dying came up, they just shook their heads without much emotion. It seemed that even the act of sighing was exhausting, and they needed to conserve their energy for their work.

Zheng Yan paused for a moment, then went to find Wen Jinbing's fellow villager.

It was a woman, around fifty years old, eating a steamed bun with chili sauce. As she ate, she kept an eye on the cars outside that were hiring, figuring out when she needed to stand up and rush out.

She felt more empathy for the Wen family's situation. Putting down her steamed bun, she sighed and said, "I wonder if they've been haunted by ghosts. They've been dying one after another."

When asked about money, she knew a bit more: "He hasn't earned much money these past few months. The old and the young have all passed away. He wasn't focused on his work and even lost a hundred yuan in the process. He's very frugal; he hasn't bought much, hasn't sent anything back home, and probably hasn't saved any money. Only Wenwu in his family has a social security card with money in it, so it's not on him at all. I don't know where he spent it."

Tan Ming and Xiao Chen both sensed that something was wrong.

Wen Jinbing has earned about seven or eight thousand yuan in the past few months, based on a monthly income of two thousand. If he was determined to take revenge even at the cost of his life, why would he work so hard to earn money and sell his cell phone for cash? Where did he spend that money?

Zheng Yan then asked about Wenwu again. The older sister finished her steamed bun and said, "Wenwu was a very well-behaved and filial boy. He did everything at home and had to climb a mountain to go to school every day... The government provided support and encouraged everyone to grow medicinal herbs. Life was just about to get better when a few of the young men went up the mountain to collect honey, and one of them fell and died."

"Wenwu wanted to go to town to ask if there was any subsidy or anything, but he happened to run into a group of drunk thugs on motorcycles fighting, and they got involved... Alas, he just died like that. I heard that when they carried him back, Aunt Wen cried so hard she collapsed on the ground, and she passed away that very night. Jinbing wanted to find those thugs to demand an explanation, but it was such a chaotic day, he didn't even know who they were. Even if he found two of them, they were willing to pay compensation, but it was only a few tens of thousands of yuan. Could that bring two lives back? Wenwu is a good student; he could earn tens of thousands of yuan any amount... Jinbing lost all motivation."

And what about the tens of thousands of yuan in compensation?
Where did all this money go?

Zheng Yan asked again, "Did Wen Jinbing mention to you that he suspected Wen Wu's death was not normal?"

"No, I don't think so. He's never been a talkative person. He doesn't say a word when he's hungry, thirsty, or tired. But... he wasn't here waiting for work for a while more than a month ago. When he came back, he brought me eggs from his hometown. He must have gone home for a trip. He was still injured."

With injuries?
After leaving the gig economy market and driving on a wide road, Zheng Yan began to share his analysis.

“Wen Jinbing returned to his hometown more than a month ago. He must have discovered that Wenwu’s death was suspicious and started to investigate further, eventually finding a connection to someone. Or rather, someone guided him to find a connection to someone.”

Tan Ming: "Then he somehow found out that the person had stayed at the guesthouse near the archery range the night before last, even specifying room 107, so he took a knife and planned to take revenge."

Based on their analysis, Xiao Chen raised two suspicious points: "First, where did he get the information? Second, what's the story behind Wenwu's death that made him decide to kill him?"

Information is often more valuable than real goods. How could Wen Jinbing, who spends his days at the odd-job market, know when the other party went on vacation, where they went, which guesthouse they stayed in, and which room they stayed in?
So it's highly likely that someone deliberately told him this, and the price might be that money that has vanished without a trace.

As for the second point, if Wenwu's death was intentionally caused, what would be the reason? Why would someone target a child who is not yet an adult for asking about posthumous compensation for his friend?

(End of this chapter)