A Good-for-Nothing

107. A Statement (1)

Translator: Dragon Rider

Zu Zhichong pocketed his cellphone and looked at the two of them, a somewhat serious expression on his face. “Liu Lanxue’s dead.”

“What?” On hearing this, both of them exclaimed in amazement and with that He Zheng furrowed his brow, suspicions lingering in his mind. “We were just about to visit Liu Lanxue when she died. Why do I feel that someone’s been crossing us?”

Zu Zhichong shook his head.

“Let’s ravel out the information that Vice-principal Wu provided us. First, Liu Lanxue was a new recruit. Since she was under unduly great stress, her mental state was unstable. There had been several occasions when she behaved unreasonably. She’d even vilified her student for stealing money and eventually ended up apologizing as the principal and the student’s parents requested, which had been an even heavier blow to her. After that, the teacher found the humiliation unbearable and believed that her student was the one to blame for everything, so she gave the student a detention on the pretext of having a talk with him, but the student ended up dead in the classroom.

Judging from the contents on the remaining pages of Liu Lanxue’s diary, Xu Tianhao always had feelings of hostility towards her when she was in charge of the class. In the latter half, though there was no explicit information on the details about Xu Tianhao stealing money, she made it clear that she’d been wronged, that Xu Tianhao had indeed stolen the money and might falsely accuse her. Her psychological defenses broke apart and eventually, she killed Xu Tianhao – or put an end to something.

“In other words, one way or another, Liu Lanxue was in connection with Xu Tianhao’s death.”

Zu Zhichong inclined his head. “But there’s definitely something else behind this.”

“Let’s pay a visit to the police station first. Maybe we’ll find something there.”

They were just about to go to the police station when Zu Zhichong’s cellphone rang again. It was a video sent to him by Sergeant Luo. “What is it?” He Zheng frowned.

Zu Zhichong shook his head and tapped the icon of the video. Soon, it started to play.

A wail came from the loudspeaker of the phone, which sounded like an old man crying. The three of them widened their eyes at the same time, watching the video.

Two old people in their sixties were surrounded by a large group of local ruffians and hooligans who were punching and kicking them. The two old people kept begging them to stop. The whole scene made the three of them feel very uncomfortable.

The video, which was only ten seconds in length, soon came to an end and with that Sergeant Luo sent a text message over.

“The two old people assaulted are Liu Lanxue’s parents. They are in a hospital now. Those local ruffians and hooligans have been taken into custody. Preliminary inquiries show that there’s definitely a link between Xu Tianhao’s family and the one who hired these hooligans.”

“This is beyond the pale.” With a piercing look in his eyes, Zu Zhichong put away his cellphone and said, “We’re not going to the police station. Let’s go to the hospital first.”

Neither of the other two said anything. Qin Huai decided not to go back home. The three of them got into Zu Zhichong’s Lotus Erova and went to the hospital.

In the hospital.

Looking through the windowpane in the door, they saw the two old people lying in their respective sickbeds. Their eyes were a muddy color and the two of them cut a dying figure. When they arrived, there were some policemen outside the ward. Surprisingly, Sergeant Luo was also present.

“The button indeed belonged to Xu Tianhao, but it’s not from this school uniform of his,” Sergeant Luo informed them.

“I see.” Zu Zhichong gave a bob of his head. “Did you get any useful information from them in there?”

“Yeah,” replied Sergeant Luo. “Previously, they’d been all along unwilling to tell us what happened. After this incident, the elderly couple gave us a full account of what they knew down to the smallest detail.”

Sergeant Luo’s countenance was tinged with weariness. “It’s very likely that Liu Lanxue was the culprit, but the reason why she committed murder… ”

He held back the words on the tip of his tongue. Zu Zhichong exchanged glances with He Zheng and then observed, “Let’s go inside first and hear what her parents have to say.”

“Leave the poor elderly couple be. We recorded a video. Take a look.”

Of course the three of them raised no objection. Sergeant Luo led them to the side and handed his cellphone to them.

In the video, the elderly couple were lying in their respective sickbeds, looking withered.

Sergeant Luo’s voice was heard.

“Would you please tell us exactly what happened between Liu Lanxue and Xu Tianhao that is unknown to us?”

The elderly couple kept silent for quite a while. Eventually, the old madam spoke.

“Xu Tianhao was an utter monster, and so are his parents. All people in that school are monsters. It was them… It was them who hounded my daughter to death!”

The old madam abruptly burst into tears, trembling all over. ‘Women are vulnerable, but mothers are strong’, as the saying goes. Face covered in bruises, this old madam sobbed out a story about Liu Lanxue.

In the First High School of Coastal City.

It was shortly after nine o’clock in the evening already. Nobody apart from Liu Lanxue was in the teacher’s office. The teacher whose desk was opposite hers had been teaching in this school for four or five years, and thus no longer needed to put a lot of effort into preparing lessons or managing a class like she, a rookie, did.

Exhaling deeply, Liu Lanxue stretched and flicked a glance at the wall clock. The self-study session was almost over. Liu Lanxue opened the left drawer and fished an empty leather bag out of it. She had specially bought this leather bag not long ago to keep the class fund (money collected termly from all students in a class and supposed to be used on class-wide group activities).

Liu Lanxue put the money that she had collected earlier this day into the drawer, rose to her feet and walked to Class 305 that she was in charge of.

In a couple of months they would enter the twelfth grade, so everybody was under great stress. At this moment, all of them were quietly sitting in their respective seats studying hard, their heads down. Liu Lanxue’s heart slightly ached for these kids who had been working so hard these days, but working hard was the only way to gain admission into a good university.

Liu Lanxue quietly walked into the classroom, causing no interruption to any of the students.

“Mrs. Liu, I need to use the restroom.” A schoolboy rose from his seat and broke the peace in the classroom.