Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Putting aside what Cheng Lingfei had done, the Rural Cooperatives Homicide Case was truly something else! Who would’ve thought that not only were the robber and killer different, but both of them were hiding in an apartment near the crime scene!
Cheng Lingfei was right, after such a big incident it was only natural to assume that the murderer would have run far away. And to most people, they wouldn’t have connected the image of a coldblooded murderer with Cheng Lingfei’s frail and weak demeanor.
Maybe there had been some luck involved in this case, but it was undeniable that Cheng Lingfei’s high IQ and boldness were the main reasons she was able to remain at large for so many years. Her doing things so brazenly without leaving a single clue gave the investigating team back then a hard time while trying to solve the case. Zhao Yu felt that even if he had been a part of the team, he would have had a hard time as well.
“The house was remote, and we had moved in not long ago. What’s more, my mother liked to pick mushrooms down at the countryside and I was frequently commuting to school, so we didn’t interact much with our neighbors,” Cheng Lingfei continued without Zhao Yu and Miao Ying asking. “The matter of Wang Xuejun bullying my mother was scandalous, so our neighbors didn’t know, nor did he air his dirty laundry in public.”
“Even if he told others, what would happen?” Cheng Lingfei asked. “My mother was out harvesting mushrooms, which meant she had an alibi. People wouldn’t believe a frail old lady would be capable of such a thing either! As for Xie Mengqin and Zhao Meng, there was even less to worry about. Those two have so many enemies that no matter how the police investigated, they wouldn’t figure it was me. Who would believe that the cause of their deaths was them calling me an illegitimate child? At that time, there was only one thing I was most concerned about!”
“What was that?” Zhao Yu asked hurriedly.
“When Ah Biao passed out from the taser, he only had the cash on him, and I couldn’t find the controller. Because of that, I began to worry about whether or not he had shut down the CCTV. If not, then whatever I did would have been for naught. The police would come to take me away before Ah Biao regained consciousness!” she replied. “Fortunately, that didn’t happen. When Ah Biao woke up, I did not hear any police sirens so I figured he only forgot to remove the hard drive.”
“So, during the whole thing, Yang Zebiao was locked up inside your basement?” Miao Ying asked curiously. “Did you manage to convince him in the end?” Cheng Lingfei shook her head. Miao Ying was surprised and pressed for more. “Then how did you explain it to him? And you locked him up for so long, there’s no way your mother didn’t know, right?”
“I lied to my mum and told her I found a part-time job teaching cello at a music school. Because the school was quite far away, we rented another house in Gao Lanqi and moved there. But secretly, I was still living in the old house as I had to take care of Ah Biao!” Cheng Lingfei told Miao Ying.
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“Then…” Zhao Yu recalled the childlike demeanor of Yang Zebiao and asked, “what actually happened to him?”
“When Ah Biao woke up, I revealed everything to him except for the murders,” Cheng Lingfei said, pausing for a short moment before continuing. “As expected, Ah Biao lost it after hearing everything, and kept asking me to turn myself in. He said that if I told the truth, I might get a lighter sentence!”
“Hmph,” she scoffed. “But he didn’t know that my crimes were too severe. After that, I slowly told him about my past and the reason for my plan for revenge. I wanted him to understand my pain, but no matter what I said he wouldn’t have it. If he didn’t listen, then I couldn’t let him go. I was in a dilemma!” Cheng Lingfei explained. “I thought about it for a long time, about killing him, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Although he was a burden, he was also my only support…”
“Those were some rough times,” Cheng Lingfei recalled. “I neglected my studies and didn’t dare spend any money. A year passed like that, with Ah Biao locked in the small dungeon, and he faced multiple mental breakdowns. At one point he wouldn’t eat and even attempted to commit suicide. He begged for me to let him go, and even said he would take the blame. But I couldn’t do it, I couldn’t let him go…”
One year… Cheng Lingfei made it sound like it was nothing, but Zhao Yu and Miao Ying listened uneasily. What would Yang Zebiao become after a year living like a rat? This woman was a psychopath.
“Sometimes, to calm his suicidal tendencies, I would even drug his food,” she explained to them. “Those drugs were used to treat depression, but they also worked well since they caused drowsiness and made him fall asleep so he wouldn’t think as much. I endured those dark times until talk of the Rural Cooperatives Homicide Case died down. I could finally start my revenge plans!”
“I used a sum of the money to buy a ranch, and then hired trained mercenaries like Jiang Ke to help out with the operations. In a few short years, I regained everything I lost! Of course, it’s not a matter of just saying you want to become successful and relying on external methods,” Cheng Lingfei stated. “You have to actually know how to run a business, and I put in an unthinkable amount of effort to do so! I studied daily. Researching, improving… I read practically every economics-related book in Gao Lanqi’s library. I don’t think I slept for even four hours a night. Many of my businesses and plans were carried out in tandem, and other than business rivals, I still had to be careful of the police. There was no room for error, so I had to ensure everything was perfect!”
Upon hearing this, Zhao Yu finally understood how Jiang Ke’s robberies and prison break were carried out with such precision.
“During this time, I moved once and built a secret room in that house for Ah Biao to have a nicer environment. His mental state also began to improve, along with my long-term persuasion, he slowly resigned himself to his fate, so…” she paused.
Zhao Yu had guessed what the ‘so’ meant, but decided to continue listening quietly instead of interrupting.
“This was about the same time I got Jiang Ke to take Wu Fangfang’s scandalous photos. I let Wu Fangfang off the hook at first and didn’t show the photo to brother Shi Hai because I couldn’t bear to see him sad, and also because… a child was growing inside of me!”