Lu Qing woke up after sleeping for more than five hours.

She rubbed her aching temples, opened her eyes, and frowned slightly when she realized where she was.

How could she be sleeping in the car?

Lu Qing got out of the car and returned to the police station.

Then they saw Gu Xicheng and Jian Ming leading a group of people sorting out the victims' information.

Seeing that Lu was awake, Gu Xicheng immediately got up and took the food to the microwave to heat it up.

When I returned after the food was heated up, Lu Qing was already looking at documents.

Gu Xicheng brought the food over:

"Let's eat something first, and then we'll see."

Seeing the worry in Gu Xicheng's eyes, Lu Qing smiled slightly:

"good!"

Having slept for so long, Lu Qing was indeed hungry, but her mind was focused on the case, and she kept getting distracted while eating.

Upon seeing this, Gu Xicheng immediately told her about the clues he and Jianming had discovered over the past few hours.

"The information of these victims has been compared, and they are almost all young women between the ages of twenty and twenty-five."

Furthermore, they are all single and live alone, and according to people around them, they all have very good personalities, are kind and warm-hearted.

The disappearances almost always occurred at night. Because these were single women living alone, their disappearances were usually only discovered by friends or family two or three days later, who then reported them missing.

“That’s right!” Jianming nodded in agreement, then continued:

"Judging from the murderer's modus operandi, he is a heartless and insane person."

Judging from the wounds on the first victim he kidnapped, his methods of torture were not yet very sophisticated.

Moreover, the incident involving evil cultivation occurred in the last few months. When he committed his first crime, he may not have had the help of evil magic, so he couldn't have disappeared without a trace and would have left clues.

So we started with the first victim and went through the events surrounding her disappearance.

As he spoke, Jianming posted the photo of the first victim.

"Her name was Xiang Peiyun. She was 23 years old when she disappeared. She had just graduated from university and was working as a salesperson in a foreign trade company."

She went missing on March 18th last year. Two days later, her colleagues noticed she hadn't come to work, so they went to her house to look for her and then discovered she was missing.

Her family arrived shortly afterward, and when they couldn't find her, they called the police.

Police also searched her neighborhood and reviewed CCTV footage, eventually identifying a suspect.

Jianming then pasted another photo of a man's back onto the screen.

Lu Qing asked, puzzled, "Why is there only a shot of their backs? Weren't their faces captured?"

Jianming shook his head helplessly:

"No. This photo of his back was found by the police at the time after a lot of effort, from a small shop."

When Xiang Peiyun entered the residential area, this man followed behind her.

According to Xiang Peiyun's colleagues, before she disappeared, she told them that it seemed like a man wearing a black hat was following her.

But since there was no evidence and nothing happened, she didn't pay any attention to it.

Lu Qing stared at the blurry photo of the figure from behind, pondered for a long time, and then asked:

Do you know exactly how Xiang Peiyun was kidnapped?

In short: "The police who investigated at the time said that Xiang Peiyun was probably lured out of her home by the murderer at night, and was drugged and taken away in the fire escape."

The vehicles entering and leaving the community that day were checked and found to be fine. The only suspicious person was the garbage collector.

The community security guard said that the person collecting the garbage that day was not the usual person; he was wearing a mask and a hat, and deliberately avoided the security cameras, so none of the photos captured his face clearly.

Lu Qing frowned slightly: "Why was Xiang Peiyun so easily tricked into leaving her home? And even went to a place without surveillance cameras, like a fire escape."

It's so late, and she's been followed before, isn't she afraid?

Liu Manyun suddenly spoke up: "Could it be that she knows the murderer?"

Lu Qing nodded: "It's possible, but it's just speculation. We still don't have any useful clues."

Gu Xicheng: "Not entirely."

Lu Qing immediately looked at him: "What do you mean?"

Gu Xicheng took out a map of Kyoto and circled the residences of the female victims on it.

"Most of these victims are concentrated in the southern part of the city, which means that the perpetrator's activities also took place in this area."

As mentioned before, it's very difficult to find a secluded place that can imprison fifteen girls without them being discovered, no matter what they do inside.

There is a former factory site in the south of the city that has just been relocated. There are many abandoned factory buildings, and the surrounding area is slated for demolition. Many residents have moved away.

I think the murderer is very likely hiding here.

Moreover, when I asked the people in charge of this area during the last major investigation, they said that there are many migrant workers there who do not have residence permits, and there may be some who slip through the net.

They went several times before they managed to check everyone, but they couldn't guarantee they hadn't missed anyone, and they planned to go again in a few days.

Lu Qing's eyes flickered slightly: "That's right!"

"With the police coming to investigate again and again, the murderer will definitely be afraid of being discovered."

He could hide easily, but the fifteen girls couldn't. Once discovered, they would definitely betray him, so he had no choice but to kill them.

Thinking of this, Lu Qing couldn't wait to go and see what was happening in the south of the city.

"Gu Xicheng, let's go now!"

"Jianming, you and Manyun go and investigate the people around Xiang Peiyun, especially the men she's close to, and see if you can find anything."

"good!"

Gu Xicheng and Lu Qing quickly drove to the abandoned factory in the southern part of the city.

There are many old factory sites here, and it's impossible for just the two of them to investigate them all in a short time.

Lu Qing took out the compass and used his tracking technique.

Gu Xicheng: "The compass has a limited tracking range. Can it track such a large factory area?"

Lu Qing smiled and said, "I haven't been training for nothing all this time."

The range that a tracking spell can cover is related to the caster's strength. Previously, Lu Qing could only explore an area of ​​several dozen miles in radius, but now it can extend to a hundred meters.

Since the murderer frequently appeared in that place, he must have left behind some evil aura.

Given that he tortured those girls, there must have been a bloody residue left behind.

As long as you keep narrowing down the search, finding it won't be difficult.

Lu Qing sat cross-legged, closed his eyes, and began to cast a spell.

After a long while, Lu Qing finally opened her eyes: "Found it!"

She led Lu Qing to an abandoned chemical plant, where they indeed found some recent footprints outside.

Following the footprints, we arrived at the entrance to the factory's basement.

As soon as the lid was lifted, a bloody smell mixed with a foul odor wafted out.

Lu Qing almost vomited from the fumes.

She opened the lid, let the air circulate for a while, and then covered her mouth and nose before going down.

The ground below was very dark, with only a few small skylights letting in some light.

By the light, the two saw bloodstains and drag marks all over the ground.

The basement was large and spacious, containing some iron cages, the kind used to keep large dogs.

The cage contained chains with handcuffs, leg irons, and even a neck collar attached to the ends.

Lu Qing couldn't help but think of the scars on the necks, wrists, and ankles of those victims.

They were once locked up like dogs in this place, and the longest time they were locked up was more than a year.

What immense pain that must have been!