The door to the monitoring room was knocked on again; it was past midnight.
Team Leader Qi called out "Come in!" and the door was pushed open.
"Bai Qianmo? What brings you here again?"
Upon seeing the person who followed Bai Qianmo in, Captain Qi immediately stood up from his chair and respectfully went forward to greet them.
"My lord, what brings you here?"
"We have some personal thoughts about Lan Xiaoxiao's case that we'd like to discuss with Captain Qi."
"That's great, please have a seat."
Gu Jueye and Bai Qianmo walked to the monitoring station and sat down.
Qi's gaze swept back and forth between Bai Qianmo and Gu Jueye. Why did he feel that there was a bit of ambiguity between the two of them?
"Captain Qi, what time did you start checking the surveillance footage outside Lan Xiaoxiao's room?"
“Lan Xiaoxiao checked into the hotel at 2 p.m. yesterday. She went to the hot springs in the morning, had lunch, and then went back to her room for a nap. She didn’t leave her room until 6 p.m., dinner time. We started reviewing the surveillance video from that day at 6 p.m..”
Having received a definite answer, Bai Qianmo secretly breathed a sigh of relief.
It seems her guess was probably correct.
The hotel starts welcoming guests at 10:00 AM, meaning that the only time you can enter this room during the day is between 10:00 AM and 6:00 PM, a total of eight hours.
"Captain Qi, please retrieve the video from 10:00 AM yesterday."
"Are you going to start the investigation this morning?"
“I suspect that the murderer may have been hiding in this room all along, but Lan Xiaoxiao just didn’t find out.”
Team Leader Qi frowned, still somewhat puzzled.
"Even if the murderer sneaked into the room during the day, how did he leave the room after killing Lan Xiaoxiao?"
Bai Qianmo was too lazy to explain anymore and urged Captain Qi, "Let's check the surveillance footage first."
Team Leader Qi didn't ask any more questions. He instructed his subordinates to retrieve the surveillance footage and begin the investigation bit by bit, starting from when the hotel officially opened at 10 a.m.
They stayed there for over two hours, during which no one entered the room.
Around 12:30, a cleaning lady pushed a cleaning cart to the door of the room, took out a key card from her pocket, swiped it, and the door opened. She then pushed the cart into the room.
"Lan Xiaoxiao checked in this afternoon. This time of day should be for disinfection and cleaning to welcome guests."
About twenty minutes after the cleaning staff entered the room, they pushed their cart out of the room.
Bai Qianmo's gaze remained fixed on the cleaner and her cart.
"Set the video here."
Team Leader Qi immediately focused the surveillance footage on the cleaning staff leaving the room.
Is there a problem?
Gu Jueye stared at the video surveillance for a moment, then looked at Bai Qianmo beside him.
"There's something wrong with this cleaning service."
Team Leader Qi looked at Bai Qianmo and Gu Jueye.
Two detectives standing nearby asked curiously, "Could the murderer have hidden in the trash can?"
Team Leader Qi turned his gaze back to the big screen.
"Continue playing."
Upon hearing Bai Qianmo's instructions, Captain Qi immediately pressed the play button, and the video started playing again from the moment the cleaner left the room.
"The cleaner is rather thin. From the video, the trash can on the cart is already quite full of trash, but her posture when pushing the cart is different when she enters and exits the room."
Filled with curiosity, Captain Qi watched the videos of the cleaner entering and leaving the room several times and made some comparisons. Finally, he noticed the problem.
"It is obviously much more difficult for the cleaner to push the cart into the room than when it leaves the room, which is illogical unless the volume of the trash can when entering the guest room is much larger than when leaving the room."
One of the subordinates said, "It's possible for someone to be hiding in the trash can. If the murderer was hiding in the guest room before Lan Xiaoxiao checked in, where was he hiding the whole time? Lan Xiaoxiao spent several hours with him, didn't she notice anything at all?"
"Since the other party was able to work with the cleaning staff, it means they knew about the interior of the room beforehand, and had already planned a hiding place before entering the room, and ensured that the hiding place was absolutely hidden and safe."
Gu Jueye said, "This person planned very meticulously and must have calculated how to escape after killing someone."
Bai Qianmo nodded: "If I'm not mistaken, that cleaner can't be found now. There's also a possibility that she wasn't a cleaner at all, but was an imposter."
"However, even the most meticulous plans can have flaws. Finding a way to leave the room was the most overlooked step in his perfect plan."
Gu Jueye chuckled: "You think the same way I do. If we want to find the murderer, we need to start investigating from the time Lan Xiaoxiao's body was discovered."
Team Leader Qi was like a rattle-drum, glancing at Gu Jueye one moment and Bai Qianmo the next.
What were they saying? It sounded like gods were fighting; he couldn't understand a word they were saying.
"Ahem, gentlemen, could we please elaborate on what we're saying?"
Bai Qianmo explained: "If it is confirmed that the murderer was brought into the room by the cleaning staff, it means that from the time he entered the guest room around noon until Lan Xiaoxiao was murdered, the murderer never left the room. Therefore, after killing her, he would have to find a way to leave. The only chance would be when outsiders discovered that Lan Xiaoxiao had been murdered."
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