3
That night, Xu Wenjing tossed and turned on the hard bed in the staff dormitory, unable to fall asleep.
Based on the current investigation, the suicide hypothesis is no longer tenable. A woman, with no luggage or cash, wearing only a few clothes, traveled thousands of miles to a completely unfamiliar city to commit suicide. While theoretically possible, it's difficult to understand from a common sense perspective.
If it was homicide, it might make sense, like an elopement stemming from an extramarital affair...
But this raised even more unexplained questions. The footprints and other clues left at the scene were so obvious, it seemed as if they were deliberately left for the police to find. Why didn't the killer clean them up? Not to mention the videotapes scattered in the well. If it weren't for the connection between the tapes, she would have no way of connecting the deceased to the missing person thousands of miles away. Why did the victim, who had no luggage, bring sixteen videotapes with her? And why did the killer throw such important evidence into the well?
Perhaps these videotapes held some special meaning for the murderer, forming an integral part of his murder ritual. In vendettas, such complications occasionally occur.
She simply got up from the bed, put on gloves, took out the videotape from the evidence bag that she had watched countless times, and rewound it to the beginning to watch it again.
When Xu Wenjing first discovered the tapes from the well, he had no idea if they could be repaired. He showed them to a friend who worked at a movie theater, hoping against hope. To his surprise, he explained that they were fine as long as they weren't exposed to magnetic fields, similar to the properties of plastic. He then treated them with specialized tools, and they were playing normally right away.
The police station didn't have a videotape player. Procuring one for this case would have been a lengthy process. So she simply bought a cheap secondhand one and watched the films at home during her free time, spending dozens of hours on them. She'd watched almost all the tapes; they were just ordinary movies. Except for one special tape.
It wasn't that she wasn't interested in the tape. On the contrary, she had forced it into the projector countless times over the past two weeks, but no matter how hard she tried, it wouldn't load. The tape was white, half the size of a normal cassette, and had no label with the movie title or price, only a Panasonic Japanese logo. It was probably used for specialized equipment.
After showing it to a friend at the cinema, she also didn't know and said she would ask for her, but there was no follow-up.
The next morning, she rode her bicycle to the steel plant again to investigate.
The factory gate had been sealed off by police. There were many onlookers, including reporters and people from TV stations carrying cameras.
Perhaps he smelled the enticing aroma through the restaurant window. What started as a simple suicide case suddenly became bizarre, truly piqued the media's interest.
After entering the police force, Xu Wenjing gained a deeper understanding of the media's tastes. Take, for example, a case of a love-killing. The perpetrator was a woman in her forties with a flat nose and thick lips. She was about 1.7 meters tall and stocky, like a badly stuffed sausage, thick in the middle and narrow at the ends. During the arrest, three male police officers worked together to barely subdue her.
Yet, the media relentlessly used adjectives like "delicate" and "beautiful" to portray her as a magazine cover model. Rumors spread like wildfire, twisting the case into a Qiong Yao romance drama—after all, the core of the case—infidelity and manslaughter—were bland and uninteresting to the average citizen.
The media's cameras were now focused on a balding man in a military overcoat. Xu Wenjing still remembered that face: Lao Qi, the steelworks' security guard and the man who had discovered the body. Facing the reporters' aggressive questioning, his forehead was sweaty and his words were halting.
"I don't know her at all, and I don't know why she chose this place to jump into the well..."
"But I heard that someone committed suicide at the factory last year, and you were the one who discovered it. Was it the same person?"
"I have no idea……"
These guys are incredibly well-informed. Xu Wenjing frowned. If they got caught up with her, she'd be in trouble. She wanted to go around to the back door, but a middle-aged man smoking a cigarette caught her attention. He was unloading a VCR from a van with the local TV station logo taped to the side.
A thought struck her, and she remembered the unplayable videotape. Judging from the man's age, he must be a senior cameraman at a TV station, having experienced the era when videotapes were popular, and perhaps he knew something.
"Excuse me, are you the cameraman?"
The man raised his head and caught a glimpse of Xu Wenjing in police uniform. He looked surprised and nodded.
"I have something to ask you..." She concealed the source of the videotape and described its shape and size. Surprisingly, the other party understood immediately.
"Oh, the kind you're talking about is VHS-C, right?"
"V...V what?" Hearing the completely unfamiliar word, Xu Wenjing guiltily rubbed her cuffs with her index finger and thumb. Her English grades were always at the bottom when she was in school.
"It's a VHS-C tape." The man pointed to the VCR on his shoulder. "It also contains tapes for storing images, but they're VHS versions."
Xu Wenjing was a little confused. "Isn't this the VCD era? Why do we still need videotapes to record videos?"
"Then you'd have to ask a researcher. VCDs that can be inserted into a VCR haven't been invented yet. I've been in this business for ten years, and I've always used videotapes."
"So what's the difference between the VHS-C model you mentioned and regular videotapes?"
"VHS-C, to put it simply, is a smaller version of VHS, used in portable camcorders." Perhaps because he was being asked about his area of expertise, the man went on incessantly. "To accommodate handheld use, it's halved in size. But its drawbacks are low clarity and monaural recording. Professional photographers generally don't use it. It's usually used by amateurs for things like wedding documentaries..."
"Wait a minute," she interrupted quickly, "so this tape is specifically for video recording, not the kind of movie tapes that are sold on the market?"
"Of course, the picture and sound quality of VHS-C is not good enough to be used as a medium for burning movies."
Xu Wenjing's heartbeat suddenly accelerated, as if a blower had blasted a powerful stream of air into an engine. She instinctively realized that if the tape truly contained something, it would be a crucial clue in solving the case. "Do you know how to play a VHS-C tape? I tried putting it into a regular VCR, but it wouldn't work."
"It's a bit troublesome. It requires a special converter box. I have to go back to the station and ask my colleagues. Maybe he has it..."
"Is the videotape you mentioned related to the steel mill case?" Someone suddenly spoke behind her. Xu Wenjing was startled. The reporter just now came up to her silently without her noticing.
"According to regulations, it cannot be disclosed." Xu Wenjing subconsciously gave the standard response from police training, and then regretted it. This was equivalent to implicitly admitting the other party's speculation.
The reporter grinned like a shark smelling blood, his pointed teeth gleaming in the sunlight. "Are you the officer in charge of the case? Are you available for an interview?"
"I have a mission now, so I don't have time..."
"It only takes a little time. Just ask a few simple questions. Don't worry, I won't ask sensitive questions that will affect the investigation of the case." The reporter kept pestering.
"I really can't."
The reporter let go of his hand and turned to the cameraman. "I saw the conversion box you mentioned used by the 'Global Village' program team next door last time."
"Really? I don't quite remember..."
The reporter ignored him and gave Xu Wenjing a meaningful look. "I'm very familiar with the people on that production team, so borrowing this kind of equipment is a piece of cake. But right now, the interview isn't finished, and I can't report back to the station..."
In desperation, Xu Wenjing had to agree to be interviewed.
Contrary to her promise, the reporter's questions were sharp. She had to be vague and stop several times. It took quite a while to finally record a broadcastable segment.
Xu Wenjing hitched a ride to the TV station, only to discover the reporter's claim of borrowing equipment was a cover-up. The station staff denied ever having seen a converter box. Fortunately, the cameraman was kind enough to lend her a key and search the dusty warehouse with Xu Wenjing until midnight. Finally, they found the converter box hidden in a pile of junk in a corner and even helped her connect it to an unused projection device at the station.
Although she felt embarrassed towards the cameraman, Xu Wenjing still kicked him out of the room, locked the door and watched the contents of the videotape alone.
At first, there was nothing. The screen was pitch black, and there was no sound. She was beginning to wonder if it was just a blank tape when she suddenly heard a clattering sound in the background, like footsteps. She also heard a soft cough. Suddenly, someone started talking.
Two people were discussing something; from the sound of their voices, it was a man and a woman. The camera panned upward, capturing the dim light and revealing a man's face. No, not a man; his face was still childish, a child. The woman's face was invisible, but judging by her voice, she was probably about the same age.
"Are you filming?" the boy asked.
"Shut up and speak as we rehearsed," the girl replied. Judging from the direction of the voice, she should be the one holding the camera behind the camera.
The boy seemed a little nervous. He cleared his throat again, as if testing his voice, and said, "Next, I will announce my murder plan."
The next morning, she excitedly rushed to the bureau. Others looked at her with a strange look. But she didn't care about such trivial matters. She only wanted to report her findings as quickly as possible.
She pushed the door open and walked into the office. Before she could even open her mouth, Captain Qin exploded in anger: "What did you do yesterday?"
"Yesterday I investigated the videotapes retrieved from the well and found important evidence..."
"I didn't ask that. Did you accept an interview from the TV station?"
"It was just a short paragraph, and it didn't say anything... How did you know?"
"Didn't you watch the news last night? You were given quite a few shots. You really showed off your face!"
"I was avoiding them like I was protecting them from thieves, but something unexpected happened..." she replied awkwardly. "I only answered one or two questions briefly. They have nothing to do with the case."
"No problem?" The captain grabbed the Metropolitan Morning Newspaper from the table and threw it at her, nearly hitting her in the face. "Go see for yourself how those troublemakers report it."
Even though she was mentally prepared, she was still shocked when she saw the headline. She pinched the newspaper so hard that her fingers turned white and she almost tore it in two.
This is truly outrageous. The report claims that the mysterious murders at the steel mill are related to a curse from an evil spirit.
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