Ke-style law enforcement officers

Chapter 19 The Name That Was Painted Off
Emma and Enid, two high-achieving students, determined in five minutes that Milo couldn't possibly pass the exam by cramming, and then spent the entire morning discussing how to "find another way out."

They use all sorts of tricks, doing whatever is most unreliable.

Milo had no idea what these two were learning at Nanwei Academy.

If one day in the future a clown like Enid were to join the ranks of law enforcement, it would truly be a misfortune for all the people of Nanwei City.

……

...

the other side.

After the sewer incident was resolved, Rebecca completed the case report overnight.

From the murder of Daisy's family to the carriage murder and everything that happened in the sewers last night, she recorded it all truthfully.

This includes how Milo initially found Daisy hiding in the house, and how he, as a suspect, located the carriage in a very short time.

Later, when all the law enforcement officers were tracking the bloody smell of the horse's entrails, Milo, with his keen intuition, found a crucial clue and used a black cloth as a guide to track it down, eventually finding Daisy in an abandoned shelter.

Finally, here's the whole story from last night.

Daisy had her eyes gouged out right under their noses, just a wall away.

Throughout the entire manhunt, Milo was still secretly in charge.

……

After Rebecca finished writing, she reviewed it again. The report was over ten pages long, and Milo's name appeared on almost every page.

Furthermore, there were many details in Milo's entire case-solving process that Rebecca couldn't understand at all.

For example, why was he so certain that Daisy was hiding in the storage room at the crime scene from the beginning, and why was he able to pinpoint the exact location of the carriage accident even after being locked in the room for a whole day?

Rebecca couldn't understand these questions no matter how hard she tried.

Therefore, in her reports, she could only attribute everything to "Milo's keen intuition."

So much so that the phrase "keen intuition" appears many times throughout the document.

Rebecca was somewhat frustrated, partly because of her inability to uncover the truth, and partly because Milo had been so secretive from beginning to end, never sharing his investigative ideas, making her report seem rather "brainless."

On the other hand, she had to admit that without Milo's appearance, she didn't know when this series of murders would end, or how many innocent citizens would have died tragically under the knife.

"Perhaps the inspector is right; law enforcement officers need someone like him."

Rebecca stared at the paper covered with writing on the table and muttered to herself.

On the night of the carriage murder, Nero had already noticed the presence of Milo, the city guard. So after Milo carried Daisy and Rebecca back to the enforcement office, he directly wrote the assessment notice by hand.

At first, Rebecca felt that Nero's decision was a bit too hasty.

Because Milo is ultimately a person with an unclear background; 95% of his file is blank, making it impossible to investigate him. To become a law enforcement officer, one must have an absolutely clean record and upright character, and Milo is clearly not that kind of person.

"But he's still too weak."

Rebecca shook her head again.

In her view, law enforcement officers should not only have the mindset to solve cases, but also the absolute force to eradicate evil, and Milo only possesses the first point.

In Rebecca's eyes, ten Milos wouldn't be enough for her to fight.

If Milo is really to join the law enforcement team, he will have to undergo comprehensive training, including combat, melee weapons, and firearms training. He has a long way to go.

……

After completing the case report, Rebecca bound the other documents together.

This includes copies of some old documents that she had previously retrieved from the archives of Nanwei City. Combining these documents, one can roughly determine the nature of the truth behind the case.

Rebecca never forgot Milo's words: there was definitely more than one real killer in the case; there were at least two, or more.

And this is indeed the case.

The strange man seen in the abandoned containment facility and Robben in the sewers—that's two people now. So far, only Robben has been killed, and there's another strange man of unknown origin wandering outside.

Rebecca knew that once her documents were submitted, there would be no public announcement of the case; the documents would only be reviewed by a few high-ranking officials in the law enforcement system.

Therefore, she had to unravel the mystery as thoroughly as possible, revealing every clue, including her own conjectures.

……

Nanwei City Law Enforcement Headquarters.

In the law enforcement conference hall, decorated primarily in absolute black and gray, the wall-mounted sickle totem reliefs and the hard-edged, minimalist lines embody the absolute, brutal aesthetics followed by the law enforcement system.

At the front of the enormous conference table sat only three men. These were among the highest-ranking members of the law enforcement system in Nanwei City, and Nero was one of them.

"You've seen the items, right? What are your thoughts?"

Nero had a cigar in his mouth.

The documents spread out on the table were the case reports submitted by Rebecca.

"Who is the detective whose name is covered up?" A bald, middle-aged man sitting opposite Nero picked up a report. Many parts of the report were covered up in black, seemingly to deliberately obscure someone's name.

Moreover, there are many such small black dots on almost every page.

The name that was deliberately obscured was naturally Milo, and he was the only one who appeared so frequently in the reports.

“For certain reasons, I don’t plan to let too many people know his name for the time being,” Nero replied calmly, tapping his fingers lightly on the table.

"Why? Is he in danger?" On the other side, the man with an eyepatch over his left eye asked Nero.

“You could say that,” Nero nodded, handing the two men in front of him the copy Rebecca had submitted.
"My chief of staff discovered some intriguing details. Before this, we had integrated and compared information on all the victims of the serial murders, but found no similarities. The victims' ages, genders, occupations, etc., varied greatly, making it almost impossible to find any similarities, which led us to suspect that the killer committed a crime of passion..."

Nero removed the cigar from his mouth, exhaled a thick cloud of smoke toward the ceiling, and continued:
"But now we've found a common thread among the victims: these people whose eyes were gouged out are all survivors of the Great Plague."

The bald inspector scoffed: "What are you talking about? Who in this city isn't a survivor of the Great Plague?"

The one-eyed inspector held the list in his hand, glanced coldly at the other man's bald head with his only right eye, and said in a gloomy tone, "He's talking about survivors who recovered from the plague."

"Let me see." The bald inspector reached out and took the document.

The document contains a comparison copy that Rebecca extracted from the list of recovered patients.

Starting with the first murder, every victim had contracted the virus during the pandemic and eventually recovered and survived.

One thing they had in common was that they had all received blood healing from the Golden Rule Church.

This is an important discovery by Rebecca.

As early as the night of the carriage murder, Milo mentioned that the church's attitude toward the serial killings was very strange, and their behavior seemed to be cleaning up the mess left by the murderer.

It was this sentence that awakened Rebecca.

Furthermore, their subsequent tracking through tattered cloth on the carriage led them to an abandoned shelter in the valley. All of this suggests that the murders were related to the great plague five years prior, and that the church was involved in both.

So she searched through the city archives and found the patient list from that year.

It was eventually determined that all the victims had contracted the disease during the plague, and that they had all recovered through the church's blood healing technique.

Why do churches repeatedly interfere with law enforcement?

Why did the killer choose patients who had recovered from blood therapy?
How did he identify these victims?

What unspeakable truth is hidden in this?

……

The three of them stared at the information in the copies in their hands and fell into deep thought.

Clearly, the truth behind the murder has only revealed the tip of the iceberg so far.

As members of the law enforcement system, they are obligated to pursue all evil to the end, as they have sworn an oath to do. However, the problem is that, given their positions, social class, and the power they wield, they may not be able to uncover the truth behind the case.

“This name should indeed be covered up.” The bald inspector suddenly spoke up: “I’ve read through the case report. This is a talented person; he shouldn’t have died so young.”

From the moment the truth of the matter involved the church, even the three inspectors present could not guarantee their own safety, let alone those below them.

“This is unnecessary. The church has far more information sources than we do. What they want to know, no one can hide from them,” the one-eyed inspector shook his head.

Nero took a puff of his cigar: "Then let's leave it at that for now. I propose that the public statement regarding the case be based on the previous report, without any modifications. As for these things on the table, let the three of us just look at them and submit them when the time is right, or perhaps never submit them at all. We'll wait and see what the Church does next, if they pretend nothing happened..."

“Continuing this investigation will do no good for any of us,” the one-eyed inspector said calmly, leaning back in his chair.

"Looks like there's a slight disagreement." The bald inspector's face showed a playful expression, his gaze shifting back and forth between Nero and One-Eye, as if he were watching a good show.

“I don’t plan to do anything big.” Nero moved his fingers, showing no emotional fluctuation. “I just wanted to let you two know. What’s been bothering me lately are those bastards in the black market.”

"You mean the Solomon Gang? I heard they've been fighting over something lately..."

"Should we send someone in to sneak in and check the situation?"

“This was arranged a long time ago. The problem is, now that my mole has been killed, we have to start all over again…”

……

At this point, the three inspectors realized something, and their eyes simultaneously focused on the name that had been covered up on the document.

(End of this chapter)