The Elixir is for You, The Poison is for Me

#456 - guess

Before even entering the room, Lu Jing had already detected a strong smell of blood.

Following the scent, he quickly spotted a corpse on the bed.

Where the head should have been on the corpse's neck, there was now only emptiness.

Fresh blood spurted from the severed area, staining the sheets red, and then dripped onto the floor tiles through the gaps between the bed boards, just like a classic scene from a cult movie.

No wonder the maid who was sent by Wen Lun to call for help was so terrified that she lost all color in her face.

Li Bufan and the Duke of Yingguo had arrived before Lu Jing and were already looking around the room.

The two didn't care too much about the Wen family's reward; instead, they were more eager to find the murderer as soon as possible. Li Bufan even took the initiative to share what he had found.

This book is first published on 𝕥 𝕨 𝕜 𝕒 𝕟 . 𝕔 𝕠 𝕞.

"There is only one wound on the body, um, the one you see, so we can basically rule out the possibility that the murderer used other means to kill Hall Master Jiang and then cut off his head to divert attention."

"Unless the real fatal wound is also on the neck," the Duke of Yingguo interjected.

"Yes, that's also possible," Li Bufan nodded. "However, the only place with blood in the room is near the bed. There are no signs of fighting anywhere else. And according to my observation, the bloodstains on the headboard were all left after the beheading. So, personally, I'm more inclined to believe that this one cut was the cause of Hall Master Jiang's death."

"Knife?" Lu Jing raised his eyebrows.

"Yes, you can tell from the incision that the murder weapon was a knife, and a very thin and fast one. The length should not exceed seven inches, making it easy to carry and hide," Li Bufan said, pausing before adding, "I didn't find it in the room. The murderer must have taken it away, so if we can find this knife, we should be able to find the murderer."

"But I still don't understand," the Duke of Yingguo said, "Can a knife really be that fast? With Hall Master Jiang's martial arts skills, plus the hidden weapons he carried, he couldn't even put up a fight and was beheaded with one strike. To achieve this, just a good knife is probably not enough, right?"

Li Bufan was silent for a moment, then nodded, "Indeed, Hall Master Jiang is at the Second-Rate level, and almost at the peak of Second-Rate. It wouldn't be easy for even a general First-Rate expert to take him down in a one-on-one fight. Plus, he carried a lot of gunpowder, especially the terrifying hidden weapon, Wrath of the Buddha."

"Once he decided to throw it out, probably no one in this room would survive, not to mention that he could call for help if he saw things going wrong. So, to kill him, you only had one chance, and there aren't many people in the world who can do that."

"Not many" meant that there were still people who could do it.

And there were some within the Wen Family Manor, such as Li Bufan himself.

Besides him, Lü Qinghou, Yu Wenyu, Jin Duoduo, and even Lu Jing were all considered capable of doing it.

Although Lu Jing himself didn't think so, his knife skills were average. It was more like staff techniques than knife techniques. Using a knife reduced the power by 20%, and he wasn't particularly fast. Plus, his lightness skill wasn't outstanding among First-Rate experts.

Lu Jing's strength was actually his almost unlimited internal energy, which provided super endurance. Unfortunately, because he performed too well in the previous battle on the river, restraining Li Feilong with one move, he was naturally included in the list.

And that's why Aunt Wen assigned each of them a team of guards, not just to be at their disposal, but also to monitor them. It's just that their identities were extraordinary, and it wasn't convenient to say things directly.

Li Bufan seemed to have thought of something. He left in a hurry shortly after saying the last sentence, and then the Duke of Yingguo also bid farewell and left unhurriedly.

After they both left, only Lu Jing and his team of guards were left at Jiang Lei's residence. Lu Jing carefully searched the house from beginning to end.

As Li Bufan said, there were no other signs of fighting anywhere else in the house.

It was unclear if Jiang Lei had some kind of cleanliness obsession. The tables, chairs, and even the teapot and teacups on the table were arranged neatly, and there were no signs that anyone had touched them.

Until Lu Jing moved his gaze to the wooden box at the foot of the bed, paused for a moment, and then stepped forward to open it. He found that it contained some clothes, and at the bottom of the box, there was about 1,200 taels of silver.

Lu Jing beckoned and called the captain of the guard team outside the house, "Was this box already in the house before Hall Master Jiang came?"

The captain of the small team following Lu Jing was a woman of about twenty-seven or eight named Wen Liran. She seemed to have practiced an external martial art, especially her palms. The skin and blood vessels faintly showed a reddish color, and there were many calluses on her hands, indicating that she had put in a lot of hard work in this martial art.

However, her palms were no longer delicate and fair. And since all women in the world love beauty, Wen Liran was no exception, so she usually kept her palms hidden in her sleeves.

Hearing Lu Jing's question, Wen Liran shook her head, "I'm mainly responsible for guarding the manor, so I'm not very clear about this. But I can find the maid who cleans the house to ask. She should know."

"Thank you for your trouble."

"You're welcome, Grandmaster Lu. Aunt Wen has already instructed us that I will cooperate as much as possible with anything you order," Wen Liran said respectfully, while instructing two of her subordinates to find the cleaning maid.

Lu Jing nodded, "I have some doubts in my mind. Jiang Lei obviously valued this box very much, but now it only contains some ordinary clothes and 1,200 taels of silver. This amount of silver is not a small sum, but it's not too much for Jiang Lei either. He has no reason to be so nervous about such a small amount of silver."

Wen Liran's mind raced, "Does Grandmaster Lu think that someone replaced the contents of the box?"

"I have this suspicion," Lu Jing admitted.

Wen Liran then had a sudden inspiration and said to Lu Jing, "Grandmaster Lu, this box doesn't look small. It should be able to accommodate one person. Could it be that the murderer was hiding here before, taking advantage of Hall Master Jiang's unguarded moment, suddenly jumped out to attack Hall Master Jiang, first acupuncturing Hall Master Jiang, then dragging Hall Master Jiang to the bed and killing him with a knife? In this way, perhaps it can be done without too much martial arts skill."

Lu Jing was stunned when he heard this, and then his expression became a little strange, "This… is unlikely, right?"