Chapter 51: The Power of This Accursed Money

Beneath the river, burlap sacks, wrapped around stones.

When he heard these words, Huang Chao’s face grew grim. He quickly ordered the workers to halt both unloading and loading the cargo ship and summoned those skilled in swimming to help recover the sacks from the riverbed.

It wasn’t long before two sacks were dragged up from the water by the crowd.

The mouths of the sacks were tightly bound, with ropes attached to heavy stones, which the workers had already untied underwater.

Huang Chao stepped forward personally and opened one of the sacks. Inside lay a corpse, swollen and pale after being soaked in the river for so long.

He opened the other sack.

The two missing men had been found, but both were dead.

Many of the workers present turned pale at the sight of the bodies, though they were a bit more composed than ordinary people. Those who worked long on the water had grown used to the occasional floating corpse, so this was not unheard of. Still, these two were their colleagues just a few days ago.

And now, they’d died so suddenly and inexplicably.

“Mr. Kelly,” Huang Chao said, his expression ashen and his tone earnest. “Please, find out who did this.”

Kelly Losaidi’s face also grew serious as the missing persons case turned into a murder. He replied, “Mr. Huang, at this point, I recommend you call the police and let the Federal Police investigate. They’ll be much more effective. After all, we are only private detectives.”

Private detectives often took on murder and missing persons cases, and a fee of twenty thousand Lang was standard. But now that it had become a murder, the price would be different.

As he spoke, Kelly couldn’t help glancing at Li Changqing beside him, wanting to gauge his opinion.

He saw Li Changqing staring unblinkingly at the two corpses. Kelly thought to himself that this was odd—did the man have some morbid fascination? What could be so interesting about corpses?

Li Changqing, however, was simply curious. He gathered spiritual energy into his eyes, and to his surprise, saw a faint black mist encircling the two bodies.

A baleful aura.

Their deaths, it seemed, were far from ordinary.

“I agree with Kelly. It’s best to let the Federal Police handle this from here,” Li Changqing said, unwilling to be too deeply entangled in this strange case. The more he witnessed such inexplicable forces, the more cautious he became.

“I can offer more,” Huang Chao protested. He didn’t want the Federal Police involved. With all the goods passing through the riverside dock each day, a murder investigation would mean the police sealing off the site. Even if they worked quickly and solved the case in three to five days, the losses would be substantial.

If they were any slower, the financial hit would be even greater. The goods stockpiled at his dock had to be delivered to the buyers on schedule, or the penalty fees alone would be a fortune.

“I’ll add thirty thousand Lang to the original twenty thousand,” Huang Chao offered.

Li Changqing removed his felt hat and placed it over his chest, apologetic. “Mr. Huang, it’s not a matter of money.”

“Fifty thousand Lang.”

“Eighty thousand Lang! With the original twenty thousand, that’s a hundred thousand Lang in total!”

“Xiaoyu,” Li Changqing called over his shoulder.

Tang Xiaoyu, stunned by Huang Chao’s bidding, snapped out of it at his call. Reluctant to part with such a sum, she asked, “Are we leaving?”

“Leave? Get the commission contract and draft a new agreement with Mr. Huang.”

Very well.

Li Changqing admitted to himself that he was once again bowing to the power of money.

The damnable allure of money…

A smile finally appeared on Huang Chao’s face. Compared to the potential losses caused by police intervention, a hundred thousand Lang seemed almost trivial.

After drafting a new agreement, the three of them officially accepted the murder case.

Of course, the incident still needed to be reported to the Federal Police—the law required it in the event of a murder.

But unlike in the previous world, here it was entirely permissible for clients to hire a detective to solve a murder. As long as the perpetrator was found and evidence secured, the Federal Police could then make the arrest.

This law had two main advantages:

First, it allowed private detectives greater room to operate.

Second, private detectives were highly professional, and if someone was willing to help solve a case, the Federal Police were more than happy to oblige.

Of course, most murder cases were still reported to the police; only those like Mr. Huang, with special circumstances, would entrust them to a detective.

The workers pulled the corpses from the sacks and sent them to the funeral home, while Huang Chao made arrangements for cargo operations to resume.

Li Changqing, Kelly Losaidi, and Tang Xiaoyu remained at the site of the recovery, analyzing the situation together.

“To kill—both at once—there are two possibilities,” Li Changqing began. “First, it could have been someone they knew. The murderer is familiar to both victims, recently had a serious conflict with them, and killed them over it.”

“Second, it’s the work of a deranged serial killer—killing at random without reason.”

“But the first is more likely. The surveillance at the dock wouldn’t fail for no reason—someone must have tampered with it. And the main gate cameras have always been intact. That night, no outsiders entered the dock, so the killer is almost certainly one of the dock’s own.”

Kelly Losaidi nodded in agreement. He added, “But there are few people on night duty. For two strong men to be killed quietly, then tied to stones and dumped in the river, I’d estimate there were at least two perpetrators.”

Li Changqing shook his head slightly. If there had been no sign of baleful energy, Kelly would be right. But if some strange power was used, one person would suffice.

Of course, he didn’t voice this thought.

If the killer was someone with such baleful energy, the investigation would be straightforward: gather everyone at the riverside dock and see who bore the taint. The murderer would be revealed.

This case would not be hard to crack.

The only difficulty was—

How powerful was this practitioner of dark arts?

And if exposed, what would he do if driven into a corner?

Li Changqing spoke quietly to Tang Xiaoyu, “Go back to the office and bring my two guns and the iron pellets from the cabinet.”

“Alright,” she replied, nodding. With daylight still left, she hurried off toward the detective agency.

“Kelly, later let’s have Mr. Huang gather all his workers. A murderer always slips up somewhere,” Li Changqing said, hoping inwardly that this case would end smoothly—and profitably.