National Forensic Doctor

"The murderer is still hiding at the crime scene?"

Liu Jinghui’s words were clear to everyone, but most found them hard to believe.

Liu Jinghui didn’t answer directly. He merely said, "We have now discovered that there’s a high probability of two murderers. One of them is likely the props master; he’s already in the interrogation room, still refusing to confess. As for the second murderer, their footprints don’t match those of the crew members, meaning there’s an extra person at the scene. After committing the crime, if this person didn’t have the chance to leave, where could they be hiding?"

"The crime scene—the replica Ming-style courtyard—is quite large and architecturally complex. It’s definitely capable of hiding someone," Wang Chuanxing said.

Jiang Yuan also agreed with Liu Jinghui’s statement. He wasn’t encountering a case of "murderer returning to the scene" for the first time, so he nodded and said, "It’s quite likely. The suspect, Wang Yuxian, is a props master, so he probably knows how to hide his accomplice well."

"If we look at it this way, last night—or rather, in the early hours of this morning—the disturbance makes sense, doesn’t it? If they had managed to cause enough chaos or if a new film crew moved in, the hidden murderer at the scene could easily take advantage of the situation to escape," Wang Chuanxing reasoned as his thoughts began to align.

Liu Jinghui smirked slightly and said, "The plan is even more intricate than what you described. If the new crew moves in, the director would be eager to start filming. If surveillance cameras interfere with that, the director would likely order the cameras to be shut down. At that time, the murderer could stealthily slip away, leaving outsiders completely unaware of what had transpired. It would be like vanishing into thin air."

Mu Zhiyang said, "Looking at the surveillance footage, there might be gaps in the timeline, no?"

"That depends on the person reviewing the surveillance footage. If there are few personnel or those doing the review aren’t meticulous—if they don’t examine the footage at a steady pace from start to finish—they may not notice. Alternatively, if such gaps occur frequently, noticing won’t make much difference. Short-term camera outages are not unusual, and without evidence, the officers in Image Investigation won’t be able to say much. This type of negligence doesn’t surprise me—I’ve seen countless mishandlings." Liu Jinghui spoke with the expertise of someone who knew every detail of procedural investigation, including its common pitfalls.

Some case investigators have displayed such carelessness or ineptitude that their actions could even be deemed laughable. Some of these cases were later reviewed, summarized, and published in academic papers. To paraphrase a common saying: "How big a mess have you made at work?"