The captain then asked somewhat hesitantly, “May I know if the victim has regained consciousness?”

“He just came out from the ER but isn’t out of the woods yet,” answered Mu Yazhe.

“Then…”

He added, “I’m afraid it will be hard for you to get any clues from my father-in-law. His larynx was seriously injured in addition to his grave injuries. The police might’ve to wait for some time until he could speak again.”

“Oh… That’ll make things difficult on our side!”

“Difficult?” the man retorted. “The perpetrator remains at large as we speak. If we let that person off scot-free, more victims may appear. Shouldn’t your top priority be tracking the offender down and bringing them to justice?”

“It’s easier said than done. We police aren’t omnipotent gods. What’s more; we encountered many obstacles while trying to collect evidence, and with our lead cut off, we won’t be able to find any useful clues even if we continue with the investigation!”

His countenance turned darker as the police captain continued to rattle on.

The bureau chief sitting at the side tactfully let out a loud, meaningful cough as he shot his subordinate a warning look. Only then did the young captain realize how rude his words came across. He hung his head low in a fluster.

“Aren’t there any surveillance cameras around in the neighborhood?”

“There are several of them.”

“Why didn’t you guys go through the footage, then?”

The captain spoke in resignation. “The incident happened in an old neighborhood, which was built in 1988. The surveillance cameras located there lacked maintenance over the decades and aren’t working anymore. We’ve retrieved the security footage belonging to the buildings around there. Apart from the cameras placed at garages, entrances, and some other important locations, the rest failed to capture anything useful to our investigation as the incident happened in their blind spots.”

After mulling over the issue for a moment, the bureau chief suddenly said, “Go retrieve the footage of those cameras located at the entrance of the neighborhood and see if you can find any suspicious-looking people entering and leaving the area based on the estimated time of the incident!”

His subordinate shook his head helplessly. “That’s exactly what we did at first, but after even reviewing hours of the footage, we didn’t see anyone suspicious at all.”

“How’s that possible?!” he exclaimed. “Do you have any footage of the victim entering from the main gates? We can find our suspect by seeing if there’s anyone suspicious tailing him!”

The captain explained, “The thing is we don’t have any footage of the victim entering from the main gates, chief. There’s a garage located near the back gate in this neighborhood, and the residents rarely use the back gate. Based on the proximity between the victim’s apartment and the back gate, I surmised that he used the back gate to enter the neighborhood.”

“Look into this and retrieve the relevant footage.”

“There’s no surveillance camera installed at the back gate, though.”

The bureau chief cursed inwardly. This offender really knows where to commit their crime!

Did they run a check on the neighborhood’s camera locations before committing the crime?

“This…” He frowned in concern. “Aren’t there any witnesses at all?”

“Unfortunately not. The incident happened rather late at night; on top of that, the residents rarely walked about on the streets at night due to the neighborhood being located near the industrial area, where there are a lot of immigrants loitering about. We thought that the cameras at the garage would have captured some footage that might be useful in our investigation, but alas, they weren’t angled to capture images of people entering and leaving from the back gate.”

Rapping his knuckles against the desk, he asked sternly, “Could this be a robbery case?”