The first bar Su Mo went to had a relatively relaxed atmosphere without too much noise. It felt a little bourgeois.
He didn't stay for even two minutes before leaving. This was clearly not the kind of place a murderer would look for a target. The reason was simple - it wasn't chaotic enough. Only a sufficiently chaotic place would allow the murderer to take the target away unnoticed without drawing others' attention.
Next, he entered the second bar. This bar was much more raucous.
Heavy metal music filled the entire venue, lights flashing incessantly, with several scantily clad women dancing on the stage. Su Mo didn't understand why so many people liked this kind of headache-inducing environment. He didn't like it either.
But he felt this was a place that met the criteria, so he found a seat and quietly observed.
After about half an hour, he got up and left. He had eliminated this bar too, because the spending here wasn't high enough. The people who came here to have fun didn't seem to have much money.
And so, he observed one bar after another, from the head of the street all the way to the end, spending nearly three hours in total before finally arriving at the entrance of the last bar.
He had narrowed it down to four venues. The place where the murderer was likely looking for a target was probably one of these four nightclubs. He was in no hurry, quietly lying in wait.
Before entering the last bar, he sent Li Danting a text message. Yes, they had added each other on WeChat.
"Come to Honglou Street to pick me up. I'm drunk."
The tone was extremely rude. Any girl seeing this kind of message would probably get very angry.
As expected, Li Danting was furious. She didn't like men who went to nightclubs, she really didn't like them.
Upon seeing this message, she made a decision - she would still go there this time, but afterwards she wouldn't have anything more to do with Su Mo.
Half an hour later, Li Danting arrived at Honglou Street. She then saw Su Mo cozying up with a scantily clad woman, chatting and laughing.
She really wanted to turn around and leave, but still suppressed her anger and walked over to Su Mo's side. "Let's go."
Feigning surprise at being discovered, Su Mo let go of the woman. Then he staggered along with Li Danting towards the parking lot.
"Now I'd like to see you come up with any more reasonable storylines, stupid woman. Bye bye." Su Mo secretly exulted.
Pretending to be dead drunk, he handed Li Danting the car keys, then got into the back seat by himself and pretended to fall asleep.
Then, neither of them spoke. Li Danting drove and took Su Mo to the archives.
Finally, after returning Su Mo's car keys, she left in a taxi with a stony face the entire time.
Back home, she gave a cold laugh. "Men, not a single good one among them." Then she immediately blocked Su Mo.
That night, Su Mo slept very well, very peacefully. He felt that he had finally gotten rid of that stupid woman, and life was becoming wonderful again.
For the next week, he lingered around those four nightclubs on Honglou Street, not doing anything, just ordering a few drinks and sitting quietly in the corner observing.
Until the 8th night, when it was almost 2am and Su Mo was about to leave,
he saw a youth in his early twenties walk in from outside. The young man had fair skin and was tall, probably about 6'1". He had a medium build and looked quite wealthy from his clothes.
After entering, the youth kept a low profile like Su Mo, sitting in the corner drinking while letting his eyes wander around.
The young man's appearance made the corners of Su Mo's mouth curl up. He felt this was very promising, so next, he secretly observed the youth while the youth secretly observed others.
Half an hour later, a woman in black stockings walked into the bar. She wasn't very pretty, quite ordinary. And from her looks, she seemed mean-looking - one glance and you could tell she was not to be trifled with, bad temper.
But the young man stared fixedly at the woman. The dim lighting obscured his expression, but Su Mo could sense that aura - it was the feeling of a snake flicking its tongue.
Sure enough, soon the youth walked over to chat up the woman, laughing and talking as they drank quite a lot.
It wasn't until 3am that the young man put his arm around the woman and left the bar, presumably to go play cards somewhere.
At this time, Su Mo also settled his bill and left. Although he moved very quickly, by the time he got outside, there was no trace of the other two.
But it was fine, he had remembered what the young man and woman looked like. Finding them again wouldn't be hard, just a matter of time.
Then he got into his own car and returned to the archives. He wanted to sleep now. These past few nights he had been sleeping late, that wasn't a good habit.
As a nerd, Wang Jian was used to staying up late - that was a basic occupational skill. To be precise, night time wasn't when he slept.
If nothing special was going on, he basically didn't sleep at night. Around 5 or 6 in the morning was when he went to bed.
At 3am, having just finished a round of gaming with pretty good aim and another MVP, his Demacia had once again slaughtered through Summoner's Rift.
After sitting for so long his shoulders were a little sore, so he stood up and walked to the window to relax.
As a nerd, having a pair of binoculars to peep on the surroundings at any time was quite reasonable, right? Ahem, to observe the world at any time was quite reasonable, right?
So next to his window was a set of binoculars.
With nothing to do, he habitually started observing. He really enjoyed this - he often saw shadows of people playing cards in the rooms around him, which he loved watching.
Since his home was on the 6th floor, he had a good view. Soon, he noticed a room about 200 meters away with its lights on.
Through the shadows in the window he could see two people inside playing a game.
"Hehehe..." He had a lecherous expression.
Very quickly, the upper shadow suddenly leaned back slightly. He knew it was over.
But the next moment, his expression froze, then became one of shock and fear.
He saw the upper shadow raise both hands up high, still holding something that looked like a knife, then fiercely hack down at the one below. After that, the lower shadow stopped moving.
"No way... No way. Could I have just witnessed a murder?
Damn, don't tell me that's the one called Disciple 9!"
Before Wang Jian could think further, the upper shadow started getting up, holding that knife-like object and messing with the woman's head.
Now he was almost certain. "Damn, this really is that Disciple 9!"
At this time his mind was in turmoil, wondering whether to call the police or ignore it.
After thinking hard for a while, he decided to watch a little longer and call the police after making completely sure.
Another 10 minutes later, the woman's shadow remained motionless. He saw the man holding up something that looked like skin. Now he didn't hesitate - he immediately called the police, then got dressed and ran towards the nearby building.
In fact he was very scared, scared of being killed by the murderer. He knew his own limits - if he encountered the killer, he would absolutely not be a match.