The Scheming Ex-Husband's Courtship-Chapter 593 - 517

Chapter 593: Chapter 517
Just as Jian Si was startled, Nan Zhan had already seen through her thoughts with an indifferent gaze, "Surprised, are you? I wouldn’t come to pick up someone without a name."
It was then that Jian Si relaxed. Perhaps it was guilt that overwhelmed her when he suddenly called out her surname. Upon calming down, she realized there was nothing strange about it. He was Nan Yu’s brother, so it was only natural that he knew her name.
Jian Si got out of the car, and Nan Zhan was already ahead. His strides were large, almost striding briskly; she had to jog to keep up with his pace.
He walked into the security room of the residential complex, and immediately a wave of heat hit them. Although the windows were open, the small space was still more stiflingly hot than outside.
A man who looked to be in his fifties was sitting at the desk drinking water and flipping through a newspaper. When he saw the two newcomers, he paused and greeted, "Hello, can I help you with something?"
"Are you Li Quangang?" Nan Zhan asked bluntly. After receiving a nod of acknowledgement, he glanced at Jian Si, "There are some questions regarding the car arson case on June 18th we would like to ask you."
"Are you police? The police have already questioned me many times," Li Quangang remarked, but upon seeing Nan Zhan’s remarkable presence and powerful aura, he equated him with the police in his mind. Perhaps a high-ranking official had come to personally oversee the case, "What do you want to ask? I can recite it by heart now."
Nan Zhan had just gestured for Jian Si to ask the questions she needed to, so Jian Si went over and smiled at Li Quangang, "Brother Li, hello, I’m Jian Si. Could you please describe in detail the appearance of the suspect you saw that day?"
"No problem." Li Quangang pulled over two chairs, "Please have a seat first."
Jian Si sat down, while Nan Zhan chose a sofa further away, casually flipping through the case files, looking as though he didn’t want to intervene with her interrogation. This eased Jian Si’s previously restless heart by a great margin.
"Brother Li, what time did you see the suspect?"
"It was after two in the morning. I heard some noises outside, so I went out to check. A man was walking out of the complex. I didn’t pay much attention at the time, but soon after he left, there was an explosion-like noise from the parking lot. At that time, he was the only one who had entered and exited the complex, so I suspected that the arson was his doing." Remembering that day’s events, Li Quangang was still frightened. A total of six sedans were burned, and that was just in their complex. He heard that other places had also experienced cars being set on fire. Fortunately, it all happened in the middle of the night and did not result in any casualties.
"What was your first impression of this person?" Jian Si took out a sketchpad and pencil.
"He had a big nose," Li Quangang recalled forcefully, "A rosacea kind of big nose."
"Anything else?"
Li Quangang scratched his head, "It was just a fleeting glance, and then he quickly walked away with his head down. Plus, it was night-time, so I didn’t see too clearly. I can’t describe the other features very well."
Jian Si showed Li Quangang a surveillance snapshot from the files, "Brother Li, is this the person you saw?"
Although the image was blurry, Li Quangang confirmed immediately, "Yes, that’s him, I’m sure of it. Even though the facial features aren’t very clear, the resemblance is striking."
Jian Si nodded, then asked a few more questions, and Li Quangang told her everything he could describe without reservation.
About half an hour later, the phone in the security room rang. Li Quangang answered it and stepped out, leaving Jian Si and Nan Zhan alone in the stuffy, cramped security room.
She was already sweating from the heat, so she took a paper towel from her bag to wipe herself and cast a look at Nan Zhan, who was sitting in the corner sorting through the documents. Gripping the paper towel in her hand, she hesitated again and again, ultimately lacking the courage to offer it to him.
Perhaps sensing someone’s gaze, Nan Zhan looked up from the document in his hand. Their eyes met, his sharp and dark, and Jian Si felt guilty and lowered her head. To cover her embarrassment, she quickly grabbed the pencil and began drawing according to Li Quangang’s description.
"His eyes were very small." While Jian Si was on her fifth portrait, Nan Zhan who was sitting there suddenly said, "His gaze seemed unfocused, not clearly discerning black and white."
Jian Si was stunned and asked subconsciously, "How do you know that?"
Neither the surveillance footage nor Li Quangang’s description had revealed the suspect’s eyes.
"It’s simple. The first thing the witness noticed was his big nose. The lighting wasn’t good in the darkness of night; the nose seemed particularly large mainly because the man’s eyes were so small, which accentuated his large nose."
"And the unfocused gaze?" This seemingly had no relation with the nose’s size.
Nan Zhan set aside the case files he was holding and pulled something out of his pocket to fiddle with, "One commonality among the burned cars is the model; moreover, before being burned, their bodies and windows were severely scratched up by a sharp object."
Jian Si had gone through the files earlier too and immediately challenged, "But two of the cars were different models."
"Those were just collateral damage while the suspect set fire to the target vehicles," Nan Zhan casually continued toying with the object in his hand, "This person is quite short, only 161 centimeters tall."
The security camera’s angle was almost vertical, making it impossible to determine height, and Li Quangang, having only paid attention to the suspect’s face, had a vague impression of the height. Jian Si was astonished by how Nan Zhan could reach such a precise conclusion of 161 centimeters.
"Based on the height and angle of the scratches on the windshield, the person was lying on the hood and scribbling on the windshield with a sharp object before committing the act. Considering the car’s particularly long front end, and using the distance from the hood to the scratches plus the height of the car body from the ground, it’s not difficult to calculate his exact height."
Thinking of these numbers, Jian Si was somewhat overwhelmed, "You don’t really know the height of every car body from the ground, do you?"
Nan Zhan’s expression looked somewhat arrogant and matter-of-fact, "I can’t guarantee it for cars that haven’t left the factory."
Jian Si was majorly surprised.
"Then how did you conclude that his eyes were unfocused and indistinct?"
"Because he’s timid. People who are timid usually have this characteristic, they lack decisiveness in their actions and are fearful."
"Timid?" Jian Si was increasingly confused. Would a timid person torch so many vehicles in the middle of the night, committing serial arson?
She certainly wouldn’t dare.
"The destroyed cars were all of the same model; have you considered the reason?" Nan Zhan leaned back on the sofa, looking at her leisurely with ease.
It was indeed very hot here; fine beads of sweat glistened on the tip of her nose, which under the refracted sunlight made her skin appear even whiter.
Actually, she was very beautiful.
Jian Si shook her head: "Perhaps it’s obsessive-compulsive disorder."
Nan Zhan tapped his forehead with some helplessness, "Targeting the same model for the crime indicates that he has some sort of hatred towards this type of car."
"I got it. He’s taking revenge on society because he can’t afford one," Jian Si voiced with certainty this time.
Yet she received an even more scornful look from Nan Zhan, who was somewhat amused and distressed, "Miss Jian, it’s good that the criminal isn’t you; otherwise, I really wouldn’t be able to solve this case."
Jian Si blinked her eyes, initially mistaking it as a compliment. She realized only later that it was mockery.
However, she quickly looked at him suspiciously, "Do you mean to say that you’ve already solved the case?"
"Once your portrait is drawn, the case is essentially solved." He spoke with absolute certainty and confidence, his expression exuding an aura that made one want to blindly worship, "This person has a certain connection with this model of car, he loathes it very much, probably because it has caused harm to him or to someone he knows—over ninety percent of car-related cases are due to traffic accidents."
"You’re saying, he or someone related to him was hit by this type of car?"
"Yes, and it was a hit-and-run that has yet to be found. So, to vent his anger, he wanted to take revenge on this model of car. He naïvely believes that by burning all of Aus City’s cars of this model, he can certainly punish the perpetrator. Yet, he is also very timid because according to the data, there was one car in this neighborhood that wasn’t burned because it had a drunk person in it that night. Despite the arsonist being blinded by rage, he still didn’t dare to commit murder. That is to say, from the start, his target for revenge was the car, not people."
"I understand, just check the incident s related to this model of car during this period," Jian Si realized.
"You finally have a smart moment," Nan Zhan continued to fiddle with the object in his hand, and Jian Si noticed that what he had been skillfully twirling was a small Crystal Rubik’s Cube, which had been solved and scrambled many times over as he conversed with her, and he could even remember the position of each color without looking.
After marveling briefly, Jian Si continued to draw, eventually coming up with ten portraits, and by then, Li Quangang had also come back from being busy.
Jian Si handed the ten portrait sketches over to him, asking him to identify the person he had seen that night.
Jian Si actually wasn’t very confident in herself; the clues provided by Li Quangang were limited, and the rest was thanks to Nan Zhan’s pointers. However, her mind held countless faces, all as if etched by a painter’s brush, so when Li Quangang described the rough features, she could quickly draw a basic outline.
Li Quangang flipped through them one by one until he reached the last page when he suddenly pointed at the person in the drawing with his finger, "It’s him, it’s him, I’m sure of it."
Despite only having encountered him briefly, Li Quangang recognized the man when he was reproduced in front of him.
With some delight, Jian Si confirmed again, "Big Brother Li, look closer, are you sure it’s him?"
"Yes, it’s definitely him, especially this nose, which left a deep impression on me."
Feeling some excitement, Jian Si glanced at Nan Zhan; he was looking down playing with the Cube in his hand, the smile on his lips carrying an air of having everything under control. **