The music in the nightclub was very loud, and there were a lot of people with a complicated mix of smells.
Jian Jing found the bar, sat down, and ordered a margarita that wouldn't taste too bad, then lowered her head to photoshop. She downloaded the dean's photo from the school bulletin board, used a face swap app to change it to big wavy hair, smoothed out the wrinkles, and a brand new gender-swapped dean's photo was freshly baked.
"Miss, your drink," said the bartender very gently to the beautiful young lady.
"Thanks," Jian Jing held up her phone, "Have you seen this woman before?"
The bartender was taken aback, with thoughts like "Cheating?", "Doesn't look like her", "Looking for a woman?" quickly flashing through his mind, but his mouth smoothly answered: "Haven't seen her before."
Jian Jing: "You didn't even look carefully."
"I see too many people every day, I really can't remember," his tone was sincere, his gaze earnest, making people unable to help but doubt whether they had received special training to deal with similar situations.
Jian Jing narrowed her eyes, speaking gently: "This is my aunt, she's been missing for many days, and her family is very worried."
When she acted, who could disbelieve her?
The bartender's wariness greatly decreased. They were mainly afraid of customers causing trouble, but this young lady was beautiful, and she was looking for a relative, not the troublemaking type. So he took a careful look at the photo.
On closer inspection, it did look a little familiar: "She's a regular."
Jian Jing immediately felt more confident.
Sure enough, the dean of her school had a crossdressing fetish, no doubt about it.
He left his phone and ID in the car, not because he read too many detective novels and planned to stage a disappearance, but purely to dress up and hook up at the nightclub...ahem, hook up with people.
But who would go clubbing for a few days without going home? This was going to be trouble.
How could she convince the nightclub owner to let her look at the surveillance footage? Should she sneak in as a white kitten?
Wouldn't that be overkill, like she was in a spy movie?
While she was worrying about it, an opportunity knocked on the door.
"First time here?" Someone sat down next to her spot, chatted familiarly, "Haven't seen you before."
Jian Jing's attitude was still good: "I'm here looking for someone." She turned her phone to show him the photo, "Have you seen my auntie?"
The other person glanced at it: "Looks a little familiar." He chatted some more, "What are you looking for her for? Who did she come with? We'd have to think hard about it. Why don't you come sit with us, we're all regulars here, maybe someone recognizes her."
Jian Jing didn't hesitate much before agreeing.
- There was a big misunderstanding here.
She agreed without thinking because physiologically she was on par with males, and even better than the average man in some ways. When had she ever seen a physically fit man carefully consider an ordinary invitation?
However, the ways of the world are cruel. Most girls cannot enjoy such "privileges". More cautious girls would never go to a meeting alone.
Once she arrived, the men assumed she was willing to go further. But this was precisely what the girls had never considered and could not understand.
The result was predictable.
Jian Jing asked for information: "Have you seen this woman before?"
"Looks pretty familiar, I think I've seen her before," in the private room, the few men exchanged glances, their answers were similar, "When did I see her? Ah, I just can't remember clearly now."
It was normal for one person to say this, but two or three giving the same answer was clearly toying with her.
Jian Jing rolled her eyes - she wasn't angry yet - waved her hand and simply said, "Forget it if you don't remember." She didn't want to waste time, stood up and walked away.
"Wait wait," said the man who had called her over, smiling as he handed her a drink, "they're just teasing you. We have definitely seen her before, she's a regular, likes to party pretty wildly. What are you looking for her for?"
Jian Jing asked: "Did you see who she was with when she came here the night of the 3rd?"
"This... I didn't notice," the other side stalled awkwardly, "Why are you in such a hurry to find her? Tell us what's going on and maybe we can help you think of a way."
Jian Jing pondered.
He took the opportunity to push more drinks: "No rush, have a drink and take your time telling us."
The lighting at the nightclub was very soft, like a beauty camera filter, making even plain-looking people seem gentle and charming under the dim lights, not to mention the man offering her drinks looked quite handsome and had pleasant speech and a great sense of humor.
But... scumbags were not in short supply amongst the sanctimonious.
Jian Jing lowered her head to look at the glass. Under the dim lights, the color of the liquor was distorted, there were patterns on the glass, even if she stared hard at it, she might not be able to spot anything amiss.
She thought her eyes were blurry and took a sip through the straw.
Character Status Panel: Minor date rape drug poisoning.
After five seconds, the status disappeared, suggesting the effects of the drug had already been neutralized.
She pressed her fingers to her temple, turned her head to glance at the well-dressed man beside her, and took a deep breath.
Then, with lightning speed, she got up and clamped his face between her five fingers.
The man was caught off guard.
Before his brain could react, he saw the innocent, naive-looking female student prying open his jaw and pouring the entire glass of liquor into his mouth.
Some of the alcohol went down his windpipe and he coughed violently, "Cough cough cough, what, what are you doing? Blargh!"
His friends were shocked and hurried over to diffuse the situation: "Put it down, stop that, what are you doing?"
"Go get the owner over here," Jian Jing looked coldly at the servers milling around, "otherwise I'll report to the police that you have illegal transactions going on here."
The servers were startled and quickly tried to mediate: "Miss, please don't talk nonsense, we're a legitimate bar, we don't have anything shady going on."
While speaking, they signaled the bouncers to come apprehend her.
"Miss, please come with us," said the bouncer uncle as he gripped her shoulder and pressed down forcefully.
Jian Jing grabbed his wrist, twisted hard, and flipped him over her shoulder.
The glasses shattered noisily on the floor, attracting quite a few customers nearby.
"If you want to fight, I'll oblige. Anyway the police will be on my side when they get here," she said unhurriedly, glancing at the man who was disoriented from the effects of the drugs, "I advise you not to make trouble for yourselves. Just let me see the surveillance footage and I'll only cause trouble for him."
The servers were extremely adept at judging the situation.
If people started fighting in the venue other customers would surely leave, affecting business.
The customer's request was not unreasonable. Let them sort out their own mess. The server immediately put on a smile: "The young miss misunderstood, if you have any doubts let's go to the back and talk it over."
Jian Jing said: "At least you know better."
The server led her to the office and spoke gently: "It was just a misunderstanding. Drinks are on the house for the miss today. And we have coupons here, you get 50% off next time you come."
Jian Jing cut to the chase: "Show me the surveillance footage."
The server played Tai Chi: "That concerns customer privacy..."
"Do you want me to call the police over to check the footage and search for illegal drugs at the same time?" she asked coldly.
The server shut his mouth and signaled the bouncer with his eyes.
The bouncer understood: "There are no cameras inside, I'm afraid we can't help you."
"Check the entrance," she pulled over a chair and sat down, "Cue it up to the 7 pm on the 3rd."
The bouncer made excuses: "The cameras are broken."
Jian Jing raised her eyebrows and asked back: "Don't you think I look familiar?"
The server took another look, seemed unconcerned, and smoothly brushed her off: "Did you act in a TV show? I knew it, miss looks just like a celebrity."
"My surname is Jian, Jian Jing," threats like revealing her identity were a bit embarrassing. Jian Jing steeled herself a little before saying, "You can check Weibo, and reconsider whether you want me to post a message saying your establishment in 2077 has a habit of drugging female customers."
The server was still hesitating when the bouncer slapped his thigh, having remembered: "I knew you looked familiar! You're that female fiction author right? My daughter loves your books, we've bought so many copies at home."
Having him say that, the name Jian Jing did sound familiar, at least as well-known as a second-tier celebrity. The server immediately changed his tune: "The cameras are broken? Let me take another look, I think they were fixed."
The bouncer cleverly fiddled for a bit and pretended to be pleasantly surprised: "You're right, fixed now."
Jian Jing: Exhausted.
Finally, under duress, she got to see the surveillance footage.
There were two pieces of news, one good and one bad: The good news was that she saw Dean Wan come in, he hadn't been careful and the entrance camera caught a good half of his face. The bad news was...there was no footage of him leaving.
Did he leave through the back door? Or did he change back into men's clothing, borrowing someone else's outfit, so he slipped by undetected?
Jian Jing considered for a moment, then abruptly stood up.
"Miss Jian..." the server chased after her.
Jian Jing ignored him and headed straight for the back door. Once out of the nightclub, she dialed 110 and reported that the nightclub had drugged someone, suggesting they conduct a thorough investigation.
After hanging up the phone, Jian Jing took a good look at her surroundings.
The back door of the bar opened into a dingy alley. 2077 was located in an industrial district known for its industrial atmosphere, and the back door led to a gloomy building.
The lower seven floors were almost completely dark, while the upper seven housed escape rooms, which the building was known for.
It was a barely-alive commercial building suitable only for horror businesses.
Jian Jing walked around in a big circle, returning to the parking lot to let out her bored Husky. She let it sniff her coat, saying, "Let's go, find someone."
Having learned the ropes once, the Husky tracked more skillfully this time.
It first lingered around the entrance of the bar before Jian Jing dragged it to the back door. It paced back and forth several times, hesitatingly walking inside.
The shops on the ground floor had all gone out of business, leaving only dim façades strewn with abandoned construction materials.
The escalators were out of service, covered in dust. Only one elevator still worked. It was the only place that still had lights on; lamps in other areas were either broken or removed, leaving pitch darkness.
Jian Jing held the dog with one hand and shone her flashlight around with the other.
Their footsteps echoed in the hollow, pitch-black building, shadows fluttering. From dark corners came faint rustling sounds.
In an instant, the outside world was blocked off as specters lurked in the darkness.
The Husky was frightened, constantly looking back at its owner.
Jian Jing patted its head to signal it to stay close to her legs as they slowly walked on.
Dust flew as the flashlight beam stopped at a corner.
There was a corpse.
The Husky was spooked, taking small steps back.
Jian Jing told it to stay put while she took gloves out of her pocket and familiarly examined the body.
She first looked at the face - yes, it was Dean Wan, who had gone missing. Though for some reason, he was not in women's clothing but had changed back into men's attire.
The body showed distinct hypostasis, bright red in color, fully fixed, and did not fade when firmly pressed - death must have occurred over three days ago.
Most spine-chilling was his expression, seeming to smile and leer, which looked extremely bizarre in the current environment.
Jian Jing sucked in a pained breath and called the police.
The responding officer was Gao, an acquaintance.
Seeing Jian Jing, Gao heaved a sigh of relief and chatted, "Professor Jian, what a coincidence you discovered the body?"
Jian Jing said, "He was a teacher at our school who went missing." She briefly explained the story and specially pointed out the change in outfit, continuing, "If he died after spending the night with someone, that would explain the change of clothes, but why did he end up near a bar?"
Gao's eyelid twitched. "You said he was previously in women's clothing?"
"What about it?"
Gao seemed to think of something. Glancing at her, he said, "Know why Ji Feng didn't come? He got assigned to another case, the serial Ice and Snow Woman murders."
Jian Jing's eyes lit up with understanding.
