Ma Hongyun was the first to explain, "Big Brother died the night before last and was only discovered the following morning. In the early hours of that night, he was still drinking with Xu Shan.
At the time, I was drinking and playing finger-guessing games with a group of brothers in the stockade. They can all testify for me."
As he spoke, he pointed at several stockade residents present.
When Zhou Hao's gaze shifted toward them, those residents immediately nodded again and again, indicating that Ma Hongyun was telling the truth.
Xu Shan curled his lip. "Maybe you ordered Heizi to poison him? Heizi brought over some drinking snacks that night. Maybe he poisoned them then."
"You're dragging Heizi into this again. Would Heizi really do something like that for a thousand gold coins? Does he think his life is too long? Such a poison scheme full of holes—was he an idiot?" Ma Hongyun said disdainfully.
Zhou Hao raised a hand, and Ma Hongyun and Xu Shan immediately fell silent.
Cracking sunflower seeds, Zhou Hao said, "Whether Heizi poisoned him or not, he must be connected to one of you, or perhaps to Tiger Fiend Stockade. What we need to discuss now is your involvement.
From what Ma Hongyun just said, he has an alibi. As for whether he ordered Heizi around, we can discuss that later."
He paused, looked at Xu Shan, and said, "You were drinking with Shi Po all night, so you have no alibi. You admit that, right?"
Xu Shan nodded. "I admit it."
Zhou Hao nodded slightly and asked, "Do you have a Ring of Holding? I want to inspect it."
"Why should I let you?" Xu Shan immediately refused.
Zhou Hao shrugged. "Because I'm stronger than you. Is that enough?"
Xu Shan paused. Could he say it was not enough? He could only obediently hand over his Ring of Holding.
Zhou Hao easily erased the ownership mark on the Ring of Holding and glanced through its space. Its capacity was far smaller than his own Ring of Holding.
He dumped everything out. There was not much—aside from gold coins, there were only a few weapons, and those weapons did not look particularly high-quality either.
"See if there are any treasures," Zhou Hao instructed Ma Hongyun.
Ma Hongyun immediately stepped forward and searched through the items. After a while, he looked up at Zhou Hao, shook his head, and softly uttered two words. "None."
Zhou Hao frowned. If someone had truly coveted Shi Po's treasure, then it had to have been hidden somewhere. But where?
How was he supposed to know?
If he could not investigate from this direction for now, then he could only inspect the scene. But he guessed the scene had probably already been ruined beyond recognition, and even if he went, he would not find any clues.
Then should he investigate the leftover food? It had probably been dumped long ago! Besides, he did not want to touch those leftovers. Forget touching them—he did not even want to look at them.
Zhou Hao thought it over and over, but it seemed there was nothing left to investigate. He let out a faint sigh. Being a detective was truly difficult; using his brain was exhausting.
It looked pretty satisfying on television, but actually doing it was genuinely a little irritating.
Ma Hongyun suddenly heard his sigh and looked at him in confusion.
Zhou Hao scratched his head, turned to look at Xu Shan, then swung out a fist.
With a bang.
Xu Shan spun seven hundred and sixty degrees through the air before landing face-first on the ground, kicking up clouds of dust and passing out on the spot.
Sure enough, in a fantasy world, violence was still the most straightforward solution.
Zhou Hao rotated his wrist and turned back to ask Ma Hongyun, "Is there a prison here?"
Ma Hongyun nodded blankly. "Yes, but it hasn't been used in a long time."
Zhou Hao waved a hand and pointed at Xu Shan. "Lock him up. Then search the entire stockade. If there really is a treasure, it must be hidden somewhere nearby. It can't have been hidden far away."
"O... okay." Ma Hongyun nodded, secretly thinking, It seems this lord's temperament isn't all that gentle either!
At first, Zhou Hao had been willing to listen to them talk for so long and had even been willing to help them deal with Shi Po's case. Ma Hongyun had thought Zhou Hao was a very mild-tempered person, but now it seemed that he had been wrong.
At that moment, the stockade residents who had been stunned by Zhou Hao's sudden attack were just about to scold him when a single look from Zhou Hao made them shrink their necks in fright. None of them dared say a word.
Zhou Hao rubbed Yezi's head and asked, "What do you think of Uncle's handling of this matter?"
"Very good." Yezi nodded heavily.
Because he also believed Xu Shan had been the one who poisoned Shi Po.
Zhou Hao smiled, then looked at Xu Shan lying on the ground and sleeping like a dead pig. He sighed again and shook his head, thinking, *I originally wanted to solve the case with my own wisdom and indulge my detective cravings, but there's too little information. I haven't even seen the murder scene, and I don't understand the whole process very well.
It's hard to determine the result from Ma Hongyun and Xu Shan's few scattered words alone.*
So he felt it was better to keep things simple and brutal. In this other world, beating people was not against the law, and arresting people did not require evidence. Why bother worrying so much? Lock him up first and talk later.
This experience could be summed up in one sentence:
"Being a detective is hard!"
Ma Hongyun took Xu Shan away and locked him up.
Although many stockade residents felt that this was an improper way to handle things, with Zhou Hao there, none of them dared say anything.
They had seen enough already. Zhou Hao did not need any reason to strike—he hit people whenever he felt like it. For details, one could refer to the incident of Xu Shan getting beaten this time, as well as the incident of Xu Shan getting beaten last time.
Zhou Hao left with Yezi, while Ma Hongyun took Xu Shan toward the dungeon.
Afterward, everyone dispersed, though many stockade residents continued to discuss the matter heatedly.
After Zhou Hao sent Yezi home, he returned to his own room as well.
"Dad, you're so lame!" Zhou Yuanbao detached himself from Zhou Hao's wrist.
Mu Jinyin flew down from Zhou Hao's head and nodded very seriously.
Zhou Hao rolled his eyes. "What was there to solve in a case like this? You could tell who the killer was at a glance. Continuing to play along would only waste my time.
Besides, it wasn't that I couldn't solve it because my IQ was lacking. There was simply too little information, and I hadn't even seen the crime scene or the poisoned sample. It was perfectly normal that I couldn't solve it."
After saying all that, all he got in return was a soft "Oh" from Zhou Yuanbao.
Mu Jinyin gave him one extra sentence. "Oh, then you're still so lame!"
The corner of Zhou Hao's mouth twitched. So what if he had wanted to show off and failed? It was not like anyone else knew.
He pointed at the two floating in the air and threatened, "If you mention this again, don't expect to get even a single divine crystal from me in the future."
Zhou Yuanbao and Mu Jinyin immediately behaved themselves. Heaven and earth might be vast, but divine crystals were the greatest. They could live without anything else, but they absolutely could not live without divine crystals.
Zhou Hao rolled his eyes dramatically and grumbled inwardly, These two are really heading in the direction of becoming money-grubbers and foodies.
"Sleep."
He did not want to talk to those two anymore. He dove straight onto the bed and went to sleep.
Come to think of it, how long had it been since he had slept? And how long since he had slept in a bed? Half a month, perhaps!
This sleep was truly comfortable...
The moment Zhou Hao touched the bed, he quickly fell asleep, and he slept all the way until dawn.
The instant he got up, he was brimming with energy and vitality. This was probably how sleep helped humans!
Zhou Hao gave a self-satisfied sigh in his heart.
Before you continue