It's still a cold winter night outside, Suzhou rarely snows, and it is said that Wuchang is a wide place in Huguang, but no snow does not mean that it is not cold, the temperature is very low at this time, the Huguang waterway is longitudinal and horizontal, the air is humid, and this cold weather is enough to choke.

At night, the fog also began to get heavier, and Li Mi had to have all the corpses moved to the house, still being examined by Suo Changsheng, he hoped that Michael could send Emmanuel over earlier, so that there would be no shortage of manpower.

The conversation between Shicai and Zhu Gaosui also made Li Mi understand a very important information, that is, in addition to Zhu Xianhuai and Zhu Xianqi, there are also county horses like Wang Ruoquan, and he also knows the mystery of Zhu Huakui's background!

If this reasoning continues, apart from this Wang Ruoquan, is there anyone else who knows about this?

Li Mi even sighed a little for a while, as if the whole world knew this secret, but he was still stupidly exploring, of course, this was just a personal feeling.

Right now, the brothers are still doing their own things, and Li Mi's focus is to find out Fang San'er!

Zhu Gaosui had already persuaded Li Mi to go back, because the longer Zhu Gaosui stayed in Jixi Hall, the greater the danger of his mother-son relationship with Fang San'er being exposed.

Zhu Gaosui also knew that his ability was limited and he couldn't provide more help to Li Mi, although he was still worried about his mother's safety, he finally went back.

Li Mi sat down and thought about it for a while, and finally had a draft.

Thanks to the blockade of the palace, the person who set the fire behind the scenes must still be in the palace, and Fang San'er was actually taken away by this person, then Fang San'er will definitely be in the palace!

It's just that the palace is so big, you can't go door-to-door to search, Wuchang City was originally a prince everywhere, there are many miscellaneous generals like dogs, and the palace is full of nobles, if you search it wantonly, it will inevitably cause turmoil.

Besides, Fang San'er's identity is secret, and such a large-scale search will inevitably attract great attention, and it is impossible to keep it secret.

If Zhu Huakui, the king of Chuding, finds out that his real purpose of Li Mi is actually to investigate his life experience, I am afraid that even his Li Mi will be in danger.

For this reason, a large-scale search is unlikely, and the scope must be narrowed to a manageable level, which requires finding targeted clues to exclude the suspicion of the vast majority of people.

Because the Jixi Hall is already a "ghost house" that no one dares to care about, the surroundings are empty, and the probability of witnesses is very low, not to mention that there is such a big thing, arson is a crime that the king of Chu cannot tolerate, no one wants to be involved in the slightest relationship, even if there are witnesses, it is impossible to take the initiative to report.

If Li Mi wants to narrow down the scope, he can only rely on on-site investigation.

Xiong Tingbi was still investigating the fire, and he successfully found the fire point, but this fire point made Li Mi feel very surprised.

Because the fire started in the dining room!

In other words, the arsonist first poisoned these palace people, watched the palace people fall in the dining room one by one, and then cruelly lit the fire!

Regarding the investigation of the point of the fire, Li Mi has also been involved, after all, arson cases are also a relatively common form of crime in later generations.

The key to investigating the fire point is to determine the location of the fire point through the combustion characteristics of the fire scene.

The methods that Li Mi learned were all scientific and technical, and he really didn't know how Xiong Tingbi mastered them, so he carefully observed them for a while.

In general, there are several common characteristics of ignition points.

One is the V-shaped combustion feature, where the flame usually burns from the bottom up, and in places such as the wall next to the ignition point, objects close to the flame will leave V-shaped burning marks.

The second is the characteristics of the roof, after a fire, the fire will bring smoke and heat up to the roof, and then be blocked by the roof, spread in all directions, the roof will appear black smoke, and the degree of burning is different from other locations.

In addition, depending on the direction of the heat flow, the burning flame can generate a large amount of heat, which will be transmitted to other objects by convection, conduction, and radiation, thereby spreading the fire, and the initial ignition point can be found through the investigation of these objects.

Of course, there is also the directionality of heat radiation, such as the position of the frame against the wall on both sides of the door and window, because the frame on both sides is heated, the degree of combustion is different, you can judge the direction of the fire point, through these directions and clues, you can find the initial fire point.

The most intuitive is the burning traces of the floor, and the isolated multiple fire points are the main characteristics of man-made arson, just like the fire points found by Xiong Tingbi, in addition to the tables and chairs in the dining room, as well as the furniture around the four walls, the characteristics of the fire points have been found.

What Li Mi learned was the experience of his predecessors, and it also contained scientific inferences and extremely valuable technical properties.

But Xiong Tingbi is just a martial arts warrior, or a humble scholar, how did he learn about the experience of the fire field?

Although Li Mi had confirmed that Xiong Tingbi's demarcated fire point should be correct, he still asked Xiong Tingbi.

"How did Shibaoka-san know this?"

Xiong Tingbi hesitated for a moment, and then said to Li Mi: "When the foolish brother was young, the family suffered an unknown fire, and the family also lost their lives......

"Brother Fool's family is actually not too wealthy, but he had a good life when he was a child, but after that fire, the family was burned down, and it gradually withered......

Although Xiong Tingbi's words are ordinary, Li Mi can also feel the unpeace in his heart, and if he thinks about it from his heart, he can understand why Xiong Tingbi cares about this knowledge.

"Brother Shibaoka is a great talent, this martial arts will definitely be able to go to high school, and the future is immeasurable, this past suffering, isn't it a kind of life grinding?"

Xiong Tingbi knew that Li Mi was comforting him, and at this time he also smiled and said: "Brother Xian doesn't need to be like this, Brother Fool has already seen these things, but now that he says it, he is also a little embarrassed." ”

Li Mi smiled, and didn't dwell on this issue, but walked to a few fire spots, twisted the ashes on the ground with his hands, rubbed them, and said to Xiong Tingbi.

"There's something strange about this thing that ignites the fire......"

At present, the weather is cold, the air is relatively humid, and if you want to set fire artificially, you need something to start a fire, Li Mi can see that the ashes of this fire point have turned white, and the burning energy is very large, and the thing that ignites the fire is definitely not ordinary firewood or something like that.

Xiong Tingbi spent most of the night to find the point of the fire, and Li Mi only needed to look at it a few times to know that the thing that caused the fire was not simple, and Xiong Tingbi was also extremely impressed.

"Yes, this thing that started the fire was specially conspired, and the arsonist had planned it for a long time, not on a temporary basis!"

When Li Mi heard this, he couldn't help but feel excited, if it had been planned for a long time, it meant that the arsonist was not coming for Li Mi and the others, and Li Mi and the others were just at the right time.

At this time, Xiong Tingbi took a saucer from the side, and the plate contained a handful of fire ashes, and Xiong Tingbi pulled off the wooden hairpin on his head, pulled the ashes, and said to Li Mi.

"Brother Xian, come and see, this ash was collected from the place where the fire started, and this gray and white one is easy to say, but this black one is a little weird......

Li Mi took a look, but saw that there was some black opaque solid substance in the ashes, which was twisted and rubbed, and it was very oily.

Xiong Tingbi said on the side at this time: "Earlier, I thought that this was a coal jade object that was melted, but it didn't look like it, after all, coal jade is also hard......"

Li Mi put the little lump of things under his nose and sniffed it at this time, and he immediately became excited!

"It's not jet, it's asphalt!"

"Asphalt?" Xiong Tingbi obviously doesn't know much about asphalt, and Li Mi doesn't plan to explain that asphalt has appeared in human society and civilization since ancient times, and countries such as ancient Rome have begun to use asphalt to build houses or use it in wars.

In many City Guard battles, the defenders will boil the asphalt and use the asphalt to defend the enemy.

Of course, there was also asphalt in ancient times in my Great Celestial Empire, but it was not so widely used and not so popular.

This asphalt is also divided into several types, some are rock asphalt, some are oil asphalt, and some are coal asphalt, according to different sources, or different refining methods, the varieties are also different.

Li Mi didn't know what kind of asphalt he was holding, but he didn't need to know, because even if he didn't know this, Li Mi was enough to launch an extremely important clue through the asphalt itself, which could almost narrow down the scope of the investigation by most of it!

No matter what kind of asphalt it is, it is not natural, but refined, and refining asphalt requires equipment and technology, and it is by no means something that can be done secretly in a room!

Whether the arsonist bought the asphalt or said that he refined it, as long as he can find the person who refined the asphalt, he will be able to find the clues of the arsonist!

And in the royal city outside the palace, there are many yamen or workshops, and there are also supervised houses in the palace!

Xiong Tingbi saw that Li Mi was so excited, and he couldn't help but show puzzled eyes, and Li Mi explained to him.

"This fire-inducing thing needs to be refined, and ordinary people can't do it, it is very likely that the person who supervised the construction of the house in the palace did it!"

There are furnaces and blacksmiths in the supervision room, and the palace itself is also developing and maintaining firearms, so it will definitely not be too far behind in research on asphalt and the like!

Because King Chuding is extremely strict with the official system of the royal palace, his trust in the outside world is also very low, and if he buys asphalt outside, the risk is too great, so Li Micai guessed that the arsonist must have been refining the asphalt in the construction house!

Suo Changsheng, Zhao Guangling and the others were still busy working, and Li Mi didn't care about it for the time being, and after a brief discussion with Xiong Tingbi, he summoned the five prince's guards, let them lead them, and walked to the palace supervision room!

The supervised house is also a popular place on weekdays, in fact, to put it bluntly, it is the palace's own workshop, and the scale of the supervised house is not small, and even creates farm tools to sell, making a lot of money for the palace.

In ancient times, iron tools were controlled, and ordinary people were not allowed to buy and sell copper and iron privately, and the palace did not need to comply with it, so the workshops of the palace made a large number of agricultural tools and sold them to farmers in Wuchang.

Of course, in addition to building farm tools, this supervision room will also create some fun things for the princes and nobles, as for weapons, they dare not build them, because building blades privately is no different from rebellion!

However, there are many things such as replacing horseshoes and maintaining armor chain mail saddles on weekdays, and these guards are also familiar with the supervision room, and they soon brought Li Mi and Xiong Tingbi here.

The prince has already explained, these guards also know how to do things, and even if all the people in the supervision room are gathered, Li Mi was dumbfounded at first glance, because there are so many people, and there are almost more than a hundred people!