Chapter 325: Chapter 323: What Plan?

After breakfast, the DNA test results from last night came in.

It was a match with the DNA from the mask found in the house on the street north of the Sheep God Temple.

Lu Zhishen and Chu Xingrou went to interrogate Twenty-one again.

Su Miaoyi sat in the police station courtyard, basking in the sun.

After a while, Zhuang Yanzheng brought over a small stool and sat down beside her.

Su Miaoyi glanced at him, closed her eyes, and continued to bask in the sun.

"Still sunbathing? You’re tan enough already," Zhuang Yanzheng said.

Su Miaoyi opened her eyes and looked at him.

Zhuang Yanzheng said, "I’m not kidding. You’re really darker than when you were in Jinghai."

Su Miaoyi ignored him and closed her eyes again.

Zhuang Yanzheng looked at her and said, "So, tell me about your plan."

"What plan?" Su Miaoyi said, her eyes still closed.

"If you didn’t have a plan, you wouldn’t be this calm in the face of Twenty-one’s silent provocation." Zhuang Yanzheng lowered his voice. "How are you thinking of catching Tian Min?"

Su Miaoyi opened her eyes and looked at him again.

Zhuang Yanzheng watched her, waiting for her to speak.

"Why do you think Tian Min came back?" Su Miaoyi asked.

Zhuang Yanzheng thought for a moment. "So she could still live with her brothers?"

Su Miaoyi raised an eyebrow. "Even if she had successfully escaped, her brothers would have become long-term surveillance targets, making it difficult for her to ever see them. She has ties here. She doesn’t want to be exposed. She wants to live a clean life. That’s why she came back."

Zhuang Yanzheng looked at her. "You want to force her hand? Block all her escape routes?"

Su Miaoyi nodded. "Not completely. Letting her go home is the only escape route I’ll leave her—a path for her to try and run. When she’s cornered and decides to flee, she’ll expose herself. But... that was yesterday’s thinking. I already had the whole plan figured out."

As she spoke, she glanced at the watch on Zhuang Yanzheng’s wrist. "In another fifty-seven minutes, I was planning to go find her."

"That was yesterday’s thinking. What about today?" Zhuang Yanzheng asked.

"Today..." Su Miaoyi put on an enigmatic expression. "I was waiting for you to ask."

Zhuang Yanzheng: "..."

"And if I hadn’t come to ask?"

"But you’re asking right now, aren’t you?" Su Miaoyi said.

Zhuang Yanzheng fell silent.

"If you hadn’t asked, I would have told you on my own, of course," Su Miaoyi said. "We still have a while. I’m letting the sun grant me energy and organizing my thoughts."

Just as Zhuang Yanzheng was about to say something, he saw Duan Wenrui coming over from next door. He stood up. "Captain Duan, why aren’t you getting more sleep?"

Duan Wenrui pinched the bridge of his nose. "I just got a call. They told me they still haven’t found Zhao Yongliang."

Su Miaoyi stood up as well. "If there’s no sign of him at any of the intersections, it’s very likely he traveled through the mountains again."

"The weather was good yesterday, so we used a drone, but we didn’t find anything. The search is still ongoing today." Duan Wenrui looked up at the bright sun in the sky. "The forecast calls for rain. This sun probably won’t be out for long."

"If you follow the mountains, you can walk right out of Chang City, can’t you?" Zhuang Yanzheng said.

"Yes," Duan Wenrui said. "You can get out by walking continuously, but it would take a very, very long time."

"And along the way, there are fruit trees and corn, so he wouldn’t be short on food." After a pause, Zhuang Yanzheng added, "Could he be hiding somewhere?"

Duan Wenrui looked worried. He turned his head and saw Su Miaoyi scratching her cheek with her right index finger, her head tilted slightly, but she was completely still.

"Consultant Su?"

Zhuang Yanzheng looked at Su Miaoyi and saw that she was motionless, frozen in place.

"Consultant Su?" Duan Wenrui called out to her again. Seeing no reaction, he looked at Zhuang Yanzheng. "Captain Zhuang, this is..."

Zhuang Yanzheng looked at him. "It’s fine. She’s always like this. When she’s deep in thought, she tends to tune everything out."

Duan Wenrui glanced from him to her, his expression a mixture of belief and bewilderment. "Ah."

"Don’t worry about her. She gets like this whenever she’s thinking. We’re all used to it," Zhuang Yanzheng said.

"Oh." Duan Wenrui nodded.

"Captain Duan, you should go get some more rest."

"Alright," Duan Wenrui said. "I’ll go tell them about the search direction for Zhao Yongliang and then head back."

"Okay."

Duan Wenrui went to the office and came out more than ten minutes later. Su Miaoyi was still in the exact same position, not having moved at all.

"This..."

Zhuang Yanzheng stood beside her. "She’s been thinking for a while."

"Are you sure she’s okay? Should we call a doctor?" Duan Wenrui asked.

"No, no need." Just as Zhuang Yanzheng said that, Su Miaoyi suddenly clutched her throat, bent over, and started coughing.

Her sudden movement startled Duan Wenrui.

Zhuang Yanzheng quickly steadied her by the arm, rubbing her back as he leaned down to look at her. "Are you alright?"

Zhuang Yanzheng kept rubbing her back, helping her catch her breath.

Su Miaoyi was coughing so hard she could barely breathe, and holding her breath left her feeling weak.

Zhuang Yanzheng helped her sit down.

After a few seconds of stunned confusion, Duan Wenrui hurried to the office to get some water.

Su Miaoyi’s coughing subsided. She first glanced around—no one was nearby. Once the coughing stopped completely, she caught her breath and said, "Zhao Yongliang is dead. It should be on Tian Min’s family’s land. There’s a pit for storing things. The body is in the pit."

Duan Wenrui, hurrying out of the office with a glass of water, heard that very sentence.

He stopped dead in his tracks.

Hearing the sound, Su Miaoyi and Zhuang Yanzheng turned to look at him.

One look at his expression and they knew he had definitely heard her.

But he was trying his best to pretend he hadn’t heard a thing.

He walked over and handed the water to Su Miaoyi.

"Thank you." Su Miaoyi took it and drank a few sips.

Duan Wenrui said, "I’ll, uh, I’ll just go next door to sleep, then. Call me if you need anything."

With that, he started walking toward the adjacent building.

Su Miaoyi tapped Zhuang Yanzheng’s arm.

Zhuang Yanzheng immediately said, "Captain Duan, we’ll need you in a bit. Please wait here for a moment."

Duan Wenrui stopped and looked back at them.

He knew they didn’t fully trust him and were worried he might pass on information. He walked back.

’But how did she know Zhao Yongliang was dead?’

Zhuang Yanzheng went to get Lu Zhishen and the others.

Su Miaoyi and Duan Wenrui sat together for a while.

The two of them sat in silence, neither saying a word.

When Chu Xingrou and Lu Zhishen came out, Su Miaoyi told Lu Zhishen the location where she had seen Zhao Yongliang’s body buried in her vision.

Then, she and Zhuang Yanzheng left, taking Duan Wenrui with them.

Chu Xingrou and Lu Zhishen took a team of officers to find Zhao Yongliang’s body.

"I’ll go alone," Su Miaoyi said. "You guys stay nearby, but don’t let her see you."

Zhuang Yanzheng nodded.

Besides waiting for an update from Su Miaoyi, he also needed to keep an eye on Duan Wenrui.

"You’re going alone?" Duan Wenrui asked anxiously. "Isn’t that too dangerous? Zhao Yongliang was a skilled fighter, but she still killed him. What if she..."

"It’s fine," Su Miaoyi said. "I’ll contact you immediately if there’s a problem."

Seeing her insistence and that Zhuang Yanzheng didn’t object, Duan Wenrui stopped protesting. "Safety first."

"Okay."

...

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