Ch94.1 – Requesting for a.s.sistance
In the cafe, Xiao Yujun turned on her laptop and in the subfolder of the “November Topic Case Record” folder, there was an unt.i.tled compressed file that was about 300MB.
Xiao Yujun said, “I hadn’t found it when I got my laptop back yesterday. I only noticed it when I wanted to start working on my doc.u.ments in the morning. I remember that you copied it with the rest from a USB; it can’t be opened, is it yours? Why didn’t you name it?”
Yu Hao, “It’s not……”
Zhou Sheng said, “Sure enough, that kid’s IQ is seriously scary.”
“Ou Qihang put this on here?” Xiao Yujun asked.
Fu Liqun didn’t know what was going on and only listened at one side without interjecting. Yu Hao turned the laptop screen around, opened up the compressed file, and a ‘input pa.s.sword’ popup appeared.
Zhou Sheng smiled, “Well, this is gonna be fun.”
Xiao Yujun said, “What’s this?”
Xiao Yujun wasn’t fully aware of the details regarding this matter, but she had a vague idea from her earlier inference. As for the information, pa.s.sword, and set up that Ou Qihang had prepared, Xiao Yujun was completely unaware.
Xiao Yujun’s laptop has only been accessed by two other people aside from herself — one was Ou Qihang, the other was Yu Hao.
Yu Hao said, “Why did Qihang do this?”
“This is his gamble.” Zhou Sheng said, “Gambling on the chance that we’ll help him. Don’t contact him now.”
“Un.” Xiao Yujun said, “Yesterday, his mother told me that he had already gone home. He must be closely monitored now; if we contact him, we might also end up under surveillance.”
Yu Hao frowned, “What’s the pa.s.sword?”
Yu Hao, “???”
Xiao Yujun looked at Yu Hao in surprise. Zhou Sheng got up to buy coffee, “Take a guess? If you get it right, I’ll cook something good for you tonight.”
Yu Hao, “How could I?! I don’t even know how many characters there are in the pa.s.sword! Even winning the lottery has better chances than this ba?”
Yu Hao looked at Zhou Sheng, who was ordering coffee at the counter.
“What if I can’t get it right?” Yu Hao said.
“I’ll still cook for you.” Zhou Sheng turned back and said.
Only then did Yu Hao stop worrying, no, the most important thing now was the pa.s.sword!
Fu Liqun said, “Is this evidence?”
Yu Hao said, “Yes, but I have no idea at all……”
Zhou Sheng said, “Drink a cup of coffee and calm down ma, I’ll call Officer Huang over now?”
Xiao Yujun said, “My judgment? I’ve been deceived so many times though, but……I do really want to trust him.”
Yu Hao didn’t really understand. “Why did you say that?”
“Huang Ting’s superior wants to bury this incident ba?” Fu Liqun turned the laptop towards himself, “Does this kid want to ask for your help to keep things moving?” As he spoke, he said to Yu Hao, “If Huang Ting listens to his superiors and takes the laptop away, then there would be no point in looking for him.”
Yu Hao understood now. Zhou Sheng brought back the coffee and gave each person a cup. Xiao Yujun didn’t ask why they brought Fu Liqun along. Since Zhou Sheng had allowed him to accompany them, she thought that he must be a very good friend of theirs.
“Call him ba.” Xiao Yujun said.
Zhou Sheng took a picture, “I’ll send him a WeChat message, if he doesn’t see it, then forget it.” As he spoke, he took a picture of the laptop screen and sent it to Huang Ting. Huang Ting replied in seconds, “Wait for me.”
Yu Hao, “You didn’t say where we were.”
“He can tell at a glance from the cafe in the background.” Zhou Sheng said casually, “Jun Jie, come, let’s talk first. What do we do? Do we help him?”
Xiao Yujun said, “We have to find a way. The public account isn’t with me, that kid’s really……”
Xiao Yujun didn’t hesitate at all between ‘helping’ or ‘not helping’, and instead went straight to ‘finding a way’. When Yu Hao heard this, it was as if his understanding of Xiao Yujun was renewed. Zhou Sheng and Fu Liqun looked at each other. Zhou Sheng nonchalantly grasped his cup and took a sip, while Yu Hao was still wracking his brains over the pa.s.sword. But he knew that Zhou Sheng already knew it, so it wouldn’t matter much even if he couldn’t guess it.
Not long after, Huang Ting arrived and had apparently just woken up. He frowned as he looked at Fu Liqun, “You’re here too?”
Fu Liqun said, “I’m just here to watch, don’t mind me.”
Huang Ting didn’t know whether to cry or laugh for a moment. He pulled the laptop closer to glance at it, then looked at Yu Hao and Zhou Sheng. “The bureau did an a.n.a.lysis of your conversation once, including the surveillance video. No pa.s.sword was found hidden in the dialogue.”
Zhou Sheng said, “And you even said that ‘no one wanted to lower themselves to the level of a high school student’. A group of old and crafty detectives got played around with by a kid, no one would believe it even if you tried to spread that.”
Huang Ting said, “There are many detectives who get played around with by criminals in this world, but everyone often forgets this one sentence——”
Yu Hao was still thinking about the pa.s.sword, but at this time, he looked at Huang Ting.
Huang Ting said these solemn words in all seriousness, “Justice has a long arm. Got it? Setbacks are temporary; going around in circles is temporary too. As a detective, one must always believe in some things — that is, in our insistence. As long as we persevere in this insistence, then there will come a day where the clouds will disperse to reveal the sun.”
Everyone, “……”
Yu Hao thought, that was so well said!
Xiao Yujun looked at Huang Ting with an appreciative gaze. Huang Ting continued, “That’s why I fervently hoped that Ou Qihang could get bail pending trial. I have no right to try him, but if it was up to me to evaluate him, I’d say that I admire this kid very much. Yujun, do you really want to get involved in this?”
Xiao Yujun said, “He’s requesting our a.s.sistance, what do you think?”
Zhou Sheng hadn’t bought coffee for Huang Ting, so Xiao Yujun gave her coffee to him. Huang Ting took a sip. No one said a word, and in this silence, Huang Ting said to Xiao Yujun again, “This isn’t a trivial matter, it’s highly probable that it’ll affect your work and promotion.”
Xiao Yujun smiled, “What’s the big deal about that? I can always find another job.”
Yu Hao, “……”
Huang Ting, “What about your bonuses and down payment?”
Xiao Yujun didn’t know if she should cry or laugh, “What are you saying? Money is but a worldly possession, how can it be compared with truth and justice?
Fu Liqun, Zhou Sheng, and Yu Hao’s expressions all looked a little strange. Fu Liqun said in an exaggerated manner, “Jun Jie, please accept my bow!”
Zhou Sheng immediately said, “You’ve become my G.o.ddess, and can now stand shoulder to shoulder with my sis-in-law!”
Xiao Yujun said, “Reporters also have professional standards to uphold. I’m just doing what I should be doing, otherwise, why go into this field?”
When he heard Xiao Yujun’s words, Yu Hao felt like he solved a problem that had troubled him for a long time.
Xiao Yujun rubbed her temple and said, “I’m just afraid something will happen to that kid.”
Huang Ting answered, “Too many people are involved on the inside. If the evidence is conclusive, then it’s not like there isn’t any hope at all. It has been an extremely sensitive case for the past two years; from top to bottom, one layer after another, if we manage to find ideal breaking points in the ice, it may not be as difficult as we imagine it to be.”
Xiao Yujun said, “That, I know. Our news media has always been a little faster than yours; a lot of gossip circulates around reporters.”
Zhou Sheng said, “They stopped investigations halfway last year, was it because of that?”
Huang Ting wasn’t surprised at all and looked at Zhou Sheng. Yu Hao didn’t really understand what they were talking about, but he guessed that they should be discussing the official circles.
“Zhou Sheng’s information sources should be the most accurate.” Xiao Yujun said.
“I’ve only gone for two meals.” Zhou Sheng said casually, “I don’t have any information sources.”
Fu Liqun looked at all three of them.
Huang Ting said, “Thought it through? Pa.s.sword, come, let’s see what’s inside.”
Zhou Sheng motioned to Yu Hao. Yu Hao said, “I still don’t know!!”
Zhou Sheng flashed him an enigmatic smile and made some movements. Yu Hao and Fu Liqun watched Zhou Sheng, and at that moment, Yu Hao recalled instantly that the motions resembled turning a Rubik’s cube!
“That……” Yu Hao said, “He thought of it so long ago?”
“I don’t think so.” Zhou Sheng replied, “On the day he s.n.a.t.c.hed the laptop away, he hastily reset it. Only this compressed file used this pa.s.sword, because he saw you and Jun Jie together and thought that you two would be the right people to hand it over to.”
Fu Liqun thought about it for a moment, then typed the letters ‘I, L, O, V, E, U’ on the keyboard.
Zhou Sheng, “Gege!”
“Let me key it in!” Yu Hao said, “It’s such an important moment……wait, how did you know?”
“Young Master told me before, that the kid gave you a Rubik’s cube and after piecing the six sides together……”
“He overestimated me too much.” Yu Hao said.
Yu Hao abruptly understood everything! From the moment Ou Qihang saw them yesterday, or even earlier, he has had this card up his sleeve and made up his mind to hand the information over to Yu Hao! And he had made that action in front of Zhou Sheng to remind them of the Rubik’s cube!
When Yu Hao returned the Rubik’s cube to him after summer vacation had ended, it was implicitly understood as his rejection, as well as the fact that he had solved the Rubik’s cube! So Ou Qihang knew that he had pieced it together! So after he s.n.a.t.c.hed the laptop away, he left this card behind and set the pa.s.sword of one of the compressed files as the English letters on the Rubik’s cube and left it in Xiao Yujun’s laptop.
All these rings were fastened together one after another, yet Zhou Sheng actually managed to break it down piece by piece and unravelled it for Ou Qihang. Before they left, Zhou Sheng’s words ‘you’re still too inexperienced, learn your lesson’——
“Yeah.” Zhou Sheng said indifferently, “I don’t like him, so I gave him a little scare and made him think that I was in cahoots with Officer Huang and would pa.s.s the information to the enemy.”
“We were on the same side from the start.” Huang Ting said, “You should say that we’re not in cahoots with some people from the city bureau.”
Yu Hao, “You guys are too smart!”
Fu Liqun opened the compressed files and looked up at them from behind the computer screen.
Yu Hao, “??”
It seemed as if a huge burden had been lifted from Fu Liqun’s shoulders, and he no longer looked at the laptop.
Zhou Sheng really didn’t know what to do with Fu Liqun. “What are you thinking? His a.s.sets weren’t in Ying City in the first place!”
“Did you forget about the creative parks?” Fu Liqun said, “It’s the same as Yun Lai Chun ba?”
Huang Ting casually looked at Fu Liqun and turned the laptop around, “I’ll take a look.”
Zhou Sheng said, “I’ll take a look first.”
Xiao Yujun, “That’s my laptop!”
Yu Hao, “Stop s.n.a.t.c.hing it, I’ll look at it first!”
Yu Hao turned the laptop to face himself, and everyone else could only wait for him to go through it. Yu Hao opened the folder and was instantly stunned — it contained recordings, photos, and a form. As well as……a bidding doc.u.ment. Yu Hao read the text in detail. Ou Qihang had even written a doc.u.ment for Weibo. Just before the incident of Ou Weihong sinking the stolen money, someone had delivered the bidding doc.u.ment to Ou Weihong in advance. Ou Weihong took it home and was inadvertently photographed by Ou Qihang.
Yu Hao plugged in his earphones and handed one to Zhou Sheng, while he handed the other to Huang Ting. Huang Ting said, “You guys listen first.”
Zhou Sheng shifted over and watched with Yu Hao. The two of them listened to the recordings — Ou Qihang had recorded them; there wasn’t only one segment, there was also a conversation recorded with the guest at Ou Weihong’s home during the handover of the doc.u.ment.
What did he record this for? Yu Hao’s heart was beating wildly, but when he read further, he found his answer. Rather than saying that this was a denouncement letter, it was more of a portion of Ou Qihang’s memoirs. There were more than 5,000 words in the doc.u.ment. Ever since childhood, his father had never regarded him as an ignorant child, and would always mention the dark side of life, society, the workplace, and even politics in the official circles, and would share all these with him without hesitation.
He spoke about everything he knew without reservation. Even when it came to issues regarding his work, his father would occasionally tell him about his choices and why he made them.
This made Ou Qihang understand many things before he should have; he knew about corruption and bribery, understood his family’s financial situation, as well as the current situation in officialdom where collusion was deeply ingrained. He developed an acute understanding of politics as a result. Ou Qihang’s memories, as captured in the doc.u.ment, revealed that he understood that his father had done all that in hopes of nurturing him into partic.i.p.ating in politics in the future.
Yu Hao pressed the touchpad and pulled the mouse down. When he saw up to this point, Zhou Sheng shook his head in dismay.