Chapter 112: Beauty's Escape, the Great One Goes Against the Flow

After the autopsy reports of the two deceased came out, within twenty-four hours, the Nanzhou Municipal Faction officially released the preliminary findings of the No. 7 homestay explosion case.

The core of this result is just four words: no one died!

Yin Qiuhong did not die.

The No. 7 homestay had an unknown underground shelter; if one hid inside the shelter, even if the outside was blown to pieces, Yin Qiuhong would not be harmed.

As Yang Qing said: Yin Qiuhong was playing the golden cicada shedding.

The criminal investigation team speculated:

On the night of the No. 7 homestay explosion, after the fire brigade extinguished the fire and everyone cleared the scene and retreated, Yin Qiuhong and an unknown fat woman pushed open the shelter entrance blocked by rubble.

After the two crawled out of the underground shelter, they fled the scene overnight.

Now, has Yin Qiuhong escaped abroad?

Where is she hiding?

No one knows this; the airports and seaports of major cities nationwide have found no entry or exit records for Yin Qiuhong.

The police speculated:

Even if Yin Qiuhong wanted to leave the country, she would not use normal channels.

She came from public security.

She possesses extremely strong counter-investigation abilities.

The purpose of her playing golden cicada shedding was to shake off police pursuit; using normal channels would leave clues for the police, so she could not leave such a loophole.

This matter worried Yang Qing to the point of having two big heads.

Yin Qiuhong is on the run.

Yang Qing therefore had to lead the criminal investigation team in working overtime to trace Yin Qiuhong's whereabouts; this New Year, let alone going on a blind date, he didn't even have time to go home and eat a reunion meal with his parents.

Someone even more depressed than Yang Qing is Municipal Party Committee Chief Gao Peng.

On the night of the No. 7 homestay explosion, Gao Peng's mistaken command caused seven armed police to be injured in the blast, two of whom suffered severe facial burns and are still lying in the intensive care unit, not out of mortal danger.

Provincial Party Committee Secretary Liang, yesterday at the standing committee meeting, flew into a rage and publicly criticized Gao Peng.

Today, superiors issued a punishment decision, giving Gao Peng a major demerit penalty.

This is considered light.

Because his mistaken command led to serious consequences and multiple serious injuries, Secretary Liang, when probing opinions at yesterday's standing committee meeting, originally intended to demote him.

Because someone from the Central Discipline Inspection Commission pleaded for mercy, it did not rise to the level of dismissal.

However…

The major demerit penalty is still a fatal blow for Gao Peng.

He had originally dreamed of achieving some political performance this year, striving to move up a rung, gradually plotting for the position of Deputy Provincial Party Committee Secretary, to shift his ranking forward in the Provincial Standing Committee.

Now that he has received the penalty, his path to promotion has been completely cut off.

The impact period of a major demerit is eighteen months.

Thus.

Even if Liang Jingzhong is transferred away in the future, Gao Peng still cannot hope to become Deputy Provincial Party Committee Secretary; his ranking in the Provincial Party Committee will still remain at the bottom.

"Liang Jingzhong, what have I done to offend you? You actually blocked my promotion space!"

On the way back from the provincial capital Wuzhou to Nanzhou, Gao Peng watched the scenery speeding by in reverse outside the window; his mood sank to the extreme, feeling that his career was like that scenery, rapidly retreating.

He had a belly full of anger with nowhere to vent.

After returning to Nanzhou, Gao Peng hurried straight to Xiao Yunce's office.

"Bang!"

Xiao Yunce was sitting at his desk reading documents when the angry push on the door startled him; normally no one would dare barge in without knocking.

He looked up.

When he saw Secretary Gao with a dark face standing at the doorway.

Xiao Yunce hastily put down his documents, stood up, and greeted: "Secretary Gao."

Seeing Gao Peng with a black face and not speaking.

Xiao Yunce then hurried forward a few steps, nervously greeting this big shot: "Secretary Gao, do you need something?"

"Thirsty!"

Gao Peng strode straight into Xiao Yunce's desk, sat down, and began toying with the windproof lighter on the table, as if a nameless anger was about to erupt.

Xiao Yunce hurriedly called out: "Secretary Bai, bring two cups of tea."

"Okay."

After hearing Secretary Bai's reply.

Xiao Yunce turned and smiled at Gao Peng: "Secretary Gao, you're in luck; a friend gave me a can of Taiping Monkey King tea yesterday, which is said to lower blood pressure…"

"Even if you gave me an immortal pill now, it would be useless!"

Gao Peng stared at the lighter in his hand, pinching it between two fingers, turning it over and over.

His voice also turned icy: "Was the golden cicada shedding trick Yin Qiuhong played arranged by you? If you wanted to blow up the homestay, why didn't you first say hello to me?!"

"Secretary Gao, this time I am truly wronged."

At this point Xiao Yunce figured it out: the explosion injured seven armed police; Secretary Gao must have been rebuked by the provincial authorities, and he is now looking for someone to vent his anger on.

"I'm not your punching bag!"

Although Xiao Yunce felt stifled with resentment inside, his outward expression remained properly composed.

He consistently maintained a respectful yet humble attitude: "Secretary Gao, to be frank, that day I indeed had Secretary Bai call Yin Qiuhong. But Yin Qiuhong did not follow my instructions and tried every means to evade my sight. I only learned after the incident that she had gone to the homestay street; this truly was not my arrangement."

"If she doesn't listen to you, who does she listen to?!"

Gao Peng looked up, and that deadly stare made Xiao Yunce's hairs stand on end.

Xiao Yunce forced himself to explain:

"She's not stupid either; she definitely knows I want to deal with her, so she's avoiding me. If I knew her escape plan, I wouldn't have said that night I'd go to the scene to maintain stability—how could I let you twist your ankle there?"

Gao Peng grew angrier the more he listened.

"As soon as I got back to Nanzhou I was cleaning up after you, and Yin Qiuhong lost control—yet you didn't tell me! Now you're still making excuses, saying this has nothing to do with you?!"

Xiao Yunce's scalp went numb from the scolding, and he was momentarily unable to rebut.

He could only lower his head and stay silent.

Gao Peng, still fuming: "Yin Qiuhong lost control, and you didn't tell me! You got together with Shang Keqing's ex-wife Ding Yuxia and even had a son, and you didn't tell me either! Just how much have you hidden from me? Today I'm giving you a chance to make excuses—say, is Shang Liang really your son?!"

"I can make it so he isn't my son," Xiao Yunce replied firmly.

This bewildering answer left Gao Peng both angry and amused: "What you're saying is that Shang Liang really is your son, and then you can sever that blood tie? Now Ding Yuxia is out of touch, the municipal discipline commission hasn't arrested anyone—most likely she's been snatched by the provincial anti-corruption task force—so how are you going to clean up this mess?"

"Secretary Gao, I'll clean up my own mess," Xiao Yunce said. "As for how exactly I'll do it, you don't need to ask. If anything goes wrong later, I'll take the blame—you'll know nothing."

Hearing that, Gao Peng stopped pressing for details.

It was obvious that Xiao Yunce's way of cleaning up his mess was likely illegal or non‑compliant—the more one knew, the greater the responsibility.

Gao Peng coldly warned Xiao Yunce: "Don't just focus on arm‑wrestling with Chu Jinsong—you're the top official, you need to chase performance! I'm giving you one year; this year our city's GDP must surpass that of the provincial capital, Wuzhou. If you fail to meet this target, I won't be able to hold my ground in the province, and then you won't have any good days either!"

"Rest assured, I don't need a full year—give me another six months and I'll produce results."

When it came to performance, Xiao Yunce had always been confident; he'd already figured out that, with time tight and the workload heavy, waiting for the results of the Qingzhu Ling development project would surely be too late.

The urgent priority was to concentrate capital to push the real‑estate economy and sell more land.

Seeing that Gao Peng was still seething,

Xiao Yunce didn't want to keep forcing himself to endure the scolding, so he quickly changed the subject: "Secretary Gao, a couple of days ago Gao Lu called me and said that Lin Dongfan kid doesn't know how to behave."

"Lin Dongfan is nothing more than a sword in Chu Jinsong's hand," Gao Peng mused. "It looks like the Chu faction is trying to probe my bottom line."

Xiao Yunce said: "Chu Jinsong's advantage lies in having transferred Lin Dongfan from the city to the province; now Lin Dongfan no longer falls under our Nanzhou jurisdiction, and he comes to Nanzhou as a core member of the anti‑corruption task force, acting with impunity."

Hearing that, Gao Peng gave a light chuckle and said nothing.

He thought, "If Xiao Yunce can't control Lin Dongfan, can I, a provincial Party Standing Committee member, control him either? This is ridiculous—I could crush him as easily as squashing an ant!"

These past few days I've been holding in a bellyful of anger, and now I finally have a place to vent it.

I'll use that kid as my first target.

Gao Peng pulled out his phone, dialed Liu Yishou of the provincial procuratorate, and said, "Prosecutor Liu, have your anti‑corruption bureau's Lin Dongfan come see me right away!"