Chapter 418: The Final Struggle

Yu Dazhang had seen his share of grand occasions.

Even so, the scene before him still took some getting used to.

Everyone rising to their feet in welcome... that kind of reception seemed reserved for big leaders.

We're all pretty familiar with each other, no need to make it so formal.

Arriving at the conference table, he saw the head seat at the far end had already been left open for him.

"Please, sit, everyone."

Yu Dazhang raised a hand, gesturing for everyone to take their seats.

Once everyone was seated, he swept his gaze around the officers present.

Everyone had shown up, not a single one missing.

"Um..."

Yu Dazhang thought for a moment, then looked toward Captain Hua beside him:

"I just got out of the hospital, so I'm not up to speed on the follow-up. Let's start with a report on the latest progress in the case."

Captain Hua nodded, then turned his attention to the officers who had been handling interrogations over the past few days.

The officers took the hint and began speaking one after another.

Yu Dazhang listened quietly, and even after hearing them all out, he didn't find anything worth noting.

Once Yang Jieru and Zhang Chao learned their mother had been caught, the two of them stopped struggling and confessed every criminal fact in full.

Their statements were almost completely consistent with what Zhang Chao's mother had given.

The evidence on hand could corroborate one another as well.

Together they formed a complete, coherent, contradiction-free chain of evidence.

As far as Yu Dazhang was concerned, this case was ready to move into the closing procedure.

When the last officer finished his report, the meeting room fell silent; everyone turned their eyes to Yu Dazhang, waiting for him to speak.

Why is everyone looking at me? For a moment, Yu Dazhang didn't know what to say either.

The task force members were all just methodically following procedure, which in itself wasn't a problem—so why had they called him here?

Seeming to read his discomfort, Captain Hua prompted him from the side:

"Everyone's waiting for you to assign the next steps."

"Just follow the standard investigative procedure." Yu Dazhang cleared his throat and said:

"Everyone's done a great job. Keep it up—this case will be wrapped up soon."

After saying this, he noticed every officer in the room wore a look of visible relief.

It seemed they had all been waiting for him to say that final line.

After the meeting adjourned, Yu Dazhang and Captain Hua went alone to an office.

"Why do I get the feeling everyone's a little off today?" Yu Dazhang complained to Captain Hua:

"It's like they can't work a case without me giving an order. They were clearly doing fine—so why insist on having me give the word?"

He'd figured it out: the reason the task force had been waiting for him was to hear him give the order to close the case.

"You can't blame them for that."

Captain Hua's lips curved into a faint, ambiguous smile, one that seemed tinged with a hint of schadenfreude:

"We were all ready to close the case, and then you went and had that shootout."

"Think about it—that shootout of yours was basically a slap in everyone's face."

Pausing there, he noticed the look on Yu Dazhang's face and shifted his angle to continue:

"Besides, you've been on this case from start to finish; no one knows it better than you. So now, as long as you don't speak up, no one dares give the order to close it."

"And that includes me. I'm afraid you'll dig up something else, too."

Captain Hua laughed as he spoke:

"I really don't want to get slapped in the face by you again."

In fact, the moment Captain Hua was halfway through, Yu Dazhang had already figured out where the problem lay.

But it hadn't been intentional on his part.

If anyone was to blame, it was the suspects for being too cunning.

Earlier, he had fallen right into the trap Yang Jieru and the others had set—he'd met Zhang Chao's mother twice without realizing anything was off.

Even after he finally saw through their scheme, he'd nearly lost his life in the process.

The little net cap on his head right now was proof enough.

He wondered if the wound would leave a scar. He was only twenty-three—if he ended up with a bald spot, Qu Tuotuo would probably move on to someone else within two years.

Seeing Captain Hua waiting for an explanation, Yu Dazhang casually cooked one up:

"After I went into that KTV, somehow my head suddenly got really sharp, and I saw right through their scheme."

If anyone else had heard that, they'd have thought he was talking nonsense.

But Captain Hua believed him.

He had personally watched Yu Dazhang walk into that KTV called "Caesar's Palace."

Looks like people do need to relax now and then... Captain Hua couldn't help sighing inwardly.

It's just that this fatty's way of relaxing was a bit too lowbrow.

Any fool could tell that "Caesar's Palace" wasn't a proper KTV.

Just as he was about to ask Yu Dazhang what kind of entertainment that KTV had, he suddenly remembered something.

"Oh, right—Zhang Chao's mother wants to see you."

Captain Hua's expression turned complicated:

"She also set a condition — if you go see her, she'll reveal where the money is hidden domestically."

What hidden money location… Yu Dazhang didn't quite follow.

He frowned and asked:

"Last time at the hospital you told me she'd already disclosed where the dirty money went. So where's this hidden stash coming from?"

Feels like a never-ending stream… Yu Dazhang added silently to himself.

"What she disclosed was the money already transferred into overseas banks," Captain Hua explained:

"That sum was six hundred million, and another hundred million she had converted to cash and hidden away."

That trick isn't anything new.

Plenty of criminals have used similar methods in the past.

There was a pretty interesting news story online before.

A man bought a foreclosed property, and during renovations he accidentally smashed open a wall and discovered a hidden room — inside was a full sixty million yuan in cash.

Another man, also buying a foreclosed place, had fifty-seven million in cash fall from the ceiling.

Practically the legendary windfall from the heavens.

And those are only the ones that got exposed.

Human nature is greedy, after all — how many people out there found dirty money and kept quiet, selfishly pocketing it for themselves?

"Quite the variety of tricks."

Yu Dazhang hadn't expected there'd be something involving him in all this.

Half an hour later.

Outside a single-patient hospital room.

Two officers stood guard at the door, and at the stairwell two more plainclothes officers were patrolling.

Yu Dazhang walked inside and saw two female officers standing by the window, ramrod straight, expressions stern.

Security's tight enough… he knew full well such arrangements were absolutely necessary right now.

The woman in the bed had just gone through a tremendous ordeal; if she got the wrong idea and killed herself, everything afterward would be a nightmare.

"You wanted to see me?"

Yu Dazhang sat down beside the bed, his face cold as he looked at her.

From the moment he stepped inside, the woman's gaze had never left him, as if trying to see straight through him.

"Didn't expect you'd recover so quickly."

Nothing showed on the woman's face, and her voice was perfectly even — impossible to tell joy from sorrow.

"What you didn't expect was that I'd still be alive," Yu Dazhang said in a low voice:

"By rights, someone like you should understand what 'winner takes all, loser dies' means, so you wouldn't hate me, let alone care whether I live or die."

His voice was deep, carrying a hint of authority, as though he had seen through everything long ago:

"You insisted on seeing me for no more than two reasons."

"If I were dead, in your view no one would see through your final plan."

"If I weren't dead, you'd use me to close the final loop."

Yu Dazhang's gaze burned like a torch, fixed hard on the woman in the bed:

"Go ahead then — start your performance."

(End of chapter)