Chapter 1037: Network Manhunt

He Yuzhu got straight to the point: "Section Chief Miao, I would like to see the surveillance footage from the day that person left. I mainly want to confirm which street he took that day and where his final destination was."

Upon hearing this, Section Chief Miao's face instantly revealed a look of difficulty: "Old He, let me be honest with you! There are thousands of surveillance cameras on the streets and alleys of our city... Just collecting the tapes from every intersection would take a day or two of hassle, let alone watching and screening them frame by frame."

He Yuzhu was silent for two seconds before speaking again: "Then what if I provide the manpower and resources to help collect all the tapes? Do you think that would be feasible?"

Section Chief Miao was stunned for a moment, lowering his head to ponder for a long time: "The method is a good one... but reviewing surveillance is classified work; not just anyone can handle it. According to the bureau's regulations, it must be done by our own people who are politically impeccable and reliable."

He Yuzhu slapped his thigh and made the decision on the spot: "I will arrange the people! They are veteran employees from the Hongxing Electronics Factory, all of them long-time Party members with absolutely clean political backgrounds. They will all sign confidentiality agreements before entering, and the entire process will be monitored and supervised by your officers. There will absolutely not be a single slip-up!"

Section Chief Miao hesitated for a long time before finally nodding in concession: "Since you can guarantee that the personnel are reliable and will strictly follow the rules, I will make an exception and approve it. But I'll say this upfront: all tapes can only be viewed inside the Public Security Bureau. Taking them out privately, copying or duplicating them, or leaking a single word to the outside is strictly prohibited."

"You can rest assured on that point!" He Yuzhu agreed immediately. "I will have He Zheng send a few technical experts over to set up an internal local area network on-site. We will upload all the video content to a server; then, everyone will have their own monitor, and they can pull up whichever segment they want to watch. We won't have to keep rewinding tapes, which will save both time and effort."

Upon hearing this, Section Chief Miao's eyes lit up instantly: "This method is brilliant! If you really can build it, could you make a set for me too? That would be a huge help to us!"

"We will leave it behind when we're done."

"That's great!" Section Chief Miao said, a bit excited.

He Yuzhu did not delay and dialed He Zheng's phone number on the spot.

After hearing the ins and outs, He Zheng laughed on the other end of the line: "Dad, this is simple, a piece of cake! I'll send the technical experts over to set up the local area network immediately."

He Yuzhu was blunt: "This is not simple. You are sending me your best Engineers; my requirements are very high! Perhaps this will be your direction for future development! Send the people over immediately!"

"Huh? So urgent? Starting work overnight?" He Zheng exclaimed.

"Less talk, hurry up!"

"Alright, alright, alright, I'll listen to you and arrange it immediately!" He Zheng softened his tone at once, not daring to say another word.

For seven full hours, under He Yuzhu's personal supervision, a simple video retrieval platform was successfully built.

In this day and age, the prices of hard drives and memory are ridiculously expensive, and storage capacity is small; to build this system, a significant amount of money was truly spent.

Looking at the brand-new equipment and the completed system before him, Section Chief Miao was completely stunned and couldn't help but pat the table in admiration: "Good stuff! Old He, you're really leaving this system for our bureau? That will make handling cases much more powerful in the future!"

He Yuzhu was very generous and replied casually: "No problem. Once the technology is upgraded later, I'll have people make facial recognition software, and then we'll be able to lock onto a suspect's tracks in minutes."

Section Chief Miao's eyes shone as he listened, his face full of anticipation: "That would be too amazing! Old He, you must help us with that!"

He Yuzhu turned his head to look at the Chief Engineer Wang Xiao, who had been sent by He Zheng, and joked with a smile: "Did you hear that? Section Chief Miao has given you a new task."

Wang Xiao scratched his head and said thoughtfully: "Technically, this comparison system can be realized, and the prospects are excellent, but the research and development difficulty is not small, and there are many challenges."

He Yuzhu's tone was steady: "For those in technology, if you don't face difficulties head-on and overcome them, how can you progress and grow?"

Wang Xiao gritted his teeth and nodded, his tone firm: "Alright! I guarantee that within one year, I will go all out to tackle the key problems and build this facial recognition system!"

"Once the system is deployed, give priority to putting it into practical use here for Section Chief Miao," He Yuzhu instructed solemnly.

Wang Xiao nodded heavily, firmly taking note.

Having arranged everything at the Public Security Bureau, He Yuzhu did not stop and headed straight for Qinghe Hospital.

The hospital has strict regulations; family members are not allowed to enter the wards outside of visiting hours. He could only stand at the hospital entrance and dial Fang Deng's number.

On the other end of the line, Fang Deng's voice carried heavy fatigue: "Dad, Doctor Liu's condition was particularly critical this afternoon; she suffered an acute illness and was rushed directly into the ICU for emergency treatment. Fortunately, the rescue was timely, and combined with that bottle of special water you sent earlier to stabilize her state, she was finally pulled back from the gates of hell. She has now been transferred to an observation ward and is basically out of danger; there's nothing serious."

He Yuzhu's heart tightened, and he hurriedly asked: "Will she suffer any lasting complications?"

On the other end of the line, Fang Deng suddenly chuckled, her tone carrying a hint of teasing: "Dad, I was secretly wondering before if Doctor Liu was interested in you. It wasn't until today that I learned you knew her mother. To be honest, is she your illegitimate daughter? I looked at her childhood photos, and she looks exactly like you did when you were young!"

He Yuzhu was helpless and annoyed: "You girl, you dare to make fun of me?"

"But she does look like you!" Fang Deng said with a giggle.

He Yuzhu smiled bitterly to himself.

He knew clearly in his heart that Doctor Liu's mother had specifically sought someone to father a child based on his appearance back then.

He had no way to explain such a private and hidden matter; the more he described it, the more suspicious it would look.

He immediately put on the airs of an elder and spoke sternly: "Stop the idle chatter and tell me the specifics of her condition!"

Fang Deng also put away her joking manner and replied seriously: "This time it was a critical symptom triggered by acute respiratory failure. The rescue was timely, and there was no substantial damage to her internal organs. She will fully recover after a few days of quiet rest."

Hearing this, He Yuzhu let out a long breath, and his hanging heart finally settled completely.

Over the next two days, everyone worked around the clock, day and night, relying on the newly built server to repeatedly screen and compare massive amounts of surveillance footage, finally locking onto Shi Lei's final hiding spot.

But the location they eventually found caught everyone off guard—a residential compound currently under lockdown management due to the epidemic.

In the surveillance footage, Shi Lei was seen skulking around the perimeter wall of the compound before his figure disappeared completely.

Section Chief Miao stared at the final segment of the recording, his tone certain: "Old He, there's no need to overthink it; he definitely snuck into this controlled compound to hide."

He Yuzhu nodded slightly, a cold glint flashing in his eyes: "It's easy to handle once the location is locked."

He did not let Section Chief Miao continue to follow up on the subsequent arrest, as he had already calculated everything in his mind.

As long as the person was still in the compound, he had absolute certainty that he could pull him out steadily.

The proprietary identification system in his hands, while unable to perform long-range, large-scale Scanning, was absolutely foolproof for precisely identifying a person's tracks within two hundred meters.

It was just that the timing was wrong; the epidemic-controlled compound was heavily guarded, and it was impossible to sneak in during the day. He could only wait until the dead of night when no one was around to take action.

Two o'clock in the morning, the night was deep and quiet, and all was silent.

The night was as thick as ink, and He Yuzhu's figure was light, like a black shadow, silently climbing over the wall to sneak into the controlled compound.

This compound was quite large, with twenty-six residential buildings in total.

He held his patience, checking building by building and Scanning floor by floor, not daring to be the least bit negligent.

After spending four full hours, just as the sky began to turn pale and dawn was about to break, he finally captured Shi Lei's trail on the top floor of a residential building.

A penthouse suite on the sixteenth floor.

There was more than just Shi Lei in the room; four strange men were also hiding there.

He Yuzhu did not rashly force his way in, fearing that making a commotion would alert the surrounding residents and startle the snake.

He moved with light steps, silently making his way to the rooftop, and climbed from the rooftop onto the balcony of Shi Lei's room. It was midsummer, the weather was sultry, and the balcony door was not closed.

He Yuzhu quietly entered the living room of this apartment.

This vacant apartment must have been put into use temporarily; it had almost no furniture, and there were only mattresses in the three bedrooms.

A cool mat was spread over the mattress, and Shi Lei and four other men were lying on it in a tangled heap, fast asleep; there was no one keeping watch at all.

Piles of instant noodles and bottled water were stacked beside them. Clearly, they had stocked up on supplies in advance.

He Yuzhu did not hesitate in the slightest, taking the five men into his space one after another, and not a single one of them noticed.

After handling everything, he drove straight to that villa on the outskirts of the city that was rarely used.

He basically never came to this villa, but whenever he did use it, it was for interrogating suspects.

He released Shi Lei alone from the space.

Shi Lei slowly opened his eyes, and upon seeing He Yuzhu standing before him, his face turned deathly pale in an instant, and his whole body trembled uncontrollably, as if he had seen a ghost.

In contrast, He Yuzhu's expression was calm, and there was even a hint of a smile on his face as he slowly held out a cigarette: "Doctor Shi, we can consider this our first time dealing with each other, so why are you so afraid of me?"

Shi Lei's lips trembled incessantly, his eyes filled with terror, and he couldn't manage to say a complete sentence for a long time: "You... you..."