Chapter 57: The Word ’Cruel’ Written on the Leg

Having spent half a day merely gossiping, Lu Yangcheng raised his eyebrows in curiosity. Li Jing grinned, explaining.

"Inspector Chen is my landlord, I’m just renting from her."

"Renting!?"

Lu Yangcheng’s eyes lit up with excitement.

"So does that mean the two of you are actually living together?"

"..."

Li Jing.

Technically, he wasn’t wrong.

But he felt the need to clarify things.

Although Chen Yuran had loudly proclaimed in front of everyone that they should go home and sleep together that morning, causing the whole Serious Crime Six unit to misunderstand, rumors were bound to spread sooner or later.

As a man, he had to be aware of the situation.

Regardless of whether Chen Yuran cared about the gossip or not, the rumors others started didn’t necessarily align with the truth.

Just as he started to explain, Lu Yangcheng suddenly heaved a nostalgic sigh.

"Ah, it’s so true that life is not fair. If I had your luck and found such a beautiful landlord, I’d be in heaven."

?

Li Jing slowly typed out a question mark.

The bitterness in Lu Yangcheng’s words was palpable, but what’s with the sudden sentimental streak?

Li Jing was confused.

Seeing his confusion, the thoughtful Yi Xiuzhu chimed in.

"You remember that Yangcheng was supposed to have dinner with Deng Ying from still night team last night, right?"

Before she could finish speaking, Lu Yangcheng quickly interrupted.

"Stop! Don’t say another word!"

He turned to Li Jing, warning fiercely.

"And you better not ask! It’s too embarrassing!"

He’d completely forgotten about Lu Yangcheng’s prior dinner arrangement with Still Night Team leader Deng Ying. Now that Yi Xiuzhu reminded him, he remembered.

Seeing Lu Yangcheng’s sudden agitation stirred his curiosity.

Embarrassing? That sounds promising!

The more shameful the story, the better for all of us to have some fun, right?

Leaning towards Yi Xiuzhu, Li Jing whispered.

"What happened? Tell me in detail."

Obviously, Lu Yangcheng wasn’t happy with the turn of events and cut them off sternly.

"Yi Xiuzhu! When I told you about it last night, I was treating you as a friend, a brother, hoping you’d comfort me! You’ve been rubbing salt in my wounds all night, but I never blamed you! But if you dare tell him about it, you can count me out as a friend!"

Yi Xiuzhu was about to relay the story to Li Jing when he paused, a frown creasing his forehead.

"So... there’s still a chance for us to remain friends?"

"..."

Lu Yangcheng.

Before he could say anything, Yi Xiuzhu turned towards Li Jing, spilling the beans.

"Deng Ying is his distant cousin."

"..."

Li Jing couldn’t help but crack a smile.

Deng Ying was Lu Yangcheng’s distant cousin?

Who would’ve thought?

Looking over at a dejected Lu Yangcheng, Li Jing tried holding back his laughter.

"You don’t recognize your own cousin?"

Lu Yangcheng moved his lips, quietly protesting,

"I already said she’s a distant cousin, our relationship is far removed. Isn’t it pretty usual that I wouldn’t recognize her?"

Li Jing blinked at that, figuring it made sense.

It’s not rare for someone to not recognize all of one’s relatives, especially among the younger generations who don’t necessarily mind these things too much.

Even close relatives might not be fully known, let alone distant ones.

So, the question is...

There doesn’t seem to be anything shameful about this, so what could have gotten Lu Yangcheng so worked up?

It seems like...

there’s more to the story!

Li Jing, a "temp" at the Serious Crime Unit Six, quickly analyzed the "case" and looked at Yi Xiuzhu for answers.

Upon seeing this, Yi Xiuzhu casually dropped the big news,

"Yangcheng didn’t recognize Deng Ying, but Deng Ying recognized him. When they met, he noticed that Deng Ying wasn’t put off by his sun-tanned face, instead, she showed great concern for him, so he took the opportunity to confess."

"..."

Li Jing.

He was right; there was more to the story.

But he hadn’t expected things to have evolved like this.

Lu Yangcheng sure had guts...

Did he really confess his feelings after just a few days of talking in the group and only one dinner date?

Isn’t that too hasty?

Up until now, it’s nothing really.

The worst-case scenario is being rejected, there’s nothing to be ashamed of.

The problem is Deng Ying is his cousin, a cousin who recognizes him.

This situation is equivalent to social suicide!

The word ’tragic’ is written all over it.

Looking towards Lu Yangcheng, Li Jing wanted to say something but stopped himself.

Lu Yangcheng, at this point, seemed unbothered by the situation, rolling his eyes dismissively.

"What’s the big deal? It was just a misunderstanding," he said.

While he casually made these remarks, he shot Yi Xiuzhu a hateful glance.

"You just wait. You’d better not embarrass yourself in the future or else you’re going to regret it," he warned.

Yi Xiuzhu merely replied with a cryptic smile, not bothering to respond.

Seeing this, Lu Yangcheng felt the sensation of punching cotton, but there was nothing he could do about it.

He just can’t lose his temper with Yi Xiuzhu.

While he was still mulling over it, his phone vibrated in his hand.

Lifting his eyes from the screen to glance at his phone, joy filled Lu Yangcheng’s eyes.

"I really have customers from my own company, ten of them at once!"

As he spoke, he held up his phone for Li Jing and Yi Xiuzhu to see.

In Lu Yangcheng’s Immortal Message app, there were ten screenshots of customer orders that matched the list, each of them having purchased personal health checks in the last few days.

Looking over the ten orders, Li Jing voiced out.

"We have the orders now, how are we going to make contact with these ten people?"

"It’s simple. We can pose as my company’s employees delivering gifts and perform a product experience callback. We can’t guarantee we’ll get any useful information from these ten people, but at least we can ensure they don’t notice anything suspicious about our contact."

As Lu Yangcheng spoke, he continued.

"But we’ll have to prepare beforehand. We need to make it believable, so we can’t forget the uniforms and ID badges."

Upon hearing this, Li Jing took a moment to consider, then replied.

"It’s already late tonight. Not only for the callbacks, but trying to contact the other people on the list at this hour isn’t feasible either. Captain Dai told us to be prepared for a long-term operation, clearly considering this point."

Saying so, he continued.

"Yang Cheng, leave your address later. When you go home tonight, get everything prepared for the callbacks. Xiuzhu and I will meet at your place tomorrow morning. You can prepare more gifts for the callbacks to ensure that the targets can’t refuse to interact with us, but don’t go too overboard. Keep track of all the expenses yourself, and report to Captain Dai for reimbursement afterward."

"Sure."

Lu Yangcheng responded, mentioning another problem.

"Also, we three can’t be doing the callbacks at the same time. If all three of us show up, it might sabotage the possibility for future interaction with those ten targets. If we get a positive result, it’s alright, but if we get nothing, we’ll only be left with seven more people to contact."

"Hmm."

Li Jing nodded in agreement.

The culprits dealing with the prohibited stuff would definitely not be limited to these 17 people on the list.

But all they had at the moment was this list. Wasting 10 contactable targets in just one day would not be worth it.

As he was pondering how to arrange this, Yi Xiuzhu suddenly spoke.

"I’ll not be involved in the callbacks."

?

Li Jing turned his head.

Lu Yangcheng also asked with a puzzled look.

"What’s up?"

Facing both men’s stares, Yi Xiuzhu casually said.

"I’m not very good with words. I can communicate well enough with people I know, but when it comes to strangers, I probably wouldn’t be able to say two sentences without offending them. I’m not capable of doing such callbacks."

"..."

Li Jing.

"..."

Lu Yangcheng.

In the face of Yi Xiuzhu’s self-awareness, both were left speechless.

This indeed slipped their minds.

After having worked together with Yi Xiuzhu for a while, except for occasionally behaving a bit dark, he hasn’t been too outrageous, thus they both overlooked his poor social skills.

Seeing Li Jing and Lu Yangcheng silently looking at him, a slight unease appeared on Yi Xiuzhu’s face.

"You two handle the callbacks, I’ll take care of the seven without orders. I have some connections in society. If they enjoy some form of entertainment in their leisure time, as long as it isn’t too low-level, I should be able to figure it out. Give me a day, we will meet this time tomorrow evening to discuss the strategy."

Having said this, he added.

"If need be, I can look into the ten with orders later. This type of thing takes time and I wouldn’t be able to handle so many at once."

At such statements, both Li Jing and Lu Yangcheng raised an eyebrow.

Regardless of what Yi Xiuzhu’s ’connections’ were, if he was confident in using them, they must be reliable.

If they can confirm the remaining seven individuals’ leisure activities, devising a contact strategy would undoubtedly be much easier.

Thinking of the benefits, Li Jing said.

"Alright, just be careful when working separately."

...