Chapter 419: Chen Yao's True Identity

After the counseling room door closed, Su Ming sat on the sofa for a full seven minutes without moving.

The coffee cup had long been empty, yet he still twirled it in his hand, his fingertip rubbing the dried coffee ring on the cup wall, his thumb nail unconsciously scraping the logo at the bottom.

Something was off.

Can't say exactly where, but it just felt off.

The feeling was familiar—back in his previous life, during the apocalypse when he survived by scent, every time he entered a building that seemed safe, a cool, tingling sensation would spread across the back of his neck. Nine times out of ten, something deadly was hidden inside.

Su Ming set the cup on the table, pulled out his phone, and flipped through two pages of his memo.

It listed the key points he had summarized last night: the Zhao Clan construction material collapse timeline, the energy residue parameters at the Old District homicide scene, Ding An Industry's Capital Topology Map, and Chen Yao's enrollment registration information.

The enrollment registration information was simple.

Orphan. Qiu Ce Yuan special recruitment. Sponsor: Ding An Industry's education fund. The guardian field lists the foundation's legal representative, signature neat and orderly, seal clear.

It was overly clean.

Su Ming stood up, tossed the cup into the Trash Can, left the counseling room, and walked along the Corridor toward the faculty office area. His steps were neither fast nor slow, and he nodded at familiar colleagues he passed.

He entered the office and locked the door from the inside.

He pulled open the bottom drawer and retrieved a black Encrypted Terminal with no markings. It was his exclusive device as a covert lookout, directly linked to the Investigation Bureau's Intelligence Division, authorized personally by Wei Gong, with only two registered users—Wei Gong and himself.

Su Ming dialed out an encrypted channel.

Three tones.

The other end answered.

"Search a person," Su Ming lowered his voice, speaking rapidly, "Qiu Ce Yuan Elementary Department special enrollment student, Chen Yao, thirteen years old, ID XT-0079. I need all her files before enrollment: household registration, orphanage records, medical history, social connections, the sponsor's actual controlling chain—everything."

The other side hesitated for a second, "Su Team, if we follow the regular retrieval procedure—"

"Skip the procedure," Su Ming cut him off, "use my covert lookout permission, within twenty minutes."

"Understood."

He hung up.

Su Ming leaned back in his chair, staring at the ceiling.

The office's central air hummed, the fluorescent tubes blazed white. From the playground outside, the elementary department trainees' running chants drifted in, uniform and vigorous.

He closed his eyes and replayed every frame from the counseling room in his mind.

Grabbing the skirt hem. Trembling. Red eye sockets. Pleading. Bowing.

No flaw.

Not a single flaw.

That is the biggest flaw.

Even a thirteen‑year‑old orphan, accustomed to the harshness of life, will show a momentary "distortion" in emotional response when talking alone with an unfamiliar adult. Either excessive nervousness leads to logical confusion, or a forced attempt to please makes the expression rigid, or over‑nervousness suddenly relaxes to an unreasonable degree.

People aren't machines; there will always be rough edges.

But Chen Yao didn't.

Every one of her reactions fell within the textbook psychological standard range, precise to an unsettling degree.

Su Ming opened his eyes.

The terminal gave a slight tremor.

He looked down at the screen; it was a reply from the Intelligence Division. Not a text report—a voice message.

In theory, the Intelligence Division always returns information in encrypted text, never via a voice channel.

Su Ming frowned and opened it.

"Su, Su Team..." the voice on the other end was clearly unsteady, breath trembling, "Can't retrieve it."

"What does that mean?"

"Chen Yao's pre‑enrollment files—the orphanage records, household registration transfers, medical system, even the archives of the hospital where she was born—are all encrypted. Not ordinary encryption, but a financial‑grade multi‑layer shell, nested with legal block agreements from at least four different law firms. I tried two routes: the first via the social security system's data mirror, only to find the mirror itself had been replaced; the second via the orphanage's digitized paper archive, whose database access rights were bought out by an investment firm called 'Hanlin Capital.'"

Su Ming's fingers froze.

Hanlin Capital.

He had seen that name on last night's Capital Topology Map; it was the third‑layer nested holding of Ding An Industry.

"I also tried the municipal household registration bureau's underlying data," the intelligence officer's voice grew more urgent, "Su Team, that side is also locked, using a commercial confidentiality clause, and the signatory is... the legal team of Huan Yu Heavy Industry."

Shen Wanshan.

Su Ming's pupils contracted by half a millimeter.

A thirteen‑year‑old orphan's household registration file requires encryption involving four law firms, two Capital Groups, and the legal team of the Federation's largest defense contractor?

This isn't protecting privacy.

This is building a wall.

A wall built with money, a wall built with law, using legal and compliant means to weld a little girl's past shut inside a black box.

"Your permission level is insufficient," Su Ming said.

"Sorry, Su Team, I've done my best; digging further would trigger the other side's warning mechanism—"

"That's enough," Su Ming cut the call.

The office fell silent.

He stared at the red "ACCESSDENIED" prompt on the terminal screen for five seconds, his finger joints slowly tightening.

The regular channel was blocked.

Then take the unconventional route.

Su Ming extracted from the terminal another communication module with a higher encryption tier. This module had no serial number, no name; the interface displayed only an input box and a send button.

Wei Gong's backdoor for him.

A backdoor directly to the Federation's topmost database.

This database is not on any public network, physically isolated, and maintained by dedicated personnel. In theory, only the Federation's highest decision‑making tier has authority to access it—ranging from the full identity data of S Ji wanted criminals to the medical records of various state leaders, everything is present.

Su Ming entered Chen Yao's identity code.

The fingertip hovered above the Send key for two seconds.

He hesitated.

It wasn't fear. It was weighing.

Once pressed, this query will be recorded. Even if it uses the backdoor authorized by Wei Gong, the query log itself remains traceable. If the other side's intelligence network is deep enough and wide enough—

Su Ming recalled the corpse in the Old District that had been sliced by a rule‑type Weird, uniformly‑speed section.

He remembered the trading precision that could evaporate a hundred‑billion‑yuan conglomerate within fifty‑three minutes.

He recalled Chen Yao's textbook‑perfect crying in the counseling room.

He pressed.

Sent.

Data loading.

Three seconds. Five seconds. Eight seconds.

The progress bar on the screen crawled unusually slowly; each time it jumped a notch, Su Ming's heartbeat quickened a beat.

Twelve seconds.

The progress bar completed.

The page switched.

A complete identity file unfolded on the screen.

Su Ming's gaze scanned from top to bottom—

Name: Chen Yao.

Gender: Female.

Date of birth: March 14, 2031.

Place of birth: Dongyang City Third People's Hospital.

All of the above are known information. No new data.

He scrolled down.

Household registration transfer records.

Welfare institute intake records.

Guardian change records.

These items, encrypted and locked in ordinary databases, hold no secrets before the Federation's top database. Su Ming skimmed quickly, his gaze lingering on each line of data for no more than 0.3 seconds, expertly filtering out useless information.

Then his gaze stopped.

The bottom of the page.

The direct relatives section.

Father: Chen Dewang (deceased).

Mother: Liu Xiulan (deceased).

Elder brother:

Su Ming's eyes didn't move.

His breathing didn't move.

He froze there, staring at the four characters that popped up on the screen.

Chen Shao.

Elder brother: Chen Shao.

The remarks column immediately followed with a long string of red annotations—Federation S Ji wanted criminal, Yujui, codename "Dominant", Eden Garden leader, danger level: extremely high.

Su Ming's back pressed against the chair back, and his whole body slowly slid down.

Something in his mind snapped.

It wasn't shock. The word "shock" is too mild.

It was that kind— you solve a math problem, each step feels logically consistent, yet the final answer tells you the premise of the whole problem was false.

You thought Ding An Industry was a white glove of some conglomerate family.

You thought the Zhao family's extermination was a violent cleanup incidental to business competition.

You thought Chen Yao was backed by a wealthy, powerful protector.

Right.

There is indeed a protector.

But that protector's name is Chen Shao.

Federation S Ji wanted criminal.

Eden Garden.

Su Ming closed his eyes, then opened them again.

Shen Wanshan. Hanlin Capital. Ding An Industry. Twelve conglomerate giants jointly Short Selling.

They're all Chen Shao's pawns.

What about Qiu Ce Yuan?

The Qiu Ce Yuan, championed by Wei Gong, with three hundred billion poured in, bearing the Federation's next‑generation Yujui cultivation system— from infrastructure to operations, the money came from Shen Wanshan, the land was approved by Guo Family.

Su Ming's hand rested on the tabletop, his nail scraping the surface and leaving a white mark.

He didn't utter a curse.

He just sat there very quietly, breathing evenly, his expression blank.

But his mind was racing at an unprecedented speed—

Wei Gong sent him to act as a covert lookout, monitoring capital infiltration.

Fine.

The capital infiltration was detected.

The source of the infiltration is Eden Garden.

And the leader of Eden Garden keeps his own younger sister in Qiu Ce Yuan.

What does that mean?

It means Qiu Ce Yuan wasn't infiltrated.

From the first Reinforced Steel Bar in its foundation onward, Qiu Ce Yuan is all Chen Shao's property.

Every brick, every sum of money, every teacher recruited and every student selected—all are within Eden Garden's line of sight.

The Federation thinks it has built a school to cultivate schemers.

In reality the Federation built a cage, then drilled itself inside.

Su Ming locked the terminal screen.

Then he stood up and walked to the window.

Outside the window, on the elementary division's playground, the trainees in uniform were doing the recess exercises.

The ranks were tidy, the chants loud.

The sunlight was fine.

Su Ming spotted Chen Yao's figure in the crowd.

Third row, fifth from the left.

She followed the beat doing stretch exercises, her movements not very precise; when she fell behind she would furtively glance at a classmate's posture. A boy accidentally nudged her, and she hunched her shoulders and gave a shy smile.

Extremely ordinary.

So ordinary it made Su Ming's spine shiver.

He turned, leaned against the window frame, tilted his head up to stare at the ceiling. The white light from the fluorescent tube washed his face with no color.

What should he do?

Reporting to Wei Gong is mandatory. But after reporting?

If they stir the grass and scare the snake, Chen Shao will immediately trigger the emergency plan; Shen Wanshan and the global capital network behind him will complete asset transfers and personnel evacuation within twenty‑four hours. By then the Federation will have only a hollow shell.

If they don't stir the grass, it's equivalent to watching the Investigation Bureau's most important talent cultivation system continue to run in the enemy's palm.

Su Ming pulled out the Encrypted Terminal and sent Wei Gong a six‑character message.

"Urgent matter. Face‑to‑face."

After sending it, he slipped the terminal back into his pocket and looked out the window again.

On the playground, the recess exercises ended.

Chen Yao walked toward the teaching building, backpack on her back, head down, along the path hugging the flowerbed edge.

The Old Hairpin wrapped in copper wire on her head flashed in the sunlight.

Su Ming watched the slender figure disappear around the stair corner, slowly exhaling.