Chapter 35: The Dust Settles

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Wu Yongcheng said that they had found a recording on a cassette of popular music in Du Xiaolin’s home.

The recording was a conversation between Zhu Xuejun and someone known as Mr. Wang. In essence, they were discussing how to use Zhu Xuejun’s academic paper to commit fraud and endorse a new drug developed by Mr. Wang’s pharmaceutical company, thereby securing approval for it.

At the same time, Zhu Xuejun would use his authority to turn the Third Municipal Hospital into a designated institution exclusively supplied with the new drug.

The interests involved could amount to tens of millions, and Zhu Xuejun himself might have pocketed more than a million.

The moment Wu Yongcheng discovered the recording, he reported it to the bureau chief. The matters unearthed by the 316 case had gone far beyond the jurisdiction of the criminal investigation department.

In addition to the economic crimes division, the case would have to be reported to the drug administration, the medical insurance bureau, the procuratorate, and several other departments.

After hearing Wu Yongcheng’s report, Chief Xie was so excited that he climbed out of bed at once and headed straight for the municipal party committee. This was a major case involving multiple departments—the likes of which Baicheng had not seen in more than a decade.

Meanwhile, Zhu Xuejun, who had been swaggering arrogantly moments earlier, instantly became as wilted as an eggplant struck by frost when he heard the recording Wu Yongcheng produced.

The interrogation that followed went as smoothly as walking across level ground.

It also proved that Zhou Yi had gotten almost every step right.

Quick-witted Du Xiaolin was far more formidable than the obsessive and unhinged Zhang Xinli. After becoming Zhu Xuejun’s mistress, she had tried every possible way to extort money from him.

Moreover, judging from his habit of giving her only cash over such a long period, she inferred that Zhu Xuejun must have had a long-standing kickback arrangement with pharmaceutical companies.

Du Xiaolin therefore played up her “sweet and understanding” nature to win Zhu Xuejun’s favor. He gradually brought her into his social circle, displaying her as a prized possession.

At banquets, she would often use trips to the ladies’ room to touch up her makeup as an excuse to switch on the Sony Walkman in the bag she had left at her seat and secretly record Zhu Xuejun’s confidential conversations with others.

She had always been fond of singers from Hong Kong and Taiwan, and sometimes even shared her earphones with Zhu Xuejun. But he had never cared for popular music, considering it all worthless trash.

That, however, successfully dispelled his suspicions of Du Xiaolin. When he learned that she had hidden the recordings among the songs on her tapes, he was utterly astonished.

Then one day, Du Xiaolin recorded a conversation between Zhu Xuejun and Mr. Wang. The explosive contents made her realize that her chance to rise to prominence had finally arrived.

She confronted Zhu Xuejun and threatened him with the recording, demanding five hundred thousand in compensation for the years of her youth she had lost to him.

Only then did Zhu Xuejun understand that this woman was different from all the others he had toyed with in the past.

At heart, she was exactly the same kind of person as he was.

He then used the excuse of raising the money to stall her again and again.

In reality, he was plotting how to eliminate Du Xiaolin cleanly, without implicating himself.

At last, he thought of using someone else to do the killing.

And the weapon he chose was Zhang Xinli, whom he had cast aside.

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But he had never intended to spare Zhang Xinli either. Only by eliminating her could he ensure that no trouble remained.

He came up with what he believed was the safest method: use a terminal illness to bury everything.

For him, that was not difficult. He had personally examined Zhang Xinli’s stomach ailment. Even if it did not turn cancerous immediately after being drugged, it would eventually do so.

He thought the plan was flawless.

Even if someone traced his relationship with Du Xiaolin, even if Zhang Xinli—the murderer—were discovered, at most he would be accused of an improper private life. To a man with money and power, what did such a thing matter?

Once some time had passed and the storm had died down, he would still have his fortune and could continue carousing every night.

After the entire truth was exposed, he could not understand how his supposedly perfect plan had failed.

After listening to Wu Yongcheng’s account, Zhou Yi let out a helpless sigh.

“What’s wrong? You’re not happy after solving such a major case?” Wu Yongcheng asked.

“I was just thinking how strange it is that not one of the people involved in this case was innocent.”

The final truth left Zhou Yi feeling deeply moved and troubled. He had thought they were merely restoring justice to a victim twenty-seven years too late. He had never expected that Du Xiaolin’s actions had, in the end, simply led her to her own destruction.

“Your way of thinking is wrong. When we police investigate a case, we seek the truth and uphold the law and justice. The moral rights and wrongs of the case itself are neither our responsibility nor our burden. Even if you believe Du Xiaolin brought it upon herself, we still have to uncover the truth. Because this justice is not merely for the dead—it is also for the world we live in, for the order of heaven and earth.”

Wu Yongcheng’s impassioned speech swept away the gloom in Zhou Yi’s heart.

It also woke Chen Yan.

“Captain Wu, what were you saying just now?”

“Captain Wu said—”

Zhou Yi had barely begun speaking when Wu Yongcheng snatched up a steamed bun and threw it at him.

“I said steamed buns should be eaten while they’re hot. They don’t taste good once they’ve gone cold.”

“Hot, hot, hot!”

Chen Yan sprang out of bed at once.

Ten minutes later, Zhou Yi stood at the entrance to the municipal bureau, facing the sunlight as he stretched luxuriously.

“Morning.”

Xu Nian, dressed in a beige trench coat, walked toward him and greeted him with a smile and a wave.

“Morning, Doctor Xu.”

It was exactly the time when the municipal bureau began work.

“You worked overtime again last night?” Xu Nian asked as she approached, then pinched her nose. A powerful smell of alcohol radiated from Zhou Yi.

Embarrassed, Zhou Yi scratched his head. “Brother Biao dragged me out drinking later last night.”

The moment she heard that it had been Jiang Biao, Xu Nian burst out laughing.

“So you didn’t get completely drunk under the table?”

It seemed Wu Yongcheng had been right. Jiang Biao’s reputation as a heavy drinker had spread throughout the entire municipal bureau—even Xu Nian knew about it.

“I did. I only just woke up.”

“I heard you solved a major case. Congratulations.”

“No, no. It was all Captain Wu’s doing. I just ran errands for him.”

Xu Nian smiled. Early that morning, she had already received calls from several colleagues asking whether she knew a young police officer named Zhou Yi, since no one by that name was listed in the municipal bureau.

And yet, according to what they had heard, he was the key figure in solving the 316 case and the much larger case behind it.

“So when are you officially reporting for duty at the bureau?”

Zhou Yi smiled. “That’s not up to me. Captain Wu says there are still disciplinary issues to deal with. But he told everyone to go home and get some proper rest.”

Xu Nian nodded. “You really should get some rest. I’ll head in to work first.”

“All right. Bye.”

Zhou Yi watched Xu Nian’s graceful figure recede, his heart filled with complicated emotions.

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The moment he left the municipal bureau, Zhou Yi had planned to visit the hospital and check on his grandfather. But after lowering his head and smelling himself, he caught a powerful stench of alcohol, mingled with the sour odor that came from fighting through an entire day and night without rest. He decided to go home and take a shower first.

When Zhou Yi returned home, he found no one there. Judging by the time, his parents had already gone to work at the steel mill.

In fact, he knew the situation at the steel mill had already become dire. Its books had long been running at a deficit, while the many problems left over from the planned economy had made a vast number of state-owned institutions, including the steel mill, bloated and inefficient.

The mass layoffs of workers were not a sudden event. They were the result of troubles that had been accumulating for years, an inevitable outcome that had sooner or later to arrive.

But it was not the workers’ fault. It was a limitation of the times, a painful phase that society had to endure as its structure developed.

Zhou Yi could not alter the course of history, but he hoped that he could at least change the fate of the people around him.

He searched himself for a long while but could not find his keys. Then he remembered that after awakening in his reborn life the night before last, he had been called by his mother to his second uncle’s house while still dazed and had not brought his keys at all.

After thinking for a moment, he bent down and moved aside the earthenware jar his mother used for pickled vegetables.

As expected, a key lay underneath it.

He had just opened the door when a voice called out behind him:

“Zhou Yi?”

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