Gao Ang suspected there was something wrong with his ears. Would his senior brothers fight?

Although he looks big and burly, he has an excellent personality. His mentor once praised him, saying that he is like Zhang Fei threading a needle, rough but meticulous. Moreover, he is very easy-going and has nothing to do with fighting.

Where are the others?

"Solitary confinement."

"How did you end up in solitary confinement?"

"Re-offending".

"How did you 're-offend'?"

Gao Ang once again doubted his ears, wondering if Cao Kun's senior brother had been fighting before?

But he had never heard of it either. Although the two of them weren't that close before, he hadn't heard him mention it to his mentor in the three years he'd been in Shanghai.

Then there can only be one possibility: his senior had been in a fight two years before he came to Shanghai, before he graduated.

"How long will you be detained?"

"24 hours."

It was clear that Xia Weiwei was also very upset. After answering Gao Ao's question, she quickly ate a couple of bites of food and went upstairs to rest, without even saying a few polite words to Lillian to welcome her back.

This also shows that the two are really good friends.

The internal fighting within the municipal bureau has a terrible impact, especially in a metropolis like Shanghai. If not handled properly, it will tarnish the country's reputation and allow all sorts of unhealthy trends to flourish outside.

After being confined, Cao Kun was immediately suspended from his duties, and the case he was handling was handed over to Liu Zhuo, the same person who had fought with Gao Ang over a girl.

After buying two packs of cigarettes and taking Xiaohua with him, Gao Ang decided to visit his senior brother.

He wasn't there to kick someone when they're down; this time, he wanted to resolve two perplexing issues:

1. Why did the fight happen this time?

2. Why did you fight last time?

The two men and the cat stared at each other in the living room. Cao Kun basically understood Gao's purpose, but he didn't know how to explain it.

“I’ve said it many times, I have no conflict with Section Chief Zhang, and I don’t know why I beat him up, but no one believes me. They all think I’m acting like a big shot because I solved a few cases. I’m speechless.”

With his hands shrugged, Cao Kun began to complain, his tone full of grievance.

"You...you really have no personal grudge against him?" Gao Feng asked skeptically.

"What personal grudges could there be? The city bureau's priority is handling cases internally. No personal emotions can be allowed to interfere with work. That's the rule."

"Stop, stop, stop. Rules are rules. Don't give me lectures. We're all human, and we all have emotions."

As soon as he heard him about to preach, Gao Ang immediately waved his hand to stop him.

"Were you rivals in love before?"

The fire of gossip began to burn, and Gao Feng asked a question with a cunning and scheming tone.

"Enemy my foot! That didn't happen at all. Let me tell you what happened."

Cao Kun, too lazy to pay attention to his unreliable junior, recounted the events between himself and Section Chief Zhang of the Technical Department.

"Wait a minute, you mean you're going to ask him about the test results for that thumb ring?"

"That's right, their technical department is in charge of this. I wanted to ask them if there were any suspicious fingerprints or other information on it, but this bastard just came up to me and said something like..."

Was Section Chief Zhang always like this?

Gao Ang seemed to have grasped some key information and asked a follow-up question.

"Oh? Old Zhang? He used to have a very good temper. We all called him Old Zhang the Ox, since he was born in the Year of the Ox. He was also very hardworking and never complained about working overtime..."

"He insulted you, and you immediately attacked him?"

Cao Kun hesitated for a moment, then replied somewhat awkwardly, "Uh, it seems like that's how it happened. I acted impulsively and punched him... Old Zhang's assistant, Xiao Liu, saw me make a move and came over to break it up. He said break it up, but really he just grabbed me and let Old Zhang beat me up. Hey, I couldn't stand it! Two guys who use pens dare to fight me with knives? I went up and took them both down in no time..."

Gao Ang reached out and interrupted his performance, "Didn't you notice anything unusual about yourself?"

“Abnormal? Nothing abnormal. If someone insults you, you should definitely fight back…” Cao Kun began his long-winded explanation. Gao Ang did not interrupt him during this process, but carefully observed his micro-expressions and body language.

His movements were exaggerated, his eyes bulged dramatically, his eye sockets turned red, veins bulged on his neck, and spittle flew everywhere...

This person looks exactly like a mentally ill person.

This process lasted for about fifteen minutes until Cao Kun felt thirsty, picked up his teacup and took a big gulp, and then stopped venting.

When the word "irritable" came to Gao Ang's mind, he remembered that when he went to Wu Mei's house before, he found a thumb ring. He had examined the thumb ring carefully and always felt that something was wrong with it.

At that time, I seemed to have a tendency to be easily angered. I had a lot of anger inside that I wanted to vent, but I suppressed it.

Could there be something strange about this thumb ring?

Normally, Gao Feng would never have suspected this ring; there's a high possibility that Cao Kun lost control of his emotions.

Work-related reasons, dietary issues, emotional entanglements, etc., are all possible reasons.

Coincidentally, Gao Feng had a deep impression of that ring because he rarely noticed anything amiss after the mutation.

The small flower was one, but he didn't notice it at all; the thumb ring was another, and his intuition told him that something was strange.

Should he tell his senior brother about his doubts? Gao Ang dismissed the idea.

He sensed something strange, something supernatural, like Little Flower, whose claws could tear through its own graphene-like skin.

Who knows what else might be unusual about this ring? If his senior brother discovers something, and he himself was the one who gave him the clue, wouldn't his secret be exposed? He can't just kill his senior brother to keep the secret, can he?

"Senior brother, what have you found out about the thumb ring we got back from Wu Mei's house yesterday?"

"What, you suspect there's something wrong with that ring?" Cao Kun took a sip of water, clearly recovered, and immediately regained his usual alertness.

"Hi, no, I was just asking casually. I think that design is quite unique, and I'm thinking of buying one online."

He waved his hand dismissively, pretending to be indifferent.

"Is it pretty? There's nothing wrong with that ring. It's all Wu Mei's own fingerprints, and there's no other information. Her relatives have already taken it back." After twisting his neck a couple of times, Cao Kun gave him the answer he wanted to know.

Now that they had confirmed the ring wasn't in the evidence room, Gao Ang didn't plan to stay any longer. The two chatted for a while longer before leaving.

"Oh dear, I forgot to ask him why he got into the first fight..."

Retrieving the scent data of the ring from the database, Gao Ang initiated tracking mode, starting from the city bureau's gate.

In his perception, the route of the scent became clearer and easier to track than before.

When he was tracking Zhang Jianping's blood scent last time, he had to repeat multiple routes and eliminate other factors that could cause the scent molecules to diffuse. It took him a lot of effort to find that sewer.

This time it's very different; the odor molecules seem to have become particularly sensitive, or rather, the molecular diameter has become much larger.

Of course, the molecular diameter cannot be large; it is likely that the sensitivity of the sense of smell has increased again, which could be due to the lightning strike or the effect of recent 'photosynthesis-like' activity.

Following the scent, the person and the cat quickly found the location of the ring. It was in the same neighborhood as Wu Mei and the others, but not in the same building.

He parked his car in an empty parking space in front of the building, rolled down the window, and sat in the sun, smoking and listening to the sounds around him, trying to extract the clues he wanted.

He quickly found the information he was looking for: a conversation between two adults and a child.

The two adults are likely Wu Mei's older brother and sister-in-law, and the child is her biological son, the son she had with her ex-husband.

According to the case file, Wu Mei's son was raised by her, while Zhang Jianping's son was raised by his ex-wife. Due to family reasons, her son did not live with them, but instead lived with his uncle and aunt.

The house they are in now was lent to them by Zhang Jianping for free, as a way of repaying their debt of gratitude for raising them.

As for why Wu Mei and her husband didn't bring their sons back to live with them, the case file also states that it was a result of their discussion, in order to avoid the melodramatic scenario of stepfathers and stepmothers.

Cao Kun and his colleagues had also suspected that the couple had murdered them for money, but the final investigation proved their innocence.

It wasn't until new clues were discovered in the storage room and sewers that the city bureau focused all its efforts on Wu Mei.

The conversation between the three didn't yield any new clues; instead, the child kept saying things like "I'm sorry," which piqued Gao Feng's curiosity.

Whom should we apologize to?

Was he Wu Mei's accomplice?

That's impossible. This kid has been staying home playing online games all this time. Due to special circumstances, his uncle didn't dare let him go out. He's been at home 24 hours a day. Besides, given his age and experience, how could he do something like that?

With this incident at home, neither of the adults was in the mood to go to work. They both took leave to stay home and take care of the child, fearing that he might do something foolish or be traumatized.

The three of them lived a very dull life at home. Gao Ang listened patiently for an entire afternoon until the neighborhood fell silent around 11 p.m. before he finally took action.

"Don't wander off. I'm going out for a bit. Keep an eye on the car."

He patted the cat's head, and the cat responded with an eye roll.

Gently closing the car door without even locking it, Gao Ang followed the scent into the building.

After confirming the floor and room number where Wu Mei's son was located, he came out again.

Since it was a suburban community, security measures such as surveillance cameras were not particularly comprehensive. Gao Ang easily avoided all the cameras and successfully reached the back of the building, which was the side where Wu Mei's son's room was located.

Without breaking a sweat, Gao Ang climbed to the top floor by following the rainwater pipe.

The building has seven floors, and Wu Mei's son and his family live on the sixth floor.

After visually assessing the location of the sixth-floor window, Gao stood with his back turned on the edge of the rooftop, took a small step back, and fell to his death.