Chapter 008 Chapter 8

After finishing today's face-scanning live broadcast, Qingtong was sent back home, ended the role-playing, and prepared to do her own thing and then rest and sleep.

And in Sui City, someone is destined to stay awake tonight.

Guo Rui is a new recruit who has just joined the police force. No matter where the police force is, they all implement the method of old people guiding new people. The one guiding the newcomer Guo Rui is an experienced senior named Qin Zheng, who has been working on the front line for more than ten years. It can be said that he has seen all kinds of cases. No matter why the police are on duty, he can always take the time to tell Guo Rui everything and tell him his many years of experience.

But this time, Qin Zheng said nothing.

Not to mention having worked on the front line for more than ten years, even if he had lived for more than forty years, he had never encountered such a thing.

He was so confused as to not have any experience.

"Master, where are we going?" Guo Rui asked after getting in the police car.

Qin Zheng fastened his seat belt while sitting in the passenger seat. He sighed and looked out the window: "Go to the village that appeared in the live broadcast, and then follow the path to the mountain."

"Hey? Aren't you going to the Shuxiang Building?"

Qin Zheng: "Shuxianglou has been taken over by someone else. What we need to do is to investigate the whereabouts of the three people who were turned into paper people in the live broadcast. Didn't the group of people in Heng City get released without any problem later, or these three people are fine too. Anyway, let's go to the cemetery on the mountain first to see if we can find those three people."

Guo Rui started the car: "Well...what should we do with Shuxianglou?"

"What else can we do?" Qin Zheng touched his pocket and tried to take out a cigarette, but then he remembered that he was at work and put his hand back. "Contact the owner of the mansion. The owner wants to buy the mansion with money and make it the official property in the future."

"What happens after you buy it?"

"The first thing is to investigate and see if there are any traces of the antique dealer mentioned in the live broadcast. If there are no traces and the antique dealer cannot be seen, then repair it and try to attract the antique dealer. If that doesn't work, then develop it into a tourist attraction and charge some tickets to make money."

Guo Rui frowned slightly: "Will the owner of the mansion sell it? That is an ancestral home that has been passed down for more than 200 years."

"Ten years ago, the mansion was put up for sale online, although it was only on the market for a few months." Qin Zheng said, "It's not that the owner of the mansion didn't want to sell it, the problem is that no one can afford it. The cost of renovation alone is 200 million, how much do you think the old house is worth? The money for buying the mansion plus the money for renovation, this number can buy a courtyard house in Beijing."

As for not renovating it, it is impossible. The mansion is valuable because of its antique style and historical sense. The land alone is not worth that much. If someone wants to buy it, of course they come for the old house.

The reason why it is left like this is because the owner is reluctant to demolish the house left by his ancestors. Now that the higher-ups are willing to pay to buy it and renovate it, what is there to be unhappy about?

If you keep it in your hands, it will either collapse or you will have to keep spending money to maintain it. It's a dead end no matter how you look at it.

The owner's children are all abroad, and no one is willing to inherit and look after the old house.

Just as Qin Zheng said, after the owner of the house knew that his mansion appeared in the live broadcast and received the call from above, he happily sold the mansion at the market price.

Before Guo Rui and Qin Zheng arrived at the small mountain village, the first wave of people had already entered Shuxiang Building and began to inspect the condition of the old house while searching for clues.

Of course they couldn't find any clues, because right now, the mysterious antique dealer didn't exist.

Here, Guo Rui finally drove to the foot of the mountain. Although they were not one of the audience members who were pulled into the live broadcast, one of their colleagues was. Through the video recorded by a colleague's mobile phone and comparing it with the barren mountain in front of them, Guo Rui and Qin Zheng determined that this was the place where the live broadcast was filmed.

"There are footprints here." Qin Zheng said, pointing to the ground.

The soil was still a little wet, and you could see the footprints of three people climbing up the mountain.

Following the footprints, we soon arrived at the deserted cemetery where the live broadcast started.

"That weird thing on the live broadcast is really closely related to the graveyard." Guo Rui looked around curiously and said, "It turns people into paper dolls, and the places where they appear and disappear are all deserted graveyards."

Qin Zheng said nothing. He was watching the recorded video on his phone in one hand while leaning over to observe the ground.

"Master, what's wrong?"

"Xiao Rui," Qin Zheng stood up and said, "What should we look for first when investigating the clues left at the scene?"

"Looking for... footprints?"

Qin Zheng nodded and pointed to the wet muddy ground in front of the tombstone: "I have confirmed that the person in the live broadcast did step on this place, and there are some marks left here, but... it's too shallow."

He turned off the live broadcast, took a photo with his phone, and said helplessly: "Based on my experience, the weight will definitely not exceed ten kilograms."

"If the soil here wasn't wet, there wouldn't be even this little mark left."

Guo Rui's expression finally changed: "So..."

Qin Zheng finally couldn't help it, took out a cigarette and put it in his mouth, but he didn't light it, just bit it.

This is his habit, when he encounters something he can't figure out, he likes to smoke for a while. But now he is in the mountains and still on duty, so he can only chew on it.

"Whatever he is, he is definitely not a human."

Guo Rui: "Then...should we continue investigating?"

"Of course we will investigate. No matter what it is, if someone is missing, we have to investigate it thoroughly." Qin Zheng laughed, "Even if the missing person is a criminal. Xiao Rui, this is our job and our responsibility."

"Well, how do we investigate next?"

"I have no idea." Qin Zheng stuffed the unlit cigarette back into the cigarette box. "Let's first investigate whether there are any abandoned graves nearby. Logically, we should send more people to find someone. Who is the one who made the bureau so busy now?"

"oh."

"Especially those in charge of network security, don't even think about sleeping tonight."

If I can't find any clues, I won't be able to sleep, I'm afraid I'll just bang my head against the computer and question my life.

"When the night market incident happened in Heng City, I thought it was a good thing that it didn't happen in Sui City." Qin Zheng sighed, "But I was slapped in the face so quickly."

And judging from the situation, it might be even worse than Heng City. At least no one in the night market was hurt, but it’s hard to say what’s going on here.

As an old man, Qin Zheng felt that the possibility of those three people being released was very low.

"Go back and check the family situations and addresses of those three people, and contact their relatives." Qin Zheng paused and continued, "The live broadcast was not censored, and the transcribed videos were all over the Internet. Until now, we have not received any reports from the families of those three people. The investigation in this regard may not be very smooth."

Either they don't have any family, or they have a grudge against their family and don't want to care about them.

Thinking of the comment about Qian Er gambling, Qin Zheng felt that the latter was more likely.

Guo Rui wrote down what his master said, and then began to search and investigate the situation nearby. He squinted his eyes and looked carefully at every blade of grass and every tree. Unfortunately, in the end, he saw nothing except the particularly shallow footprint at the beginning.

Looking back, Guo Rui saw Qin Zheng looking up at the sky. He asked, "Master, what are you looking at?"

"I was wondering where the camera that filmed the live broadcast should be."

Qin Zheng pointed to the top of his head: "From the distance and angle of the live broadcast, it's probably here."

Looking in the direction Qin Zheng was pointing, Guo Rui only saw branches and leaves covering half the sky.

"Hanging on a tree?"

"No, a little further away."

"If it's farther away, the live broadcast will be blocked by the leaves."

"Yes, but the live broadcast was not blocked." Qin Zheng sighed, "Forget it, let's record it first. We can't handle this kind of problem that cannot be explained by science. The priority now is to find someone."

Guo Rui said "oh" and turned around to continue investigating, but suddenly he twisted his foot and fell to the ground. Then he found a hole covered by trees and shouted "Master" excitedly.

Qin Zheng also walked over and took a look, then shook his head: "This is a burglary hole, and it was built a long time ago. The wet soil shows no signs of being touched. It has nothing to do with what we are investigating. Contact the relevant department. This matter is not our business."

Guo Rui nodded.

After marking the location, the two walked around the area again, and finally made sure that no one was there, so they drove back home.

Guo Rui was arranged by Qin Zheng to contact the relatives of the three people, while Qin Zheng himself was sorting out the clues he had obtained from the investigation. When he was busy working, someone walked in and placed a cup of tea on Qin Zheng's desk.

"Okay, let's take a break first."

Qin Zheng raised his head and asked: "Have you finished dealing with the Shuxiang Building that you are in charge of?"

"It's done." Zhuo Junliang smiled helplessly, "I didn't find anything. I used a magnifying glass to observe almost every place, and finally concluded that no one had been there for at least three months. There was dust everywhere."

"In the end, we concluded that either the antique dealer who went in was a ghost, or... no one had ever been in there."

Qin Zheng pushed the data and documents he had recorded in his hand to him and said, "Don't use the old way of thinking to investigate such a case. Take a look at this."

Zhuo Junliang saw the footprints and weight guesses recorded by Qin Zheng, as well as the camera incident. His face darkened for a moment, and he rubbed his brows: "Really, past experience is useless now."

Qin Zheng was silent for a long time while holding his teacup, and then said, "Recently, there has been news from above that they are planning to set up a new department."

"Isn't it the weird response department?"

"Well, it's a temporary setting at the moment. If a large number of weirdos descend upon us in the future as the person in the live broadcast said, it will become a permanent department." Qin Zheng said, "The higher-ups plan to let me lead the team and recruit a group of young people to join."

"oh."

"You can come too."

"I'm not a young person."

"Everyone under 40 is included. We can't have all of them be newcomers in their twenties who are not mature enough. People in their thirties are the backbone." As for those over 40, there is only the senior Qin Zheng.

"Tsk, to deal with weird things, why don't you recruit some monks or Taoist priests? Maybe they will be more useful than us."

Qin Zheng said nothing, but just stared at Zhuo Junliang with a dim look in his eyes.

Zhuo Junliang was stunned for a moment, then realized: "Is it true?"

Qin Zheng nodded.

The meaning above is very clear, no matter whether the cat is black or white, a cat that can catch mice is a good cat.

If we are unable to make any breakthroughs in our investigation here, we might as well go and visit a temple.