Chapter 189
Song Zhou held Chen He so high that her feet were off the ground, making her feel exceptionally light.
"Why have you lost weight again?" He buried his face in her hair, and his eyes turned red instantly.
Chen He jumped to the ground, pushed him aside a little, looked him up and down, and his face changed in shock: "Why is there so much blood on your body?"
Song Zhou quickly said, "It's not my blood."
Chen He was still worried and felt around from head to toe: "Are you injured?"
Song Zhou was not injured, and for a moment he felt a little annoyed. Then he suddenly had an idea and held out his hand: "My hands are all scraped."
Chen He grabbed his fingers and gasped, "They're all blistered! What happened?"
"I'm exhausted after tearing down a house."
Chang Ting, who was busy carrying people not far away, said leisurely, "Aren't you tired? You even broke some people's bones."
Chen He turned around and saw a blood-soaked man being carried into an ambulance. He was startled: "Is that... Lu Dun?"
"It's none of my fault. He fell on his own." Song Zhou wouldn't let her attention drift away. He pulled her back and complained, "I was locked up in here and fed instant noodles for several days. They didn't give me anything else."
Chen He held his thinner face in her hands and said angrily, "How could this happen? Who did this?"
"Yes, who locked you up here? Who gave you the instant noodles? Tell me clearly." A voice came from the side.
The two turned their heads and saw that a big light bulb had appeared next to them.
Zhang You's face was pitch black and the ends of his hair were burnt, as if he had been smoked half-cooked on the stove and had just been taken down. He held a notebook in his hand and had already started taking notes.
Song Zhou closed his mouth cautiously. After a pause, he said, "I was knocked unconscious and have no recollection of it. It might have been Lü Dun."
Zhang You's face was filled with disbelief: "You can't remember anything at all?"
"I can't remember anything at all." Song Zhou looked at him, his expression clearly saying: I lied, what can you do about it.
Chang Ting stretched out his arm and intervened between the two of them: "Alright, you just bully kids. You don't have to cover up for Wang Hanshuang anymore.
"Zhou Zhengzheng is holding her and is on his way back. Wang Hanshuang has already admitted to kidnapping you. She said she deliberately put you in a desperate situation and forced you to kill Lü Dun."
Song Zhou lowered his eyes and said after a moment of silence, "Please tell her that I understand her pain. However, suffering is not a bargaining chip for privilege. I will not allow others to dictate what I do."
Chang Ting was very pleased: "Fortunately, he is still in the rebellious stage."
Song Zhou's eyes lit up: "Who are you talking about..."
"Let's get down to business. What did you get out of Lu Dun?"
"Building Z." Song Zhou said.
Building Z.
In the task force office, Zhang You used a cross-border network access tool and followed the URL Song Zhou gave him. After some trouble, he finally opened an overseas website.
"It's very secretive, with layers of security," Zhang You said. "This is what's called the dark web."
The background image on the homepage is a small building outlined with black lines, immersed in a dark red.
Song Zhou and Chen He sat on either side of Zhang You. Chen He recognized it immediately: "It's the base building."
Zhang You moved the mouse to the small building and clicked it, and an input box appeared on the page.
Room number: ________
password:________
Song Zhou said, "Lü Dun said the room number is the painting number, and the password is hidden on the painting. We have to get the painting first."
"Got it." A voice came from the door, and Chang Ting walked in holding a flat wooden box.
The three of them stood up involuntarily, their eyes all falling on the wooden box.
"I just recovered this painting from an overseas buyer." Chang Ting paused. "'Sleeping Bloom'."
"Sleeping Bloom." An oil painting about Qiu Yue's death.
Chang Ting looked at Song Zhou, then at Chen He: "You two, do you want to see it?"
Song Zhou was speechless for a moment. His cold fingertips warmed as Chen He grasped them. They both said in unison, "I want to see it."
Chang Ting didn't say anything else. He put the wooden box on the table, put on gloves, opened the box, and opened the layers of foam board and bubble film to reveal the painting wrapped inside.
It was indeed the original copy of "Sleeping Bloom" that I had seen in the archives. Chen He couldn't see the colors, but a patch of flowers in the valley still stung her eyes.
Chang Ting carefully carried the painting out, placed it on his desk, and leaned it against the wall. He said, "There are seven death paintings, numbered from Z-101 to Z-107. This one is Z-107. The buyer was very uncooperative and refused to acknowledge that there was a code hidden in the painting. We had to crack it ourselves."
Several people gathered around the painting to examine it.
Zhang You's nose almost touched the painting. "It's just a landscape. How can there be a code?"
Someone pulled him from behind and said, "Go close the curtains."
"Who is it..." He turned around reluctantly and saw Zhou Zhengzheng, "Okay, Sister Zheng."
He quickly ran to close the curtains, plunging the room into darkness.
"Please move aside." Zhou Zhengzheng stepped forward, took out something like a small flashlight, pressed the button, and the lamp head emitted a purple light.
"This is an ultraviolet lamp used for banknote detection."
As Zhou Zhengzheng spoke, he brought a small lamp close to the painting and carefully traced it from top to bottom. "If Zhu Zangmo mixed some fluorescent material into the paint and wrote the code on the painting, in a dark environment, the fluorescent material would absorb the energy of the ultraviolet light and the code would appear clearly."
Everyone held their breath and watched the small purple circle of light slowly move across the canvas.
Go to the bottom.
"Okay, no." Zhou Zhengzheng put away the ultraviolet lamp. "Zhang You, open the curtains."
Zhang You ran to open the curtains.
Zhou Zhengzheng pulled out a magnifying glass. "The password could also be hidden in Morse code. Look for any suspicious dots or lines."
The magnifying glass scanned it carefully.
"Okay, still no."
Zhou Zhengzheng took a deep breath and put away the magnifying glass: "Zhang You, close the curtains."
Zhang You responded and left very skillfully.
Zhou Zhengzheng took out another high-intensity flashlight.
Chang Ting couldn't help but speak out: "Apprentice, wait, when did you prepare these tools?"
"I heard there were hidden characters in the painting, so I urgently searched for them from my colleagues. Oh no, I borrowed them."
Chang Ting was speechless: "...Go on."
The room darkened again.
Zhou Zhengzheng turned on the flashlight and placed it on the edge of the painting so that the light was parallel to the picture.
"Oil paint is layered on top of each other, creating an uneven surface. If the artist is interested, they can layer some of the paint to a certain thickness and shape, and then project the shape of the characters under the lighting at a certain angle."
The flashlight circled the painting.
Zhou Zhengzheng: "...Okay, still no."
Zhang You looked at her admiringly: "Sister Zheng, how did you come up with these possibilities?"
"I learned it from detective novels."
Zhang You glanced at her pocket: "Anything else?"
"No more." Zhou Zhengzheng was discouraged.
Chang Ting touched his chin and asked, "Could it be that Lu Dun lied?"
Song Zhou continued, "Probably not. He wouldn't dare."
Everyone looked at him and was horrified, not knowing what Lu Dun had experienced.
Zhou Zhengzheng gestured to Zhang You, and Zhang You quickly opened the curtains.
At this moment, the sun outside the window moved a few inches, and when the curtains opened, a ray of sunlight fell on the painting.
Chen He's eyes suddenly fixed, and he pointed at a corner of the canvas that was clearly illuminated: "Isn't this it?"
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