Crime Crackdown · Chat

That day, the sky over Lüteng City was as gray as an old rag, damp enough to be wrung out, yet stubbornly refusing to rain. Li Chengyang stood, as usual, before the floor-to-ceiling windows on the 28th floor of the Xinshuai Group. Dressed in a sharp suit, his eyes behind his glasses lacked focus. Fourteen years had passed, and while the city's skyline had changed significantly, the tension in his heart had never slackened. Today, for some reason, that tension tightened another notch. "Brother Yang, the Supervision Group's motorcade has entered the city." Da Jiang pushed the door open, the pink thermos in his hand creating a bizarre contrast with the scar on his face. "Mhm." Li Chengyang didn't look back, merely adjusting his tie. The man reflected in the glass was a world away from the detective he once was. Meanwhile, in the office of the Criminal Investigation Detachment at the City Public Security Bureau, He Yong was stuffing the last of his documents into his briefcase. He looked up at the map of Lüteng City on the wall, his gaze lingering for two seconds on the words "Shimen District" before he grabbed his bag and strode toward the conference room. His footsteps echoed in the corridor—firm, calm, like a chess piece moving into position. No one noticed an old sanitation truck on the provincial road leading to the city, playing the song "Wish You Peace." The driver stuffed a clove of raw garlic into his mouth, staring expressionlessly at the fork in the road ahead. There, a woman clutched a DV camera, anxiously looking in the direction of oncoming traffic. Inside her camera was an answer she had waited fourteen years for. On the other side of the city, the neon lights of the Phoenix Nightclub had yet to flicker on in the twilight. Sun Xing reclined on a sofa in a private booth, playing with a switchblade, the blade clicking open and shut at his fingertips. "Brother Xing, the city's getting lively today," a subordinate leaned in and whispered. Sun Xing sneered, the curl of his lip somewhere between a smile and a predator's instinctual baring of teeth. "Lively is good," he said, stabbing the knife into the table. "Only when it's lively does it get fun." In a narrow alley in the south of the city, Lin Hao had just stepped out of a battered van. He had been tailing the "Beauty Loan" lead for two full weeks. His black leather jacket was covered in dust, and the bloodshot streaks in his eyes were impossible to hide. His partner handed him a bottle of water; he took it but didn't drink, instead staring at the tightly shut iron gate at the end of the alley. "Quite a stir in the city today," his partner remarked. Lin Hao tossed the water bottle onto the car seat and cracked his stiff neck. "No matter how big the stir, the people who need catching will be caught." He spoke calmly, but with an irrepressible ferocity. The grass on his father's grave had been growing for fourteen years; he was used to not waiting for anyone and relying only on himself. A muffled roll of thunder rumbled across the horizon. Anyone could tell it wasn't thunder, but something deeper that had been gathering strength underground for a long time, finally unable to contain itself. <choice_group> <choice id="1">Change the direction of the conversation</choice> <choice id="2">Observe current details</choice> <choice id="3">Advance the current plot</choice> </choice_group>