CH 167

As long as hard work was put in, anyone could make progress quickly.

Lin Chen read dozens of pages of materials again, took advantage of the tea break, and went to the network department. The two police officers inside were working overnight shifts as well. They took turns lying down on the table to rest, as if they couldn’t bear it anymore.

Seeing him push the door and enter, the one who was still awake looked at him blankly as he waved to him.

After all, this wasn’t the police station where he worked, so Lin Chen didn’t know the name of the other party. He could only nod his head and drag a chair over and sit down.

“You’ve worked hard,” he said to the police officer, who was still awake.

“Not as hard as you. How many hours have you not had a good rest? Just look at your face.”

Lin Chen lowered his head and took a sip of tea. Jiang Chao’s subordinates made him speechless, just like him.

But to be honest, since Xing Conglian and Wang Chao left, he really hadn’t had a good night’s sleep. Every time he wanted to close his eyes and rest for a while, countless pictures would flash in front of his eyes, one after another. For a while, it was a picture of Xu Ran being hit, and for a while, it was the scene of Song Shengsheng’s death. In short, those images that left the deepest impression in memory were also the easiest to emerge from the subconscious when the consciousness was relaxed. The one he thought about the most was Xing Conglian.

Lin Chen pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to wake himself up from this bad state.

Only the sound of the computer case was left in the office. The police officer smiled awkwardly a few times, not knowing what to say.

“There hasn’t been any progress so far, right?” Lin Chen held his teacup as he asked.

The other party nodded. “After cross-comparison, all the fans of Mr. Song Shengsheng seem to have nothing in common. Whether it’s age, life experience, locations, and the like, the only thing they have in common is gender.”

“Well, if they want to select victims, they will always use some statistical method to make it less easy for us to find the problem.” Lin Chen thought for a while and suddenly looked up at the police officer in front of him. “There’s another possibility. The personal files stored on the internet are still relatively simple. There should be something that isn’t on the file that’s very important, but we haven’t found it until now.”

“Like what?”

‘That’s a good question.’ Lin Chen fell into contemplation.

There were too many things that weren’t counted in the archives, such as what they bought on Taobao or if they had bought a book today… But the reason why Meijing and Xiang Ye chose Song Shengsheng’s fans was most likely because Song Shengsheng had influence over his fans, and most of the singer’s influence on the fans would be reflected through works and advertising endorsements.

Lin Chen remembered that Wang Chao had once made him a collection of Song Shengsheng’s MVs and advertising works. He patted the police officer next to him on the shoulder and asked the other party to open up his email and bring up the documents Wang Chao had sent.

Then he discovered that because too much time had passed, the files sent by Wang Chao had expired and couldn’t be downloaded.

Lin Chen subconsciously took out his phone, then realized he couldn’t call the teenager now. There would no longer be that sweet voice on the other end of the line.

He looked at the contact number in a daze for a while, until the voice of the police officer next to him called him back.

“I’m sorry. The information has expired, so I have to trouble you to collect it again.”

“Don’t say that. You’ve been helping us.” The other party scratched his head embarrassedly and suddenly said, “Why don’t you just transfer over here?”

Lin Chen was taken aback. He didn’t know where Jiang Chao’s men could come up with such whimsical ideas.

“I’d better not. My original unit is quite good.”

Before he finished speaking, Jiang Chao’s applause suddenly came from the door.

Lin Chen turned his head and saw Vice Captain Jiang clapping his hand twice. He patted his subordinate’s shoulder heavily and said to him, “Seriously, Consultant Lin, you should think about it. Hongjing is a small city. I know you and Lao Xing aren’t the types who pursue higher glory and officialdom, but as you can see, Yongchuan is a big city with a dense population. Criminals especially like to commit crimes here. Besides, don’t worry. You and Lao Xing have solved so many cases together. If Lao Xing is transferred, his rank will probably be just as high as mine.”

Lin Chen sighed inaudibly. He couldn’t tell Jiang Chao that the reason Xing Conglian chose Hongjing was because he wanted to live a less exciting retirement life. But speaking of it, Xing Conglian’s position in his retirement career may have undergone some deviations since he appeared.

“Let’s talk about it when he comes back.” Lin Chen could only evade like so.

“Hey…”

Jiang Chao sighed heavily as he pulled over a chair and sat down beside him. “What are you doing?” He asked the police officer, who was looking at information.

“Consultant Lin gave me a direction. I’m looking for some information.” As he spoke, he looked over again. “Consultant Lin, it will take me some time to find the materials. Would you like to take a break first?”

Lin Chen shook his head and took another sip of tea. “No, I’ll wait for you here.” He paused and then said, “I thought for a while. What Xiang Ye and Meijing planned should be a relatively slow-acting thing. Otherwise, they wouldn’t spend more than ten years waiting. This, of course, is most likely related to Song Shengsheng’s imprisonment. I’m afraid there are reasons for the time I just mentioned.”

“You’re very reasonable, but it really takes some time to check the materials from ten years ago.”

Lin Chen nodded. He rested his head on one hand and thought about the MVs and commercials he had seen. The pictures in his mind were switched frame by frame, and he felt the answer should be obvious, but in the last two days, almost all his thoughts were occupied by Xing Conglian, and any remaining thoughts were distributed to Wang Chao, so there wasn’t much energy to think about the problem.

What Jiang Chao said earlier wasn’t wrong. The real motivation of Xiang Ye and Meijing was an urgent matter, while he had more time to clearly think about the rest.

Thinking of this, the pictures in his mind suddenly stopped.

Song Shengsheng’s appearance in an advertisement appeared before his eyes. At that time, Song Shengsheng was still young. He was wearing a cap and huge sunglasses, and his collar was pulled extremely high, as if he were hiding someone. Subsequently, the ad screen gradually cleared. Lin Chen remembered that it should be in a hospital space. He carefully avoided the doctors and patients passing by, making people think he seemed to be up to no good. After a very thrilling period of time passed, he suddenly opened the door of the ward, then took something from his pocket and sprayed it into the air.

“Bang, bang, bang!”

He shouted.

As the ribbons fell from the sky, everyone in the ward was stunned. At this moment, the first person to react was a little girl lying on the hospital bed. The little girl covered her face and cried, looking very excited.

Song Shengsheng hurried over to hold the little girl in his arms and comforted her, like a prince charming in a fairy tale. He said to her in a gentle tone, “Sorry, my princess. I’m late.”

The subtitles then appeared, which showed: [AIH Insurance. Protecting you for a lifetime.]

A chill ran down his spine, and the porcelain cup in Lin Chen’s hand crashed to the floor.

The police officer lying on the table suddenly straightened up and shouted, “What happened!”

“Consultant Lin, what’s the matter?” The other police officer looked at him worriedly.

“Insurance… Have you checked the insurance of Song Shengsheng’s fans?”

“Yes, most people are on social security, so there are no problems there.”

“I’m not talking about social security. It’s commercial insurance.”

“It’s not in the file, so you have to go to the major insurance companies to compare the lists.”

“You don’t need to go to the major insurance companies. Just go to AIH.”

The police officer nodded. Although he had many doubts on his face, he immediately called the Yongchuan branch of AIH and communicated with the operator on the other end of the line.

Jiang Chao sat aside and listened inexplicably. His face was gloomy as he asked in a low tone, “Consultant Lin, what does this mean? Could it be that Meijing and the others wanted to burn thousands of Song Shengsheng’s fans to defraud the insurance company? Isn’t this something we can find out as soon as we check the beneficiary of the insurance?”

When Jiang Chao was talking, Lin Chen was squatting down to pick up the broken porcelain. Hearing Jiang Chao’s question, he couldn’t help but clench the porcelain in his hand uncontrollably.

No matter which part of AIH Insurance Xiang Ye and Meijing tampered with, using Song Shengsheng’s appeal to induce fans to buy insurance and then kill those fans, the sinister intentions were beyond normal logic. This was more like a ruthless mockery: Look, in the end, it’s not your favorite person who makes you buy things you shouldn’t buy but kills you.

Even though he couldn’t confirm whether it was an insurance issue or not, if Meijing managed to kill Song Shengsheng’s fans in the end, he couldn’t imagine what the public and media would say after learning about it.

And it was only now that he realized what Meijing said. The innocent victims in this fire would become brain dead fans. Many would say that if they didn’t chase stars, they wouldn’t die, so they deserved it.

How many people could clearly realize that there was no necessary causal connection between fans buying goods endorsed by idols and their deaths? It wasn’t Song Shengsheng who killed them; it wasn’t the insurance products that killed them; it was the malice of the forces behind the scenes that killed them.

But how many people who adhere to the true concept of right and wrong would clearly recognize this?

Lin Chen lowered his head and released his hand. His palms were flushed. Jiang Chao gasped violently in front of him but didn’t dare say a word.

Some people would say, “So that’s what happened. Who made them rush to buy things endorsed by idols.”

Some people would say, “I told you before that you shouldn’t buy things endorsed by stars. It’s all a waste of money, but this time it wasn’t just a waste of money but also a waste of life.”

Some people would say, “Maybe Song Shengsheng conspired with his agent to kill fans for money.”

Seeing such a similar statement would make anyone who was kind from the bottom of their hearts despair for human nature—and this was probably what Xiang Ye and Meijing wanted.

He suddenly thought of the question Wang Chao had asked. “Have you ever seen an extremely evil world?”