CH 269

Afternoon, Hongjing Municipal Police Bureau.

The electronic induction doors slid open on both sides, and officials wearing different uniforms were busy coming and going. At the same time, vehicles from various provinces and departments continued to enter the parking lot, and their gray-blue exhaust fumes appeared vast under the sunlight.

The scene here was even more overwhelming than the city-wide operation to capture Shen Lian yesterday.

A group of fully armed special agents passed by as Huang Ze stood by the stairs. He withdrew his gaze from the doors and nodded to the special agents. After that, he hurriedly said a few words to the leader of the Hongjing political department who was in front of him.

“Director Chen, in all honesty, I don’t know much about the specific details of the case.”

“If there’s a special situation, you really need to inform me in advance so that I can make arrangements.”

“That’s for sure.”

Huang Ze responded ambiguously.

Director Chen turned and walked upstairs, and the person in charge of the special agents department was already waiting on the side.

Another series of questions followed, leaving Huang Ze unable to answer. He didn’t even know why he was standing here.

For the past half hour, his phone had barely stopped ringing.

His superiors were questioning what exactly he was up to, while his subordinates were asking what had happened.

Shen Lian had been arrested and brought to justice, and the top brass of Zhourui Pharmaceutical had already confessed. The speed of solving the case couldn’t be described as anything other than miraculous.

At the same time, detailed research on TERN was proceeding methodically, and with the help of insiders from Zhourui and relevant information, it was only a matter of time before they cracked this drug.

Of course, the key to quickly solving this deadly drug was Shen Lian. Although it was difficult to say out loud, Huang Ze greatly admired Lin Chen’s choice when confronting Shen Lian. Next would be the interrogation—Lin Chen’s area of expertise. As long as Shen Lian cooperated with the police, all the problems would be solved instantly.

However, half a minute after the chairman of Zhourui appeared in the hall, Lin Chen and Xing Conglian suddenly disappeared. By the time he received news from the two, Xing Conglian had already gathered all the city departments for a large-scale meeting, which was happening right now.

If it weren’t for a friend from Meicun discreetly inquiring whether Xing Conglian was trustworthy, Huang Ze felt he wouldn’t have known that a group of lunatics on the dark web was bidding on their surrounding cities.

It was quite ludicrous.

Thinking of this, Huang Ze couldn’t help but clench his fists.

Just then, the hall suddenly fell silent, and everyone stopped their ongoing discussions and turned to look at the main entrance of the hall.

People instinctively followed the actions of others, and Huang Ze unconsciously turned his gaze toward the glass doors. Someone was taking off their sunglasses and walking toward them, covered in dust and dirt from below the steps.

It was Xing Conglian. Of course, he was accompanied by his small follower carrying a shoulder bag.

Huang Ze took a deep breath.

Xing Conglian stepped onto the last step, and the glass door slid open again. At that moment, the hot air from outside and the clamoring voices from inside collided.

“Captain Xing, what exactly happened!”

“Will Meicun really face a terrorist attack?! What about us in Hongjing?”

“What are the criminals demanding?”

As the doors closed, Xing Conglian stood in the hall and raised his left hand.

His clear and solemn voice overwhelmed all the overwhelming questions, slowly saying, “Everyone, please calm down!”

His voice was clear, serious but composed, inspiring trust, and the room quickly quieted down.

Xing Conglian lowered his hand and continued, “In five minutes, there will be a brief case briefing in Room 201. I hope everyone enters in an orderly manner. After the briefing, there will be a short Q&A session, and we will be responsible for answering your questions.”

Xing Conglian’s words were concise and to the point.

……

White projection screens and laptops were set up in front of the podium.

Each computer’s video function was fully activated, connecting various departments from the three provinces.

Wang Chao quickly ran to the stage and set up the projection equipment. He connected the microphone, opened the laptop, adjusted the projection screen, and just managed to finish within the five-minute time frame.

The audience below immediately fell silent, and no one made a sound.

At this moment, Wang Chao took off the hat that had been covering his head, bowed, approached the microphone, and said, “Then, I’ll begin.”

There was a commotion in the crowd; no one had expected Xing Conglian to entrust the important case briefing to an inexperienced young boy. However, Xing Conglian just stood with his arms crossed below the stage, not saying a word.

Wang Chao didn’t mind the doubts from below; he had a serious expression as he opened a screenshot of a webpage on the projector. On a black background was a sea of gold waves that looked like a three-dimensional wave pattern. Huang Ze noticed that the website had the suffix “.onion”.

Calm and composed, Wang Chao said, “Based on relevant intelligence, forty minutes ago, our bureau discovered an unknown website on the deep web. The website displayed maps of three provinces, including Cheng’an, Jiangxia, and Zhelin.” As he spoke, he clicked on a map of the three provinces and overlaid it.

It was clear that the city boundaries perfectly matched between the two maps. Wang Chao didn’t pause and continued, “This website uses Bitcoin betting to attract members of the dark web to place bets on the cities of the three provinces. You can simply understand it as using money to vote, and the one with the most votes wins. The winner in this round is Meicun. According to the usual modus operandi of the criminals, we have reason to suspect that Meicun will be attacked.”

Wang Chao concluded the case briefing concisely.

After his speech, there was silence in the audience for a while. Everyone looked at each other with grave expressions, but also somewhat bewildered.

“Is that it?”

Although no one really questioned it, everyone’s faces were filled with similar questions.

“Do you have any questions? I’ll answer any doubts related to the network and information technology aspects of this case,” Wang Chao said seriously, taking a deep breath.

“How did you confirm that the website’s Bitcoin betting and the map are not a prank animation, and that the criminals did not create this website to cause public panic?”

“I verified the betting process with an account.”

“Are there really so many users on the dark web?”

Wang Chao seemed to have anticipated similar questions, and a screenshot of an English website appeared on the projection screen. It had various classified items for sale, resembling a regular shopping website, but upon closer inspection, it was selling illegal firearms, dangerous drugs, and, of course, human lives.

“Take the famous dark web ‘Silk Road’ as an example. The website has nearly a million registered users, a complete forum community, and an anonymous transaction system. It has sold illicit goods amounting to a billion dollars worldwide. Despite several FBI crackdowns, there are still continuous iterations of the website. Although I cannot currently analyze the traffic, based on the estimated betting amount, the number of visitors and bettors on this website should be over 50,000.”

The projector screen displayed several simple screenshots and quickly flashed through them.

“Why didn’t the network monitoring detect it before, and how did it attract a large number of users to place bets?” someone asked.

Wang Chao put the case aside and explained, “Promoting dark web websites is more like word-of-mouth marketing compared to the surface web. This website adopts password access and uses point code encryption in the information dissemination process. We don’t have enough resources to monitor every corner of the dark web, so it escaped our surveillance during promotion. However, we believe that there should be a large forum deep in the dark web distributing the website’s address and password. Users who gain the trust of the administrators can obtain the password.”

“Wait a minute, I have a question.” Someone interrupted Wang Chao and spoke up. “So, people are betting on our surrounding cities, and the city with the most bets will be attacked. Am I understanding this correctly?”

Wang Chao nodded. “Correct.”

“Can all the betting users profit from this?”

“The website operator can profit, but whether the bettors can profit, we are not sure yet.”

“Are these people crazy? Are they spending a lot of money just to see more deaths in Meicun?” The person continued, “I don’t believe it. How could there be such people in the world?”

Standing in front of the stage, Wang Chao held the microphone and said coldly, “If you have studied the dark web’s websites related to pedophilia and the prices for those resources, you wouldn’t ask such a question.”

The young man stood tall, and in that moment, he revealed an experience and responsiveness far beyond his age, very much like Xing Conglian.

After that, there was a period of whispers in the audience, and no one asked Wang Chao any more questions.

“Does anyone else have any other questions?” Wang Chao asked.

At this moment, someone raised their hand and said loudly, “Since this website initially escaped detection, how did you later discover it? Also, where did the tip-off you mentioned come from?”

This question was very sharp. Upon hearing it, Wang Chao couldn’t help but steal a glance at Xing Conglian.

It was just a slight reaction, but Huang Ze understood clearly that the tip-off had indeed come from Lin Chen.

However, just as he was prepared to hear Xing Conglian’s perfunctory answer to the question, the police captain walked up to the stage and took the microphone from Wang Chao’s hand, and said, “I’ll answer the questions related to the case details.”

Huang Ze was stunned at the words, and what Xing Conglian said next surprised him.

He said, “Our bureau consultant, Mr. Lin Chen, received an anonymous message, and, after cracking the message’s password, we found this website.”

“So, the criminals personally delivered the clue to you?” someone said incredulously.

“More accurately, it wasn’t a clue but a taunting letter from the criminals,” Xing Conglian said calmly.

The audience below was in an uproar again, and questions were raised one after another:

“Are you sure about the target suspects?”

“Even if you confirm the authenticity of the dark web betting, how do you know that Meicun will be attacked and not something else will happen in Meicun?”

“Isn’t this just a joke by the criminals to cause public panic? We have mobilized most of our forces to handle this. What if it’s the criminals’ plan?”

“If you determine it’s true, how do we effectively protect ourselves from the attack?”

Xing Conglian stood on the stage, attentively listening to each question.

“We need to understand the entire process and specific details of this case.” Someone participating in the video conference finally spoke up and summarized all the questions.

Xing Conglian looked at the person and nodded. “Sure, what do you want to know?”

“My first question is, since Lin Chen received the message, where is he right now?” the person asked.