Chapter Fourteen: The Green-Haired Boy

I was certain those thugs wouldn’t just let things go, so before we reached the bank, I had Li Hong get out of the car to pose as a bystander and keep an eye out for any suspicious characters nearby. Li Hong was a pro at this sort of thing; he gave a confident, “Don’t worry!” and went on his way.

When we arrived at the bank, Old Lin was intently studying a list, occasionally jotting down notes or making marks, with Mouse by his side. Spotting us, Old Lin waved us over. I hurried to him and asked if there was a problem.

He handed me the list. “This is Song Yuanhai’s bank card. There’s a regular transfer of a thousand yuan every month from an anonymous sender.”

“Is it even allowed to make anonymous postal remittances?” I asked.

Old Lin nodded. “Cash remittances can be anonymous, even using a code name.”

I nodded in understanding. Song Yuanhai was a migrant worker, his income unstable and typically paid in cash, and likely more than a thousand yuan at that. This steady monthly payment of a thousand seemed suspicious.

We checked when the bank card had been opened—ten years ago.

Good lord, another startling coincidence!

I called over the lobby manager and asked whether she knew who deposited money into this card on the fifteenth of each month.

She said she’d ask the tellers, since she herself didn’t interact with cash remitters.

The results left us all stunned.

The person depositing money for Song Yuanhai was none other than the old gatekeeper! He was so familiar to the tellers because he came in every month to make the deposit.

Tang Jingjing quickly asked, “Do you know what the gatekeeper’s relationship is with Song Yuanhai?”

The teller said she’d asked once before, but the old man just said he was sending money to family, and she hadn’t pried further.

That was odd. How could the gatekeeper possibly be Song Yuanhai’s family? There was something fishy here.

“Look,” Old Lin pointed out, “the money is almost always withdrawn the very day it’s deposited. If not, then it’s taken out the next day. Song Yuanhai clearly didn’t trust leaving money in the account.”

“And here,” I said, indicating the last deposit, “the transfer was made after Song Yuanhai died, yet the money still disappeared that very day.”

“Dear lord, money taken by a ghost!” Li Xingchen exclaimed, clutching his head. “We’re doomed, it’s definitely haunted.”

The lobby manager gave us a strange look. “He’s dead?”

I decided to come clean. “Yes, the money was withdrawn the day he died.”

Suddenly, the lobby manager looked nervous, pulling a crucifix from her pocket and clutching it in her palm, breaking out in a cold sweat.

I hadn’t expected her to be so superstitious.

It’s often said that fear is contagious, and it’s true. At first, none of us thought much of it, but the lobby manager’s reaction dragged us all into a pit of unease.

“I don’t believe in ghosts!” I forced a casual smile to lighten the mood. “Let’s pull up the surveillance footage from that day. The card might not have been on Song Yuanhai; someone else could have made the withdrawal.”

The lobby manager explained that the surveillance memory cards were routinely overwritten, and she wasn’t sure if the footage from that day was still available.

I glanced at Li Xingchen. “I know there’s a way to recover deleted data—you can do it, can’t you?”

Li Xingchen formed an OK sign with his hand. “No problem!”

We took the bank’s surveillance memory chip and gave it to Li Xingchen for safekeeping, planning to recover the data once we were back.

Just then, a commotion erupted at the bank entrance. Li Hong strode in, holding a young man like a chicken by the scruff. The youth’s hair was dyed an unconventional green, and his face bore several fresh bruises—clearly Li Hong hadn’t gone easy on him.

“You’ve got no right to detain me! Let me go! Who the hell do you think you are?” the green-haired youth shouted, struggling, but Li Hong ignored him.

Security guards hurried over to intervene. “Take your fight outside—there are police at work here!”

I quickly stepped in to block the guards.

Li Hong explained, “This punk was acting suspiciously outside the bank, watching us the whole time. Hey, Li Xingchen, what are you doing?”

I turned to see Li Xingchen brandishing an ashtray, ready to swing it at Green Hair’s head. I rushed to stop him. “Don’t be rash! Let’s ask some questions first—then you can have your turn.”

“That bastard! If I don’t turn you into a eunuch, it’ll be an insult to the bandages on my head!” Li Xingchen yelled, eyes red with anger.

“This isn’t the place,” I said. “Let’s go back to the station.”

Back at the station, after a series of interrogations, the green-haired youth finally confessed. They’d been hired by someone whose only instruction was to prevent the investigators from entering the bank at any cost.

“Do you know the person’s name?” I asked.

He shook his head. “Didn’t even see his face—he wore a ghost mask when we met.”

I was almost certain it was Lin Yunshan.

“Try contacting him again,” I suggested. “If you help us, maybe we won’t charge you with obstructing justice.”

“How am I supposed to contact him?” Green Hair retorted. “We only met once, in a little alley by the KFC. Maybe he’s still there.”

Tang Jingjing slammed the table. “I’ll go catch him now!”

“No, it’s too dangerous. Take Li Hong with you,” I said.

She nodded.

Old Lin mused, “From my years of experience, the culprit isn’t especially clever—otherwise he wouldn’t have used such a clumsy method to block Li Xingchen. It’s a classic case of protesting too much.”

“Judging by his methods, I doubt he’s actually the murderer,” Old Lin continued.

He made sense; I didn’t think Lin Yunshan was the mastermind either.

Old Lin continued his analysis, “He must have his reasons for doing this. Mingxuan, what do you think his motive might be?”

“Could he be trying to shield that mysterious woman?” I replied.

Old Lin nodded. “Very likely.”

That made things even stranger. What was the connection between that mysterious woman and the three men? Why would everyone risk their lives to protect her? A love affair? Impossible.

“There’s another possibility,” Old Lin said suddenly.

“What is it?” I pressed.

“This might involve religious faith. Besides familial and romantic ties, only religious conviction drives people to sacrifice their lives for others. During your investigation, did you notice any strange symbols, patterns, or insignia?”

I thought back—no, nothing of the sort. I shook my head.

Soon after, Tang Jingjing called to say she hadn’t found the masked man. I told her to return.

When she came back, I noticed she looked at me strangely, but I didn’t ask. She’d always been a bit eccentric.

The search for Lin Yunshan continued non-stop, but with the regular police handling it, there wasn’t much we could do.

Our only lead was that Li Xingchen had started recovering the data from the bank’s memory chip.

Despite his usual unserious demeanor, when he worked, the handsome angle of Li Xingchen’s face was enough to make any woman swoon.

He informed us that the bank’s memory chip was different from a regular memory card—recovery would take a day or two.

We had no choice but to wait.

Li Xingchen was a hacking prodigy; what would take him a day or two, other cyber police might take a month or more.

That evening, as I was getting off work, Tang Jingjing suddenly called out to me, inviting me to dinner.

She seemed preoccupied, as if she had something to say but couldn’t quite get it out, so I agreed.

Throughout dinner, she was distracted. I asked if she had something on her mind. Tang Jingjing nodded with difficulty, glanced around cautiously, and finally spoke, “When I went to that alley near KFC today, I smelled a familiar scent.”

“Chicken wings?” I joked.

She shot me a disdainful look. “I don’t have time for your nonsense. I’m serious. That smell made me suspect someone.”

“Who?” I tensed up. “You wouldn’t keep it from the task force unless… is there a traitor among us?”