“Let me in! I want to reveal your true colors, spending the taxpayers’ money without doing your job. You can’t even protect your own partner. Who do you think you are?” Shen Xiang rounded up a group of people and started shouting emotionally downstairs. He became even angrier after seeing Bai Wu.

“Xu Lan! Xu Lan, come out here! I know you’re in there! Don’t be a coward and hide! I need an explanation today! Wendi did this to help you guys, doesn’t your conscience hurt, hiding like that?”

Shen Xiang kept calling on Xu Lan’s name. Bai Wu also kept staring at this beautiful lady. Finally, Bai Wu has had enough and pulled Shen Xiang upstairs while the bodyguard followed closely.

“You! What are you doing! Don’t think that I will be afraid of you. I can tell you, I told the press before coming over. If anything happens to me, you guys will be in deep trouble!” Shen Xiang warned fiercely while she tried to keep up with Bai Wu.

“I’ll bring you to see papa. He’s not what you think he is,” Bai Wu said stiffly with a gloomy face.

The people from the police station and the hotel saw with their own eyes how Bai Wu punched Li Xiu, thus no one dared to stop him. Without any obstructions, Bai Wu successfully took her to level eight. The policeman standing on both sides looked at Bai Wu nervously, fearing that he would punch them in the gut.

“Where’s my papa?”

“Xu Lan! Come out here! I know you’re inside!” Shen Xiang became more ruthless, where she shouted at the only room with an opened door. She was deeply impacted by Wu Wendi’s death. She should not have accepted Wu Wendi’s resignation to come over here.

“…”

“Xu Lan! I have your son with me. If you still don’t want to come out, I’ll die together with him!” Shen Xiang’s words scared off the police on duty and they backed off slowly. Not long after, Xu Lan walked out with a group of people.

“Bai Wu? How did you come up?” As a matter of fact, the room actually had excellent sound insulation. It just happened that they opened the door and walked out at that particular moment. It was so coincidental that – Qin Lao kept on mocking him with it till this day.

“I…”

“Xu Lan! You’ve finally come out! What’s the final verdict? If you don’t give us an explanation, you won’t have a police station anymore!” Shen Xiang walked speedily towards Xu Lan and grabbed his collar.

“… Ms. Shen, please calm down. The dead cannot be revived. The most important task would be how to catch the killer,” Xu Lan gently separated from Shen Xiang and said calmly.

“You are heartless! Wu Wendi came over every night to report to you. Now, something happened and you brushed it off by saying just find the killer! Find the killer, the killer! Have you found him after so long? If you had, Wendi wouldn’t be… waah…”

Shen Xiang cried in grief. She could not understand how someone that was just playing with her yesterday could be gone just like that, lying on the cold bed in such a humiliating way.

“What did you say!” Xu Lan held Shen Xiang forcefully and asked with squinted eyes.

“I said you are not fit to be a human! You have no conscience!”

“Not this! The previous sentence that you said.”

“I said, you guys are shirking the responsibility and blaming it on the killer.”

“No, not this,” Xu Lan closed his eyes to recall what Shen Xiang just said. Suddenly, he asked loudly, “You said she’ll report to me?”

“Yes! She was so happy with the new clues she gathered these few days. She said that she was not smart, that’s why she wanted to send you all the information because you’ll definitely know who it was,” Shen Xiang was shocked by Xu Lan and told him everything without reservation.

Xu Lan clapped and sighed before returning to Hu Cheng. His cell phone was probably left behind in the cave. Even if this was not the case, it could have been picked up by the rescue team members.

What did Wu Wendi send him?

The public had no time to recover from the news about the appearance of a real dragon, Wu Wendi’s case was already causing a stir akin to a disturbed flight of butterflies from the Amazon rainforest. G City was at the cusp of public opinion when Shen Xiang reported that the police had been giving out fake information with the intention of pressuring the killer and misleading the public.

The police were condemned immediately, not only by the people of G City but the entire nation. The cases of the serial killing were exposed in front of the public. While everyone was shocked by the merciless and barbarous killer, they were also condemning of the unavailing efforts of the government. They could not find any clues about the killer after spending over a month on the case.

The news that Xu Lan asked Wu Wendi to broadcast was also brought up and criticized maliciously. The ones sitting behind computers and cell phones started lambasting the police, verbally abuse and vilify them. Some even doxed the personnel who worked on these cases.

In the meeting room, everybody was looking at Xu Lan and the device in his hand with a heavy heart. Inside it could carry information that could save them, but it could all for naught.

“How was it?” Hu Cheng asked restlessly. His hair was all dried up and messy, just like his mood.

Xu Lan stared at the tobacco pouch for a long time and finally handed over the cell phone.

Wu Wendi sent him a total of five messages within the span of three days. One of them was sent as a multimedia message. There were two messages about Li Xiu, one on Qiu Ling, and the last one regarding Big Boss Liu.

“Xiao Li, please get Shen Xiang, I need to ask her some questions,” Xu Lan rubbed his temples and said. He continued, “Director general, how’s Li Xiu’s condition? Is he able to come to the station?”

Hu Cheng squinted his eyes and looked at him for a while, before nodding his head and walking out to make the call. Xu Lan stood up and signaled Sun Fei over, “Do you have any cigarettes? Want to go out for a joint?”

Sun Fei handed over the cigarettes, leaned on the gates and hesitated when he was about to speak.

“Remember the scratch marks made by Li Xinyi?” Xu Lan looked towards downstairs with his bloodshot eyes. Bai Wu was scaring Xiao Zhang at the information counter. They were chasing each other. ‘Don’t they feel bored?’

“I remember. The marks were crooked and distorted. I thought it was a signal left for us, but I went through all of the cipher keys and didn’t manage to find any correspondence, that’s why I’ve put it aside since then.”

Sun Fei remembered very clearly because he did not sleep the whole night just to decipher those scratch marks.

“The scratch marks were new, I think she wanted to tell us something. However, the situation was just too pressing. Do you think it’s possible that she gave us the wrong message since she was not trained professionally?” Xu Lan took a drag of his cigarette before putting off the cigarette butt. Smoke emerged from his nose. His squarish face seemed to look softer and pallid.

Sun Fei lowered his head with a heavy heart. If they were wrong about that, they would be left with nothing else. If they made hasty conjectures, there was a risk of going off the tracks, which was the reason why he did not mention those scratch marks.