S.C.I Mystery Series Volume 3 Chapter 64

Ghost Murderer 31 – Box

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Chen Mi's appearance was indeed out of everyone's expectation.

The people inside the car looking at this scene were also somewhat unsure of how to react. Zhan Zhao froze and looked back at Bao Zheng, "Bao Sir, did you arrange this?"

Bao Zheng hurriedly shook his head, "… No."

"Chen Mi has been a police officer for how many years?" Bai Yutang was also puzzled, "This person is usually a little difficult to get along with, but is otherwise normal. Has he been undercover for all those years? Undercover in the bomb disposal unit? For what?"

"Not likely." Bao Zheng shook his head, "Chen Mi usually has no faults, nor can we see anything wrong with him…" Bao Zheng said, then patted Zhan Zhao's arm and said, "You are a psychologist, tell me, is there anything about Chen Mi that fits the characteristics of a spy?"

Zhan Zhao was also confused, "It indeed does not look like it… most likely… he went rogue? Or is controlled by threats."

"This is possible." Bai Yutang asked, "Could it be that he failed to show his love for Qin Ou and then developed hatred?"

"When it comes to showing love or something, I can't figure it out either." Zhan Zhao said, "Look, Qin Ou has been away from the police force for a long time. If Chen Mi really loved him enough to go rogue, then why didn't he approach him before?"

The group looked at each other, it was indeed too strange.

In the car at this moment, Qin Ou was far more surprised than Zhan Zhao and the others.

Honestly, he trusted Chen Mi and he didn't think he was this kind of person in any way. This case was getting more and more complicated.

Chen Mi saw Qin Ou not saying anything and looking astonished, and he couldn't help but smile, "I didn't have a choice, this is the best method."

Qin Ou faintly froze, and then looked up, looking at the other two men in black.

Through Qin Ou's vision, Zhan Zhao saw the eyes of several other people. The eyes of the people whose faces were half covered by the masks could still be seen, and of course, the hint of surprise that flashed across their eyes when they saw Chen Mi did not escape Zhan Zhao's eyes.

"Hmm…"

"What's wrong Cat?" Bai Yutang asked when he saw that Zhan Zhao seemed to have noticed something.

"Chen Mi may not be a spy, perhaps… he is trying to convey some message to Qin Ou, and Qin Ou has gotten the message… otherwise he would not have bothered to look at those people." Zhan Zhao stroked his chin and whispered, "Look at the eyes of those people."

Jiang Ping stopped the image as Zhan Zhao had requested.

Everyone looked down and saw that what flashed through the eyes of those black-clothed and masked people, for a moment, was surprise! A very distinct look of surprise.

"They're obviously puzzled by Chen Mi's behaviour." Bai Chi said, "But Chen Mi is indeed very strange, why did he take his mask off at this time?"

"That's right." All of them nodded.

Bai Yutang looked at Zhan Zhao, "Cat, is there something else you don't understand?"

"En." Zhan Zhao nodded, "Everyone is surprised, but there are many different kinds of surprise. If those two people were surprised… because they thought what Chen Mi did was wrong, there would be a certain amount of sinisterness in their surprise. They would be thinking 'Is this kid crazy? How can he reveal his identity at this time?'"

The group nodded.

"But look at their current expression, there is nothing but surprise." Zhan Zhao smiled, "It's like they're saying 'Oh… how is it this person?'"

Bai Yutang froze, "In that case, maybe they didn't even know that this person was Chen Mi beforehand. In other words they didn't know each other."

"You mean these few people may not know each other?" Bao Zheng frowned, "These people are well trained at first glance, they don't look like ordinary people… They are familiar with the equipment, and this operation is risky… Could it be that police officers are being used to carry out this operation so that the real culprit behind it can stay out of the way?"

"But this is all just speculation." Zhan Zhao smiled helplessly, "… What Chen Mi wants to convey to Qin Ou may be such a message."

"Has Qin Ou understood the message yet?" Bai Chi was a little worried.

"It will be understood." Zhan Zhao smiled faintly and looked at Bai Yutang, "What do you think?"

"I suppose so." Bai Yutang smiled and said, "The car has stopped."

As everyone looked at the surveillance screen, they saw that the car Qin Ou and the others were in had stopped.

A man in black pushed Qin Ou out of the car and together they entered an abandoned factory.

Qin Ou was experienced and took a quick look around so that Bai Yutang and the others could find the correct location and familiarise themselves with the nearby terrain.

"It's an old wastewater treatment plant, it hasn't been used for a long time and is being prepared for demolition sometime soon." Jiang Ping quickly connected to the satellite through the positioning system and searched for the floor plan of this plant using satellite aerial footage.

"There are lots of containers inside." Bai Yutang put on his bulletproof vest while staring at the screen, "I'll take some of my men in and prepare for the rescue. Hu Zi, Luo Tian, come with me, Ma Han…"

"Okay." Ma Han had just gone to the SWAT team to get his sniper rifle and was loading it.

"We’ll go in first." Bai Yutang said to Bao Zheng, "Don't get too close to the car, be careful of a surprise attack by them."

Wang Chao and others were armed and got out of the car to protect it. It was some distance away from the factory and should still be relatively safe.

"Don't worry, the reinforcements I arranged are already nearby." Bao Zheng said.

"That's good." Bai Yutang nodded

"I'll go too." Zhan Zhao wanted to go, but Bai Yutang smiled and put on his headset, "You can monitor remotely, Cat."

"But…" Zhan Zhao was not happy.

"You can remotely monitor Qin Ou and us at the same time, it'll make it easy for us to act." Bai Yutang smiled at him and, having finished, led the three out of the car and drove another car to the back door of the factory. Seeing that there were already armoured police vehicles waiting in ambush in the distance and feeling that there was no problem with safety, Bai Yutang got out of the car and exchanged words with the officer in charge. After agreeing with each other, Bai Yutang took the three of them and entered the factory first.

Zhan Zhao and the others continued their stakeout.

Zhan Zhao looked at both sides; one side was watching the situation of Bai Yutang and the others on the satellite surveillance, which could give them a hint on whether there was an ambush or not, and the other side was to watch what Qin Ou saw after he entered the container.

The container was empty, no one was there, and Zhan Zhao was a little disappointed.

The only thing that was there was a box in the middle of the container. The box was very large and made of camphor wood.

Qin Ou frowned and looked at Chen Mi, who was on the side.

"Your task is simple." Chen Mi said, "Defuse the bomb inside the box, open the box, and take out what's inside."

Qin Ou nodded and took the toolbox. Chen Mi walked with him, as if to help, while the other two stood at the door staring out, in charge of guarding. They both had guns in their hands, their expressions and movements were very skilled…

"Sure enough, they are professionals." Bao Zheng said, "At a glance, they are soldiers or police officers."

"Ah," Bai Chi said, "could they also have satellite feeds?

Zhan Zhao frowned slightly and stared at the men's headphones, it was indeed possible…

"It's not that hard to steal satellite signals…" Bao Zheng said to himself.

"Don't worry, can't you see they're all confused?" Jiang Ping laughed wickedly.

Zhan Zhao and the others all froze and looked at the monitor.

They saw that those people cocked their heads as if they found the sound in their earpieces harsh, and one of them simply removed his earpiece.

At that moment, they heard Qin Ou yell, "What's all the noise?!"

The men looked at each other and had no choice but to go out and wait at the entrance of the container.

Bai Chi poked Jiang Ping, "Ugh, technical emperor, what did you do?"

Jiang Ping was quite proud, "I hid jamming chips on Qin Ou's body, which have electromagnetic radiation, so all of the communication signals in the surrounding area don't work well, but of course, the ones our own people use are anti-interference."

The group all looked at him with admiration – truly a technical emperor!

At this moment, the satellite screen showed that Bai Yutang and the others had already arrived in the vicinity of that container.

Zhan Zhao hurriedly turned on his communication device to alert him, "Xiao Bai, there are only two people there, Qin Ou and the others have just gone in to prepare for the bomb disposal. You guys should stay put for now, wait and see what happens, be careful of alerting the snake."

Bai Yutang replied, "Understood." Then he, Luo Tian, and Zhao Hu laid in ambush. Ma Han, who had always acted alone, took his gun and went off somewhere, probably to find a sniping position.

Qin Ou opened the camphor wood box and what caught his eye was a bomb… which had an interesting structure.

Simply put, there is a small iron box inside the camphor wood box, and there is a bomb with a complex structure between the iron box in the center and the camphor wood box.

This layout is clearly arranged to to discourage  anyone who wants to get their hands on the contents of the box. Using a bomb to prevent theft is really more useful than a thick metal plate.

"The timing system is about to run out of time." Qin Ou looked down and took a closer look at the timing system, and was somewhat stunned for a long time before saying, "It's actually set for twenty years?!"

Chen Mi smiled faintly, "You still have half a day left to dismantle it, otherwise, we will all just have to be blown up into the sky. It shouldn't be taken as a last resort… but maybe the bomb has been dampened or has deteriorated over the years."

"It’s unlikely." Qin Ou looked up and smiled at him, "You also know that there were far fewer counterfeits back then than there are now."

Chen Mi froze, looking at Qin Ou, and smiled faintly for a long time.

"Oh? This look…" Zhan Zhao raised an eyebrow and whispered, "Chen Mi really likes Qin Ou!"

"This matter wasn't really a secret in the police force back then." Bao Zheng sighed somewhat helplessly, "Only Qin Ou himself didn't know about it."

"In that case, why did Chen Mi get involved?" Zhan Zhao felt puzzled.

None of them could figure it out, so they could only wait until later to think of a way to ask, hoping that it was just a last resort.

Qin Ou stared at the bomb for a long time, then took out the drawings again to compare them, and asked, "Did you draw the drawings?"

"En." Chen Mi nodded, "There were some parts I wasn't sure about, so I didn't draw them."

"This bomb is really old." Qin Ou carefully examined the bomb's wiring, "The person who installed the bomb must have been an elder, very powerful."

"That's right." Chen Mi nodded his head.

At this time, Qin Ou noticed a string of codes on the small box inside and frowned slightly.

Naturally, Zhan Zhao and the others also saw it.

"This box has a code…" Jiang Ping screenshotted the image, "I think I've seen it somewhere."

"A bank!" Zhan Zhao immediately remembered, "A safe deposit box where banks help depositors store their valuables!"

"That's right!" Jiang Ping hurriedly began to check the box, "It looks like it should be very old… Not many banks had this business back then."

"Look for it by the style." The group all got excited.

"Found it!" Jiang Ping compared it with a bunch of pictures and said, "This bank used it more than twenty years ago."

"This bank…" Zhan Zhao saw the picture and faintly stared, "I think it was mentioned in the previous files."

"Oh!" Jiang Ping searched the previous information, "So that's it, this is the bank whose vault was blown up! It was the last case committed by Chen Xinglong, Yu Feng, and their gang."

"Chen Yu's mother and father?" Bai Chi also remembered.

"Oh…" Zhan Zhao immediately understood, "Could it be that when they robbed the vault back then, in addition to stealing the money, the two also stole this safe by mistake, thinking it was jewellery or something… Is it also possible that Chen Yu's parents could have been killed because of this?"

"Then this bomb was made by Chen Yu's father, Chen Xinglong?"

"Chen Xinglong is a veteran of the counter-attack war against Vietnam." Bao Zheng said, "It is said that he is a genius with bombs."

"In other words, Chen Xinglong probably saw what was inside and thought it was quite important, so he deliberately rigged the bomb so that no one could open it to take out what was inside. The person who wanted him hasn't opened that bomb in over twenty years, or maybe something has happened to them… in short, in the end they are betting on Qin Ou?"

"It's highly likely." Zhan Zhao said, "Even though the details of it may be wrong, the general direction should be the same… Guess what's inside?"

The group shook their heads.

"The controller for an atomic bomb?" Bao Zheng suddenly said… Everyone looked at him with a speechless expression.

"I don't know if Qin Ou can take it apart, I feel so nervous!" Bai Chi sat down with his hands on his chin and stared at the screen.

At this time, Qin Ou had already carefully observed the box and was ready to take action to dismantle the bomb.

"Bao Sir, there's a situation!"

At this moment, Jiang Ping pointed to the periphery of the factory, a small group of people were entering through the back door, "It's not our special forces, someone from the other side is coming to back them up."

"Xiao Bai, the other side has someone coming to support, at your rear, eleven men in total, all heavily armed." Zhan Zhao hurriedly informed Bai Yutang, "They should know that we've interfered with their communications and so they are coming."

Bao Zheng took out his walkie-talkie, "Reinforcements to the outer perimeter and get ready, surround the factory! We can't let them escape this time, I won't let them get anything out of the box!

Putting down the walkie-talkie, Bao Zheng's eyes flashed with a hint of excitement, "What's in that box… I can probably guess what it is."

Zhan Zhao turned back to look at Bao Zheng, surprised, "Really?"

Bao Zheng smiled, "Look at the number on that box, what is it?"

Zhan Zhao looked at the number again, "2627… ah, the end numbers of my and Xiao Bai’s birthdays!"

Bao Zheng nodded.

"What is that thing?" Zhan Zhao raised his eyes to look at Bao Zheng. Could it have something to do with himself and Xiao Bai? Or is it just a coincidence…

"Where do so many coincidences come from? It might have been saved by that person." Bao Zheng sighed softly, "There shouldn't be many people who would use your birthdays as numbers...and as far as I know, that person did save something important back then."

Zhan Zhao's heart moved and he immediately thought of someone, could it be him?!

‿︵‿︵ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ・❉・ ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ‿︵‿︵

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Translator Notes

Please feel free to comment any mistakes I made so I can improve and do better as I go through the book.

Translated: February 24, 2022