S.C.I Mystery Series Volume 6 Chapter 114

New Year Special – Food Competition 2

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The Bai Group's food city was packed with people. When it came to stirring things up, the twins were still the experts. On the first floor of the food city, they had set up the jellyfish tower that had previously been moved over from Zhao Jue's house, and right in the centre, they had built a huge multi-layer cylindrical glass tank wall filled with all kinds of seafood and seabed scenery. It could be eaten, admired, and at the same time promoted the glassware...

The competitors would arrive shortly to select their seafood, and passers-by all stopped to watch. It was the first time they had seen seafood sold in a way that looked like an undersea world...

The whole building was packed with people.

As the twins were admiring the scene, the phone rang.

Xiao Ding answered, listening with a cheerful smile. "Oh? A suspected serial killer has slipped in..."

Beside him, Da Ding, who had been chewing on skewered meat, nearly swallowed the skewer. He jerked his head round. "What?"

Xiao Ding hung up without a change of expression, as calm as ever. Today, Big Brother, Qi Le and her band, Xu Lie, Jiang Nan, and Lin Ruo had all come, and even Kalin had turned up with her daughter. With a room full of jinxes and bringers of bad luck, if something didn't happen, it would hardly live up to Big Brother's legendary reputation!

Xiao Ding's phone received the photo of Wang Yong sent by Jiang Ping.

The twins clicked their tongues in disapproval and sent it on to the security team, telling them to watch out for this person.

In the surveillance room, the footage was linked directly to the police bureau.

Xiao Bai Chi stood before several rows of screens, searching for Wang Yong's figure.

Inside the food city, the security team's patrols had all been dispatched, weaving through the crowds looking for suspicious individuals.

In stark contrast to the tension outside, the rehearsal area on the second floor buzzed with relaxed energy as the small teams had gathered together to work out the day's dishes.

Bai Ye held a tablet, reporting the side dishes to Eleven and Issel.

The twins were masters at livening things up. Soon, they would have the team members go and catch the seafood themselves, and there would also be a livestream. Fortunately, the two new chefs might not be skilled in other areas, but when it came to fishing, they were both experts.

Moreover, in the supplementary books Bai Yutang had given them the other day, there had been a complete encyclopaedia of marine produce, which both of them had read, so they should not make any mistakes when catching the seafood.

For today's seafood banquet, besides the compulsory seafood fried rice and seafood soup, each team could also make one signature seafood dish and one dessert.

The dessert could be made with seafood or simply in the shape of seafood. As long as it looked like seafood, it would count.

Bai Ye planned to make his signature sauce-glazed lobster, and for dessert, he would do the little starfish cake he had made for Mia's birthday. Mia had called them adorable, and her taste in such things was probably reliable.

Issel wrote out a list, while Eleven got the tools for catching seafood ready.

The judges' table was lively too. Xu Lie was still there today, but not as a judge, he was simply there to freeload.

Having avenged his great grudge, Guan Xiaoyue was in high spirits, crouching with Lin Ruo as the two of them studied the large box Eleven had placed by his feet.

The box was about the size of a cello case at a glance. Had the chef brought an instrument to work?

Xu Lie kept tugging at the two who had never seen the world before, telling them to just look and not to mess with it!

When Issel finished reading the list, he noticed a little bear head peeking out beside him. He turned to look, and sure enough, Mia had appeared, holding a cell phone.

Zhan Zhao was bombarding her with texts – Where's your dad?! Get him on the phone right now!

Issel glanced at the screen, then turned his head and shoved the phone back – Ignore it! Daddy needs to concentrate on work, a man's career comes first!

Mia tilted her head, looking at her dad. Daddy finally has a career now...

Just as Mia replied, "Daddy's busy..." Zhan Zhao started frantically sending screenshots.

Mia had no choice but to poke Issel again.

Issel glanced at the phone screen. Just then, someone outside shouted, "Time to catch the seafood..."

Eleven and Issel immediately grabbed their tools and ran off.

Bai Ye was holding a mortar and pestle, grinding spices as he leaned over to take a look. "Wang Yong came to the food city?"

Mia nodded, tapping at the phone that was still being bombarded with screenshots – The kitten seems very anxious!

"Mhmm..." Bai Ye took the phone and sent a reply back.

In Bai Yutang's car, Zhan Zhao was swearing in frustration. "Isn't Issel's real job supposed to be helping people find things? Why is he suddenly busy with side jobs as a chef?"

Up ahead, Bai Yutang could already see the food city. Because of the crowds, the police cars didn't dare use their sirens for fear of causing panic.

But right now, a line of cars was queued up in front, waiting to get into the car park, so driving in was impossible.

Bai Yutang had no choice but to pull over in a random open spot, drag Zhan Zhao out of the car, and walk the rest of the way, with the rest of the SCI team behind them all, following suit.

With a ding, Zhan Zhao finally heard his phone ring. When he picked it up, Mia had sent back a message: Is there a bounty on this Wang Yong?

Zhan Zhao quickly replied that there was, and a hefty one at that.

Bai Ye glanced at the screen and motioned for Mia to take the phone over to her mother.

So Mia ran off to find Kalin.

Kalin had come with Anna and was tasting the macarons made by Qian Lin. The two mothers had eaten the cake Issel brought home the other day and absolutely loved it!

Mia showed the phone to Kalin and gestured a couple of times.

Kalin smiled faintly, reached out, and patted Zhao Jue, who was in front of her sampling a mango prawn.

Zhao Jue had come to the food city looking to poach talent, hoping to lure a suitable chef away to his dessert shop. He hadn't expected there to be such a crowd, so noisy and bustling.

When Kalin handed him the phone to look at, Zhao Jue glanced at it, tilted his head in thought, and seemed to find it worthwhile. He reached for another prawn and left together with Kalin.

Mia waved at the two of them from behind – Don't cause trouble!

In the lounge, Bai Jintang was standing by the table. On the table, the bottle warmer held two bottles of milk.

Across the room on the sofa, Hao Ling and Chen Yu were changing diapers for the two babies.

Big Brother Bai thought that perhaps there ought to be a nursery on every floor of the food city...

Just as he was thinking this, his phone buzzed. It was a message from the twins, apparently, a serial killer had slipped in.

Attached was a screenshot that Zhan Zhao had sent them of Wang Yong.

Big Brother Bai silently set his phone aside, picked up the bottles, and handed them to Chen Yu and Hao Ling.

Watching the two babies gurgle and slurp as they drank their milk, Big Brother Bai nodded – Indeed, no matter what it is, it'll be fine as long as you get used to it...

Once the babies had finished their bottles, Chen Yu and Hao Ling carried them off to the rehearsal room to play, while Big Brother Bai stood by the floor-to-ceiling window looking out.

Amongst the crowd, he could see the security team searching floor by floor.

At the main entrance, Bai Yutang and Zhan Zhao entered with the SCI members, though his Gongsun hadn't come.

Big Brother also found it a bit odd. He had looked over the case briefly, Wang Yong had only just managed to escape from the wedding venue. Instead of finding a way to flee for his life, why would he come running to the food city? What was in the food city...

Big Brother Bai suddenly recalled that Shi Yanshuo had also turned up at the food city for no apparent reason, and had even gone to watch a rehearsal. That guy... could he have left something here? Or rather...

Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang rushed into the food city. With the sea of people ahead, Bai Yutang had the team split up to search floor by floor, keeping in touch with the twins at the same time.

Meanwhile, Zhan Zhao stood in the crowded lobby, dazed – Why would Wang Yong take such a risk to come here? It doesn't fit his style at all.

Zhan Zhao also thought of Wang Yong's connection with the food city – Shi Yanshuo!

Shi Yanshuo had indeed come to the food city without reason before, on the very day Fang Beibei was caught... and of course, Fang Beibei had also been there!

Zhan Zhao stroked his chin – Shi Yanshuo and Fang Beibei had once appeared in the same rehearsal room, though Fang Beibei was arrested later.

If she hadn't been arrested then...

Moreover, when Fang Beibei had noticed the man in the yellow raincoat tailing her, she had sought out Wen Xiaorou precisely to create the impression that something had been planted with Wen Xiaorou.

And both Fang Beibei and Shi Yanshuo had carried themselves with utter confidence. Did the two of them actually have something in their possession?

When Shi Yanshuo arrived that day, the two had originally planned to carry out a handover, but when the accident happened, the item hadn't changed hands. And now Wang Yong, at the risk of being discovered, had come to the food city just to retrieve that very thing? 

"What could it be?" Zhan Zhao tilted his head back to scan the surroundings – Did Fang Beibei hide something in the food court to give to Shi Yanshuo, or did Shi Yanshuo hide something to give to Fang Beibei?

"Cat?" Bai Yutang finished the call with Xiao Ding, and the news he got was that every floor had been checked, and Wang Yong's whereabouts had not been found yet.

Bai Chi's search was also unsuccessful. After Wang Yong entered, he kept his head down and melted into the crowd. Everyone's heads looked more or less the same, and even Bai Chi's supercomputer brain had crashed. He sat there dazed, wiping at a nosebleed, while Wen Xiaorou was forcing sugar water into him, telling him to stop looking or his head would explode any moment!

At the entrance to the Bai Group's surveillance room, Big Brother Bai happened to run into Zhao Jue and Kalin.

Zhao Jue stroked his chin as he looked Big Brother Bai over, giving him a compliment. "Mhmm! Pure bloodline."

Bai Jintang pushed the door open with a hint of resignation.

Inside the monitoring room, several technicians were present, talking with Jiang Ping.

When they saw the boss come in, everyone turned their heads to look.

Bai Jintang instructed them to pull up the footage of Fang Beibei and Shi Yanshuo's movements after they arrived at the Bai Group on the first day of the competition.

Almost at the same time, Zhan Zhao's call came.

Big Brother Bai picked up the call and told Zhan Zhao they were already looking.

Zhan Zhao pulled Bai Yutang straight towards the surveillance room.

The two of them pushed through the crowds of people and finally made it there, just in time to see Kalin pointing at the screen, asking, "What room is this?"

That day, Fang Beibei's car had broken down, so she had run to the venue. It turned out she hadn't only run to the Bai Group, she had also run upstairs.

At the time, the live broadcast studio was set up on the ground floor, but the rehearsal rooms were on the upper floors... She hadn't taken the elevator but had run up directly. No wonder her bodyguard had nearly collapsed that day, the poor man's big frame really had been put through it climbing all those stairs.

Fang Beibei was much faster than her bodyguard. After running to a certain floor, she had opened the door of a room, stepped inside briefly, then quickly came out again. Her bodyguard had only caught up a moment later, and the two of them had then gone upstairs together.

"This is a storage room, isn't it..." Da Ding asked Xiao Ding.

Xiao Ding said that on these floors, that spot was all storerooms, mostly used for storing fish tanks...

"Fish tanks?" Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang exchanged a look, and both turned to the twins. "The fish tanks downstairs they're using to keep the seafood?"

"Yeah, and all the fish tank decorations, all kinds of bits and pieces..."

"How did Fang Beibei just open the door and walk in? Wasn't it locked?" Zhan Zhao wondered.

"Wow, how long do you think it took to build the fish tank downstairs? Months, okay! And with all kinds of installations, it cost a fortune..."

Xiao Ding called the engineer responsible for handling the fish tanks.

Before long, a chubby young man came running upstairs.

Zhao Jue recognised him, he had been the one who came that day to install the jellyfish tower. It turns out it was all the same business.

The twins asked what was stored in the storage room on the floor where Fang Beibei opened the door.

The aquarium guy said it was for fake decorations and backdrop panels.

"Fake decorations?" Bai Yutang was puzzled. "What exactly?"

"Well, the fish tanks downstairs are decorated to look like the seabed, so there is a lot of sand and rocks. Because of the weight issue, the rocks are all artificial. Then there are also air pumps, wiring, pipes, filters..." The aquarium guy assured everyone not to worry, that everything was perfectly fine, and they were a professional team.

The group exchanged puzzled glances until Kalin spoke up, "So all those things are underwater, right?"

Bai Yutang asked the surveillance team, "Is there surveillance in the room?"

The surveillance team said there was...

But when they pulled up the footage, they realised that because the storage room was so crammed with glass panels and other building materials, the cameras' view was blocked, and nothing had been captured.

Bai Yutang scratched his head in frustration, and Zhan Zhao also felt it was turning into a headache... No one knew what Fang Beibei had hidden in there, and whatever it was, it was most likely already installed inside the tank, which meant it was now sunk beneath the water.

The aquarium wall downstairs was constructed of multiple tanks built together, permanently installed for all the seafood restaurants in the building to use... How were they supposed to get it out? More to the point, they didn't even know where it was!

Bai Jintang asked the twins if the tanks could be drained.

The twins looked at the aquarium guy.

The aquarium guy smiled, "Sure."

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief.

"We carry out weekly water changes as part of our maintenance." The young man said with a professional look.

"Drain it right now"

"Eh?" The young man looked stunned. "It took us a whole week just to fill it! The water circulation has to be managed in a grid format, and water changes have to follow the programmed process. We also need to account for the load-bearing capacity of the glass structure. To empty it would take at least two to three days, otherwise, it'll collapse!"

For the first time in his life, Zhan Zhao felt an almost irresistible urge to shout at someone to "speak Chinese"...

"So what should we do?" Just as Zhan Zhao was anxious, Karin suddenly pointed at the monitor and said, "Isn't that the murderer?"

Everyone stared at the monitor. Sure enough, Wang Yong seemed to know which storage room Fang Beibei had used. He also entered the storage room, but the room was already empty by then, so he came out again and headed in the direction of the aquarium wall.

Bai Yutang immediately told Ma Han and Zhao Hu to lie in wait near the aquarium wall.

......

Meanwhile, the different teams had already assembled in front of the aquarium wall.

Eleven climbed a ladder with a fishing net.

Issel commanded, "That lobster!"

‿︵‿︵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: September 14, 2025 by Angel

Edited: November 19, 2025 by Angel