Shen Yue felt a jolt run through her body, followed by a surge of excitement. She immediately typed out a message to her elderly mother:
"Mom, duty calls at the police station, so I won't be coming."
Then, tossing her phone aside, she rushed out the door.
When she arrived, the duty officer was already escorting a young man into the interrogation room.
"What's going on?" she asked, puzzled.
"Captain Shen, you're finally here. Take a look at this first."
A sealed bag of shiitake mushrooms was handed over. Shen Yue instinctively frowned, taking it in her hand to examine closely.
"Is there a problem?"
"Take a closer look."
Puzzled, Shen Yue tore open the sealed bag. As a familiar, pungent odor wafted out, she shuddered and instantly came to her senses.
"Where did this stuff come from?"
"The young man out there brought it in to report a crime. Our officers didn't dare make a call on their own, so we brought it to you—"
Before he could finish, Shen Yue had already ducked into the interrogation room.
The officer gave an awkward smile, replaced immediately by a grave expression as the realization dawned on them all: a major case was about to break in Lucheng.
Given the treatment he had received ever since stepping into the municipal bureau, Xu Wuyan knew exactly what he would be facing next. Even though he was the one reporting the crime, not a single standard procedure would be skipped.
Inside the interrogation room, a strikingly sharp-looking female police officer sat before him. Seeing the insignia on her shoulders, he felt a brief flicker of surprise.
"What's your name?" Shen Yue asked after sitting down, placing the bag of mushrooms on the table as she began the questioning.
"Xu Wuyan."
"Do you know what this is?"
"Yes, which is why I came to the police."
"Where did you get it?"
"Found it by accident."
"Found it?" Shen Yue sneered.
"Officer, you don't need to ask. Let me just tell you directly." Xu Wuyan began to reconstruct the entire sequence of events, carefully omitting only any information involving Yao Can.
The cover story he had designed for himself went like this:
At seven o'clock in the morning, his flight landed, and he went to Lucheng Central Hospital. Having once suffered a concussion, he was there for a follow-up checkup.
After leaving the hospital, he went to a real estate agency to rent a place and ended up at Lancheng Shuyuan, the very residential complex where Yao Can lived.
Around noon, he went to the farmers' market to buy groceries and bumped into a woman wearing a baseball cap, accidentally swapping the shiitake mushrooms he had bought. It wasn't until he was cooking lunch that he realized the mix-up. After a whole afternoon of inner conflict, he finally decided to report it to the police.
From beginning to end, Yao Can's name never appeared anywhere in the story.
"Do you know what this is?" Shen Yue held the bag of mushrooms. The skepticism in her tone made Xu Wuyan mentally replay his statement once more. Confirming he hadn't missed anything, he shook his head.
"I only know it's no good. It must be some kind of contraband."
"Mm, what you said is correct. I want to thank you for coming in to report this promptly. I'll have our people take down your information. If necessary, we might summon you at any time."
"No problem at all. I will certainly cooperate and come whenever called."
"Is this the only bag of mushrooms you have? If you have any more, don't hide them. The consequences are very serious."
"How could I dare? After discovering this, I spent the whole afternoon agonizing over it. I'm terrified of retaliation, you understand?" Xu Wuyan shivered, a look of genuine panic on his face as he replied.
"That is indeed a problem. Do you live alone now?"
"What else? I just arrived in Lucheng, and classes don't start for another month. I was planning to take a job during this time to scrape together tuition, but unfortunately... Now, Officer, those people aren't going to come after me, are they?"
Shen Yue did not answer. Instead, she tapped her fingers on the desktop as if deep in thought. Xu Wuyan's peripheral vision lingered on her face; he knew that everything he had said still needed to be verified, and until the police checked it out, they wouldn't allow him out of their sight.
"Xiao Hu, take this young fellow down to get some rest and find him something to eat."
"Got it."
The recording clerk nearby stood up, and Xu Wuyan offered his thanks before following close behind toward the lounge.
Shen Yue stared at the bag of mushrooms in her hand, silent for a long time. Behind her, God knows when, a crowd of people had gathered, evidently having caught wind of the news.
"Captain Shen."
"Are all the members of the criminal investigation team here?" Shen Yue asked calmly.
"Reporting, everyone is on standby."
"Good. First, take these mushrooms for chemical testing to confirm whether this is what we think it is."
"Qiu Feng, following Xiao Hu's records, investigate this person named Xu Wuyan. Get every single piece of surveillance footage from the moment he appeared in Lucheng."
"Yes."
"Officer Wu, sorry to trouble you. Take a team right now to the farmers' market at Lancheng Shuyuan, conduct a thorough blanket search, and see if there is any residue of this left behind."
"Received, I'm on it."
"Remember, don't alert the enemy—search quietly."
"Everyone else, meeting."
Shen Yue stood up, tossed the bag of mushrooms aside, and strode straight out. At that moment, an aura of murderous intent radiated from her.
"Old Hu, could this really be..."
"Who knows? Wait for the test results."
A flash of excitement crossed the faces of the group. The appearance of this bag of mushrooms had sent shockwaves through the municipal bureau right from the start, and Shen Yue's meeting lasted deep into the night before she finally came back to see Xu Wuyan.
Xu Wuyan hadn't been idle in the lounge either. He was abundantly clear that until his background was turned completely inside out, he wouldn't be walking out of here.
He kept reviewing things in his mind. That afternoon, Yao Can had handed over the background check she had managed to dig up. Only then did he realize what kind of new identity that high-ranking personage had arranged for him. It wasn't complicated at all—it was simple to an absurd degree.
Xu Wuyan, native of Shancheng, no parents, made a living by picking up trash.
Just that simple sentence, complete with detailed records of financial aid from various levels of townships, and a photo that looked identical to him.
A rootless duckweed—this was the identity the big shot had fabricated for him, and it was also the basis of Yao Can's suspicion toward him. For someone with such an identity to have such delicate, tender skin—anyone would find it hard to believe he made his living picking up trash.
The original Chen Bufan had been raised in luxury; no matter how you looked at it, he had nothing to do with picking up trash.
That was why Yao Can said his identity had problems, though she hadn't pressed him further on it.
As for the current situation, he was extremely confident that he would be able to walk out soon because all his movements were captured on surveillance cameras. His only worry was how to deal with the subsequent retaliation for reporting the crime.
Daring to traffic this kind of contraband in Lucheng was a capital offense if caught. Would those people let an eyewitness like him go off scot-free?
Obviously not. Therefore, his other hidden motive today was to seek police protection.