Chapter 50 - 1#
Chapter 50: Taking Action
9:23:30 PM, December 12, 2012.
The twelfth day after the attack.
The seventh day after Wei Xiangjin left.
The fifth day after Gu Chenzhou and He Hailou’s truth-or-dare game.
13 hours, 12 minutes, and 15 seconds after Gu Chenzhou came down from Tianxiang Mountain Villa.
The night was dark. Gu Chenzhou sat in a military vehicle with a North A license plate number 00068 and entered the Third Military Region garrison in a low-key manner.
38 hours ago, he saw off He Hailou, who was staying at Tianxiang Mountain Villa, and sent a long email to Gu Xinjun’s private mailbox.
23 hours ago, the Chunqing City Military Region carried out a temporary surprise drill, during which several soldiers were accidentally injured.
12 hours ago, he went to Zhengde Garden and had a long talk with Old Master Gu in the study for an hour and a half.
3 hours ago, he talked with Gu Xinjun in Tianrui Garden. When he was about to leave, he was stopped by Gu Zhengjia and signed the three angular characters ‘Gu Xinjun’ on the other’s failed test paper.
And now, he was sitting in a military vehicle, following the military vehicle all the way into the heart of the army, until he reached a row of bungalows built of reinforced concrete.
The adjutant, who was most trusted by Wei Chengbo and had been waiting here for a long time, saw Gu Chenzhou, walked a few steps forward, extended his hand, and shook it vigorously, saying, “Young Master Gu, you’re here.”
“Adjutant Zhang, hello.” Gu Chenzhou showed a faint smile, but such a smile was extremely blurred and brief in the dark night with insufficient light, almost flashing by.
“They are all inside.” Adjutant Zhang said, “Does Young Master Gu want to go over and take a look?”
Gu Chenzhou did not rush forward. He stood where he was and asked, “Have they all confessed?”
“Of course.” Adjutant Zhang smiled, “They’re all in here, what can’t be asked out?” His tone was as natural and nonchalant as saying that a hen lays eggs and a rooster crows.
Gu Chenzhou nodded lightly, and only then did he step forward and walk to the white-walled concrete bungalow.
This was a very long row of buildings, with a total of ten rooms connected, but the area of each room was not large, about ten square meters, square and upright.
The door of the room was made of solid steel, with no windows, only a rectangular window the size of an adult man’s palm on the iron door. The window was also welded with several thick and round iron bars, ensuring that besides sight, anything thicker than two fingers side by side could not get in or out.
Gu Chenzhou walked to the iron door and looked inside through the only window available for observation.
Dried, dark red blood, and intermittent groans.
These two things, in no particular order, were seen and heard by Gu Chenzhou at the same time.
He found one of the attackers from that day in this room—the other’s thigh was still bandaged. It was the one he had stabbed with a military knife before he and He Hailou rolled down the hillside.
His gaze calmly swept across this small room that could be seen at a glance. Several people in the room were lying on the ground against the wall in disarray, and the chairs were not far from them.
Adjutant Zhang said from the side, “There are some more over there. Does Young Master Gu want to take another look?”
Gu Chenzhou nodded slightly, followed Adjutant Zhang to the next room, and looked inside again through the small window on the iron door.
More or less the same.
He withdrew his gaze and asked Adjutant Zhang, “What did they say?”
“It’s Zhao Xianyang.” Adjutant Zhang took out the file that had been tucked under his arm and opened it to one of the pages.
This was a piece of A4 paper filled with dense black characters, not particularly clean, with dark red splash-like liquid marks in several places.
Adjutant Zhang said, “They insisted at first that it was Wang Rongze’s idea—most of them indeed only ‘knew’ that they were here for Wang Rongze. However, a text message from Wang Chang—oh, that’s the specific person in charge of the operation—exposed the mastermind behind the scenes.”
“He didn’t delete it?” Gu Chenzhou asked.
“Of course he deleted it.” Adjutant Zhang said, showing a slightly disapproving expression, “But everyone is here, what can’t be done? Whether it’s sending another one or restoring it, it’s not too difficult.”
Gu Chenzhou took the information from the other party and stood in front of the bungalow to look through it.
This information was not too thick, about five pages in total. The first three pages were the confessions of the people interrogated this time, and the last two pages were a series of black materials on that Director Zhao Xianyang.
From keeping a mistress and taking bribes, to using underhanded methods to attack competitors and even creating armed attacks.
Without investigation, it’s a beautiful picture. With investigation, the bottom falls out.
A cold smile appeared on Gu Chenzhou’s face, but he didn’t pay too much attention to the detailed and precise illegal incidents with dates and hours. He only turned to the item about his attack and confirmed it word by word.
From the time of the crime to the method and then to the motive.
Gu Chenzhou focused on the two text messages excerpted in the information—of course, they would not use words like “do it” or “OK” that obviously had hidden meanings, but very ordinary text messages, such as “go home” and “wait for you.”
Adjutant Zhang saw where Gu Chenzhou’s gaze was lingering, searched through the blue folder in his hand, and found another page of information. This time it was all the text message records between Wang Chang and Zhao Xianyang. He handed it to Gu Chenzhou and said, “A very simple set of code words. ‘Go home’ means prepare to act, and ‘wait for you’ means everything is ready. This way, when nothing has happened, even if someone accidentally sees it, because it’s too ordinary, no one will pay much attention.” As for after the incident—even if he used the world’s highest-level password, with the person in hand, isn’t it easy to decipher it if you want to?
Gu Chenzhou’s gaze returned to the very beginning of the planning of this attack.
November 27th, Wang Boyuan had just entered the capital.
November 30th, Wang Rongze booked a table at National Beauty and Heavenly Fragrance to treat guests.
This was a long-planned attack.
In National Beauty and Heavenly Fragrance, with He Hailou’s arrival, even beside Wang Rongze, there seemed to be people involved in this.
He Hailou’s arrival made Wang Rongze unable to control his anger and say that sentence.
The well-trained waiters at National Beauty and Heavenly Fragrance leaked this sentence out for people to find out in less than a night.
The vast majority of the people involved in the attack thought it was Wang Rongze’s order, so there must have been someone from Wang Rongze’s side who came forward to tell them.
“Is Wang Chang Wang Rongze’s man?” Gu Chenzhou asked Adjutant Zhang.
Obviously, full preparations had been made before. Adjutant Zhang said, “When Secretary Wang was in Chunqing, Wang Chang was very close to Young Master Wang.”
But Wang Chang was actually Zhao Xianyang’s man.
Perhaps the struggle for the change of term had already begun. Or perhaps, someone was using this change of term to stir up trouble.
Gu Chenzhou’s gaze turned to Zhao Xianyang’s promotion history. Without much effort, he found that when the other party first started working, he had worked with Wang Boyuan. Now, forty-five years have passed. One is just a director, as common as ox hair in the capital, and the other has become a strong contender for the next leader.
“Speaking of which,” Adjutant Zhang smiled, “Zhao Xianyang and Secretary Wang once lived in the same compound. When they were colleagues, I heard that Secretary Wang once looked down on Zhao Xianyang’s frivolous style.”
Gu Chenzhou smiled: “No one can predict life thirty years later.”
But in politics, one will never take risks that could harm oneself simply because of personal grudges.
Zhao Xianyang, who firmly stood with the Yu faction, would not have risked doing such a thing without someone supporting him from behind. A director and a secretary of a municipality directly under the central government, the weight of the two is too different. If someone hadn’t been working hard behind the scenes, Wang Boyuan would probably have investigated it thoroughly and clearly long ago…