We Have Our Rules

"We have our rules." "There's nothing here..."

The other investigator had no idea what had happened here. He tossed out all the worn clothes from the two boxes, even breaking the wooden boxes that had held them into several pieces.

There were no coins or Small Change here. Forget the hundreds or thousands in Small Change mentioned by the informant—there was not even a single coin.

The investigators locked in their subtle standoff immediately thought it was impossible after hearing that. They had already investigated things fairly thoroughly. This kid named Lin Qi had been exchanging Small Change on a massive scale, in ways people could hardly imagine.

Before Lin Qi appeared, no one would have exchanged Small Change at such a loss. He had opened a new path, and Sabine City Revenue Service investigators believed his seemingly endless exchange of Small Change was meant for Fox's use.

During this period, Lin Qi had only dealt with Fox and no one else. Moreover, in the past few days, the reported tax amount of Fox's laundromat had risen dramatically. The Sabine City Revenue Service considered Lin Qi the "Key Person."

Someone had been watching him since the day before yesterday. Based on his usual routine, he should have taken the collected coins to the laundromat now. On the surface, he was going to wash clothes; in reality, he was conducting an illegal transaction.

Then he would continue exchanging Small Change until he gathered a sufficient amount again.

As long as they got hold of the Small Change in his hands, marked it, and let Lin Qi deliver the coins to the laundromat, the entire chain of evidence would be complete.

Once Fox began reporting his taxes, specialists would immediately be sent to inspect the documents he submitted. Then they could catch him red-handed and send him to prison.

Everything had been planned perfectly, yet something went wrong here. Aside from a pile of old clothes, there was not a single coin in the cart. Where had the money gone? For three, four, five, six, seven, eight brief seconds, the investigator's eyes went vacant. Then he turned to Lin Qi, pointed at him, and said, "Watch yourself..."

With that, he slapped the lapel of his trench coat and quickly left with the other investigator. They needed to rush to another scene.

Their extensive work experience meant they had not placed all their hopes on this one team. Another group had raided Lin Qi's current temporary residence. If the money was not here, it had to be in his room.

Still, the investigator felt things could not be this simple. This young man Lin Qi... he was difficult to read. He did not resemble a young man who had just stepped out of the ivory tower and still held the world in awe.

Lin Qi watched the two investigators leave the alley, spat on the ground, bent down to gather up the clothes, then pushed the cart out of the alley.

Sunlight shone on his face. There was no sign that he had just been humiliated and punched, as if nothing had happened. Even his smile had not changed.

A few minutes later, he arrived at the laundromat and went straight into the Storage Room behind it. After greeting him, two young men took out their tools and began dismantling the handcart.

The handcart was not small. Its main structure was made of sturdy steel pipes lined with wire, easy to see through at a glance, so the investigator had not inspected it closely.

The laundromat manager beside him handed Lin Qi a cigarette, lit it for him, and apologized. "I'm very sorry. I already know what happened just now, but we didn't step in to help you..."

Lin Qi's gaze passed over the manager's shoulder. He watched the two workers laboriously lift the dismantled steel pipes of the handcart and tilt them over a basket.

Amid the clattering of metal, coins of every kind poured from the steel pipes like running water.

Lin Qi withdrew his gaze and looked at the manager. He shrugged indifferently. "It's fine. I was bound to deal with them sooner or later. That's why I refused. I don't like trouble."

Mr. Fox had expressed more than once during this period that he wanted to recruit Lin Qi. He was willing to offer Lin Qi an exorbitant salary of three thousand dollars a month.

In a society where the average monthly income was only two or three hundred dollars, ten times the average monthly wage was enough to tempt many people, but not Lin Qi.

He knew that people like Fox, who moved along gray paths, would find it difficult to shake off certain people's surveillance for the rest of their lives. Once he agreed, he would become one of them. No matter what he did in the future, someone would always be watching him.

If he did not join, it would be a different matter. His youth and his "shallowness" would keep people from paying too much attention to him.

By the time people began noticing him, he would have more or less completed his initial accumulation of capital.

Besides, he had no respect for a man who made his living lending money to poor people in a small city.

The manager smiled but said nothing. Instead, Lin Qi asked another question. "Who was the one who hit me?"

He lowered his head and smoked, his eyes cast downward. His hair and the smoke obscured his eyes, so the manager could not observe Lin Qi's true emotions through them.

"Michael, head of the Investigation Team at the Sabine City Federal Revenue Service. He's a very troublesome man. You'd better not entertain any inappropriate ideas."

The manager offered a friendly warning. The federal revenue system was a world unto itself. It had not only investigators, detectives, and agents, but even its own militarized forces.

It sounded ridiculous and absurd, but it was the truth: a proper, complete force that received the most formal professional military training, used to deal with certain special cases of armed tax resistance.

That was why most people told newcomers to the trade that they could do almost anything they wanted, but before the seventh of every month, they had to report their taxes to the local Revenue Service, otherwise...

Although Michael, as head of the Investigation Team at the Sabine City Federal Revenue Service, did not hold the highest rank or status, he was still considered Middle Class.

Even Fox would not want to offend someone like that without reason. For tax investigators, everyone had flaws.

Because no one could accurately remember every source of income and the proportions for each type of tax. As long as you got one decimal point, or one digit after a decimal point, wrong, they could send you to prison.

Lin Qi nodded and took a deep drag on the cigarette pinched between his fingers. "I know. Next time I see him, I'll step aside on my own..."

The manager patted Lin Qi's shoulder and did not continue the subject. "How much this time?"

"Four thousand five hundred, not counting the loose change!"

The manager froze slightly, then smiled. He took several rolls of banknotes bound with rubber bands from his pocket.

They were all five- and ten-dollar bills. The notes were old and worn, making them easy to spend.

To society as a whole, these five- and ten-dollar bills were like the coins at the laundromat. No one could say exactly what every coin had gone through before ending up here.

The Revenue Service could only use the amount reported by the laundromat to make this money clean, then deposit it in the bank under their supervision.

Lin Qi rolled up the cash and stuffed it back into the handcart. He waited until his dirty clothes had been washed, took them with him, and pushed the handcart away.

Meanwhile, on the other side, a group of people had just raided Lin Qi's temporary residence. Not only had they failed to find even a penny, they had not found a single valuable item.

"Damn it!"

They had failed to obtain solid evidence and had alerted both Lin Qi and Fox. That would bring them even more trouble, and the investigation might even be terminated because of it.