This Is Cihang City

A few months earlier.

Cihang City, Nanshan Police Bureau.

Old Li's office always smelled of smoke.

Zhang Ruobing covered her nose. "Master, didn't you promise your wife you'd quit smoking?"

Old Li put away his beloved windproof lighter and gave a dry laugh. "I told you, use my title when we're at work. Besides, this is my last cigarette."

His last cigarette for the millionth time?

Zhang Ruobing studied her mentor. "Master, did you hear about Hu Qing becoming captain?"

"I did."

Zhang Ruobing couldn't hold back. "He doesn't have your experience or your case clearance rate. He only transferred here a few years ago! That captain's position should have been yours!"

Old Li said evenly, "Ruobing, what should happen isn't always what does."

But Zhang Ruobing still wasn't convinced. "Hu Qing eats with the chief and the others all the time. It must be—"

"Enough!"

Old Li cut her off sharply. "I don't want to hear that again."

Zhang Ruobing bit her lower lip, hurt. She thought of her father, also a veteran officer, also passed over for promotion because someone had connections. He had worked the front lines every day until it cost him his life.

"You don't know the half of it," Old Li said with a sigh.

Then he changed the subject. "All right. Tell me about those two cases you're handling."

It took Zhang Ruobing a while to steady herself. "First, four women have disappeared near Guangming Hospital in Nanshan District after midnight. No bodies, no ransom calls. It's as if they vanished into thin air."

Old Li asked, "What do you think?"

Zhang Ruobing paused. "According to my investigation, all four had just left the hospital and were planning to take a taxi home."

"So?"

"So I suspect the culprit posed as a driver,