The warehouse was silent.
Li Wei stepped forward to untie the old doctor, nodding to the girl slumped on the floor beside him. She stared at him in astonishment, unsure what to say.
"How did you know..."
"I assume you want to know why I'm here. It's actually quite simple. I have my own methods. When I asked Anthony to call the police, I knew someone would tip them off. All I had to do was find that person and follow them."
Li Wei glanced around at the floor. The attackers were all lying there now, reduced to corpses.
"And I also know that Dr. Tester wasn't the one researching that punched card. You were, Miss Kia. If I venture another guess, the card wasn't on Dr. Tester at all. It's on you, isn't it?"
"How did you know?"
Kia stared at him, as shocked as a squirrel discovering that someone had stolen its entire food stash.
"Simple. You told me yourself."
"Me? I never said..."
"You did."
Li Wei wagged a finger.
"When I questioned you earlier, you complained that the card had broken your difference engine. Remember? You also said resetting it would take quite a while."
"Oh..."
"Besides, you know far too much about this card. If Dr. Tester were researching it, you shouldn't know all those details, and it shouldn't have been your difference engine that broke... Am I right, Dr. Tester?"
Undoing the last rope, Li Wei turned to the old man with a smile. The doctor gave him a wry smile in return.
"You certainly deserve your reputation as a great detective."
"It was just ordinary deduction. But we can't stay here any longer. Honestly, Miss Kia, I'm very curious how you managed to get this thing here..."
Li Wei regarded the steam-powered mech