Cleaner

The corridor was softly lit.

Kannazuki leaned against the wall.

He held the Black Water-Based Pen in his right hand, with the torn page pinched between two fingers of his left.

[Lin Yaodong.]

[Cause of death: suicide by gunshot through the mouth.]

[Time of death: 3:20 p.m.]

[Actions before death: At 3:15 p.m., after drinking his tea, Lin Yaodong will stand and insert the black USB drive hidden in his briefcase's secret compartment into the conference room projector. He will publicly play all evidence of Dongding Capital's money laundering, contract killings, and dark web bounty. If anyone tries to stop him, he will draw his gun and shoot out the power switch panel. Then, facing the surveillance camera, he will recite a three-page confession in full. After finishing, he will put the gun in his mouth and shoot himself.]

Kannazuki put away the pen. He folded the torn page and slipped it into his suit vest pocket. Pushing the empty serving cart, he turned toward the freight elevator. His pace was steady, every stride exactly the same length.

Inside the conference room.

Lin Yaodong lifted his cup of Da Hong Pao tea. Steam rose from it. He blew across the surface and took a sip.

The digital clock on the wall changed. 3:15 p.m.

Lin Yaodong suddenly froze. His teacup hung in midair.

"Chairman?" Wang Mingyuan noticed something was wrong and asked quietly.

Lin Yaodong did not respond.

He set down the teacup.

His eyes instantly lost focus, yet his movements became strangely mechanical and precise.

He opened the Crocodile-Skin Briefcase beside him, tore through the lining of its hidden compartment, and pulled out a tiny black USB drive.

He stood and strode toward the projector at the front of the conference room.

"Chairman, what are you doing?" Zhao Sihai, the chief financial officer, stood up after him.

Lin Yaodong inserted the USB drive into the port. His fingers tapped the control panel.

The screen lit up.

A folder named "Dongding Internal Transactions" opened. Densely packed spreadsheets filled the entire wall.

Then a recording played through the powerful speakers.

"Sun Jianguo, this shipment will go through Nansha Port. I've already squared things with customs. We'll split the profits thirty-seventy." It was Lin Yaodong's voice.

Dead silence filled the conference room.

Wang Mingyuan's expression changed drastically. He shoved his chair aside and sprang to his feet. "Turn it off! Hurry!"

Zhao Sihai rushed toward the main power switch on the wall.

Lin Yaodong turned. He drew a Glock 17 from the back of his waistband, chambered a round, and raised it in one fluid motion.

Bang!

The bullet shattered the power switch panel. Sparks flew everywhere. Plastic fragments struck Zhao Sihai's face, leaving a bloody cut. Terrified, he collapsed to the floor and screamed with his hands over his head.

"Chairman! You've gone insane!" Wang Mingyuan shouted, backing away.

Lin Yaodong did not look at them. He turned his head and stared directly at the surveillance camera in the corner of the ceiling.

At the same time, in Dongding Tower's ground-floor lobby.

Chen Lei stood at the security desk with two officers.

"Who was the last person Li Qiang had contact with before his car accident?"

Chen Lei tapped the desk as he questioned the security guard.

"N-no one. Supervisor Li spent the whole morning in the surveillance room, then suddenly ran out clutching his stomach and said he needed to go to the hospital.

" The guard stammered out his answer.

Chen Lei frowned. It was too much of a coincidence.

Li Qiang was a former special forces soldier in excellent physical condition. How could he suddenly develop gastroenteritis severe enough to cause a car accident?

A piercing scream suddenly came from the radio at the guard's waist, accompanied by bursts of static.

"Top floor! Shots fired in the conference room! Call an ambulance! Call the police!" It was a terrified shout from one of the top-floor bodyguards.

Chen Lei snatched the radio.

"This is Chen Lei from the City Public Security Bureau's Criminal Investigation Detachment. What's happening on the top floor?"

"Chairman Lin... Chairman Lin fired a gun!"

Chen Lei dropped the radio and drew his pistol. "Seal every exit in the building! Xiao Li, upstairs with me!"

Chen Lei rushed toward the private elevator. He pressed his finger to the scanner, but the doors did not open.

"Damn it, a Retinal Lock!" Chen Lei turned and ran toward the fire stairs. With four hundred meters of stairs ahead of him, he had no choice but to wait for security to authorize access.

"Get the backup access card!" Chen Lei shouted at the guard.

The eighty-eighth-floor conference room.

The recording was still playing.

"Post the bounty on the dark web. One hundred million US dollars. I want that guy in yellow dead."

Wang Mingyuan slumped into his chair. It was over. Everything was over.

Only Lin Yaodong had backups of these top-secret files.

Why was he showing them to everyone?

Lin Yaodong stood in front of the screen and spoke into the camera. His voice was flat, without the slightest inflection.

"I am Lin Yaodong, chairman of Dongding Capital. Over the past ten years, I have laundered thirty billion through the Construction Group. I have hired assassins to eliminate fifteen competitors.

Bribed officials at the municipal level and above..."

He was reciting a confession.

Every word was perfectly clear, and every charge included specific times, places, and people.

Qian Duoduo, the head of legal affairs, trembled all over as he desperately squeezed under the table.

For three full minutes, Lin Yaodong recited the three-page confession without missing a single word.

He paused.

The clock changed to 3:20 p.m.

Lin Yaodong held the Glock 17 backward in both hands and shoved the barrel straight into his mouth.

"No!" Wang Mingyuan cried out.

Bang!

The back of his head burst open.

Blood and brain matter splattered across the white projection screen and slowly slid down its surface. Lin Yaodong's massive body toppled backward, stiff as a board, and slammed onto the wool carpet.

Horrified screams erupted in the conference room.

"Ding."

The elevator doors opened. Holding his pistol in both hands, Chen Lei charged into the corridor.

"Police! Drop your weapons!"

The bodyguards in the corridor were already in chaos, crouching by the wall with their hands over their heads. Chen Lei kicked open the conference room door.

The heavy stench of blood hit him.

Chen Lei's muzzle swept rapidly across the room.

Wang Mingyuan lay slumped in his chair, his eyes vacant. Zhao Sihai was on the floor vomiting, while Qian Duoduo trembled beneath the table.

Lin Yaodong lay in a pool of blood, half his head shattered.

The dark web bounty recording was still playing on a loop through the wall-mounted screen.

Chen Lei holstered his gun. He looked at the transaction records on the screen, then at Lin Yaodong on the floor.

This manner of death. This uncompromising act of self-destruction. It utterly defied the human instinct to survive.

Chen Lei took out his handcuffs and pinned Wang Mingyuan against the table.

"Mr. Wang, your security drill certainly looks realistic," Chen Lei said coldly.

"Cuff them all! Notify the Technical Section. Have them bring a server and copy everything from this projector exactly as it is!"

Chen Lei walked over to Lin Yaodong's body. He looked at the fallen Glock 17.

Linhai City's underworld emperor was dead, just like that?

Chen Lei pressed his earpiece. "Any suspicious people leaving through the ground-floor exits?"

"Reporting, Captain Chen. None. The entire building is sealed. Only a few delivery workers have been stopped outside."

The second basement parking level.

Kannazuki stood behind a support pillar.

He took off his suit vest and white shirt and stuffed them into his black backpack. Then he pulled on his yellow outdoor jacket.

He put on his helmet and lowered the goggles.

His phone vibrated. The Trojan Program sent a notification.

[Zone C Freight Elevator surveillance footage deleted. Afternoon tea order data overwritten.]

Kannazuki climbed onto his electric scooter and twisted the throttle.

The yellow electric scooter merged into the rush-hour traffic and left the underground garage.

Ryuk flew through the air, holding half an apple.

"Gahahahaha! Brilliant! Light, you actually made him lay all his dirty secrets bare for the police!"

Kannazuki said nothing. The streets were a little slippery after the rain.

He rode steadily toward his next delivery stop.

Lin Yaodong was dead. Dongding Capital had fallen.

Chen Lei had obtained all the ledgers and recordings. They would keep him run off his feet.

For at least three months, Chen Lei would have no energy to investigate a delivery worker.

Kannazuki stopped at a traffic light. He looked at Dongding Tower in the distance.

It was the highest point in Linhai City. Now it was a ruin.

Eight that evening. The City Public Security Bureau's conference room.

The lights blazed.

An officer from the Technical Section was giving a report.

"Captain Chen, we've confirmed it.

There are no signs of fabrication in the USB drive's data.

The confession Lin Yaodong recited matches the leads we already have. We can close this case."

Chen Lei sat at the head of the table, an unlit cigarette between his fingers.

"Close the case?" Chen Lei gave a cold laugh. "What kind of man was Lin Yaodong? Would he suddenly grow a conscience and expose himself in public? He shot out the power switch to stop anyone from cutting off the evidence playback. He even recited his confession into the surveillance camera."

Chen Lei tossed the cigarette onto the table.

"This was an execution. Someone forced him to do it."

"But, Captain Chen, the forensic doctor's autopsy report is back. There were no toxins or hallucinogens in Lin Yaodong's body. He was fully conscious when he fired."

Chen Lei stood and walked to the whiteboard.

Several photographs were pinned to it. Li Jianguo, Zhao Lidong, Sun Jianguo, thirteen thugs, and Lin Yaodong.

"Every death points to one outcome. Linhai City's criminal network has been torn apart completely. And the biggest beneficiary is us-the police."

Chen Lei picked up a marker and drew a huge question mark beside the photographs.

"Check the surveillance footage," Chen Lei ordered. "Every entry and exit at Dongding Tower today."

"Captain Chen." A female officer stood. "We already checked.

Between 2:55 and 3:05 p.m., there's a five-minute gap in the Zone C Freight Elevator footage."

Chen Lei whipped around. "A gap?"

"Yes. We also cross-checked the top-floor bodyguards' statements.

They said a waiter pushed a serving cart inside to deliver afternoon tea at 3:05 p.m."

Chen Lei walked over to the female officer. "Find that waiter!"

"We can't." The officer tapped her keyboard. "We contacted the Cloudtop Restaurant. They never received an order from Dongding Tower this afternoon. We checked the delivery platform's backend data too. There's no record."

Chen Lei braced both hands on the table.

An order that did not exist. A waiter who had disappeared.

A five-minute gap in the surveillance footage.

An image flashed through Chen Lei's mind.

That figure in a yellow outdoor jacket, weaving through the rainy night on an electric scooter.

"Cleaner." Chen Lei forced the word through clenched teeth.

He had not gone far. He was right here in Linhai City.

He had even walked openly into the heavily guarded Dongding Tower and carried out this spectacular murder right under everyone's noses.

Chen Lei straightened.

"Pull every delivery rider's route data from the platform for the past three days.

I want a frame-by-frame comparison!"