Chapter 7: The Long Night of the Hidden Dragon

To the northwest of the county lies a place called Yellow Clay Plain.

Many years ago, this was a reeducation-through-labor farm—“being sent to Yellow Clay Plain” was essentially synonymous with “serving a sentence.” Now, through generation after generation of laborers—and, of course, mainly due to government development—Yellow Clay Plain no longer bears the desolate mark of its penal past. It has become a thriving agricultural estate. No longer do prisoners labor here; instead, it is now the vegetable garden of the villagers from Ten-Mile Post, supplying fresh produce to Phoenix City.

Few know that within the old labor farm, there is a small three-story villa. Beneath it lies a special basement.

This is the special prison, designed to hold only the most extraordinary suspects.

Its security measures surpass all others.

A nondescript car drove up to the villa. Eighty-Eight, Changye, the director, and the deputy director all stepped out together.

They entered the villa and descended to the basement, where they found the suspect. The suspect lay quietly on a small bed, his back to them.

Changye’s expression flickered: “Something’s wrong.”

Eighty-Eight was startled as well. “Open the door!”

They entered the room with a single stride, faces darkening at the sight: blood trickled from the suspect’s nostrils. He was indisputably dead.

The director’s face changed. “What happened?”

One of the guards turned pale. “He was fine when we checked. We’ve had eyes on him the entire time—no one came near. How could he have poisoned himself?”

“It’s not poison,” Changye said. “It’s the chip in his brain. The chip implanted in his brain has exploded!”

Eighty-Eight’s face turned grim. “Weren’t you instructed to block all remote signals?”

Brain chips require signal control—blocking remote signals would break their transmission and, in theory, prevent the chip from being detonated remotely.

“If I’m not mistaken, a hacker must have broken in and altered the jamming protocol…” Changye said. “Where’s the control room?”

They all went to the control room. Changye tapped a few keys, quickly entering a program. The answer was clear: half an hour earlier, a hacker had silently breached their defenses and lifted the signal block. At that moment, the chip had been activated and the suspect killed.

The director, deputy director, and the three seasoned officers stared at each other, faces ashen.

The idea of brain-implanted chips was already incredible.

Yet their adversary’s capabilities were even more astonishing. The police had preemptively blocked all signals, yet the enemy had managed to hack in and undo the block.

This method of breach was so sophisticated that even the computer experts stationed in the control room had been utterly unaware.

Their enemy’s reach was truly insidious—there was no chink in their armor.

This single remote confrontation was enough to reveal the true horror of their adversary.

Such methods were far beyond anything a mere county-level agency could handle.

Changye and Eighty-Eight knew it wasn’t the officers’ fault. They ascended to the rooftop together, the director and deputy director trailing behind them, subdued and silent, like children who had made a grave mistake.

“You’re telling me the person who cracked the case today was an ordinary villager named Lin Xiaosu?” Changye exhaled softly.

“Yes!” Deputy Director Li Lisan stepped forward.

“From over ten miles away, across four city blocks, he was able to track the suspect with pinpoint accuracy, relying on nothing but a trace of the suspect’s scent?”

“Yes!”

Changye’s gaze glimmered in the night. “Tomorrow, assign a female officer to assist me with a task. Don’t tell her who I am.”

“Yes!”

“Have her come to Room 302 at the Phoenix City Hotel tomorrow morning to meet me.”

“Yes!”

“You may go. Don’t worry about us.”

“Chief, the car is still downstairs. We should escort you both to the hotel…”

“No need,” said Changye. “It’s a short walk—we’ll manage.”

The director and deputy director exchanged glances, then descended the stairs together.

The rooftop was shrouded in darkness. From here, the county seat looked distant and remote.

Eighty-Eight exhaled quietly. “You’re interested in this Lin Xiaosu?”

“Yes. We have others in the team with enhanced olfactory genes, but even Number 101—hailed as the ‘Nation’s Guardian Hound’—wouldn’t be able to locate a suspect under these conditions in such a short time.”

Eighty-Eight nodded. “I’ll check if there’s any record of him undergoing genetic modification.”

He raised his hand and put on a pair of glasses—ordinary-looking gold-rimmed spectacles, yet when he wore them, he seemed to gain an air of scholarly refinement.

“No need. I’ve already checked,” said Changye. “There’s no record of genetic modification, which fits his family background. He comes from a regular farming household—there’s no way they could afford hundreds of thousands or millions for genetic surgery.”

“If there’s no record of modification, but a genetic mutation has occurred, there are only two possibilities. One: he inherited mutated genes from his bloodline; but both his parents and brother are ordinary people, so that’s unlikely. Only the second remains—”

“Unconscious introduction of foreign genes,” Changye said. “This is rare elsewhere, but in Tashan, it’s entirely possible…”

Unconscious introduction of foreign genes—what does that mean?

Perhaps some insect bit him, or entered his body, triggering a mutation.

Such things are almost unheard of elsewhere—if a simple bite could cause mutation, then with the billions of people being bitten by insects every day, wouldn’t the world be overrun with mutations?

But Tashan is unique. Its biodiversity is unmatched, having long drawn the attention of Hidden Dragon.

Hidden Dragon’s researchers have studied here for years.

Only three days ago, there was a major incident…

“Changye, I know you hope to recruit talent for Hidden Dragon to navigate these complex games, but you must remember: our position is precarious. Sometimes the flutter of a butterfly’s wings can stir a tornado on the far Pacific shore,” said Eighty-Eight.

“That’s why I want someone to accompany me for a test tomorrow,” said Changye.

“What sort of test?”

“I want to see if, with his unique investigative methods, he can unravel the mystery that occurred three days ago at Qingyuan Temple.”

Eighty-Eight was astonished. “You still believe Number 2198’s death was foul play?”

“To the team, 2198 is just a number, but to me, he was half a father, half a mentor. I can never forget the day in the orphanage, staring at the sky, when he appeared before me and sheltered me from the cold autumn rain with his umbrella. Nor can I forget the night before I sent him to Phoenix City, and the words he said to me… He told me: ‘Genes are a double-edged sword. Their external power is limitless, but what I can do is strengthen the spine of the blade, so that it may protect the billion people of Daxia. While my ambitions remain unfulfilled, I will not die.’”