103 The Joke Went Too Far

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Yang Tang sat in the sixth row by the aisle.

The expressionless man who had just pushed Yang Tang was seated right in the middle of the fifth row, diagonally in front of him.

Yang Tang’s first impression of this man was extremely poor. His mind stirred slightly, and he adjusted his “Eagle Eye” scanning parameters to “people with a criminal record.” As his eyes blinked open and closed, he scanned the passengers in the first five rows. Sure enough, more than a dozen golden glimmers appeared, though none were dazzlingly bright. The man who had pushed him had no golden aura at all.

Damn it, impossible. This guy looks like a criminal just by his appearance—could he actually be some kind-hearted soul?

That didn’t add up either. When I was blocking the aisle earlier, the normal way to handle it would be to first warn verbally before pushing. It’s like the yellow and red cards in soccer: a yellow card is a light warning, and a red card is a severe warning with ejection—there’s a progression. But this guy pushed me first, then spoke. From a psychological perspective, that’s an aggressive personality, often seen in people with violent tendencies or serious criminal backgrounds!

Aggressive psychology but no crimes committed yet—could he be scheming how to commit one?

Seated and nursing his resentment, Yang Tang indulged in a wild analysis. Actually, he fell into a cognitive trap: “having a criminal record” doesn’t necessarily mean “having committed crimes.” So he revised his Eagle Eye scanning to “people with violent tendencies,” and when he looked again at the front five rows, the golden glimmers surged to more than twenty, including the expressionless man who had pushed him.

This time, I’ve got you!

Bored to tears, Yang Tang finally found a way to pass the lonely journey. Using the “violent tendencies” parameter as a filter, he speculated about the identity, occupation, or mission of the expressionless man. To Yang Tang’s amazement, within fifteen minutes, his Eagle Eye had deduced the man’s profession: a corporate spy. In this line of work, the qualifications are deep-cover and seasoned; sometimes, these spies even trade in military intelligence that’s not too top-secret.

“Heh, this joke just got serious!”

After identifying the expressionless man’s profession, Yang Tang found the situation quite thorny. If this were just a corporate spy, he could ignore him or at most report his movements using hacking techniques. But this man was also moonlighting as a seller of military intelligence—and Eagle Eye had identified him as a spy on Chinese soil, meaning the intelligence he sold was likely Chinese.

This stirred Yang Tang’s rebellious spirit from his past life. He fished out his branded notebook from his travel bag, connected to the wireless network—which all modern transportation offers—and set up a proxy to download some sleek, temporary hacking tools from overseas servers. Then he hacked into the ticketing system and found the documents used by the expressionless man to buy his ticket.

Damn, this guy’s American but has a perfectly Chinese name: Gui Hai Youde!

What’s more, through U.S. network searches, Yang Tang found that the surname “Gui Hai” was not a random foreign concoction but came from his grandmother. Indeed, Gui Hai Youde’s mother was Japanese but half Chinese by blood, and he was born in Hawaii. This half-breed had grown into a multinational spy, having committed many crimes but never caught—hence no criminal record.

After some thought, Yang Tang implanted a timed alert trojan onto the cyber police’s duty page, setting it to report Gui Hai Youde’s status half an hour after the train arrived on Egret Island. This avoided the awkwardness of a police crackdown at disembarkation, which could lead to searches of all passengers.

Yang Tang didn’t want to get himself entangled. Before planting the trojan, he re-scanned the carriage with Eagle Eye to confirm there were no other spies, then exposed only Gui Hai Youde to the trojan.

At 11:03 p.m., the high-speed train Yang Tang was on arrived punctually at the Egret Island station.

After leaving the station, Yang Tang took a taxi directly to the Conrad Hotel. Just as he showed his reservation, checked into a sea-view room, and started his shower, the Egret Island Cyber Police’s duty room erupted in activity.

After his shower, Yang Tang went online to check the physical address of the antique auction shop he had first seen in the Misty City and also booked Room 8 at a guesthouse on Gulangyu Island for three days before going to sleep.

Meanwhile, the cyber police and local security bureau personnel were urgently summoned.

At 12:20 a.m., more than half the staff sat in the Egret Island Security Bureau’s meeting room.

“The situation is clear now, two issues,” the director began.

“First, Gui Hai Youde indeed has problems. Higher-ups demand we monitor him around the clock without error. The Eighth Division is tasked with this—find his address and begin surveillance. Be stealthy; don’t alert him.”

“Understood, Director Di!”

“Second, any progress on tracing the trojan implanted on the cyber police’s website?”

“Director Di, my team traced it back to Washington, D.C., but the trail ends there.”

Director Di’s mouth twitched: “Captain Geng, are you saying the Americans exposed their own spy?”

Laughter broke out but quickly died down under Director Di’s gaze.

“Director Di, that’s not what I meant. My young team’s skills are limited; we need a few experts from your security bureau.”

Director Di was frank: “Our bureau’s top hacker is Lin Zimo. He’s logged into your cyber police website and found nothing except a few logs deleted at alarm activation. So this leak is a skilled operator—Lin Zimo admits he’s no match.”

Silence fell. Everyone knew Lin Zimo’s prowess; if even he felt outmatched, catching the whistleblower hacker would be nearly impossible.

“Director Di, what’s your take?”

“I think we need to involve the provincial authorities to send specialists,” Director Di said, clearly having a plan. “I’ve had Lin Zimo prepare a report, which I’ve signed and submitted. Now we wait for their orders. But before they arrive, we must find Gui Hai and start secret surveillance.”

“Don’t worry, Director Di, the mission will be accomplished!”

The next morning, after breakfast, Yang Tang took a taxi to the address of the antique shop. Upon arrival, he realized it was actually an entire street of antiques, though the sign outside read “Secondhand Market.”

Locating the general area wasn’t enough; Yang Tang used the house number to find a shop called “Qian Mo Xuan.”

“This must be it.”

He glanced left and right again to confirm the address, then stepped into the shop’s front hall.

On both sides were glass water tanks, each with various aquatic pets. A young girl, a bit younger than Yang Tang, was in a corner helping two customers pick out turtles.

Yang Tang asked, “Is anyone in the shop?”

The girl looked up coldly and said stiffly, “Inside, turn left.”

Following her directions, Yang Tang entered the main hall, passed through a courtyard, and came into another room. To the left were shelves with many old-looking items, their ages unclear. On the right was a partitioned area with a traditional eight-immortal table, around which sat three men.

One was an elderly man in his early sixties, gaunt but with sharp eyes. Opposite him on the left sat a man in his fifties, bright-eyed and sharp, exuding efficiency. The third, with his back to Yang Tang, looked familiar, but Yang Tang couldn’t recall where he had seen him.

“Who are you? What do you want?” The gaunt elder rasped, rude in tone.

Yang Tang raised an eyebrow. “I came specially to see the physical items your shop auctions online.”

“Oh, then go look. Turn left. The piles in the southern corner are all those items. Pick whatever you want. Each is 100 yuan, no bargaining!” The elder dismissed him and turned back to his companions. “Come on, let’s continue.”

Unexpectedly, the tall man who had been sitting silently with his back to Yang Tang suddenly turned, stood up, and looked pleasantly surprised. “Master Yang, it really is you!”

“You are?” Yang Tang studied him, sensing familiarity.

“I’m the one who paid 30 million yesterday to remove the Guanyin statue!” the tall man introduced himself. “My surname’s Wan, first name Haiyang. Master Yang, call me whatever you like!”

“So it’s you!” Yang Tang finally recognized the imposing man from yesterday. “And you three?”

“We don’t sleep much. Got up early to gather and study antiques!” Wan Haiyang explained. “Master Yang, why don’t you come join us?”

“I’ll pass.” Yang Tang waved him off. He wasn’t close to Wan Haiyang, and even less so to the other two, so there was no question of sitting together to appraise antiques.

“Then just look around first. I’ll finish chatting with Old Huang and come over!” Wan Haiyang rubbed his hands eagerly. If not for knowing his two companions for over ten or twenty years, he’d have eagerly followed Yang Tang around by now.

A whirlwind week ahead! Please bookmark, please bookmark, please bookmark!