Chapter 460: Wu Chen, Beyond Scientific Explanation

Chapter 460: Wu Chen, Beyond Scientific Explanation

“Mr. Wu, I didn’t disturb your rest, did I?” From his very first words, Mao Rusong sounded a little careful. The weakness of last night, when he’d just come to, was gone from his voice.

“No. I was just about to get up.” Wu Chen smiled.

From Mao Rusong’s manner alone, Wu Chen knew he must have confirmed that Cao Liangpeng was the mastermind.

When everyone else believed the Qi brothers had staged the crash to kill him, Wu Chen had cut clean through the fog and named the real culprit barely two hours after the fact!

Mao Rusong probably knew that Wu Chen had asked Gu Ruibo for nothing but the traffic footage. That meant he had most likely had no leads beforehand and had to start from step one.

And Wu Chen was in Donghai, hundreds of kilometers from Modu! He had never examined the scene.

There was no scientific way to explain how he’d done it!

Wu Chen could even guess how Mao Rusong’s thinking had shifted. He’d likely had confirmation before dawn and wanted to call, but disturbing Mr. Wu so early in the morning wouldn’t do!

So he’d waited, and waited, all the way to eight o’clock sharp, when he figured Mr. Wu might be awake. Only then had he called, and even so, the first thing he’d asked was whether he’d disturbed Wu Chen’s rest.

When someone’s standing in your mind grows too high, too frightening, you start treating them with exactly this kind of caution.

“Mr. Wu, I’ve had Cao Liangpeng picked up…”

“Confirmed?”

“Confirmed! Fucking Cao Liangpeng, that son of a bitch! Mr. Wu, you have no idea. When I laid out the evidence and confronted him, he went crazy. Even tried to pull a gun on me. Said I’d wronged him, that he was the one who gave me my start back in the day, that I’m an ungrateful bastard… Said I don’t treat him like a person, won’t even look at him, won’t say a word to him…”

The two of them talked for more than ten minutes.

The more Mao Rusong talked, the more worked up he got, and there was a certain amount of rueful feeling in it too. The human heart. Human nature!

He truly hadn’t expected it to be Cao Liangpeng.

Cao Liangpeng’s reasons were complicated, and yet not complicated at all. Simply put, it came from years of accumulated resentment and a mind thrown badly off balance.

When Mao Rusong was first coming up, he had worked with Cao Liangpeng, and back then Cao Liangpeng had been the undisputed big brother.

They teamed up several times before falling out for good. After that, Cao Liangpeng’s business stalled, while Mao Rusong took off completely and became “Fourth Master Mao”!

He had watched a little brother who’d once been far beneath him leap up to become someone he himself could no longer reach.

Anyone would have felt jealous.

And Mao Rusong’s business kept squeezing his. Every time Mao Rusong grew a little stronger, Cao Liangpeng’s business shrank a little more.

His approach to business wasn’t as good as Mao Rusong’s. He had fallen somewhat behind the times.

Yet he blamed all his business troubles on Mao Rusong. He believed that if Mao Rusong didn’t exist, the market would naturally be his!

Wu Chen had known from the thousand-year loop what Cao Liangpeng thought of Mao Rusong. Cao saw him as a thorn in his flesh, but he had never dared move against him.

And Cao wasn’t the only one who felt that way.

As for why he had finally struck this time, there were two specific reasons.

The first was that, ten-odd days earlier, he and Mao Rusong had crossed paths at a mutual friend’s birthday banquet. Neither spoke. Neither acknowledged the other.

But Mao Rusong had been surrounded by important people, many of them calling him “Fourth Master Mao” every other sentence.

Some from great families even treated him like a brother.

Around Cao Liangpeng, it had been far colder.

People who couldn’t be bothered with him turned around and greeted Mao Rusong with beaming smiles.

Cao Liangpeng’s composure shattered!

Right then, he’d wanted nothing more than to kill Mao Rusong. But he didn’t dare.

Then, a little over ten days later, word spread across Modu that the Qi brothers had gone to war with Mao Rusong. That was the second reason!

Cao Liangpeng was ruthless to begin with. Handed an opening like this, he made up his mind in an instant to go all the way. He figured that if he killed Mao Rusong, the Qi brothers would take the fall.

Nor did he worry that the blame might not stick.

No evidence was needed. Once power reached a certain level, things like this never left evidence anyway. So if everyone believed the Qi brothers had done it, then they had!

And with Mao Rusong dead, a link would drop out of his formidable web of connections. His son Mao Qi alone would never hold it all together.

Modu’s bars, KTVs, and clubs were bound to be reshuffled!

Jealousy and hatred. And profit!

Wu Chen asked little and listened much.

If Mao Rusong hadn’t been careful this time, he really would be dead. It had been a very close call. And although the Qi brothers hadn’t done it, there was still a causal link to them, and so to Wu Chen.

Wu Chen was more than happy to let him vent a while longer.

Li Ruobing, also woken by the phone, leaned close to his ear and listened in on what Mao Rusong was saying.

They talked for nearly fifteen minutes.

“Ah!” Mao Rusong finally sighed. “Fuck. I haven’t bothered with him in years, and he wanted me dead…”

“The human heart is a dangerous thing.” Wu Chen gave a sighing laugh too.

“Exactly.” Mao Rusong’s tone shifted. “Ah! I really have bothered you, Mr. Wu. Calling this early in the morning… I just wanted to report back to you…”

“Report” was a telling choice of word.

“Let’s leave it there for now, Boss Mao. Next time I’m in Modu, we’ll get together.”

“You bet! Sure, sure, sure.”

A few more pleasantries, and they hung up.

Wu Chen set the phone aside, turned his head, and smiled at Li Ruobing.

She was eyeing him sidelong, eyes slightly narrowed. She was doing her best to keep her feelings in check, but her face still showed… shock!

It really, truly had been Cao Liangpeng!

And!

Following Wu Chen’s instructions, Mao Rusong had confirmed it completely in a single night!

They’d even taken the man!

Strictly speaking, that counted as kidnapping. But Mao Rusong had evidence in hand now. Putting Cao Liangpeng behind bars would be easy, and arranging for him to die in an “accident” in prison would be simple too!

Most of Cao Liangpeng’s assets were bound to end up under Mao Rusong’s management as well.

None of that mattered to Li Ruobing. She didn’t care. It wasn’t important. What mattered was still that one question.

How had Wu Chen watched ten minutes of surveillance and found the mastermind?!

If she hadn’t been so worn out last night, she’d have lain awake.

She was very nearly doubting her own intelligence.

Had she spotted even one clue, she could have accepted it. Falling short of Wu Chen was no problem. But she’d seen nothing at all. Her answer was zero, and his was a hundred!

Wasn’t that gap a bit too big?!

“Go on, my dear Mr. Wu. It’s confirmed it was Cao Liangpeng. Now you can tell me how ten minutes of footage told you it was him, can’t you?” Li Ruobing asked, eyes narrowed.

“You lost.” Wu Chen smiled.

“Could you stop needling me? I admit I lost. I, Li Ruobing, honor my bets! I’ll own it!” she said.

“So what did you just call me?” Wu Chen asked with a smile.

“My dear Mr. Wu…” She had barely started when she stopped. All at once she understood what he meant, and she shot him a reproachful look, though a touch of softness had suddenly crept into her expression.

“Hubby~~” She said it, deliberately mimicking the way Su Qingying talked in private.

“Say it normally. You’re you.” Wu Chen laughed.

“Hmph!” She gave a soft snort, then hooked an arm around his neck, leaned in close to his ear, and said, “Hub! By!”

Very earnest. In her own voice.

He had only been teasing her.

“Happy now?” she asked.

“Ha.” Wu Chen laughed and motioned with one hand. “Bring the laptop over. Open the footage. I’ll tell you.”

Li Ruobing immediately rolled over to grab the laptop from the nightstand.

She was beyond eager!

She refused to believe her IQ was really that low!

There had to be something she’d missed!