Chapter 1 She's Pretending to be Poor!

As soon as we heard Hong-jie was calling a friend to transport the body, we knew she was contacting her accomplices. This was a great opportunity to follow the vine and find the melon.

I asked Hong-jie if she needed a hand, to help load the body onto the vehicle or something.

Hong-jie quickly shook her head, refusing. She said such unlucky things were best left to us.

Moreover, as if afraid we'd be involved, she immediately settled the corpse retrieval fee and sent us away.

She had clearly said earlier that she had no savings and would have to use free massages to pay off the debt, but she casually pulled out a stack of hundred-yuan bills from her pocket, pulled out three, and asked if it was enough.

I smiled, accepted the money, and nodded, saying it was enough.

After that, we didn't linger and left in the corpse retrieval boat with Xiao Liang.

As we left, I secretly glanced back, and saw Hong-jie taking out her cell phone to contact her partners, she was probably going to act quickly.

At that time, people with poor economic conditions couldn't afford mobile phones at all, they used landlines or phone cards.

Those who were a little richer used Xiaolingtong (personal handy-phone system).

But Hong-jie was using a cell phone, and I took a closer look—wow! She was using a Nokia n70! Equivalent to the latest Apple phone now!

She was just pretending to be poor!

This was another flaw.

After the corpse retrieval boat had traveled some distance, Xiao Liang suddenly grabbed my arm and said, "Chen Rongsheng, pull over! I'm going to track Hong-jie and find out where their stronghold is."

Looking at Xiao Liang's thin and frail figure, I couldn't help but worry and said, "Can you do it alone? Tomb robbers are desperate people, what if you get discovered? It's too dangerous, maybe we should just forget about it."

At this time, Xiao Liang was quite brave, and firmly said, "A golden opportunity is hard to come by! Chen Rongsheng, don't you want to find Sister Xiao Mei, don't you want to avenge Aunt Mei?"

"Of course I do!" I answered almost without thinking.

"Then pull over! Let me get off the boat and track them. Don't worry, I've received professional training, I won't be discovered," Xiao Liang said, looking into my eyes.

Although I was still very worried, this was indeed a rare opportunity. After hesitating for a moment, I finally pulled the corpse retrieval boat ashore and let Xiao Liang get off to track them.

Afterwards, I drove the boat back by myself to meet Uncle Mei at home.

When I got home, Uncle Mei was sitting at the entrance of the courtyard smoking. Seeing me come back alone, he wondered, "Where's Xiao Liang? Isn't she with you?"

I quickly said, "Uncle, we've made a major discovery. That massage lady by Duck River is one of Shopkeeper Wang's people, a lookout!"

Uncle Mei was stunned for a moment, then slowly nodded and said, "That makes sense! Those who do massage are always fighting guerrilla warfare everywhere, and women are naturally fond of asking questions, they are indeed suitable to be lookouts."

Then he asked me, "What about Xiao Liang?"

I told him about the two of us retrieving the corpse for Hong-jie, and also told Uncle Mei that Xiao Liang had gone to track her. If successful, she might be able to follow the vine and find the rats' nest.

Uncle Mei looked worried after hearing this and said, "Oh no, Xiao Liang is a girl, wouldn't she encounter danger? Rongsheng, why don't we go take a look?"

I shook my head and said, "Uncle, Xiao Liang has received professional training, nothing should go wrong. If we go looking for her at this time, it will only make things worse. Let's just wait at home."

Uncle Mei thought about it and felt that what I said was right.

At this time, I asked him, "By the way, did you get any information when you went to town to inquire today?"

Only then did Uncle Mei remember and quickly said, "I almost forgot, I really did find out something. About half a year ago, an entrepreneur from out of town visited Hongyan Town and said he wanted to donate a Hope Primary School to the town for free. But Hongyan Town has a small population to begin with, and there are even fewer children. The local schools can't even fill their enrollment, so there's no need to build another primary school. But the entrepreneur insisted that more and more children would be born in the future, that we should be prepared for a rainy day, and was determined to build a Hope Primary School here..."

The more I listened, the stranger I felt. This entrepreneur didn't seem to have a very normal way of thinking.

Uncle Mei continued, "After all, the entrepreneur was donating for free, so the town thought it would be a waste not to accept it, and finally agreed. So the Hope Primary School started construction. But the strange thing is, the town clearly has large tracts of open land, but the location of the Hope Primary School has to be next to Duck River. At that time, many locals advised that if there were floods, the primary school would probably be flooded, and it would be best to move the school site further inland, but the entrepreneur was stubborn and refused to listen."

Hearing this, I couldn't help but sneer and said, "Isn't this entrepreneur Shopkeeper Wang?"

Uncle Mei immediately nodded and said, "That's what I think too, I'm afraid donating the Hope Primary School is fake, and secretly digging tunnels and robbing tombs is real. Building the foundation during the day, digging tomb tunnels at night, pretending one thing while doing another!"

Such sneaky operations by tomb robbers are actually very common. Not to mention the distant past, just take Shopkeeper Wang's other "project" in recent times—the ancient Shu tomb in Tuojiang River as an example, he played the same trick.

According to Jiang Yongguang, Shopkeeper Wang also used similar camouflage when he was excavating the ancient Shu tomb in Tuojiang River.

After all, the scale of this ancient tomb is extremely large, and it involves underwater operations, draining the tomb, and other relatively large projects, which is completely impossible to do secretly and will inevitably cause a stir.

At this time, you have to use your brain a little.

Shopkeeper Wang then commissioned a construction company to cover up the tomb robbing crime in the name of building a wharf for Tuojiang River, using this method to deceive everyone.

And the time when the Tuojiang River wharf started construction was also about half a year ago!

Combining this with the Hope Primary School in Hongyan Town, all the mysteries are solved.

I couldn't help but sigh and say, "This Shopkeeper Wang really has some tricks, simultaneously starting construction on two tombs in Tuojiang River and Duck River, operating on two fronts, and digging for treasure and leaving in the shortest possible time."

Uncle Mei also nodded and said, "Yes, maybe this ancient Shu tomb has already been looted by Shopkeeper Wang, if we can't act quickly, I'm afraid this big rat will slip away again!"

"No, we must catch Shopkeeper Wang!"

I said, clenching my fists.

Sister Xiao Mei's whereabouts and Aunt Mei's blood feud are all on Shopkeeper Wang's shoulders.

"I estimate that Xiao Liang will be able to find Shopkeeper Wang's stronghold in Hongyan Town this time, and then immediately contact Jiang Yongguang and have him bring the Xiaoling Guard to close the net. If we're lucky, we might be able to catch Shopkeeper Wang," I said to Uncle Mei.

Since Shopkeeper Wang left his son, Little Shopkeeper Wang, in Tuojiang River to preside over the overall situation, then he himself will most likely be personally sitting in Duck River.

I am still very confident in catching this person in charge.

Uncle Mei was the same, he also gritted his teeth and said, "Yes, we must catch Shopkeeper Wang! We can't let that bastard run away again!"

Just as we were discussing enthusiastically, a burst of rapid footsteps suddenly came from not far away. We looked in the direction of the sound and saw a graceful figure trotting over.

It was Xiao Liang, who had gone to track Hong-jie.

Her ponytail was a little messy from running, and her forehead was covered with sweat.

I quickly got up to meet her and asked worriedly, "How was it? Did you encounter any danger? Did you gain anything?"

Xiao Liang was so tired that she put her hands on her hips, panting for breath. She pointed to the house and said breathlessly, "Go... go inside and talk..."