Villain? No, I'll catch up with the protagonist after passing the civil service exam.

The glaring incandescent light shone on the interrogation chair of the Municipal Public Security Bureau's Major Crimes Unit.

Fine dust particles floated in the halo of light. The bulb casing radiated intense heat.

Qiu Kun's hands were tightly handcuffed to the iron barrier. His wrists were chafed raw by the metal rings, forming dark red scabs.

His face was as white as if it had been plastered with a layer of wall ash.

The frost formed by the liquid nitrogen in the underground vault had melted, turning into cold sweat that dripped down his cheeks and splattered onto the collar of his prison uniform.

Two streams of clear snot hung from his philtrum. He sniffed, but couldn't suck it back in.

Zhao Tiezhu paced back and forth in the narrow interrogation room, carrying a chipped enamel mug.

The soles of the military boots rubbed against the non-slip rubber floor, making a grating, screeching sound.

"You've become mute, haven't you?"

Zhao Tiezhu stopped and slammed his hand on the stainless steel interrogation table. The loud bang made the paper cups on the table shake.

"Bringing an exoskeleton to smash the police station vault, and now you're playing dumb? Where's your boss-like demeanor?"

Qiu Kun lifted his eyelids and glanced at Zhao Tiezhu.

He tore open his chapped lips, revealing a cold, sneer that seemed to say, "I'm not afraid of boiling water."

"I'm thirsty. Give me a cigarette."

His voice was hoarse, as if he had swallowed a handful of sand. "I won't say a word until my lawyer arrives."

Qiu Kun knew exactly what was going on.

His black market hideout was raided, and the hackers wiped out three billion from his overseas accounts. He's really screwed for life.

But he held onto his last card.

The high-ranking police officer who leaked the Evidence Division's codes to him—the mole within the force.

As long as he doesn't talk, the police won't be able to find any evidence against the mole. That mole, in order to protect himself, will do everything in his power to get him a reduced sentence.

The heavy, soundproof door to the interrogation room was pushed open.

The door hinge was low on lubrication, making a dull rubbing sound.

Lu Jingyan stepped in.

He changed into a clean white shirt. The top button of the collar was undone.

A square piece of medical gauze was pasted on the back of his left hand. A faint red streak of blood was visible through the center of the gauze, a wound left from smashing the glass in the vault earlier.

He didn't bring a thermos.

He was holding a thick stack of manila documents in his arms. It was more than half a meter tall and heavy, making his forearm muscles tense slightly.

"Bang."

The half-meter-high file was thrown heavily onto the iron table.

The clattering of the papers forced out the air inside, raising a musty, dusty smell of old archives. Zhao Tiezhu, sitting in the front row, rubbed his nose, choking on the fumes.

Lu Jingyan pulled out a chair and sat down.

His leather shoes stomped firmly on the ground. He raised his head, his dark eyes silently fixed on Qiu Kun opposite him.

He didn't show any anger, nor did he slam his fist on the table to intimidate people like other interrogators do.

It was as calm as looking at a pile of dead objects.

"You don't need to wait for your lawyer. He was taken away by the Economic Crime Investigation Team half an hour ago on suspicion of helping organized crime launder money."

Lu Jingyan's voice wasn't loud. In the room with its four soundproof walls, it echoed with a slightly muffled tone.

Qiu Kun's face twitched.

He swallowed hard, his back involuntarily leaning back against the iron chair.

"Don't try to fool me." Qiu Kun gritted his teeth, the handcuffs clanging against the iron pipe. "Without a confession, let's see how you convict me."

Lu Jingyan ignored his shouting.

Long, slender fingers rested on top of the pile of files. The fingertips turned to the first blue expert report.

"Confessions are indeed important in serious criminal trials."

His gaze fell on the black words on the white paper. The paper made a soft rustling sound as it was rubbed together.

"But under the legal framework of conviction without confession, as long as the chain of evidence forms a perfect closed loop, whether you speak or not has no impact on the court's sentencing."

Qiu Kun's heart skipped a beat.

He stared at the man in the white shirt. The fear he felt earlier, when this man had dismantled his mech with his bare hands in the vault, crept up his spine again.

Lu Jingyan spun the first report around and pushed it in front of Qiu Kun.

"This is the metal spectral analysis report for your exoskeleton armor."

His long, slender index finger tapped on several lines of complex data.

"The titanium alloy composition of the left arm matches perfectly with a batch of aerospace steel stolen from Nancheng Heavy Industry last month. The serial number of the hydraulic pump on the right leg corresponds to a scrapped batch among the supplies seized by Sirius."

Lu Jingyan raised his eyelids to look at him.

"The material flow comparison system shows that this batch of goods passed through six shell companies and finally ended up in your 'Night Owl' scrap metal recycling station."

The veins on Qiu Kun's forehead bulged.

He stared intently at the report, his breathing becoming heavy, hot air billowing from his nostrils.

"What's this? Can't I just collect this from scrap metal?"

"OK."

Lu Jingyan did not refute, and continued to turn to the second file.

Several high-resolution color photos fell out of the bunker. They were all on-site survey maps taken outside the bunker.

"This is a chemical analysis of the soil scraped from the soles of your leather shoes."

Lu Jingyan arranged the photos one by one on the iron table. His movements were unhurried, like a dealer playing cards.

"It contains trace amounts of high-dimensional radioactive dust, as well as red brick fragments unique to the air-raid shelters in the western suburbs. The wear and stress points on the soles of the shoes are completely consistent with the depth of the footprints left at the scene."

Zhao Tiezhu, who was listening nearby, couldn't help but grin.

He crossed his arms and looked down at Qiu Kun.

"Did you understand? The mud you left at the crime scene is far more honest than your foul mouth."

Qiu Kun's fingers began to tremble.

The iron handcuffs creaked as he struggled to break free, drawing blood from his wrists.

"You...you're conducting an illegal search!"

His voice cracked, revealing a desperate madness, "Just because of some mud and scrap iron, you think you can sentence me to death?"

Lu Jingyan still didn't look up.

My finger slid to the very bottom of the file. I pulled out an electronic statement with a red stamp.

"At 1 a.m. tonight, Su Xiaoxiao breached your overseas offshore server."

Lu Jingyan slammed the bill on the table.

"Eight thousand seven hundred transaction records. Each one corresponds to a defective alien product sold on the black market. The buyer's real-name authentication information is all stored in Skynet's database."

He leaned back in his chair.

The light from the incandescent bulb shone on his hard, cold jawline.

"The buying and selling of prohibited military supplies. The amount involved is as high as three billion. This financial chain is enough to expose your entire black market network."

Qiu Kun looked at the densely packed transaction record sheet.

This time, I was truly dumbfounded.

His head was buzzing. It felt like a swarm of wasps was stinging him, making his nerves throb.

He always thought that as long as he didn't confess, the cops wouldn't be able to get a confession, and the case would have to drag on indefinitely.

But Lu Jingyan doesn't play by the rules at all.

He was like a precision bulldozer, crushing all the scattered physical traces, chemical components, and electronic data into a perfectly sealed iron plate.

"Testimonial evidence, physical evidence, electronic data, and trace evidence examination."

Lu Jingyan closed the file with a crisp "snap".

"Four-dimensional integration. Closed-loop evidence chain."

He placed his hands on the table, staring at Qiu Kun, whose face was ashen.

"According to Article 55 of the current Criminal Procedure Law, if there is no confession from the defendant but the evidence is conclusive and sufficient, the defendant may be found guilty and punished."

Lu Jingyan's voice wasn't loud, but it was like a red-hot branding iron, directly burning through Qiu Kun's last laughable psychological defenses.

"Robbery of a top-secret national evidence vault. Illegal possession of heavily armed mechs. Involvement in organized crime."

The man stood up.

Smooth out the wrinkles at the hem of the shirt.

"You'd better prepare to spend the rest of your life behind bars in a detention center, reflecting on your actions. You won't even have a chance for a reduced sentence."

Qiu Kun slumped in the interrogation chair.

It felt like all the marrow had been drained from my body. My shoulders slumped down, and I didn't even have the strength to struggle anymore.

His lips trembled, and the fierce light in his eyes turned into terror.

This Lu Jingyan is terrifying. He's no ordinary person who's lost his superpowers; his mind is even more terrifying than Skynet's supercomputer.

"Wait...wait a minute!"

Seeing Lu Jingyan preparing to turn and leave, Qiu Kun panicked.

He clung tightly to the metal barrier with both hands, his fingernails scraping against the metal with a piercing sound.

"Director Lu! I'll tell you! I'll tell you everything!"

His face was contorted with grief, tears and snot streaming down his face. Blood and froth from his throat were also gushing out.

"Someone tipped me off about robbing the evidence department tonight! He even gave me the password!"

He didn't want to die. Even if he implicated the mole, he'd be willing to accept leniency in return.

Lu Jingyan picked up the file, not even glancing at Qiu Kun: "You think I can't find the person behind you if you don't speak up? You're too naive."