After breaking up with my boyfriend, I made a fortune and rose rapidly in my career.

Chen Ping's fingers traced across the rough letter paper, which was covered with printed characters cut from newspapers and had an uneven texture.

The living room fell silent immediately.

Su Qingwan looked at him nervously, even her breathing became soft.

"Lie it flat, let's call the police."

Chen Ping raised his head, his face revealing no emotion, only a frightening calm.

He carefully folded the letter, put it back in the envelope, and then put it in his pocket.

"Calling the police won't help." Chen Ping stood up, walked to Su Qingwan's side, and gently held her slightly cold hand. "Since they dared to use this method, they were prepared to be investigated. From the letter paper to the glue, to the person who delivered the letter, they won't leave any useful clues."

"What should we do? They're threatening you!" Su Qingwan's voice trembled slightly.

"No, they're threatening me, and they're testing me." Chen Ping gently rubbed his thumb on the back of her hand to reassure her. "They want to see how I'll react when my bottom line is crossed."

Chen Ping knew perfectly well that the letter was written by Company M, or by their agents in China. Gu Weizhen's discovery had already frightened them.

When business tactics fail, they resort to these underhanded tricks.

"Qingwan, do me a favor." Chen Pingfang looked into her eyes.

"You say it," Su Qingwan said without hesitation.

"Tomorrow, your newspaper will publish a preview of a report," Chen Ping said calmly and clearly. "Say that the Southern State Chip Spark Project EDA Lab has achieved a major breakthrough in underlying architecture security, and has initially verified the feasibility of cracking the built-in backdoors in mainstream foreign industrial software. The wording should be vague, but the attitude should be clear."

Su Qingwan immediately understood.

This report, once released, is enough to make some people lose their minds.

"What if they..." she asked Chen Pingfang worriedly.

"Yes," Chen Ping interrupted her. "They will definitely make a move because they can't afford to lose. But only if they make a move can I uproot them completely."

He took out his phone and dialed an unfamiliar number.

The phone was answered after only one ring, and a calm male voice came from the other end.

"Director Chen."

"Qin Yu, I need your men." Chen Pingfang didn't waste any words. "Target: one. Or maybe a group. Location: near the municipal party committee's residential compound. Time: starting tomorrow night."

"Understood." Qin Yu replied with only two words on the other end of the phone before hanging up.

They didn't ask for the reason, nor did they ask for the details.

This is a form of trust and obedience.

Su Qingwan looked at Chen Pingfang. His calmness in handling the crisis reassured her, but she also felt a little unfamiliar with him.

He was not just a junior who would have meals with her father, but also a decision-maker who could mobilize the power of the nation.

~

The following day, the online version and official WeChat account of the Nanzhou Daily published a brief industry news preview in an inconspicuous position on the front page.

The Chip Spark Program has achieved phased results and may disrupt the landscape of imported industrial software.

This news might not seem like much to the average person, but it carries significant weight in the eyes of some people with ulterior motives.

Night falls.

The municipal party committee's residential compound remained as quiet as ever.

In an inconspicuous office building a few hundred meters away, in a dark office, only a few screens were faintly lit.

On the screen are real-time surveillance images of all the intersections surrounding the residential compound.

Chen Pingfang sat in a chair, holding a cup of tea that had gone cold.

Standing beside him was a man, ramrod straight, with a serious expression; it was Qin Yu.

"Chief, everything is arranged." Qin Yu reported in a low voice, "There are twelve people in total, divided into three groups. All possible approach routes have been blocked. As long as the target enters the red circle, the encirclement can be completed within three minutes."

Chen Ping nodded without saying anything.

He is waiting.

Wait until the person who's been pushed to the limit jumps out on their own.

Time passed second by second.

At 10 p.m., Su Qingwan drove home alone as agreed.

She parked her car in the yard, then got out and slowly walked towards her own small building.

All of this was clearly recorded by the surveillance camera high up and displayed on the screen in front of Chen Pingfang.

Just as Su Qingwan's figure was about to disappear at the building entrance.

A very faint static sound came through Qin Yu's headphones.

"A report: Target spotted at the northeast corner of the alley. Black coat, wearing a mask; physical characteristics match the initial assessment."

Qin Yu quickly tapped the tablet, and a split-screen image was immediately enlarged.

In the video, a dark figure is seen hugging the base of the wall and rapidly approaching the perimeter wall of the residential compound.

He was very agile and seemed very experienced.

"Let him in," Chen Pingfang finally said, his voice calm.

"Yes."

The dark figure easily scaled the wall, landed silently, and skillfully avoided several old surveillance cameras before disappearing into the bushes below Su Qingwan's house.

He pulled a glass bottle containing some kind of liquid and a lighter from his pocket.

Just as he unscrewed the bottle cap, preparing to splash the liquid inside onto the first-floor window...

Several dark figures jumped down from above.

There was no sound, no warning.

The man felt a numbness at the back of his neck, his vision went black, and he instantly lost all consciousness.

The entire process, from taking action to dragging the person away, took no more than ten seconds.

Everything returned to calm, as if nothing had happened.

Qin Yu turned off the screen and bowed slightly to Chen Ping.

"The person has been taken away, Director."

Chen Ping stood up and drank the remaining cold tea in his cup in one gulp.

"Let's go take a look."

~

On the outskirts of Nanzhou City, there was a secret outpost without any sign.

The lights in the interrogation room were glaring.

The man who had been captured was woken up by a bucket of cold water. He opened his eyes in a daze and found himself tightly tied to a metal chair.

Two people were sitting opposite me.

One was Qin Yu, who had no expression on his face, and the other was someone he never dreamed he would meet here: Chen Pingfang, the director of the Provincial Department of Industry and Information Technology.

"Who...who are you? What right do you have to arrest me?" the man shouted defiantly. "This is kidnapping! It's illegal!"

Qin Yu ignored his shouts and simply pushed a document and a pen in front of him.

"Confession. Write down everything you know: who instructed you, who your superior is, and how to contact them."

"I don't know what you're talking about!" the man retorted, his neck stiff. "I'm just a thief, trying to sneak in and steal something!"

Chen Ping laughed.

He stood up, walked over to the man, and picked up a transparent evidence bag from the table. Inside was the glass bottle that had been taken from the man.

"Gasoline. And magnesium powder was added to raise the ignition point, ensuring it can't be easily extinguished." Chen Ping's voice was soft, but the man trembled upon hearing it. "You call this stealing?"

Chen Ping threw the evidence bag back onto the table with a crisp sound.

"I don't have time to waste with you." Chen Pingfang seemed to be losing patience. "Qin Yu, notify the Municipal Bureau and tell them that our National Security Department has arrested a suspect who attempted to carry out an arson attack on the family members of provincial party committee cadres during the course of our investigation."

National Security Bureau!

These three words made the man's face turn pale instantly.

He thought he had only taken on a regular dirty job, at most an attempted arson, but he never expected it to go directly to the National Security Bureau!

That completely changes the nature of the situation!

"I'll talk! I'll talk! I'll tell you everything!" The man's defenses crumbled instantly. "It was...it was Zhang Tao, the vice president of Hanxin Microelectronics! He contacted me! He gave me 200,000 yuan and told me to burn down that house, gave me photos, and said there was a female reporter living inside, and told me to teach her a lesson!"

Hanxin Microelectronics?

Chen Pingfang recognized the name; it was a fairly large chip distribution and packaging company in Nanzhou, and one of the key enterprises supported by the Science and Technology Department under the supervision of Sun Heming.

Qin Yu quickly typed on the computer, and soon a character relationship chart appeared on the screen.

He pointed to a name on the screen and reported to Chen Pingfang in a deep voice.

"Director, we've found it. Zhang Tao, the vice president of Hanxin Microelectronics, is the nephew of Sun Heming, the director of the Science and Technology Department."