You went on a blind date and presented an A-level wanted criminal as a meeting gift?

Chu Yunfei remained seated in his chair, looking up at Lin Chen standing before him.

"I've heard of you."

Chu Yunfei tapped his fingers rhythmically on the armrest.

"We solved Prajna's case, arrested Zhao Changsheng, and took down the Skynet base. We're quite the big shot in this small place."

The emphasis on the three words "small place" was very obvious.

Lin Chen took a sip of coffee but didn't reply.

Chu Yunfei continued, "However, you may not know much about the outside world."

"Jiangcheng City is a pond, and you are a dragon in the pond, which is quite powerful."

"But outside the pond is the sea, and any one of the fish in the sea could swallow this pond whole."

"Do you get me?"

"not understand."

Lin Chen shook his head.

Chu Yunfei was taken aback.

"I only know one thing."

Lin Chen placed the coffee cup on the table next to him quietly.

"Whether it's fish from a pond or fish from the sea, once the scales are removed, the bones are removed, and it's fried in oil, it all tastes the same."

Chu Yunfei stopped tapping.

Their eyes met briefly in the air.

There were no dramatic scenes with sparks flying, but everyone present felt the temperature drop sharply in that instant.

Then Chu Yunfei laughed, a genuine laugh from the bottom of his heart, a laugh that came from the feeling of having met a formidable opponent.

"Interesting, very interesting."

He took out two gold-embossed cards from the inside pocket of his suit, flicked them with his finger, and the cards flew through the air in an arc before landing precisely on Su Qingge's desk.

Those were two invitations.

The lettering is in gold foil, with subtle embossed patterns. The paper is of extremely high quality, and a delicate shield-shaped family crest, the symbol of the Chu family, is printed in the corner.

"Tomorrow night, on the Victoria cruise ship, I will host a small celebrity dinner, inviting prominent figures from Jiangcheng City."

Ye Qingcheng of the Ye Group was also among those invited.

Chu Yunfei stood up, adjusted his cufflinks, and lingered on Su Qingge for a second longer. The greed and possessiveness in that second sent a chill down Su Qingge's spine.

"Qingge, bring your belligerent dog along."

"Let me see what other skills he has besides being stubborn."

After saying that, he turned and strode away. The two martial arts bodyguards followed silently, like two moving shadows.

The sound of footsteps faded into the distance in the corridor.

Someone in the Major Crimes Unit office area let out a long sigh of relief, only to realize that their back was soaked in cold sweat.

Su Qingge picked up the invitation on the table, glanced at it, and frowned.

"Tomorrow night, on the cruise ship, this is a trap."

"Of course it's a setup."

Lin Chen spoke casually, as if they were discussing what to have for dinner.

"He invited you to his event, and he also invited Ye Qingcheng, bringing together all the powerful and influential people in Jiangcheng on one boat."

"He wanted to demonstrate his power to everyone and put pressure on the Su and Ye families."

"Then why are you still going?"

"How can we not go?"

Lin Chen put the two invitations into his pocket.

"They've practically delivered it to our doorstep."

Su Qingge looked at him, hesitated, and finally only said one sentence.

"Watch out for those two bodyguards."

Lin Chen nodded and walked out of the Major Crimes Unit.

Instead of returning to the safe house, he went directly to the empty office next to the evidence center.

As soon as the door closed, he took out his phone, and Ye Qingcheng called almost simultaneously.

"President Ye's information network is quite impressive."

"Chu Yunfei's people sent an invitation to my secretary half an hour ago."

Ye Qingcheng's voice was filled with obvious anger.

"At the same time, three of my core suppliers in South China suddenly broke their contracts, citing a variety of reasons, none of which were valid."

"I checked, and all three companies are controlled by the same fund from the Cayman Islands."

"The Chu family's money."

"The Chu family's money."

Ye Qingcheng repeated those four words, her tone turning several degrees colder.

"By cutting off my supply chain, he is telling me that I either have to obey and get on board, or I can wait for the Ye family to be slowly bled dry."

Are you scared?

Lin Chen asked.

There was a moment of silence on the other end of the phone, then Ye Qingcheng chuckled softly, her laughter carrying the pride and disdain of the head of the Ye Group.

"I, Ye Qingcheng, have never been afraid of anyone."

"How about together tomorrow night?"

"Honey, you're treating, I'll pay."

Ye Qingcheng's tone suddenly became playful, but then she quickly reverted to her icy demeanor.

"My people have already uncovered 70% of the Chu family's financial network in the southeast region."

"The remaining 30% circulated on the dark web and underground banks more than a dozen times, and cannot be traced by normal means."

Send it to me.

Lin Chen hung up the phone and opened the laptop in front of him, which was equipped with a military-grade encryption system.

Ye Qingcheng's information arrived three minutes later. It was a densely packed company organizational chart, a financial flow diagram, and a network of personnel relationships, as complicated as a ball of yarn that had been tangled countless times.

Lin Chen's fingers landed on the keyboard.

He didn't rush to hack into the Chu family's system.

Given the size of the Chu family, the level of protection for their core data would not be lower than the national defense level; a direct attack would be the stupidest approach.

He chose a different path.

We started by investigating the 70% of funds that Ye Qingcheng had found. Following the flow of funds, we identified every shell company, offshore account, and suspicious transaction of the Chu family in Jiangcheng.

Then, using these data as pieces of a puzzle, he constructed a complete model of Chu Yunfei's underground economic empire in Jiangcheng in his mind.

An actuary's mind makes this process as natural as breathing.

He simultaneously calculated all the probabilities and paths of the funds—where they came from, where they flowed, at which point they branched out, at which stage they were laundered, and ultimately into which underground river—forming an incredibly clear map of financial crimes.

Two hours later, he pressed the last Enter key on the keyboard.

On the screen, a vast network consisting of hundreds of nodes and thousands of money chains was clearly presented to him.

Chu Yunfei's activities in Jiangcheng were not limited to smuggling.

He's laundering money.

Using Jiangcheng's real economy and underground financial channels, the Chu family carried out a large-scale cleanup and transfer of their gray funds in the capital.

Smuggling is just one aspect; the part beneath the surface is far larger than anyone imagines.

Lin Chen stared at the screen for a few seconds, then copied all the data and stored it in encrypted form.

He doesn't know how to use these things now.

Because directly revealing it would only trigger a full-scale counterattack from the Chu family, which would drag the Su family into an even deeper quagmire.

What he wanted was to plunge that knife into Chu Yunfei's most painful spot at the right time and in the right place.

For example, tomorrow night.

On that cruise ship.

In front of everyone.

Lin Chen closed his laptop, leaned back in his chair, and closed his eyes for a while.

Images flashed through my mind: my father lying in the ICU, his body wrapped in bandages; my mother's red and swollen eyes; and Su Qingge's slightly trembling voice as she said, "The Chu family were my grandfather's political enemies."

He opened his eyes.

There was no anger in his eyes, only a chilling, terrifyingly precise calculation.

When Chu Yunfei threw the invitation in front of him, he probably thought he was issuing a condescending challenge.

But in Lin Chen's eyes, those two gold-embossed cards were the epitaphs that Chu Yunfei had personally written for him.