Handong: Sha Li wants political achievements? I'll shut down the entire province.

A lightweight disposable paper cup hit my face, bounced twice, and rolled to the ground.

Hou Liangping's head was knocked to the side by the impact, and a few drops of cold water from the previous day clung to his cheek.

He froze for two seconds, then suddenly straightened up like a stray dog ​​whose tail had been stepped on.

He slammed both hands down hard on the cold desk with a loud "bang".

"Ji Jian! What discouraging things are you saying!"

Hou Liangping's eyes were bloodshot and bloodshot, like a gambler who had lost everything.

He grabbed the stack of rough printing paper and slammed it down in front of Ji Changming.

The paper was of very poor quality; it was the kind of waste paper that had been printed on both sides, and the back of the paper even had the cafeteria's old menu from the previous month printed on it.

"This is the material I compiled after three sleepless nights!"

Hou Liangping was spitting as he spoke, and his fingers were pounding the table with a deafening roar.

"Shin (Su Jianxin) illegally colluded with overseas institutions to maliciously freeze the Chung family's offshore funds!"

"Yan Qingfeng is suspected of manipulating the financial market and obstructing normal commercial investment in Handong Province!"

He was breathing heavily, his eyes flashing with a manic light.

"The evidence is irrefutable! As long as you issue the arrest warrant, I'll borrow two squads from the city bureau, and we can turn the tables tonight!"

Ji Changming looked at the pile of tattered paper in front of him, and then at Hou Liangping, who had gone mad with greed.

He suddenly felt it was utterly absurd, and even wanted to laugh.

Ji Changming shoved his frozen hands into the pockets of his thick down jacket and snorted coldly.

"Turn the tables? Hou Liangping, I think your brain isn't filled with law, it's filled with mush!"

He stood up, walked to the dimly lit window, and ripped open the blinds.

The biting north wind blew straight in through the cracks in the window, making one's bones ache.

"Come here! Open your eyes and look at yourself!"

Ji Changming pointed to the dark courtyard outside the window, his voice sounding particularly stern in the empty office.

"It's 6:30 PM! Not a single corridor light in the entire city prosecutor's office building is on!"

"Why? Because the municipal finance bureau's account has been legally locked, and we owe the power company 300,000 yuan in electricity bills!"

No sooner had he finished speaking than the office door, which was slightly ajar, was pushed open.

A young police officer leaned half his body inside, shivering from the cold.

He held a shriveled, hard bun in his hand, his eyes darting around nervously.

"The water dispenser on the first floor is out of power and not boiling water. Do you have any hot water here?"

The officer swallowed hard and awkwardly waved the half-packet of pickled vegetables in his hand.

"The brothers were so hungry they couldn't take it anymore and wanted to just have a few bites of hot water."

Ji Changming's eyes suddenly stung with tears.

He strode to the table, picked up his chipped thermos, and shoved it into the officer's hand.

"Take these and drink them, share them all. Tell everyone to go home early today."

The police officers left, expressing their deepest gratitude.

Ji Changming turned around, his gray hair disheveled in the cold wind.

He stared intently at Hou Liangping, his chest heaving violently.

"Do you see that, Director Hou? This is what you call justice!"

Ji Changming approached step by step, his eyes sharp enough to kill.

"There are still more than thirty brothers downstairs who have risked their lives with me."

"They don't have money to eat out. The canteen doesn't even have enough money to buy a single cabbage; they're all eating cold steamed buns!"

Hou Liangping gritted his teeth, and the veins on his neck throbbed.

"That's a temporary difficulty! It's Yan Qingfeng's despicable tactic!"

He stubbornly refused to admit it, clinging to his neck.

"Once we arrest Su Jianxin and freeze Ling Xiao's accounts, everything will be resolved!"

"You're talking nonsense!"

Ji Changming, unusually, swore and slapped the stack of scrap paper off the table.

White pieces of paper were scattered all over the ground like snowflakes.

"Arrest Su Jianxin? They were operating legally right under the nose of the International Securities and Exchange Commission!"

"What are you going to use to investigate? Your mouth to fill up police cars, or your influence to cover a five billion dollar deficit?"

Ji Changming looked at him, his eyes gradually turning contemptuous.

"Hou Liangping, stop using national righteousness as a pretext. It disgusts me!"

Hou Liangping's expression changed, and he took half a step back.

"Ji Jian, you've been terrified of capitalists; you've lost all principles!"

"Don't try to label me like that!"

Ji Changming let out a cold laugh, directly piercing through the last veil of secrecy.

"Your wife, Zhong Xiaoai, has set up offshore trust funds worth tens of billions overseas. Do you think I'm blind?"

Hou Liangping looked as if he had been struck by lightning; his face turned deathly pale, and even his lips lost all color.

"You... what nonsense are you talking about!"

"She wanted to use the money to short Yan Qingfeng's stock in the US, but Su Jianxin exposed her and reported her to Interpol for money laundering."

Ji Changming stared at his evasive eyes, his words piercing to the heart.

"You're running to me like a mad dog to get arrested, not for the sake of the people of Handong at all."

"You're just worried about the Chung family's savings for their funeral! You're venting your pathetic personal resentment!"

The lie was torn apart in front of him, and Hou Liangping was like a shadow puppet whose tendons had been removed.

His legs went weak, and he slumped down onto the cold folding chair, unable to utter a word for a long time.

Ji Changming took a deep breath, feeling suffocated even if he stayed in the room for another second.

He walked back to his desk and opened the bottom drawer.

Take out a document that you have already written.

On the red-headed letter paper, the four characters "Resignation Report" were written neatly.

Ji Changming took out his personal seal made of ox horn and pressed it heavily onto his name.

"Snapped!"

The bright red inkpad looked particularly glaring in the dim light.

"I'm quitting this damn official position."

Ji Changming tore off the prosecutor's uniform from the coat rack and casually tossed it onto the dusty sofa.

He didn't look at Hou Liangping again, and pulled his cheap black down jacket tighter around himself.

I pushed open the door and strode into the darkness of the corridor.

He left behind only a cold sentence that lingered in the office for a long time.

"To hell with the rule of law ideals, I'm going back to my hometown to farm tomorrow, at least I can get a hot meal."

Hou Liangping slumped in his chair, staring at the discarded uniform, utterly silent.

Half an hour later, at the Jingzhou Municipal Public Security Bureau.

The air conditioning wasn't on in the director's office either; it was as cold as an icebox.

Zhao Donglai, wearing a thick military overcoat, was squatting in the corner, warming his hands with a dilapidated electric heater.

"Ding-dong."

The phone on the table suddenly lit up; it was an internal work group for the city's top leaders.

Zhao Donglai rubbed his hands together, picked up his phone and glanced at it, his eyes widening instantly.

There was only one lonely system notification in the group.

"Chi Chang-ming, a prosecutor from the Municipal Prosecutor's Office, has left the group."

Zhao Donglai's heart skipped a beat, and an ominous premonition rushed to his head.

Before he could even react, the office door was slammed open with a loud bang.

The deputy director barged in without even knocking.

He was out of breath from running, and his face looked even worse than the night outside.

"Director Zhao! Something terrible has happened!"

Zhao Donglai suddenly stood up, dropping the hand warmer he was holding to the ground.

"What's the panic! Is the sky falling down?"

The deputy director swallowed hard, his voice trembling like a leaf falling in the autumn wind.

"The municipal party committee's mailroom just called to say that Ji Jian slammed his resignation letter on the table and took a taxi straight to the train station!"

Zhao Donglai gasped, his head buzzing.

Old Ji just ran away? Did he quit?

Just as he was about to speak, the deputy director took two steps closer and eagerly blurted out the next sentence.

"Director Zhao, not only has Inspector Ji run away, but we're also about to reach our breaking point."

The deputy director pointed to the pitch-black municipal bureau compound outside the window, and almost burst into tears.

"The logistics department just reported that the police dog base has been without dog food for three days, and even the police cars are out of gas and stuck. Now Lingxiao Energy has said they'll cut off our residential compound's natural gas in ten minutes. How are we supposed to shift the blame for this?"