Ark Heroine Development Plan

"Go ahead."

Guan Yueli waved his hand: "The wine is good, it's not a mess, I agree."

A trace of uncontrollable ecstasy flashed across Araya Yosuke's face. He tried his best to control his emotions and spoke carefully:

"The company is trying to use Longmen as a base to penetrate the Da Yan market, but Da Yan's wine industry... is very complex. Perhaps we need your help—no, just a little help from the masters under your command, and we should be able to..."

"I don't understand this kind of thing." Guan Yueli frowned, "Go talk to A Cha."

"Thank you very much, Master Guanyue! I will do my best to contribute my strength to the Hundred Ghosts!"

Araya Yosuke kept bowing and thanking loudly, his sincerity was so moving.

Guan Yueli just waved his hand and said, "I'm going to continue drinking. Go do your own thing."

"Yes, I won't let anyone disturb you!"

He made this promise so earnestly and retreated with great respect.

Guan Yueli simply turned over, facing the table full of empty wine bottles, subconsciously reached out his hand, and then retracted it halfway.

She burst into laughter.

"You don't like that guy." Nian stroked Guan Yueli's cheek, "It's just right, I don't like him either. This guy has that, um... Eastern office worker vibe that's too strong. I never thought you'd have someone like him under your command."

"It's just... inheritance."

Staring at the empty bottle, Guan Yueli muttered to himself, "Generation after generation, person after person, some leave, some stay, it's that simple."

But what did those who left take away, and what did they forget; and what did those who stayed... inherit, and what do they still remember?

"Hey... Boss, hiccup~"

"How come you can drink more than me? That's amazing! I'll definitely follow you!"

"If we drink like this, there won't be enough for us to drink no matter where we go."

"How about... I give birth to a son, kill a few rich people, give him the money and ask him to brew wine for the boss in the future. That way... hiccups, we won't have to worry about having no wine to drink, right?"

Guan Yueli closed her eyes.

"Very disappointed?" Nian's voice sounded in her ears.

"Yeah." The woman replied softly.

"Then stop drinking and get some sleep."

"..."

"If not sleep, what to sleep for?"

She opened her eyes, picked up a new bottle of wine, bit off the cap, and drank it in big gulps.

"There's so much wine, what are we keeping it for? Of course, we're drinking it to our heart's content."

The woman named Guan Yueli was drinking and laughing, just like she behaved every day, never sad, never lonely.

But the wine will eventually run out, and all that's left is always an empty bottle.

Chapter 163 - Old Friends

"Master, can you repair the key?"

A young girl came to the lock shop pushing a scooter.

"Huh?" The old man sitting behind the counter looked up. "Car keys? Go find the car dealer."

"No, I mean Xiu."

Chen placed the slightly damaged and bent key on the counter with a subtle expression: "Is this level of key okay? I accidentally, uh... fell on the road and got run over by a car."

The old master picked it up and took a look at it: "It's okay, come and get it tomorrow."

Chen was stunned for a moment: "Not now?"

"Not so fast." The old man waved his hand. "You have to keep your car. You can't drive it anyway. Otherwise, go to the dealer and ask him to replace the key for you."

"..." The girl's expression was uncertain. She repeated the question, "Not now?"

The old master raised his head and looked at Chen for two or three seconds, then laughed strangely and said, "It's not your car, is it? Did you steal it or borrow it?"

Chen's face was frozen and he said nothing.

"Wrecking other people's cars happens every day, but breaking someone's car keys is the first time I've seen one." The old man shook his head and said, "It doesn't matter. I don't care what's wrong with your car. I can fix it for you now, but I'll pay you more."

"How many?"

"two hundred."

"Okay, how long will it take?"

"Look at how expensive your car is." The old man stood up with the keys. "The more expensive it is, the longer it will take. Just wait."

Chen's heart sank. Xingxiong was very generous and would definitely be even more generous when it came to things he liked. She had no idea how expensive this car was.

She watched the old man slowly walk to the door of the lock shop and try to push the cart to the back of the shop. He was only a little over 1.5 meters tall with a hunched back. Chen, who had been pushing the cart all the way here, knew very well how heavy it was and immediately walked over to him to help.

The old man impatiently slapped away Chen's hand that was trying to hold the handle and said, "I'm not old enough to need a little girl's help. Wait there."

Chen stared blankly at the old master pushing the car in with one hand, and looking calmly at the car keys in his other hand, as if he was thinking about how to start working.

She thought of her colleague's complaint during dinner one day: "You never know how many monsters and gods are hiding in the Longmen slums."

According to that colleague, she and her team were chasing a transnational wanted criminal, who disappeared after escaping into the slums. They were all very anxious, but the next day an old lady tied up the criminal with a hemp rope and took him to the Guard Bureau on the grounds that he had stolen cabbage from her house.

It's quite outrageous.

Subsequent investigation revealed that the wanted criminal was wrongly accused, and the cabbage thief was the aunt's neighbor.

Chen just treated this kind of thing as a story. Cops are human too, so it's okay for them to brag. Rather, having seen so many bizarre things, many officers are even better at bragging, their stories, half true and half false, leaving people speechless.

But the old man's aura and performance made Chen think of the story of that colleague and the sigh he made after telling the story.

Chen, who was sitting on the bench, didn't think much about it. It didn't matter to her whether the person was an expert or not. As long as the car could be fixed quickly, that was all that mattered.

"The only clues we have now are... those two gangs."

Chen muttered to himself.

Of the intelligence she could get, only two pieces of information were useful.

The first option is to find the manufacturer that provided the explosives to the woman, but this route has been blocked by Xingxiong and is not feasible.

The second one... is those two gangs, the slum gangs that the two women mentioned "robbed a large amount of smuggled Originium".

Chen took a different approach and obtained information about the two gangs by checking the files of the woman's boyfriend who died in the line of duty - one was called the Wujian Society and the other was called the Ma Gang. Both gangs had a long criminal record in the Security Bureau.

There is no doubt that this path leads to a more direct direction, but conversely, it is also more risky.

"Smuggling Originium" is undoubtedly a serious crime. As the absolute foundation of energy, Originium must be under the absolute control of every city in its jurisdiction. Those who can do this are all well-connected. They have the ability and channels to do this in a safer and more secretive way, rather than relying on small gangs that can't even get out of the slums.

"A cover... a cover."

Chen rubbed his brows. "Why use a gang from the slums? It's too crude, too conspicuous. Such a crude cover is meaningless."

"Or did the person behind this seize upon this idea... and conceal it in the most dangerous way possible?"

Analyzing and sorting out the facts of a case is a headache, even a despairing task for every police officer. You need to analyze more than just the clues, the current situation, and past cases. You also need to analyze the perpetrator, the criminal, and what kind of person he is. Otherwise, it's impossible to predict the correct outcome.

It's a constant nesting doll process—what if he thought of this? What if he thought of this and I thought of this? What if he didn't think of this at all?

This complex situation, layered upon layer, could only be solved with sufficient intelligence. All strategies were based on known information. But unfortunately... Chen lacked everything right now, and the most important thing was intelligence.

This is a hopeless dilemma, with no help, no intelligence, no clue, and no...way out.

Chen intertwined his fingers against his head, closed his eyes and sighed deeply.

She didn't know how the case at the Guard Bureau was progressing, and she wouldn't ask, because the answer she would get, and the process of getting the answer, would definitely not be what she wanted.

Thinking of this, Chen opened his eyes, spread out his palms, and stared at his palms.

"She really is... not wrong at all." The girl smiled bitterly.

What Xingxiong said is absolutely right.

Arrogance, imperceptible, yet so obvious.

It was precisely because of this arrogance that Chen did not approve of the investigation work of the Guard Bureau and wanted to use her own abilities to find out the truth - because she believed that only the facts verified by her own hands were the only truth.

When did she start to become like this? Was it when she first judged a sinner with her own will, or... even before that?

"But no matter what, it should be related to her." Chen murmured softly.

"Guan Yue...is this what you want?"

Chen put her hand on Chi Xiao's hilt. She thought of many things. She thought of the face of the chairman of Duanlong Group who still showed no remorse before his death, the many words Wei Yanwu said, and the time long, long ago when she didn't even have the qualifications to choose. She could only hide behind that man and watch her sister go away.

She suddenly smiled and said, "It seems not bad."

"What's not bad?"

"that is--!!!!!"

Chen's pupils suddenly contracted, his heart stopped abruptly, and he leaned back sharply, trying to get away from the face that suddenly appeared in front of him.

"Why are you here!"

Her voice was a little shrill and off-key.

"Isn't it my freedom to appear wherever I want?" Guan Yueli tilted her head. "But you, Xiao Chen, were so lost in thought just now. I thought you were drugged."

Chen selectively ignored Guan Yueli's trash talk: "Were you just here?"

"No, I heard you mumbling something about 'not bad' the moment I got here—so what exactly is 'not bad'?"

"…Nothing, just talking to myself."

"Um……"

Guan Yueli stroked his chin and looked Chen up and down until the latter began to feel uneasy, then he looked away.

"Forget it. If you don't want to tell me, I won't ask. Let me change the question. What are you doing here? Picking a lock? Your house isn't in the slums, so why are you here picking a lock?"

Chen's expression froze. Unable to find a reason, she retorted, "Then why are you here? Are you here to open the lock, too?"

"I'm here to see an old friend." Guan Yueli looked towards the counter. "Where's Ah Hu?"

"...Ahu?"

Chen was stunned for a moment: "You mean the old master?"

"There's no one else in his shop, so that should be it. Where is he?"

Chen turned his head away: "Working."

"Oh, then I'll just go find him. He's in the back, right?"

Chen didn't want to talk. She was now thinking whether it would be better for her to leave first.

At this moment, the old man came out from behind the shop and said, "Little girl, your car is too troublesome. You need to add some more..."

The old man looked at Guan Yueli, and Guan Yueli looked at her with a smile.

"Tsk." The old man clicked his tongue, "It's closed. I won't see you off."

Nian, who was bored and playing with his phone, looked up and stared at the old man with wide eyes: "Who is so awesome? Wait, you are not——"

The old man shifted his gaze to Nian, and his eyelids twitched again:

"Two gods coming at once, my little shop can't handle it, let's go quickly."

"Oh, what are you talking about? Now that you're here, why are you leaving?"

Guan Yueli approached the old man and patted his shoulder with the enthusiasm of a host: "It's been a few years since we last met. You've aged a bit. Congratulations, congratulations."

"Thanks to you." The old man bared his teeth, "Stop taking pictures, do you believe I'll just lie down?"

"You've turned into a tiger, and you've even learned how to scam people."

"Scamming is more profitable than unlocking." The old man Guan Yueli called Ah Hu sighed, "What a damn bad luck. Never mind, this day will come sooner or later. Are you here to pick up something?"

Guan Yueli blinked: "Can't I come to see you?"

"Don't disgust me."

The woman looked shocked: "Are you a male ketone, Ah Hu, you actually think I'm disgusting?"