"The debt Chen Wan took on for his mother. Ten million yuan. The contract bears Chen Wan's name—he's listed as the debtor." Yin Wuwang set the teacup back on the table. "But we checked the signing date—it lines up exactly with when Chen Xiulan returned from Linjiang to Cloud City."
He looked into Dragon Brother's eyes.
"A gambling-addicted mother runs away for two years. She comes back, and her twenty-five-year-old son walks into your office of his own accord, pledging his bar and the next ten years of his life to you. What did you do during that process?"
The curve of Dragon Brother's mouth dropped by half. This young detective's approach had caught him off guard—it didn't sound like a murder investigation. It sounded like someone settling accounts.
"I didn't do anything." Dragon Brother's tone remained steady, but the warmth from his opening had thinned considerably. "Chen Xiulan owed me ten million. She ran, I couldn't find her. Her son came to me and said he was willing to repay the debt on his mother's behalf. He seemed sincere, so I gave him a reasonable arrangement—eight percent annual interest, ten-year term, the bar as collateral."
He paused, his tone lifting slightly: "That rate is very generous for our line of work. If I'd really wanted to make things difficult for him, I had plenty of ways."
"Then why didn't you?" Yin Wuwang asked.
"Because there was no need." Dragon Brother spread his hands. "Ten million isn't pocket change, but it's not worth burning bridges over. Chen Wan was willing to carry it, so I let him carry it. He paid on time every month, never once late. Five years, five million six hundred thousand repaid." He leaned forward slightly. "I've been in business for decades. A young man who keeps his word is worth more than a young man with money."
Yin Wuwang ran through the logic. It matched Captain Lin's earlier assessment—Dragon Brother's "generosity" was pure arithmetic. A steady repayment stream was more profitable than a one-time debt collection.
"But he's dead," Yin Wuwang said. "The remaining four-hundred-plus thousand—who do you collect from?"
Dragon Brother's expression finally showed a flicker of genuine displeasure. A raw nerve, the profit kind.
"That's my loss." His tone sank. "I'd also like to know who killed him. You solving the case doesn't hurt me one bit."
That was the sentence Yin Wuwang had been waiting for.
"Then please cooperate with us on a few questions." He said. "In Chen Wan's five years at the bar, besides managing the place and repaying the debt—what else did he do?"
Dragon Brother's fingers rubbed along his watchband.
A tiny motion. His wrist turned, gaze dropping with it for just an instant. Yin Wuwang saw it clearly—he was using that brief glance downward to buy himself time to decide what to say.
"Chen Wan was the bar manager." Dragon Brother raised his head again, tone flat. "Scheduling, procurement, maintaining client relationships. He did well. Revenue's been growing steadily for the entire five years."
"Client relationships." Xie Qingyan spoke up suddenly.
It was the first time he'd spoken since entering the room. His voice wasn't loud, his pace unhurried, but Dragon Brother's gaze snapped to him instantly—because the way those two words left his mouth stripped an entire layer of subtext bare.
"Dr. Shen." Dragon Brother's tone carried a hint of an edge. "Chen Wan got along well with the customers. In the service industry, isn't that perfectly normal?"
"Depends how you define 'service.'" Xie Qingyan's expression held no trace of aggression—if anything, it carried a kind of academic calm, as though discussing the data in a lab report. "A bar manager maintaining client relationships is normal. But if the scope of service extends beyond what the position requires—that's no longer normal. That's a transaction."
Dragon Brother's lips pressed together. The aerator in the fish tank hummed its steady stream of bubbles, filling the seconds he didn't respond.
Yin Wuwang watched Xie Qingyan from the side.
His posture hadn't changed, his tone hadn't changed, even the rhythm of his breathing hadn't changed. But the precision of that statement was surgical—opening the skin, exposing what lay beneath, cutting not a millimeter too deep, not a millimeter too shallow.
Yin Wuwang felt his heartbeat skip half a measure.
Fuguang was more striking in an interrogation than on a battlefield. On the battlefield, he was the Sword Sovereign wreathed in ten thousand rays of sword light—breathtaking as a matter of course. But here, in this reception room crammed with tasteless ornaments, wearing an ordinary black jacket and sitting in a leather chair, he'd silenced a man who'd spent decades navigating the gray economy with a single emotionless sentence.
That kind of presence was something unique to Xie Qingyan in this world.
Yin Wuwang pressed the thought down. And filed it away.
"I don't know what you're implying." Dragon Brother's tone went cold. "The scope of Chen Wan's work at my bar was his own decision."
"Then let me rephrase." Yin Wuwang picked up the thread, pulling the rhythm back into his own hands. "Did Chen Wan ever—in a private capacity—accompany certain clients?"
Dragon Brother glanced at him. Then at Xie Qingyan. He shifted to the side, hands folded on his knees.
"He occasionally accompanied some VIP clients." Dragon Brother said. "Drinks, conversation. Some clients liked him, were willing to spend more—"
"How much more?"
"Varied. A few thousand on the low end, tens of thousands on the high end." A sharp edge of impatience entered Dragon Brother's tone. "But it was voluntary. Nobody forced him. He owed me money, not his body."
Yin Wuwang didn't press on how much water the word "voluntary" was holding. Now wasn't the time to crack that shell. The next piece of the puzzle he needed wasn't here.
"One last direction." Yin Wuwang leaned forward, elbows on his knees. "Was there a woman in Chen Wan's life? Not a client, not an employee—someone he personally cared about."
Dragon Brother's pupils contracted.
He hadn't expected these two officers to go there.
"How did you know?" The words came out before he could stop them.
[End of V2_Chapter 54]
Next: "He Guarded Her Like His Life Depended On It"—A Name That Changes Everything