Chapter 147 — The Long-Awaited...

Hearing this, Xia Yan was unwilling to accept it but had no way around it. Still, if the Right Elder could be caught this easily, he wouldn't be that cunning mastermind lurking behind the scenes.

And there would be no need for the Mystery Investigation Bureau to step in at all—the local police could handle it entirely on their own. Earlier, Xia Yan had investigated the Right Elder's cell number stored in Chen Afu's phone and found that it too had been routed through several relays and ended up on an overseas number.

"Everything proceeds according to plan, then," Xia Yan nodded and instructed.

The moment Xia Yan gave the order, every department sprang into action. Leading the police team was Xia Xue, who had long since been lying in ambush at the prearranged location.

"Are you ready?" Xia Yan sat in the command vehicle in the distance, remotely directing everything outside.

"All set," came his subordinate's reply over the walkie-talkie.

"Good. Prepare to move," Xia Yan ordered.

A large cargo truck started up slowly and drove toward the prearranged location. The driver was a police officer in disguise. When he reached the designated spot, the truck suddenly swerved and crashed straight into the guardrail near the intersection.

Because the speed and angle of impact had been calculated in advance, the driver suffered no injuries at all; it was only the exterior of the truck that looked severely damaged.

The driver punctured the blood bag he had prepared beforehand, spraying its contents over himself at the instant of the crash, then slumped motionless over the steering wheel as though he were a dead man.

Every detail had been simulated according to a real scenario; not a single step had been taken lightly. Who knew whether that Right Elder might sense something amiss, so each stage was performed with complete authenticity.

At that moment, Chen Afu appeared, tiptoeing to the scene of the truck accident. He made a show of peering into the driver's cab, looked around for a long while, then picked up his phone and dialed the Right Elder's number.

"Hello, Right Elder, this is Chen Afu." Chen Afu lowered his voice as he spoke.

"It's you. Well? Is the task complete?" the Right Elder asked, his voice utterly devoid of emotion.

"Yes, I just did one, at the intersection of xxx Road and xxx Avenue," Chen Afu said smoothly.

"Good, I understand." The Right Elder gave a cold laugh. "Consider yourself lucky to have scraped your life back."

After hanging up, Chen Afu let out a breath of relief. The task was finally done—he had been scared half to death. Chen Afu turned and made his way back to Xia Yan's car in the distance.

"All right, I've completed the task. The things you promised me before—can they be honored now?" Chen Afu said with a sigh of relief.

"As long as you cooperate with our research, we can spare your life, but you will be imprisoned for the rest of it," Xia Yan said.

"Doesn't matter to me." Chen Afu was unconcerned. "As long as you don't hand me over to that Right Elder, anything goes. Even if I die, just make it quick."

Xia Yan nodded, paid Chen Afu no further attention, and focused intently on the crash site, waiting for the Right Elder to appear.

Time slipped away second by second, and in the blink of an eye half an hour had passed, yet there was still no sign of anyone coming. Xia Yan grew anxious and asked Chen Afu, "After you phone him each time, how long does it take before he shows up?"

"I don't know that either. After I finish a job, I leave immediately—how would I dare stay at the scene? If the police found me, I'd be arrested on the spot," Chen Afu said.

Xia Yan said nothing more. He knew Chen Afu could not be lying to him, so what Chen Afu said now was the truth: he really did not know when the Right Elder would appear.

Still, by any ordinary logic, the Right Elder ought to have shown up here as quickly as possible—the slower he was, the greater the danger. After all, no stretch of road could stay empty forever. Once a car passed by and saw the accident, it would call the police, and the police would arrive at once. In that case, wouldn't the Right Elder lose his chance?

Xia Yan was entirely right. The Right Elder had indeed rushed here as fast as he could after receiving the call. But after arriving, he had not made a move, nor had he appeared anywhere near the crash site.

The Right Elder gave two cold laughs and said with contempt, "A pack of trash like you, thinking you can catch me? You vastly overestimate yourselves. Don't imagine that catching Chen Afu means you can lure me out—how naive. Heh heh heh heh heh heh."

The reason the Right Elder had spotted something amiss the moment he arrived was twofold.

First, he was himself a user of gu, and like Zhang Zhishen, he had an extraordinarily keen sense for other gu users. Chen Afu counted as half a gu user, and moreover one personally taught by the Right Elder himself.

So the instant the Right Elder drew near this area, he sensed Chen Afu's aura—Chen Afu was still nearby, he had not left.

With that suspicion, the Right Elder grew all the more cautious. Second, the malevolent gu on his person had a powerful sensitivity to the newly dead. At this moment his malevolent gu showed no reaction whatsoever, which meant there was no corpse in the truck at all—it was a living person in disguise.

Given these two points, the Right Elder immediately realized this was a trap: Chen Afu had been caught by the police, and they were trying to lure him out.

If he could be fooled so easily, the Right Elder would never have accomplished anything of consequence. With a cold glance at the surrounding terrain, he quickly located the men lying in ambush nearby.

It seemed Chen Afu had been abandoned. The Right Elder sighed, feeling somewhat vexed. He wondered which of the police could be so capable as to actually capture Chen Afu.

Ruining his grand plan—if he ever found out who it was, he would never let that person off, the Right Elder thought viciously.

For now, however, the most important thing was to get away from here. His malevolent gu was not yet fully cultivated, his body was still mere flesh and blood, and he remained deeply afraid of the police's firearms.

However powerful he might be, once he went out there he would likely be riddled with bullets. But no matter—once his malevolent gu was complete, he would have nothing to fear, and then he could do whatever he pleased.

With that thought, the Right Elder forcibly suppressed the fury in his heart and vanished in an instant into the night.

On Xia Yan's side, nearly an hour had passed and still there was no sign of the Right Elder. He grew anxious, and an ominous foreboding rose in his heart.

Could it be that his plan had been seen through? Xia Yan broke out in a cold sweat. It was not impossible—it was highly likely. The Right Elder was no ordinary man; he was deeply uncanny, and many things about him could not be judged by common sense. So if the Right Elder had discovered his plan, that was entirely plausible.

Still, until all hope was truly gone, Xia Yan could not give up. Though he understood in his heart that the odds were growing fainter and fainter, and that the Right Elder probably would not come, he held on until the very last moment.

A faint fish-belly white began to spread across the sky. Who knew how much more time had passed before Xia Yan finally despaired. Dawn was about to break—this time the Right Elder truly would not come.

The scene was blocking traffic, and once the morning commute began it would disrupt the normal flow. With no other choice, Xia Yan ordered his men, "Everyone withdraw. No more waiting."

Xia Yan understood in his heart that the Right Elder must have detected his plan. Though he did not know how, a failure was a failure. And after this failure, luring him out again would be doubly difficult.