NOVPUBAfterward, Chen Nan helped Hu Xingbang collect Hu Jing’s remains, and at the same time, he recited scriptures beside her, praying for her soul, hoping she would be reincarnated soon.
Having done these things, Hu Xingbang, looking utterly lost, cradled the remains in his arms and took Chen Nan and the others back to his house. There, he fetched a heavily wrapped notebook from the chimney in the kitchen, along with a USB drive.
"I’m sorry, Taoist priest, I lied to you before," Hu Xingbang said, his eyes void of light, as he recounted, "Before the incident, Xiaojing had come back once, and she gave me this notebook and USB drive."
"She said someone wanted to harm her."
"I didn’t know what she had encountered, I hoped she could escape from Jizhou and live in a place where no one recognized her."
"But she said that the other party’s power reached the heavens."
"Nevertheless, she was not afraid to die."
"She just feared that after her death, the murderer wouldn’t be brought to justice, so she entrusted me to keep this notebook and USB drive safe, to be handed over only to someone trustworthy."
"That way, even in death, she would have no regrets."
Chen Nan solemnly said, "Rest assured, old man, I will definitely bring the murderer to justice and ensure your daughter’s death was not in vain," as he took the notebook and USB drive.
Though the weight of the notebook and USB drive was negligible,
In Chen Nan’s hands, they seemed as heavy as Mount Tai.
Because he knew all too well that they contained evidence of Dai Shouyi’s illegal and unethical actions!
After handing the USB drive to Lu Yuanyang, Chen Nan opened the seemingly ordinary notebook.
Upon opening it, the pages were filled with dense text and some hand-drawn charts.
It meticulously recorded Dai Shouyi’s under-the-table dealings in engineering projects.
The bidding process for some major projects was manipulated, with Dai Shouyi using his power to appoint specific companies to win the bids, from which he received huge bribes.
The notebook also detailed Dai Shouyi’s regulatory violations in land approvals.
He abused his power to greenlight developers who did not meet regulations, leading to the irrational development of a large amount of land, damaging the ecological environment and harming the public interest.
The small USB drive, however, stored a large number of audio and video files.
There were recordings of Dai Shouyi’s secret meetings with some unscrupulous businessmen where they blatantly discussed how to divide the spoils and evade legal sanctions.
There were also some blurry video clips, showing Dai Shouyi in luxury venues receiving expensive gifts, the values of which far exceeded the norms of social exchange.
Beyond that, there were some indecent videos; Dai Shouyi starred in each, but the female leads varied, with a new one in almost every clip.
Moreover, the USB drive contained electronic documents, which included evidence of Dai Shouyi embezzling public funds.
He transferred large sums of public money into his own private accounts, for personal luxury spending and investments, causing tremendous losses to the state and the people.
Of course, it also contained the kind of information Chen Nan wanted to see, such as with whom Dai Shouyi conspired to alter the scores of those poor students – documented in great detail.
Among them was information regarding Nie Xiaoyu.
Her score was sold for eighty thousand yuan.
For eighty thousand yuan, someone bought a spot at Tsinghua University.
There was no record of the assassination attempt, but Hu Jing’s left-behind information mentioned someone named Lin Feng, who specialized in solving thorny issues for Dai Shouyi.
Chen Nan looked at Lu Yuanyang and said in a low voice, "Mayor Lu, with this information, we should be able to bring down Dai Shouyi, right?"
Lu Yuanyang knew about Dai Shouyi’s nepotism and corruption, but upon seeing all this incriminating information, he immediately felt a chill, and said, "Any single piece of evidence could topple Dai Shouyi."
Chen Nan said with profound earnestness, "Then I’ll leave the rest to you. I hope you can bring justice for Hu Jing’s wronged soul."
"Rest assured," Lu Yuanyang also revealed a mad smile, "I have made meticulous arrangements on my way here, guaranteed to bring Dai Shouyi to complete disgrace."
With that, he picked up his phone and dialed Zhao Chengfeng’s number.
Zhao Chengfeng was originally the deputy director of the Jizhou Public Security Bureau and the third in command within the bureau.
But because of Chen Nan’s guidance,
he bravely took action against criminals and was seriously injured while capturing three felons on the most-wanted list, earning him a first-class individual merit and recognition as well as a performance award from the provincial public security department.
After recovering from his injuries, Zhao Chengfeng rightfully became the head of the Public Security Bureau.
"The relevant content has been sent to your phone. Take action now!"
The moment the call connected, Lu Yuanyang said indifferently.
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The Jizhou Party School.
Except for Lu Yuanyang, all the department-level officials from the city had gathered here to study party and government regulations.
The lecturer was the municipal party secretary, Dai Shouyi.
He relished the feeling of superiority.
That’s why he hosted it once every month.
However,
this time Lu Yuanyang hadn’t been able to attend the session, which sparked a surge of irritation in him.
He felt that Lu Yuanyang was not showing him due respect.
Just at that moment,
he saw Zhao Chengfeng answering a phone call, and Dai Shouyi snorted heavily, saying with a cold face, "Director Zhao, your attitude towards learning isn’t proper."
"Haven’t I said before that during our study sessions, no one is allowed to make phone calls?"
"Why are you disregarding the rules I’ve set?"
Dai Shouyi’s words were filled with clear dissatisfaction and authority, his gaze fixed intently on Zhao Chengfeng as if trying to see right through him.
On the podium of the party school, he had always enjoyed the sense of control that came with superiority, and in his view, Zhao Chengfeng’s behavior was undoubtedly a challenge to his authority.
The others were all showing looks of schadenfreude.
They all knew that Zhao Chengfeng was not Dai’s man, and Dai had taken Zhao Chengfeng’s promotion to the head of the Public Security Bureau to heart.
Now that Zhao Chengfeng was publicly disobeying Dai, wasn’t he just asking for trouble?
Zhao Chengfeng slowly put down the phone, his eyes flashing with determination. Looking at Dai Shouyi, he said in a neither servile nor overbearing tone, "Secretary Dai, I just received an urgent task and had to take the call."
Dai Shouyi’s brow furrowed, his expression growing even darker, "What urgent task could be more important than studying party and government regulations? Director Zhao, don’t make excuses."
Standing up, Zhao Chengfeng said, "Secretary Dai, I have received instructions from my superiors regarding the investigation of some major cases. I must execute the task immediately and cannot continue with the study session." With that, he left his seat.
Dai Shouyi’s eyes glowed with a cold light, and he said, enunciating each word, "Director Zhao, I am Jizhou’s municipal party secretary. If you are to carry out a major case, how could I, the party secretary, not be informed?"
Zhao Chengfeng took off his handcuffs from his waist, and a mad smile appeared on his indifferent face, "You’ll know soon enough, because my task is to arrest you!"
