Chapter 42: Suspicious Fire

County Hospital.

Lu Hao had just been wheeled out of the operating room, and the effects of the anesthesia were wearing off.

Not only was he physically exhausted and drained, but the pain all over his body also made him wince and bare his teeth.

His leg was severely injured—fractured and heavily plastered—and his other wounds had all been treated.

This was the most serious injury Lu Hao had sustained since leaving the military.

However, he had no regrets. At the very least, he had managed to stop the fire from spreading in the nick of time, preventing it from reaching the villagers' homes at the foot of the mountain. No matter how he calculated it, it was worth it.

He had barely been lying on the hospital bed for long when Lin Xiyue rushed into the ward in a panic. As soon as she entered, she asked anxiously, "How are you? What did the doctor say? How did you get hurt this badly?"

Lin Xiyue had already caught wind of the mountain wildfire. Hearing that Lu Hao was injured, she had rushed to the county hospital in a frenzy of worry.

Seeing Lu Hao in such a miserable state felt like a surreal dream. Just last night, they had been having dinner together, and yet by early morning, he was hospitalized.

"I'm fine, just a broken leg. It's much lighter than the injuries I got in the military," Lu Hao said with a nonchalant smile.

Back when he represented the theater command in competitions, he had suffered injuries far worse than this halfway through, and he had still managed to push through to the end alongside his comrades.

Lin Xiyue glared at Lu Hao. "You're still in the mood to smile? What did the doctor actually say? Is it serious?"

"It's not serious. I'm so young; after a period of recuperation, I'll definitely be able to walk on my own two feet again. There won't be any lasting sequelae," Lu Hao said casually.

Seeing the worried look on Lin Xiyue's face warmed Lu Hao's heart a little.

After letting out a sigh of relief, Lin Xiyue pursed her lips and said, "I don't really believe a word you say. I'd better go ask the doctor myself."

Fearing that Lu Hao was deliberately downplaying it just to keep her from worrying, she gave him a sideways glance before walking out of the ward to consult the doctor.

Not long after, Lin Xiyue returned to the ward. Lu Hao said with a full smile, "Didn't I tell you? It's just an ordinary fracture."

Seeing that Lu Hao still wore that cheeky, grinning expression, Lin Xiyue scolded him angrily, "Is a fracture not serious enough? Do you need to have your leg amputated for it to count as serious? Is your brain fried? There was such a huge fire, and I heard from Hong Haifeng that you took the lead and charged right into it, even rallying the villagers to hack out firebreaks. What kind of hero are you trying to play? Are you afraid you won't die fast enough? If you really burned to death, you could go down to the underworld and laugh it off with the King of Hell."

Lu Hao scratched the back of his head and said with utmost seriousness, "I considered the danger before going in to fight the fire, but I had to lead the men up there. If we couldn't stop the fire from spreading, the remaining hills would have burned too, and even the houses at the foot of the mountain would have been consumed. That's the homes of dozens of families we're talking about. The consequences of that would have been truly disastrous."

At that moment, that was the only thought in his mind, so he fought desperately to cut firebreaks. After all, he had experience cooperating with the military and local firefighting teams; in many dangerous spots, Lu Hao had taken the lead and charged forward.

Precisely because he led by example, the villagers followed him without a second thought. If he, an official, had been cowardly and cowered backward, the villagers would have been even less inclined to fight the fire.

Hearing Lu Hao put it this way, Lin Xiyue didn't argue back, only letting out a silent sigh. "You did the right thing, but you should know that in the bureaucratic system, everyone follows the principle of 'seeking no merit, but seeking to avoid blame.' Even if you rushed in and fought desperately to stop the fire from spreading, not a single person will give you credit for it."

Lu Hao merely chuckled softly. "Leading the firefighting effort is my responsibility. I don't care if others praise me or not. I don't seek credit; I only seek a clear conscience."

Lin Xiyue gave Lu Hao a blank stare and said with a solemn expression, "Responsibility? Do you know what Li Haotian said? He claimed that as the inspection team leader and the deputy director of the Forest Fire Prevention Office, you failed to detect the fire and take measures at the first possible moment, instead allowing the fire to spread and nearly endangering the lives and property of the people. Therefore, he has already reported this to the county and wants to hold you accountable, making you the scapegoat for this wildfire. Do you understand?"

In official circles, superiors only looked at the results.

The fire was out. How it was extinguished and the process didn't matter; what mattered was the fire caused by dereliction of duty, and who should take the blame for it.

Hearing Lin Xiyue finish, Lu Hao's eyelids twitched.

That old fox Li Haotian was making him a scapegoat the moment trouble struck. He probably had ill intentions from the very beginning when he assigned him as the inspection team leader. Could it be that this had been pre-planned all along?

Thinking of this, Lu Hao's heart skipped a beat, and he frowned. "Don't you think this wildfire came about rather suspiciously?"

"You don't mean to suggest that someone set the fire on purpose, do you?" Lin Xiyue was startled, her expression tightening as well.

Lu Hao pondered for a moment and said earnestly, "I don't have proof, only suspicion, but if you connect the dots before and after this incident, it really is a bit too much of a coincidence."

"Analyze it for me. I'm listening," Lin Xiyue said, her expression turning serious.

Lu Hao gathered his thoughts and laid them out methodically. "First of all, in previous years, Fangshui Township didn't have any forest inspection teams for fire prevention, nor had there ever been a wildfire. This year, Li Haotian suddenly insisted on establishing an inspection team and forcefully named me as the leader, while also giving me the concurrent post of deputy director of the Forest Fire Prevention Office, forcing this heavy burden onto my shoulders. That way, I became the direct person in charge of forest fire prevention—as long as something went wrong, I had to take the blame. And then, a wildfire actually breaks out. Don't you think that's a bit too coincidental?"

"Furthermore, the members of this inspection team were all handpicked by Li Haotian, and all they do is slack off and idle their time away. When the wildfire broke out, none of them were patrolling the scene; they were all at home sleeping. So this inspection team was nothing more than window dressing, and I was the sole key figure."

"And here is the most crucial point: when I first spotted the fire, I ran up the mountain immediately, only to catch sight of a figure sneaking down the mountain. When I called out to him, he ran even faster. It was already the middle of the night—who in their right mind would go up the mountain?"

Recalling this minor detail from back then, Lu Hao found it even more suspicious.

"Lastly, the time the fire started is also very peculiar."

"High temperatures and drought are among the necessary conditions for wildfires. Under such conditions, bushes and weeds are highly flammable. If this were a natural wildfire, it would most likely have occurred during the hottest part of the day, not at night. Therefore, fires that generally break out at night, especially during low-temperature hours like the small hours of the morning, cannot rule out human involvement."

"If I hadn't been riding my motorcycle wandering around the mountain forests and spotted the fire glow immediately, this fire would have raged even fiercer fueled by the midnight mountain wind. It wouldn't have given us any time to hack out firebreaks, and it might even have burned down residential houses. Casualties could very well have occurred."