Chapter 19: The Grey Lines Weave a Web

At 5:40 in the morning, Song Zhao’s internal clock woke him ten minutes before his alarm.

He lay there watching the shadows of trees flicker across the ceiling—the silhouettes of plane trees outside, swaying gently in the mist, casting mottled patterns that rose and fell like breath, as if old memories were whispering against the walls.

His fingertips unconsciously stroked the orange candy wrapper at his bedside. The aluminum foil was cold and faintly astringent, its edges creased into tiny, dense lines by Su Wan’s fingernails—like a secret code, glimmering dully in the morning light with a metallic tang.

“Brother Zhao.” Su Wan’s voice drifted up from downstairs, moist with morning fog, the tail end of her call sliding like dew off a leaf.

He pushed open the window. A chill wind rushed in, laden with the scent of moss and wet earth.

She was standing beneath the plane tree, a canvas bag slung diagonally across her shoulder, its fabric frayed from years of use, brushing against her arm with a faint rustling sound. Dew clung to the ends of her hair, a bead sliding down her temple to settle in the hollow of her collarbone.

In her arms she cradled a faded tin box, the metal cold and biting, its edges mottled with rust, tools inside softly clinking from last night’s preparations: the bristles of a brush swept against a glass lens, sealed bags whispered as if murmuring secrets about to be revealed.

Number 72 Yong’an Lane hid in the wrinkles of the old city.

As the two crossed the stone-paved alley, the morning mist had yet to disperse. Cold seeped through the stones beneath their feet, the sound of shoe heels on stone muffled by the fog, leaving only a dull echo behind.

Wild roses climbed what remained of the walls at the roots. Drops of dew, red as blood, clung to the petals—shattering at a touch, spraying cool across their insteps like a scream never uttered.

Song Zhao touched the cane at his waist—the metal grip warmed by his palm, but the core still cold and damp, a lingering injury from a car accident, throbbing on rainy days.

Now, he walked faster than Su Wan. The heels of his shoes tapped crisply against loose bricks, a “tick, tick” sounding like a metronome measuring the distance to the truth.

“We’re here.” Su Wan stopped before a half-rotted wooden door.

The brass plaque with "72 Yong’an Lane" had long been pried away, leaving only a rusted indentation, rough to the touch like a scab dried with blood.

Song Zhao reached out and pushed the door. The hinges screamed, wood shavings tumbled down, startling the sparrows under the eaves—a flurry of wings cut through the silence, a few feathers drifting onto his shoulder, the down brushing his skin with a shiver.

Inside was darker than out.

The smell of mold mingled with damp earth, thick enough to feel solid, a metallic tang rising at the back of the tongue.

Song Zhao drew out his tactical flashlight. The beam swept over peeling walls, gray-white dust drifting in the cone of light like the souls of the dead, roused after twenty years of slumber.

He remembered this place—he’d been part of a raid here as a trainee. In a crack at the base of the wall, a trafficked child had once scratched a message in blood. Now, only a deep scar remained, like a wound in the earth.

“The hidden wall is behind the third brick on the west side.” He turned to Su Wan, his voice echoing faintly in the empty corridor.

She was already crouched at the base of the wall, fingertips tracing the mortar, the rough surface heating her skin. “My mentor used to say traffickers always hide their ledgers in the most dangerous places.”

As her fingernail scraped a certain brick, a hollow sound rang out—a dull “thud,” like knocking on an empty coffin.

She looked up at him, her eyes shining in the gloom, flashlight glinting in her pupils like those of a nocturnal animal. “It’s here.”

Song Zhao bent to help.

As they pried loose two bricks, fine dust rained down onto their faces, carrying the musty tang of ancient decay, making their throats itch.

The hidden compartment revealed a mouth-like opening, half a person deep, black as a yawning maw.

Su Wan pulled out a brush and swept lightly. Suddenly, metal scraped—a palm-sized copper plaque emerged, encrusted with black-brown rust, its edge clinging to fibrous cotton strands. At her touch, flakes of rust fell, leaving reddish-brown smudges on her fingertip, like traces of blood.

“Lin’s Scrap Yard, No. 07,” Song Zhao read, peering at the engraving through a magnifying glass, the cold lens pressed to his brow, his breath catching.

On the back of the plaque, a shallow groove—like a hurriedly scratched date: 2003.5.17, three days before his father Song Mingyuan’s accident.

Su Wan’s hand hovered above the plaque, then drew back. “This rust... it looks as if blood seeped in.” Her voice trembled, her fingers shaking as if the plaque burned. “Twenty years ago, when I was locked up here, I heard the traffickers say ‘Boss Lin wants new merchandise.’ So ‘Boss Lin’ was Lin Haoyu.”

Song Zhao’s hand faltered as he reached for a sealable bag.

Plastic rustled as he stared at the weathered characters—“Lin’s”—on the plaque, memory flashing to last night’s vision through the “Eye of Truth”: the attacker’s backpack tag, the pattern on Lin Haoyu’s brooch, all weaving together in his mind into a net, each strand gleaming with cold metal and sticky with blood.

“Don’t upload the evidence to the system,” he said suddenly, his voice low, slicing the air like a blade.

“We’re going to the Municipal Culture Center.”

Su Wan looked up, gray dust still clinging to her lashes from moving bricks. When she blinked, it fell away. “You mean…”

“Register it in the public relics database, under non-sensitive items,” Song Zhao pressed his thumb to the bag’s edge, the chill of plastic seeping into his skin, “with a note: ‘Suspected Republic-era disaster relief marker.’”

The more urgently they tried to erase old accounts, the more mistakes they’d make.

Su Wan smiled, a bittersweet curve like wind-ruffled water at the edge of her mouth. “I knew it—you’re not solving the case, you’re weaving a net.”

At ten in the morning, the provincial police forensic department was chilled by overactive air conditioning.

Cold air hissed from the vent onto Dong Lan’s nape, raising goosebumps.

She stared at her computer screen, sweat beading at her neck and sliding saltily into her collar.

She had just pulled the business records for “Lin’s Scrap Yard”—dissolved in 2005, its legal representative an old man named Zhou Degui. But in 2010, the yard’s land was bought up at a third of market value by “Jiangcheng Antai Labor Company.”

“Antai…” she muttered, fingers tapping rapidly, the sound sharp in the quiet office.

A flowchart of transactions unfolded onscreen; Old Scar’s bank account popped up—since 2018, a “labor subsidy” had arrived like clockwork on the fifteenth of each month, exactly covering the rent and utilities for the scrap yard.

“This isn’t coincidence.” She grabbed a marker and circled a section on the whiteboard, the tip screeching as it drew. “It’s deliberate placement.

Old Scar’s scrap yard was, in fact, Lin Haoyu’s listening post.”

At two in the afternoon, in the rare books section of Jiangcheng City Library.

Su Wan sat at the restoration table, finger poised above the “publish” button. The wood grain was cool, her fingertip damp with sweat.

On her screen was a new announcement: “Research Progress on Republic-era Disaster Relief System: Physical Evidence from Warehouse Seventy-Two Found.”

“About to send it?” came Manager Zhang’s voice from behind, his footsteps thudding dully on the wooden floor.

Su Wan turned and smiled. “Uncle Zhang, could you check the format for me?” As he bent over, she clicked the mouse swiftly—the moment the notice went live, the system log flickered with activity, green code glowing like fireflies.

Three hours later, Su Wan’s phone vibrated.

She opened the encrypted chat window. A message from Song Zhao appeared: “City Bureau intranet IP, accessed five times, photos exported.”

“They’ve taken the bait.” Song Zhao’s voice on the phone was edged with a cold laugh, like icicles shattering. “Even after Zhao Zhenbang’s death, someone’s still cleaning up for Lin Haoyu.”

At eleven that night, a single lamp glowed in Song Zhao’s attic.

The tungsten bulb cast a long shadow, webs crawling up the walls.

Before him lay three files: Old Scar’s interrogation notes yellowed, the photo of the copper plaque curled at the edges, the Antai Company’s funds chart crisscrossed in red lines like blood vessels.

His mouse hovered over “New Document.” Suddenly, he recalled his father’s words: “A real chain of evidence lets them step into the trap themselves.”

He merged the three files into a “Preliminary Report on Residual Cross-Provincial Trafficking and Local Power Collusion,” all key names replaced with code numbers.

For storage, he deliberately chose the coldest, most obscure category in the provincial archive: “Historical Unsolved Case References.”

Finally, he installed a small plugin on Su Wan’s computer—the kind of footprint that was obvious and suspicious.

Forty-eight hours later, the tracker chimed at 3 a.m.

A sharp “beep,” like the first blare of an alarm.

Song Zhao stared at the IP address on screen, layers of proxy peeled back until it pinpointed the third floor of the Development Zone Administration Building—the Secretariat’s office.

At the same time, in the Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection’s Policy Research Office.

Lu Yuan flipped through asset change records, the tip of his fountain pen clicking into the file’s spine, a spot of ink splattering like a drop of blood.

The payee for a certain property purchase burned his eyes: “Antai Real Estate Co.,” Lin Haoyu’s shadow company.

“That’s enough.” He packed the materials into an encrypted envelope, writing on the cover: “Clues on Trafficking Residuals and Power Protection Cross-Links.” He pressed the intercom: “Connect me to Supervisor Wang.”

As dawn approached, Song Zhao stood in the cemetery.

Dew still clung to his father’s tombstone, cold and heavy. He gently placed the copper plaque down. “Dad,” his voice scattered by the morning wind, drifting among the gravestones, “the path you never finished, I’m starting to weave the net now.”

From afar came the faint howl of a police siren, piercing the pre-dawn silence like a needle.

At six in the morning, the evidence analysis room at Jiangcheng City Bureau was still shrouded behind closed blinds.

The cleaning lady had just wiped down the table, the air lightly scented with lemon cleaner.

From the corridor came the tap of a cane—“tick, tick, tick”—each strike clearer than the last, like a heartbeat, like a countdown.

The doorknob turned.