Chapter 2: Investigation
“This will be the exhibit for the ‘Tears of Hope’.” Sterling pointed at the display shelf, turned to Linda and said, “Linda, introduce them to this.”
“Sure!” Linda nodded, pointed at the shelf and said, “This is where we will place the gem.”
Hanfei carefully observed it for a while. The display shelf was vertical, and the glass shield hanging in the air was probably an anti-theft shield. Looking at the shield from above, there was a large circular hole that looked like the position the gem would be placed.
“What are these things used for?” Hanfei pointed at the circular holes at the edge of the displayshelf. From afar, it looked like a huge honeycomb.
“We are about to put micro spotlights there.”
“Micro spotlights?”
“Yes. When the ‘Tears of Hope’ exhibition begins, all the spotlights will be turned on to help create a mysterious and charm feeling for the gem.”
Hanfei agreed and then asked, “May I touch it?”
“Of course!”
With Sterling’s permission, Hanfei signaled to Bo. The butler took out a pair of white gloves from his pocket and handed them to Hanfei. He put on the gloves and gently swiped around the circular holes, allowing his brain to quickly analyze the information about these holes. They each had a diameter of about two centimeters and could accommodate the size of a finger. However, stealing the gem through these holes was impossible. It seemed that his suspicions were somewhat unfounded.
Hanfei smiled. He took off his white gloves and returned them to Bo and asked, “Bo, don’t you think that something isn’t quite right here?”
“Yes, sir.” Bo looked around and whispered, “There aren’t many security guards here. It’s just like they’re allowing the wizard to steal the gem.”
“You don’t need to worry about that.” Sterling’s voice stunned Bo. “The letter said that ordinary people couldn’t stop him, so I cleared the security here.”
“You’re being too rash!” Hanfei narrowed his eyes, seeming to see through Sterling’s cover. “If you get rid of the security guards, there’s a higher change that the gem will be stolen.”
“Don’t worry!” Sterling laughed and waved to Linda.
Linda nodded and went to the control desk on the other side of the exhibition hall. She entered a number of programs, causing the display glass to quickly close, and some dense red spots emerged on the display shelf.
“Infrared alarm?!”
“Not just that.” Sterling pointed to the display shelf with pride, “This is bullet-proof glass. Normal impacts aren’t going to break it.”
“These protective measures are very good!” Hanfei agreed, but as he looked around, he frowned. For some reason, from the beginning he had felt something was wrong with this exhibition, but he did not know what the cause was.
Hanfei memorized the general arrangement of the exhibition. The display shelf was on a stage. In front of the stage were stairs connecting to a straight road below with a red carpet. According to Linda, as the exhibition began, Sterling and his family would enter from the door and walk past this straight road. Following, his children would place the “Tears of Hope” on the display shelf while Sterling himself would cover the glass shield with a red cloth. They would then wait until 8 p.m. to open it.
On both sides of the road were identical length tables which held tasty food and iced drinks. After hearing this, Hanfei’s stomach growled.
“Have you not eaten?” Sterling asked.
“A little.” Hanfei smiled awkwardly. He felt very embarrassed to make such a vulgar noise in public.
“Wait for a little while.” Sterling took out an old pocket watch. He smiled and said, “The exhibition is about to start, so you can enjoy the food as much as you want then. No worries, I’m sure the food is absolutely in line with your tastes.”
“Then I ……” Before he finished, several screams came from outside of the exhibition hall, followed by several disheveled security officers rushing into the room.
“Manager!” said an anxious security guard. “There’s a seventeen or eighteen year old teenager who says he’s a friend of your child.”
“Just let them in. I already know that.” Sterling glanced at the security guard with disdain; he was unhappy about all the fuss.
“However, we don’t know.” The security panicked, “he doesn’t have an invitation, so we thought he was a liar and wanted to kick him out, but ……”
“But what?”
“But he used a stick and beat all eight of us up…”
“What?!” Hanfei exclaimed. A teenager the same age as Hanfei beat up eight security guards with a stick? Was he really a teenager?
“No! I have to go and see!” Hanfei immediately left to see the boy.
……
“I told you! I just want to come in, I don’t want to fight!” Hanfei rushed to the door and saw a young boy standing in the doorway wearing a black tracksuit and silver-gray hair draped over his shoulders. He was holding a wood stick. His pale blue eyes were constantly looking at the guards to prevent them from suddenly attacking.
“This is ……” Somehow, when Hanfei saw this person’s gesture, he felt that these guards weren’t going to win.
“Go!” The guards rushed forward, but the teenager scorned them and suddenly hit a guard in the abdomen. Then, his body flashed and avoided another guard’s attack and attacked his face. The guard was howling in pain, causing the other guards to become stunned and stop moving forward.
This was Japanese Kendo! From the teenager’s posture, his Kendo level should’ve been around a four dan (ranking system for Kendo), but according to Hanfei’s knowledge, a level four dan had to train as a level three dan for at least three years. This meant that he could only get to this level at the age of twenty. However, the teenager was eighteen at most, which was impossible.
“You guys wanna fight?” The teenager put the stick behind his back and said, “If you didn’t attack me, I wasn’t going to attack you either. You’ve attacked me three times, so I was just giving you a few lessons, if you know what I mean.”
What was this moral philosophy about? Hanfei was amused. He had already fought back, so why was he talking about morality now? What he said was no longer meaningful.
“Don’t laugh, detective!” Hanfei’s smile froze, not because the teenager found himself laughing at him, but because his identity had been found out.
“Surprised?” The teenager smiled and said, “It’s said that a detective’s identity is best left unknown, and it is indeed difficult to picture you as a detective, but your eyes betrayed you. Plus, you have the three things any detective should carry, so it’s not difficult to deduce that you’re a detective.”
“Three things?”
“A pen, watch, and the pair of white gloves in your assistant’s pocket. The most obvious piece of evidence has to be the pair of white gloves though. After all, no one would normally bring white gloves to this place unless they had that habit.” The last sentence attracted the people around them and made them laugh, causing the atmosphere to relax a little.
“What an insightful observation.” Hanfei narrowed his eyes. He became even more curious about this teenager. What he of was that the teenager was a detective, like himself.
“Who are you ……” At this moment, Sterling had also rushed to the scene and saw the boy as he asked.
“Ouyang Hugh.” Ouyang friendly reached out his hand, smiled and looked at Sterling, as if his cold face earlier was a disguise. “I am Katy and Diro’s friend. They should’ve told you before.”
“Oh! I remember!” Sterling passionately held his hand, “You are Drunken Ghost’s child. Haha, I didn’t realize how much you’ve grown. So this time ……”
“I’m curious to see the letter, as well as the detective you hired. However, now it seems that he’s just an ordinary teenager.” Hugh said with disdain as he smiled.
“You’ll see!” Hanfei replied. Although the other’s reasoning ability was similar to him, and possibly even surpassed him, he wasn’t worried. He believed that he could win.
“We’d better go in first in case the outsiders hear ‘that thing’.” It was certain if Sterling was worried that the threatening letter would be heard by others, or if he just wanted to ease the atmosphere between the two men. He let both of them enter the exhibition hall.
Chapter 2: Investigation
“This will be the exhibit for the ‘Tears of Hope’.” Sterling pointed at the display shelf, turned to Linda and said, “Linda, introduce them to this.”
“Sure!” Linda nodded, pointed at the shelf and said, “This is where we will place the gem.”
Hanfei carefully observed it for a while. The display shelf was vertical, and the glass shield hanging in the air was probably an anti-theft shield. Looking at the shield from above, there was a large circular hole that looked like the position the gem would be placed.
“What are these things used for?” Hanfei pointed at the circular holes at the edge of the displayshelf. From afar, it looked like a huge honeycomb.
“We are about to put micro spotlights there.”
“Micro spotlights?”
“Yes. When the ‘Tears of Hope’ exhibition begins, all the spotlights will be turned on to help create a mysterious and charm feeling for the gem.”
Hanfei agreed and then asked, “May I touch it?”
“Of course!”
With Sterling’s permission, Hanfei signaled to Bo. The butler took out a pair of white gloves from his pocket and handed them to Hanfei. He put on the gloves and gently swiped around the circular holes, allowing his brain to quickly analyze the information about these holes. They each had a diameter of about two centimeters and could accommodate the size of a finger. However, stealing the gem through these holes was impossible. It seemed that his suspicions were somewhat unfounded.
Hanfei smiled. He took off his white gloves and returned them to Bo and asked, “Bo, don’t you think that something isn’t quite right here?”
“Yes, sir.” Bo looked around and whispered, “There aren’t many security guards here. It’s just like they’re allowing the wizard to steal the gem.”
“You don’t need to worry about that.” Sterling’s voice stunned Bo. “The letter said that ordinary people couldn’t stop him, so I cleared the security here.”
“You’re being too rash!” Hanfei narrowed his eyes, seeming to see through Sterling’s cover. “If you get rid of the security guards, there’s a higher change that the gem will be stolen.”
“Don’t worry!” Sterling laughed and waved to Linda.
Linda nodded and went to the control desk on the other side of the exhibition hall. She entered a number of programs, causing the display glass to quickly close, and some dense red spots emerged on the display shelf.
“Infrared alarm?!”
“Not just that.” Sterling pointed to the display shelf with pride, “This is bullet-proof glass. Normal impacts aren’t going to break it.”
“These protective measures are very good!” Hanfei agreed, but as he looked around, he frowned. For some reason, from the beginning he had felt something was wrong with this exhibition, but he did not know what the cause was.
Hanfei memorized the general arrangement of the exhibition. The display shelf was on a stage. In front of the stage were stairs connecting to a straight road below with a red carpet. According to Linda, as the exhibition began, Sterling and his family would enter from the door and walk past this straight road. Following, his children would place the “Tears of Hope” on the display shelf while Sterling himself would cover the glass shield with a red cloth. They would then wait until 8 p.m. to open it.
On both sides of the road were identical length tables which held tasty food and iced drinks. After hearing this, Hanfei’s stomach growled.
“Have you not eaten?” Sterling asked.
“A little.” Hanfei smiled awkwardly. He felt very embarrassed to make such a vulgar noise in public.
“Wait for a little while.” Sterling took out an old pocket watch. He smiled and said, “The exhibition is about to start, so you can enjoy the food as much as you want then. No worries, I’m sure the food is absolutely in line with your tastes.”
“Then I ……” Before he finished, several screams came from outside of the exhibition hall, followed by several disheveled security officers rushing into the room.
“Manager!” said an anxious security guard. “There’s a seventeen or eighteen year old teenager who says he’s a friend of your child.”
“Just let them in. I already know that.” Sterling glanced at the security guard with disdain; he was unhappy about all the fuss.
“However, we don’t know.” The security panicked, “he doesn’t have an invitation, so we thought he was a liar and wanted to kick him out, but ……”
“But what?”
“But he used a stick and beat all eight of us up…”
“What?!” Hanfei exclaimed. A teenager the same age as Hanfei beat up eight security guards with a stick? Was he really a teenager?
“No! I have to go and see!” Hanfei immediately left to see the boy.
……
“I told you! I just want to come in, I don’t want to fight!” Hanfei rushed to the door and saw a young boy standing in the doorway wearing a black tracksuit and silver-gray hair draped over his shoulders. He was holding a wood stick. His pale blue eyes were constantly looking at the guards to prevent them from suddenly attacking.
“This is ……” Somehow, when Hanfei saw this person’s gesture, he felt that these guards weren’t going to win.
“Go!” The guards rushed forward, but the teenager scorned them and suddenly hit a guard in the abdomen. Then, his body flashed and avoided another guard’s attack and attacked his face. The guard was howling in pain, causing the other guards to become stunned and stop moving forward.
This was Japanese Kendo! From the teenager’s posture, his Kendo level should’ve been around a four dan (ranking system for Kendo), but according to Hanfei’s knowledge, a level four dan had to train as a level three dan for at least three years. This meant that he could only get to this level at the age of twenty. However, the teenager was eighteen at most, which was impossible.
“You guys wanna fight?” The teenager put the stick behind his back and said, “If you didn’t attack me, I wasn’t going to attack you either. You’ve attacked me three times, so I was just giving you a few lessons, if you know what I mean.”
What was this moral philosophy about? Hanfei was amused. He had already fought back, so why was he talking about morality now? What he said was no longer meaningful.
“Don’t laugh, detective!” Hanfei’s smile froze, not because the teenager found himself laughing at him, but because his identity had been found out.
“Surprised?” The teenager smiled and said, “It’s said that a detective’s identity is best left unknown, and it is indeed difficult to picture you as a detective, but your eyes betrayed you. Plus, you have the three things any detective should carry, so it’s not difficult to deduce that you’re a detective.”
“Three things?”
“A pen, watch, and the pair of white gloves in your assistant’s pocket. The most obvious piece of evidence has to be the pair of white gloves though. After all, no one would normally bring white gloves to this place unless they had that habit.” The last sentence attracted the people around them and made them laugh, causing the atmosphere to relax a little.
“What an insightful observation.” Hanfei narrowed his eyes. He became even more curious about this teenager. What he of was that the teenager was a detective, like himself.
“Who are you ……” At this moment, Sterling had also rushed to the scene and saw the boy as he asked.
“Ouyang Hugh.” Ouyang friendly reached out his hand, smiled and looked at Sterling, as if his cold face earlier was a disguise. “I am Katy and Diro’s friend. They should’ve told you before.”
“Oh! I remember!” Sterling passionately held his hand, “You are Drunken Ghost’s child. Haha, I didn’t realize how much you’ve grown. So this time ……”
“I’m curious to see the letter, as well as the detective you hired. However, now it seems that he’s just an ordinary teenager.” Hugh said with disdain as he smiled.
“You’ll see!” Hanfei replied. Although the other’s reasoning ability was similar to him, and possibly even surpassed him, he wasn’t worried. He believed that he could win.
“We’d better go in first in case the outsiders hear ‘that thing’.” It was certain if Sterling was worried that the threatening letter would be heard by others, or if he just wanted to ease the atmosphere between the two men. He let both of them enter the exhibition hall.
