Of course, a public-opinion war was never easy to fight. Especially after so much influence over public discourse had been lost in earlier years due to a lack of attention, to the point that old rumors from decades ago could still be dug up every few months and repeatedly hyped even now.
Shu Yu watched as the video of the livestream confrontation was pushed onto the trending searches under Lu Anran’s operation, then turned and asked Xiao Que to prepare a text version for the marketing accounts to spread.
Very few people were willing to sit through several minutes of edited video. On a platform like Weibo, where most people couldn’t even be bothered to finish reading 140 characters, short but clear text was still more effective for conveying information.
“Your side should be about ready to move in, right?” After finishing what she was doing, Shu Yu looked at Team Leader Liang, who had just returned after stepping outside to take a phone call.
“They’ve been caught, but the situation is a little different from what we imagined.” Team Leader Liang’s expression was somewhat grave. “The person with him was his older sister, Yan Xue.”
“Yan Xue?” Feng Tang had just helped Chen Heng end the livestream and was extremely surprised by the news. “Wasn’t she at home when you went looking for Yan Yu earlier?”
“She hasn’t been in C City this entire time,” Team Leader Liang explained. “We investigated her movements and found that she went to G City for work after the New Year. After that, there was no record of her leaving G City. Since this matter had nothing to do with her before, we only contacted her by phone to ask whether she knew where Yan Yu was.”
Yan Yu’s claim that his sister Yan Xue had been sexually assaulted was something that had suddenly happened today. There was no way the police could have predicted it.
No one knew when Yan Xue had gone to W City, where Yan Yu was currently staying.
“Could this matter have something to do with Yan Xue too?” Xiao Que looked up after finishing the text version. “There really was someone beside Yan Yu during the livestream just now, and that person was directing him on how to perform in front of the camera.”
They had each made their own guesses about that person, but most of them had assumed it was the mastermind behind the whole incident.
“We’ll ask once they’re brought back. Right now, I feel like there’s something very strange about this whole thing. The other side definitely has another move prepared.” Shu Yu felt a terrible headache coming on. “We still don’t know enough about Yan Xue.”
However, Shu Yu suspected that Yan Yu most likely wasn’t among the people responsible for Hong Guodong’s death. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have been bold enough to start a livestream.
Solving the murder wasn’t their responsibility, so after the livestream ended, Chen Heng drove them back to the small meeting room.
The takeout they hadn’t finished at noon was still there.
“The food’s completely cold.” Feng Tang said it was completely cold, but still picked up one of the leftover chicken drumsticks and started eating it. “Where do you think this whole thing will go next?”
“I’d like to know that too.” Lu Anran pushed three chairs together and lay down across them. “We finally managed to seize a little initiative. If we could predict the other side’s actions, it would give us a huge advantage.”
“We haven’t even figured out why Yan Xue was there, let alone predict their next move.” Shu Yu carefully examined Yan Xue’s information, trying to find some clue, while tossing the neck pillow around her neck to Lu Anran.
“I think our train of thought has already been led off course,” Xiao Que said after frowning in thought for a long time. “What exactly was their purpose in choosing this case to stir up public opinion?”
“If you mean their ultimate objective, at least for now, it’s still difficult to tell.” Shu Yu had thought about this question too, but there was one thing she couldn’t get around.
The original narrative surrounding this case had been that officials were protecting one another and covering up Hong Guodong’s sexual assaults on female students.
It had been an attack on the police, prosecutors, and courts.
But Yan Yu had nothing to do with the police, prosecutors, or courts. Why would they play such a meaningless card?
And even if Shu Yu’s team hadn’t confronted Yan Yu directly through a livestream, as long as their subsequent response was prompt and sufficiently conclusive, they still could have achieved the same result. At most, a few more people would have questioned them.
From the moment Yan Yu appeared, the real culprit in Hong Guodong’s murder seemed to have disappeared from everyone’s sight.
Wait.
The real culprit?
Shu Yu suddenly remembered that Hong Guodong had been strangled to death with a belt. Although there were signs that he had been sexually assaulted, that didn’t mean the incident had anything to do with the gay community Yan Yu represented.
It wasn’t just them.
Even the police had been led off course by Yan Yu’s sudden appearance.
“If Yan Yu was only thrown out there from beginning to end to divert our attention, then we may already have fallen for it.” Shu Yu sat upright. “What does this entire incident actually have to do with Yan Yu?”
“Judging purely from Hong Guodong’s murder, if the fingerprints on the belt and the DNA remaining in his body don’t match Yan Yu, then he has never had any direct connection to the case from beginning to end.” Lu Anran suddenly sprang upright from the chairs. “And yet he voluntarily chose to become the center of public opinion surrounding the case.”
Almost everyone’s attention had been drawn toward him.
After a single livestream, the number of followers on his short-video platform account had skyrocketed by five million.
Although many of those people were insulting him, notoriety was still fame. As long as there was traffic, it could be monetized at any time!
“Check whether Yan Xue has ever worked for an MCN or a similar company.” Shu Yu vaguely realized that Yan Xue was definitely connected to this.
Yan Yu didn’t just have an account on the short-video platform. He also had a verified Weibo account. Although the vast majority of the comments under his Weibo posts were now insults, based on Shu Yu’s understanding of Weibo, these rounds of trending searches alone had probably already brought him hundreds of millions of views.
His account had long since joined Weibo’s revenue-sharing program. In other words, the views from the trending searches over just these few days were enough to earn him hundreds of thousands.
Not to mention the money that could later be made from traffic on the short-video platform. Even after the attention died down, accounts like his with large numbers of active followers could still be sold for a considerable amount.
Yan Yu hadn’t even finished vocational and technical college. There was no way he could be this familiar with online marketing. And judging from how helpless and flustered he had looked during the livestream, it was obvious that everything he did had been scripted by someone else.
In other words, Yan Yu was merely an actor.
An actor playing himself according to a script.
When Shu Yu had looked through Yan Xue’s basic information earlier, she had already noticed that after graduating from the vocational and technical college, Yan Xue attended an open university and obtained a bachelor’s degree. After that, she went to G City for work. Last year, she had even applied for an in-service postgraduate program and had already received an admission notice.
The only thing Shu Yu didn’t know was what kind of work Yan Xue actually did. That information wasn’t shown in the file.
Lu Anran quickly obtained Yan Xue’s complete records from Team Leader Liang, including the companies she had worked for after moving to G City.
Sure enough, both companies she had worked for specialized in online marketing. The latter even handled some entertainment-industry business.
In March this year, Yan Xue suddenly resigned from the company.
After that, no one knew where she went.
“March?” Feng Tang was extremely surprised. “Could she have started planning this case that early?”
“Probably not.” Shu Yu shook her head. “Yan Xue and Yan Yu most likely have no direct connection to Hong Guodong’s death. On the contrary, it’s possible that someone instructed Yan Xue to do this after Hong Guodong died.”
She didn’t believe that a twenty-four-year-old Yan Xue would have the courage to interfere in a murder case and use it to gain traffic.
“If all the subsequent marketing involving Yan Yu was Yan Xue’s work, then who gave her the idea?” Lu Anran looked up from her computer. “Team Leader Liang’s side is retrieving Yan Xue’s call records and WeChat chat history from after the New Year until now. So far, they haven’t found anything unusual.”
“Our opponent wouldn’t expose a weakness that easily.” Shu Yu wasn’t surprised. “So now, if we exclude all this marketing that has nothing to do with the case itself, what do you think the other side’s actual objective is?”
“If we hadn’t intervened, then the direction they were steering public opinion during those first three days should have been their real objective.” Xiao Que quickly understood what Shu Yu meant. “Just like last time, they had two plans. One for if we didn’t intervene, and another for if we did.”
“Exactly. So no matter how things develop, the final result should be the same.” Shu Yu set Yan Xue’s information aside. “We only stepped into this case after it had already been fermenting for three full days. By then, they should already have steered public opinion toward the direction they wanted.”
Feng Tang finished the last chicken drumstick.
“So now that public opinion has developed into this mess, how are they planning to steer it back toward their original narrative?” she asked while wiping her hands with a wet wipe.
Online discussion had already been completely diverted.
Almost no one even remembered that the original controversy had been about the police, prosecutors, and courts allegedly protecting a criminal.
If things continued like this, the other side definitely wouldn’t achieve their objective.
Lu Anran’s phone lit up. She opened the message and saw that it was from Team Leader Liang.
“Yan Yu and Yan Xue are taking the six o’clock high-speed train back. Team Leader Liang is asking whether we want to participate in the interrogation tonight.”
Shu Yu thought about it.
Normally, they definitely wouldn’t participate in interrogations. But this time, whatever Yan Yu and Yan Xue were hiding might be connected to the other side’s next move.
Shu Yu felt they needed to be involved.
“Let’s go together. We can just sit in and listen,” Shu Yu said. “Otherwise, there’s no point sitting here making blind guesses.”
Chen Heng had been running around all day, so Shu Yu had already let him leave work. Before leaving, he had handed the car keys to Feng Tang.
Feng Tang drove the car and floored the accelerator straight onto the elevated expressway.
“Take it easy.” Although this wasn’t Shu Yu’s first time riding in Feng Tang’s car, she was still startled by how aggressively she drove. “It won’t even take us half an hour to get there.”
Feng Tang chuckled.
Taking advantage of the fact that rush hour had passed and there were few cars on the elevated road, she parked outside the special investigation team’s building in less than twenty minutes.
When Shu Yu got out of the car, she felt like she was floating.
After learning they were coming, Team Leader Liang had arranged for a young police officer to wait for them outside.
The interrogation rooms weren’t in the same building where they normally held meetings, and Shu Yu’s group didn’t know the way.
Yan Yu and Yan Xue had been separated into two interrogation rooms. Team Leader Liang was interrogating one of them, while another experienced-looking officer questioned the other.
In the corridor, Forensic Examiner Tan approached with two reports in her hands.
“You’re here too.” Tan Jingrong pushed up her glasses when she saw them. “Perfect timing. I’ll tell you the results first. These are Yan Yu’s DNA and fingerprint comparison results, and these are Yan Xue’s fingerprint comparison results. None of them match.”
“So it really wasn’t them.” Shu Yu wasn’t particularly surprised. “Looks like the real culprit is still somewhere none of us have noticed.”
“Not entirely.” Forensic Examiner Tan handed the reports to the apprentice following behind her and told her to take them inside. “We conducted a second autopsy over the past few days and found something unexpected.”
Shu Yu followed Forensic Examiner Tan into a small meeting room beside the interrogation rooms.
“During the second autopsy, we discovered several tiny wounds on his scalp. Judging from the marks, they were caused before his death by sharp fingernails scratching him.” Forensic Examiner Tan showed her a photograph of the corpse’s scalp after the hair had been shaved off. Several scratches were clearly visible. “These are the kind of marks that can only be left by artificial nails after a manicure. That means a young woman was present when Hong Guodong was killed.”
“Why does it feel like we’re heading back toward a crime of passion again?” Feng Tang rested her head on her hand. “And technically, there’s no rule saying only gay men like using the back door, right? Straight men can do it too.”
The moment Feng Tang finished speaking, four pairs of eyes turned toward her in perfect unison.
“Why are you all staring at me?” Feng Tang nearly lost the lollipop in her mouth. “It’s genuinely possible!”
“If that’s the case, then our previous focus on gay men was somewhat inappropriate. This really could simply be a crime of passion.” Forensic Examiner Tan looked at her freshly completed autopsy report. “Yan Yu’s sexual orientation led all of us down the wrong path.”
Indeed, there had never been any rule stating that only gay men could sexually assault another man.
Straight men could do it too.
“Then what roles exactly did Yan Yu and his sister Yan Xue play in this case?” Forensic Examiner Tan raised her head and looked at Shu Yu. “Clearly, they weren’t innocent people who were accidentally dragged into this.”
“Based on our speculation, they probably got involved voluntarily.” Shu Yu explained the analysis they had made after returning to the office. “If their goal was to divert our attention, attract traffic, and then monetize that traffic, then they’ve already succeeded.”
And that success had even been handed to the siblings by Shu Yu and the others themselves.
Neither the DNA nor the fingerprints matched. There were also no signs that Yan Xue had artificial nails.
After interrogating them, Team Leader Liang simply couldn’t extract any useful clues from either sibling, so he came outside in frustration to smoke.
They could only be summoned for twenty-four hours. If they couldn’t get anything out of them within that period, he would have no choice but to let them leave.
“You’re here.” Only now did Team Leader Liang notice Shu Yu and the others. “We didn’t get any useful leads. There’s nothing related to this case on any of Yan Xue’s social media accounts either. They also both have alibis for the time of Hong Guodong’s death.”
“Yan Xue didn’t explain why she had Yan Yu cry about her being sexually assaulted?” Shu Yu asked.
“Her explanation is that she only told Yan Yu that Hong Guodong had harassed her before. According to her, Yan Yu made up everything that came afterward himself.” Team Leader Liang shook his head. “And Yan Yu actually said the same thing.”
As for Yan Yu spreading rumors about Hong Guodong and making false accusations against the police, that temporarily fell outside the special investigation team’s jurisdiction.
Yan Yu was therefore transferred to the local police station where his household registration was located. If the subsequent process followed normal procedure, he would probably be temporarily placed under criminal detention for spreading rumors and defamation.
As for whether Hong Guodong’s family would sue him, that was something for later.
Yan Xue extricated herself from the matter entirely.
After all, there was no evidence proving that she had induced Yan Yu to commit defamation.
“Yan Xue is pretty impressive.” Lu Anran and Shu Yu stood in the corridor, watching Yan Xue walk away. “She manipulated Yan Yu into carrying out such a complicated series of actions, and now she can still walk away completely untouched.”
“Before Yan Yu’s account gets banned, Yan Xue can probably withdraw several hundred thousand in revenue-sharing earnings from the backend.” Shu Yu rubbed her phone case. “But what I want to know more is how she learned about Hong Guodong’s murder and knew clearly that he had been sexually assaulted before being killed. Otherwise, she never could have profited from this wave of traffic.”
“There’s nothing related to it on her phone, computer, or email. There’s also nothing about this case on any of her social media accounts.” Lu Anran shook her head. “Unless someone contacted her in person, it should have been impossible to leave absolutely no trace.”
“Could she have used a virtual account?” Xiao Que asked. “Like Yang Jie in the previous case.”
“Adults have to register their ID when entering internet cafés, and we haven’t found any records for now.” Lu Anran shook her head. “She didn’t study computer science either. Even if she taught herself, there’s no way she could erase every trace against the cyber police’s powerful technical capabilities. If she had that level of skill, she wouldn’t need to be here trying to monetize online traffic.”
“Then it looks like someone contacted her in person,” Shu Yu concluded. “And that means searching through an ocean of people.”
Sometimes, meeting someone in person left behind very little information. In contrast, online spaces that felt relatively private often made it easier to leave traces behind.
For the time being, they couldn’t make any further progress through Yan Yu and Yan Xue.
But Shu Yu didn’t believe the other side would simply stop here and allow them to smoothly find the real murderer and calm the public-opinion crisis.
What were they planning to do next?
For now, Shu Yu had no new ideas.
The enemy was hidden while they stood in the open. It was extremely difficult to predict the other side’s actions.
Late that night, Team Leader Liang sent them a message saying that Yan Yu had been released on bail pending investigation and taken home by his family.
For an HIV-positive person like him, being released on bail pending investigation while in detention was quite common, so Shu Yu wasn’t surprised.
But she still felt vaguely uneasy.
Letting Yan Yu back out was hardly a good thing.
“All right, all right. It’s almost midnight. Hurry up and get some sleep.” Feng Tang was already struggling to stay awake. “This case isn’t going to end anytime soon. We’ve still got plenty of long nights ahead of us.”
That was true.
They still had no lead on the young woman with manicured nails who had scratched Hong Guodong. The other men who had attacked him hadn’t been found either.
Until the case was solved, a new public-opinion crisis that none of them expected could erupt at any moment.
Rather than sitting here worrying, it was better to get some more sleep and keep their minds clear.
Shu Yu put down her phone, but a possibility suddenly occurred to her.
Perhaps Yan Yu and Yan Xue, who appeared to have nothing to do with the case, weren’t entirely distractions after all.