I slept with my sister's classmate, and she turned out to be my boss.

The morning after Zhou Haibo confessed.

As soon as Chen Dapeng arrived at the office, Hu Yuheng called him in.

There was a folder on the desk.

The cover was handwritten with the words "Zhou Haibo approved the materials".

The retrieval date is marked next to it.

"The materials were delivered last night."

Hu Yuheng did not sit down, but stood by the table and opened the folder.

"Focus on the approval process section and see who handled it in the process."

Chen Dapeng sat down across the table and opened the folder.

The materials are arranged in chronological order.

The first page is the transfer order.

The second page contains the approval document.

The third page onwards contains the approval comments for each stage.

He flipped through the pages one by one, and the first few steps seemed normal—

The documents were received and sent by the Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection Office, then transferred to the Case Management Office, and finally to the Special Case Team.

His finger stopped when he turned to the third page.

On that page, the approval opinion section was marked with the word "Agreed," and below it was signed Qian Yongcheng.

Chen Dapeng stared at the name for two seconds.

Then he looked up at Hu Yuheng:

"Director Hu, this is Qian Yongcheng, the director of the case management office. He approved Zhou Haibo's application materials."

Hu Yuheng nodded, remaining silent as if deep in thought.

After a while, she finally spoke:

Do you know Qian Yongcheng?

Chen Dapeng nodded: "I know him, I've met him once. He came to the task force and exchanged a few words with Zhou Haibo in the corridor. I happened to be passing by at the time. I didn't pay attention then, but now that I think about it—his attitude towards Zhou Haibo was warmer than that of the other colleagues."

He paused.

"At the time, I thought it was just normal work and didn't think about it any other way. Now, looking at the timeline and events, the conversation that day happened shortly after Zhou Haibo joined the task force."

Hu Yuheng remained silent.

Chen Dapeng then asked, "When did Qian Yongcheng join the Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection?"

Hu Yuheng pondered for a moment: "He had been working in the provincial capital before being transferred to the Case Management Office of the Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection. The transfer coincided with Zeng Zhiyuan's last year as Provincial Party Secretary. The timeline matches up."

Chen Dapeng didn't respond immediately, but mentally placed Qian Yongcheng's storyline alongside Zhou Haibo's.

Zhou Haibo was brought in through a secondment process, and one of the key steps in this process was the approval from the Case Management Office, whose signatory was Qian Yongcheng.

If Qian Yongcheng was transferred to the Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection during Zeng Zhiyuan's era.

His role on this line is not as simple as just "signing a name".

Has Qian Yongcheng's work performance been unusual lately?

Chen Dapeng asked another question.

Hu Yuheng shook his head.

"Not for now. He goes to get off work and attends meetings as usual, just like always. I've already arranged for people to keep an eye on him, without alerting him, just to see who he interacts with."

Chen Dapeng did not ask any further questions.

"Director Hu, is there anything else planned?"

"That's all for now. You can go back now and wait for my notification."

Chen Dapeng responded, "Okay."

Then, he left Hu Yuheng's office.

Back at the task force, Chen Dapeng opened his notebook and drew a line on a blank page.

Zhou Haibo's name is written on the far left, with a line connecting to "transfer process".

Then, a line is drawn from the "transfer process" to the "case management office approval".

Qian Yongcheng's name was written next to it.

Draw another line upwards from Qian Yongcheng's name, with a question mark at the top.

It represents the direction this line leads to.

He paused, then picked up his pen and added a line next to Qian Yongcheng's:

"He was transferred during Zeng Zhiyuan's time—the timing matches."

Then he put down his pen and placed this line side by side with the line about Wei Yuan that Zhou Haibo had explained on the same page.

The two lines meet in the middle of the page.

Then they all extend upwards, pointing in the same direction.

He wrote three words at the top of the page—Zeng Zhiyuan.

After closing the laptop.

He picked up his phone and sent a message to He Ying: "Sister Ying, there's new progress. Qian Yongcheng—the director of the case management office, was transferred to the Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection during Zeng Zhiyuan's tenure. He signed the transfer documents for Zhou Haibo."

He Ying's reply came a while later:

"Qian Yongcheng... I remember him. He used to work in the provincial capital and had professional dealings with Zeng Zhiyuan. Are you planning to take action against him?"

"Not yet. Director Hu said to observe first."

"Then be careful."

"Okay, I understand, Sister Ying."

Chen Dapeng put down his phone and continued organizing the materials at hand.

……

Around 2 PM.

He got up to get water from the tea room, and as he passed through the corridor, he saw Qian Yongcheng walking out of the stairwell with a file folder in his hand.

He walked with a steady pace and a calm expression, showing no signs of anything unusual.

He nodded as he passed Chen Dapeng, then continued walking forward.

Chen Dapeng nodded as well, without lingering.

He went to the tea room, got some water, stood there for a while, and then went back to his office.

He didn't turn around to see where Qian Yongcheng had gone.

I didn't deliberately remember his movements—

But in my heart, I realized one thing:

Qian Yongcheng showed no unusual behavior, indicating that he was unaware that he had been noticed.

Chen Dapeng returned to his office, sat down, and added a stroke to the line in his notebook:

"Qian Yongcheng's activities were normal today, with no obvious abnormalities."

Then, he used the names Zhou Haibo, Wei Yuan, and Qian Yongcheng as three nodes, drawing them on the same draft paper to form a triangular structure that points upwards towards Zeng Zhiyuan.

……

Meanwhile, the provincial discipline inspection commission's special investigation team was temporarily detained in the detention area.

Zhou Haibo sat in a chair in the room, a cell phone without a SIM card in front of him.

This was left for him by Hu Yuheng.

Users are limited to viewing external messages at fixed times each day; they cannot make calls or send emails.

But he still has his own cell phone.

He hadn't had time to hand it in before coming in; it had been in his coat pocket.

Hu Yuheng did not search his body, probably to leave some room for maneuver.

He hesitated for a long time before finally taking the phone out of his pocket.

The screen lit up, he opened Wei Yuan's chat window, hovered his thumb above the screen for a few seconds, and then typed a few words:

"I was summoned for questioning. I'm no longer part of the task force."

He stared at the line of text for a while, then pressed the send button without offering any explanation.

After the message was marked as "read," the other party did not reply immediately.

About three minutes later, a line of text appeared on the screen:

"Okay. Watch your mouth."

Zhou Haibo looked at the message, didn't reply, deleted it, turned off his phone, and put it back in his inner pocket.

He knew Wei Yuan wouldn't say anything more.

This line of text is the final confirmation.

He was abandoned.

……

Beijing.

After sending the message, Wei Yuan took out another phone and dialed a number that was not saved in his contacts.

It rang several times before being answered, but no one spoke on the other end.

Wei Yuan spoke first:

"Old boss, Zhou Haibo is in trouble. He's been kicked out of the special investigation team and should have already confessed."

He paused for a moment, without saying what Zhou Haibo had specifically confessed.

"They might have noticed me over there."

There was a few seconds of silence on the other end of the phone, then Zeng Zhiyuan's voice came through, sounding a bit deeper than usual:

"How will you handle this?"

"I don't contact him directly, but that connection might be uncovered."

"Take what you should take back and cut ties with what you should cut off. Don't contact the provincial capital for the time being."

Zeng Zhiyuan hung up the phone without waiting for his response.

Wei Yuan put down his phone, leaned back in his chair, and sighed softly:

"Zhou Haibo was summoned for questioning and kicked out of the task force. I also came under the task force's scrutiny, and the situation was getting increasingly dire..."