A master of both medicine and martial arts, he picked up a beautiful CEO as his wife.

"Qian Chongwen, you haven't been around for long!"

Lin Yuqing had already prepared all the evidence: the allegations of hiring thugs to cause trouble, the shady dealings of malicious acquisition, the on-site records of disrupting normal construction... Each matter was piled up with evidence and sent to the right place through Old Zhou's connections.

These are all well-documented and reasonable: hiring thugs to besiege the workers' shed is disorderly conduct; maliciously acquiring suppliers is disrupting fair business transactions; and instructing thugs to injure people on the street is intentional assault.

What Lin Yuqing wanted was not for Qian Chongwen to beat or maim him, but for him to be dirty and stupid, which would only make him more vulnerable to exploitation. What she wanted was the rules of Dongyang, to let Qian Chongwen, this lackey, die a proper death on the road, so that he could not live again before he died, and to let those behind his back know: if you use a knife in Dongyang, you have to bargain according to Dongyang's rules!

Ye Feng did not use any vigilante justice, nor did he force anyone to kneel. He simply laid an invisible and intangible net to cover every corner where Qian Chongwen had escaped!

Interviews, police intervention, and the withdrawal of investment from partners—in just three days, Qian Chongwen, a newcomer who had just emerged from obscurity, went from a powerful "General Manager Qian" to a "stinky cat" that everyone avoided. His underhanded and shady dealings were exposed one by one, leaving him barely able to protect himself.

Ye Feng never wanted Qian Chongwen, that little fly.

Late that night, only one person went to the suburban villa where Qian Chongwen was hiding.

When he climbed out the window, Qian Chongwen's group of bodyguards armed with muskets were all blown down by an invisible force, along with their guns. They were slammed to the ground, their bones seemingly broken. They got up and cried out in pain, but they couldn't make a sound.

Qian Chongwen sat on the sofa, utterly terrified, staring at the nonchalant yet incredibly heavy figure, whose pants were soaked with sweat.

"I...I told you everything!" she cried, waving her hands frantically, almost screaming, "Please don't kill me! Please don't kill me! They made me do it, I have nothing to do with it, they were the ones who wanted to do it!"

"Who? Who's up there?" Ye Feng sat down in front of him and asked slowly.

"A... a man whose true face I don't know," Qian Chongwen said, trembling. "He came to me half a month ago, offering me a deposit, ten times more than what I got from Tianheng! I'm just a gofer for them, how could I possibly accept so much money? They want me to do two things: sabotage your construction site, disrupt your suppliers, and then..."

"And then what?"

"Uh..." Qian Chongwen gasped. "They even said that if they could find that Miss Lin and 'invite' her over to their men, they would add ten times the amount if the job was done..."

Ye Feng's expression turned completely cold.

Just like that bald guy said, the boss needs Lin Yuqing.

"That guy, haven't you seen his real face?"

"I've never seen anything like it, I swear to God!" Qian Chongwen said as if he had been granted a pardon. "It's all one-way communication, a phone call with a voice changer, and instructions are given through an encrypted USB drive. The money is transferred to overseas accounts in installments. I don't even know the people's surnames, or whether they're male or female. All I know is... those of them who do this dirty work are called by a name... 'cleaners'."

Cleaning personnel.

Ye Feng clicked his tongue, pondering the word, and felt a chill run through his body.

This name is bloody; it treats people like garbage, ready to be disposed of at any time. Just like what Su Man said about Tianheng using "conditioning products" to support its core executives, they are ruthless and treat human life as cheap as ants. This is the terrifying thing about Zhao Hui's group; what's most frightening is that they treat people as tools to be used and discarded at will.

Ye Feng thought of Su Man, the woman who had been drugged and cared for by Tian Heng, and who had been awakened by him and given a way out. Now, thinking about it, Su Man was just the most worthless pawn in this big game. When you're setting up a game, what does it matter if a pawn lives or dies?

How can living people be turned into tools that have no pain or fear and only obey orders? What kind of cold-blooded person is the boss behind this?

The more Ye Feng thought about it, the colder he felt. He realized that he was about to face something much larger, more ruthless, and more inhuman than any of his previous opponents.

"Can you still contact the person who made the call?" Ye Feng asked, staring at him.

"Yes...we can contact you!" Qian Chongwen nodded vigorously.

"Okay," Ye Feng said, then added, "Then do me one last thing. Say what I say, and if you do it, I'll spare your life. If you don't..."

He didn't say anything, just glanced at Qian Chongwen indifferently.

With just one glance, Qian Chongwen felt a chill run from the soles of his feet to the top of his head, and he quickly nodded, not daring to say no.

When I left the villa, the evening breeze was a bit cool, making the few neglected crabapple trees in the yard rustle.

Ye Feng stood in the messy courtyard, looking up at the dark night sky to the north, and the thorn in his heart sank even deeper.

Qian Chongwen's words, "Add ten times the price," the bald man's words, "Please come out separately," and Zhao Hui's greedy gaze fixed on Lin Yuqing before he left at Tingtao Pavilion—these scattered pieces of information silently connected in the night, forming a cold chain: "The boss is offering ten times the price, using both overt and covert methods. Does he need my life? No, he needs her!!"

At that moment, Ye Feng actually had this thought: that deadly tribulation, that "half-year period," that "True Yin Tribulation"... could it have never been his from the beginning? Could it be that his master had let him go from the start, and that his meeting with Lin Yuqing was actually a game of chess? A game of chess that he couldn't understand at all?

Thinking of this, Ye Feng was startled, and then he immediately suppressed the thought.

It's better not to think about it; don't think about things you can't understand!

The priority now is to stir up this mess in Dongyang, making the other side's eyes go blind! Not killing Qian Chongwen, having a lackey still around, and having that key channel for transmitting instructions still in existence are all part of Ye Feng's hidden strategy. He can both follow that clue to probe the other side's mastermind's strengths and weaknesses, and also, just before he leaves, drag out and eliminate all the henchmen the other side sent to Dongyang.

The key is to figure out that tall chess player and turn the "cleaner" sent from Dongyang into your "spy" and "lure"!

The master craftsman's words, "Protect that key!" truly carried a heavy weight at that moment!

He didn't know what Lin Yuqing was hiding, but one thing was certain: until he found out what it was, he had to protect this woman perfectly! Even if it meant turning the entire Dongyang upside down, he had to do it!

"Clean it up first!" he whispered, a ruthless glint in his eyes.

"Go back again."