Official statement: Tongwei is dead! You chose Ruijin, didn't you?

Qin Yuanzhou sat in the main seat, picked up his thermos and took a sip of hot tea, looking at the half-closed door in silence.

"This Secretary Dakang is truly a talent." Zhou Zhengming, tidying up the files on the table, couldn't help but shake his head and chuckle.

"This shamelessness and mental fortitude have elevated 'refusing to help someone in distress' to the strategic level of 'protecting Handong's GDP'."

"If Li Dakang didn't have this much skill, how could he have thrived under both Zhao Lichun and Sha Ruijin, the two generations of 'Kings of Handong'?"

Qin Yuanzhou put down the thermos, his gaze gradually deepening.

"However, the lesson we taught him today is enough to make him tuck his tail between his legs and go back to Jingzhou to live a dignified life. Without him stirring up trouble, we can finally get the real benefits out of the pot."

Zhou Zhengming paused, his expression turning serious: "Team Leader Qin, do you mean we should go see... the protagonist of the 'falling object' incident now?"

"He's cooled down enough." Qin Yuanzhou stood up. "Let's go meet our 'medical miracle' from Handong. Remember, when we go in, listen more, ask fewer questions, and don't express any opinions. Gao Yuliang is a powder keg right now; what we need to do is make him hand over the fuse himself."

……

The First People's Hospital of the Province, top floor special needs ward.

It was quite hot in Handong in June and July. The central air conditioning in the ward kept the temperature constant at 25 degrees Celsius, and the air vents made a soft "whooshing" sound.

Gao Yuliang was half-reclined on the hospital bed, wrapped in polymer plaster and medical bandages like a newly unearthed mummy, with only his face showing.

The electrocardiogram monitor next to me beeped, and the heart rate line on the screen was as steady as the straight asphalt road in front of the Hantong Provincial Party Committee compound.

75 BPM, blood pressure 120/80.

This data is so stable that any doctor who knows the inside story would want to curse.

Gao Yuliang kept his eyes closed.

Zhou Zhengming knocked on the door once more than half an hour ago, and then turned around and left.

That was a very skillful move.

This is like training a hawk to harden its bridle.

Qin Yuanzhou and his gang regarded Gao Yuliang as a wild and untamed bandit leader who had just been captured.

Gao Yuliang knows this all too well.

The most agonizing thing in officialdom is never the slamming of tables and glaring in the detention room of the Discipline Inspection Commission, but the psychological warfare of slowly boiling a frog in water.

You want to play your trump card, but your opponent refuses to play it, leaving you holding onto it, burning you with pent-up frustration, until you can't take it anymore.

Qin Yuanzhou is a hundred times more difficult to deal with than Sha Ruijin's hammer, which only knows how to swing wildly.

Gao Yuliang sneered inwardly.

Fine, you outlast me, and I'll outlast you.

Anyway, I'm seriously injured now.

I'm lying down, you're standing.

After an unknown amount of time, footsteps were heard outside the corridor.

With a "click," the ward door was pushed open.

Qin Yuanzhou walked in front, Zhou Zhengming followed a little bit behind, and at the very back was a young recorder carrying a briefcase and wearing black-rimmed glasses.

As soon as the recorder entered the room, his professional habit made him subconsciously glance at the monitor on the bedside table.

Immediately afterwards, his hand, which was pushing up his glasses, froze in mid-air.

He stared intently at the steady heart rate and blood oxygen saturation, his eye twitching violently.

This is a severe fall injury patient who was hit on the roof of a Hongqi car from the sixth floor?

This data is ten times healthier than what he, a young man who stays up all night writing materials in the supervisory group, has!

Is this Secretary Gao actually Captain America, sent by the Marvel Universe to infiltrate Handong?

Qin Yuanzhou, however, seemed not to have noticed the incongruous monitor at all.

He didn't sit down immediately, but instead paced half a step around the hospital bed, his hands behind his back, his gaze sweeping over Gao Yuliang's pale face.

"Comrade Yuliang, the air conditioning in this provincial hospital is quite strong."

Qin Yuanzhou's opening remarks were as polite as those of a retired cadre visiting a grassroots community to offer assistance.

"How are you feeling physically?"

Gao Yuliang then slowly opened his eyes.

Those eyes held the murky, unfocused look of someone critically injured and on the verge of death.

"Team Leader Qin is here." Gao Yuliang's voice was a little hoarse. "Thanks to the organization, my old bones aren't falling apart yet. It's just that the roof of this Hongqi car is too hard; it's uncomfortable."

Zhou Zhengming paused for a moment, holding the pen, and exchanged a subtle glance with Qin Yuanzhou.

Good heavens, this doesn't look like a prisoner awaiting trial at all.

This is clearly a veteran actor preparing to take the stage and perform a rival act!

He immediately started making fun of the incident where he smashed Sha Ruijin's car, which was a blatant display of his "deterrence".

"It's good that it hasn't fallen apart." Qin Yuanzhou nodded, pulled over a chair, and his gaze suddenly sharpened.

"The comrades in Handong all say that this is a medical miracle. I'd also like to hear from the person who created this miracle. Could you talk about it now?"

There's a sharp barb hidden in those words.

Gao Yuliang calmly accepted the challenge, even struggling to shift his body upwards slightly:

"If the organization wants to talk, even if I'm dead, I'll crawl out of the morgue and cooperate. But, Team Leader Qin, rather than calling this a medical miracle, I think it's because God thinks the drama in Handong isn't over yet, and He's keeping me, the supporting actor, on stage to see how the script will be written."

"Stop with the platitudes." Qin Yuanzhou's tone remained calm. "Comrade Yuliang, there's no microphone from the Standing Committee of the Handong Provincial Party Committee here, nor are there any of your students from the Department of Political Science and Law. You're facing the Central Joint Supervision Group. I didn't fly here to listen to your witty banter or script discussions."

Gao Yuliang slightly raised his eyelids and looked directly at Qin Yuanzhou: "So, what does Team Leader Qin want to hear?"

"truth."

"The truth is usually not pleasant to hear. And it often brings up more embarrassing facts."

"If the truth were so appealing, what would be the point of our supervisory team? Just say what you want; if the sky falls, the supervisory team will take care of it."

An eerie silence fell over the ward, broken only by the monotonous beeping of the monitor.

Gao Yuliang knew that the first shot was crucial.

You absolutely must not whine and complain like a wronged woman.

Crying out for injustice is tantamount to admitting you're in the wrong; such a submissive attitude will make the supervisory team completely disregard you.

Furthermore, one cannot completely absolve oneself of responsibility.

Only immortals are without blemishes. You, Gao Yuliang, have spent half your life soaking in the cesspool of Handong, claiming to be a pure white lotus rising from the mud unsullied. Qin Yuanzhou would throw your medical record in your face right there and then.

What he wanted to do was to thoroughly muddy the waters. He wanted the supervisory team to understand that while Gao Yuliang himself might have some mud on him, Sha Ruijin and Hou Liangping's group had been splashed with toxic excrement!

Gao Yuliang took a deep breath, his brows furrowing in pain, realistically portraying the agony of a seriously wounded soldier.

"Team Leader Qin, before we discuss specific issues, let me state my position first."

Gao Yuliang's voice was soft, but every word carried immense weight.

"As a senior Party cadre, have I, Gao Yuliang, reached this point? Yes. Are there any issues that warrant organizational investigation? Certainly."

I have shielded those I shouldn't have, and I haven't upheld the bottom line in certain transactions of interests. I won't evade this, and there's nowhere to hide from it. If the organization verifies this, and those who deserve to be killed or tortured are punished, I, Gao Yuliang, will not even flinch.

In the corner, the recorder's pen tip scratched rapidly across the paper, making a rustling sound.

A hint of surprise flashed in Zhou Zhengming's eyes. He hadn't expected Gao Yuliang to "self-destruct" so readily right from the start.

But Qin Yuanzhou remained expressionless; he knew this was just the prelude.

The old fox yields half a step so that he can bite your throat off next.

Sure enough, Gao Yuliang abruptly changed the subject, his voice suddenly turning cold and menacing:

"But I want to ask, when an organization investigates a sitting deputy provincial party secretary and secretary of the Political and Legal Affairs Commission, is the ultimate goal to uncover the problems and cure the patient, or is it to conduct a political purge and drive the person to their death?!"

Qin Yuanzhou's eyelids finally twitched: "You think someone is forcing you?"

"It's not just a feeling, it's a fact!"

Gao Yuliang's gaze passed over Qin Yuanzhou and landed on the snow-white ceiling of the ward. His tone was extremely steady, yet it carried a chilling accusation.

"Comrade Sha Ruijin was parachuted into Handong under the banner of anti-corruption and talked about the political ecology, but what kind of business is he actually doing?"

On the surface, he talks about the big picture, but his first priority is to establish his own faction, build alliances, and relentlessly suppress us so-called "local faction of Handong"!

Zhou Zhengming couldn't help but interject, "The local faction? You mean the Handong clique led by you?"

"A group of cadres, represented by myself, who have toiled and worked half their lives on this land of Handong!"

Gao Yuliang's answer was watertight, instantly linking himself with the vast number of grassroots cadres.

"Should we deal with the problems left over from Zhao Lichun's time? Of course we should! But the officialdom in Handong is not a blank sheet of paper; we can't just erase whoever we want with an eraser!"

Team Leader Qin, you've also been in charge of a region before. The worst thing for a cadre team is instability and a climate of fear. But how did Sha Ruijin handle it?

Qin Yuanzhou stared intently at him: "How did he do it?"

Gao Yuliang abruptly turned his head, his eyes fixed on Qin Yuanzhou, and dropped the first bombshell, powerful enough to cause a political earthquake in Handong:

"He conspired with my old boss's good son to deal with me, the deputy secretary of the provincial party committee."

He spoke the word "son" in a sarcastic, mocking tone, his words dripping with sarcasm.

Zhou Zhengming suddenly raised his head, his face filled with disbelief and shock.