My older sister is a villainous rich girl

The leader placed his arm in front of his chest and bowed, saying, "Excuse me! Please wait here for a moment, my esteemed guests. I will go and inform my superior to come and receive you."

He had never actually met the young master and young lady of the Duke of Winchester in person, but Duff was able to identify them so confidently, and judging from the reactions of those around him and the parties involved, they were most likely not mistaken.

To be a commoner to have connections with the Duke's son, Duff must have quite a background!

Chris, who had been silently standing behind the staff, couldn't help but turn to look at Wayne's expression, her eyes seemingly filled with surprise.

Wayne cleared his throat. "So, Dave, your job has been reassigned."

That was a huge miscalculation; it's probably impossible to fish in troubled waters now.

"Don't worry about me and Chris. Work is important. You can start the interviews now," Wayne waved his hand casually.

"Oh, by the way, thank you all for taking the time to cooperate with our newspaper. I believe that after we compile and publish these typical cases, it will help raise public awareness and deter potential criminals."

Now that you've been recognized, you still need to say the basic polite things.

“Indeed, Young Master Wayne is right.” The guards smiled obsequiously and nodded in agreement.

For a moment, the meeting room was filled with a harmonious and joyful atmosphere.

Sitting to the side, Chris rested her chin on her hand, looking rather bored.

Presumably assuming that Diff and Wayne had some connection, the guards quickly pushed Diff over and put him in charge of entertaining these two unconventional noblemen.

However, before Wayne could say anything, Chris asked with a hint of surprise, "Wayne, where did you meet this friend?"

"..."

This is a bit hard to explain.

Dave had no idea that there was anything wrong with meeting him at the Deer Cry Tavern that day, so he smiled and casually replied, "I met Young Master Wayne through Young Master Gavin's introduction, and we even had a meal together."

Upon hearing Gavin's name, Chris subconsciously frowned.

If emotional changes could be quantified, Chris would probably be displaying a "[Affection -20]" notification above her head right now.

In her eyes, Gavin was a typical good-for-nothing friend, and she naturally didn't have a good impression of the other friends he introduced to Wayne either.

Chris gave a curt "Oh," and lost interest in the conversation.

Duve was oblivious to this and continued to try to get the conversation with Wayne more lively.

Although their last meeting was unpleasant, and she had harbored resentment towards this arrogant young nobleman in private, she couldn't afford to be willful at this moment.

Whether it's Lord Simon or Lord Bulwer... they need to realize that they are not insignificant nobodys.

—Even if that is indeed true.

While trying to liven up the atmosphere, Dift subtly kept an eye on the movements at the door.

His little tricks, of course, could not be hidden from Wayne, who already knew most of the inside story.

Wayne watched him perform, nodding occasionally in agreement, which was quite in line with the image of a noble young master in the general public's impression.

Not long after, a high-ranking official from the city guard appeared.

He had a thick beard and burst into hearty laughter as soon as he entered: "It's actually Young Master Wayne and Miss Chris! Your names weren't on the original reservation list for Leaf Publishing House."

Wayne smiled politely, stood up, and greeted him.

This high-ranking official was someone I had met a few times at banquets. He was also a senior alumnus of Qingxi Academy, and came from a privileged family.

But he also has another, more intimate identity: the father of one of the members of the Lily Society.

Prior to this, many rumors about the city guards had been leaked from him.

With this connection, Wayne naturally wouldn't refuse to give him face, and instead took the initiative to joke, "Sigh, I wanted to secretly experience the life of an ordinary newspaper employee, but I didn't expect to be exposed as soon as I walked in."

Upon hearing this, the officer glanced at Deaf standing to the side, and pondered for a couple of seconds. He then quickly recovered and replied, "It's rather inconvenient to talk here. If you don't mind, please come to my office for a while. We can leave the work to our subordinates for now. Deaf, you can come too."

Dave was visibly stunned for a moment that Dave remembered his name, then a hint of delight appeared on his face.

In any case, the more important people you can get close to, the safer you will be.

After giving Barto a few instructions, Wayne and Chris followed the senior official to his office.

He only relaxed a little after closing the door and excluding outsiders.

"Please have a seat. I just obtained a batch of top-quality black tea leaves from Stuart. I've come to try them out and see how they taste different from those in China," the official said casually.

The high-ranking officials in the capital hold countless positions in various fields, solving the employment problem for a large number of nobles.

Even so, the nobles would still unite (collude) in various ways to seek greater benefits. Whether they were from the same hometown, classmates, or faction, as long as they could be classified as belonging to the same camp, the conditions for forming an alliance naturally existed between them.

Therefore, generally speaking, it's rare for nobles without fundamental conflicts of interest to actually fight to the death. After all, no one knows whether they might need the other's help when the situation changes.

The relationship between Wayne and most nobles outside his own faction was roughly the same.

Well, except for the Edgeworth family.

After accepting the tea offered, Wayne casually brought up the "Pig Man Case."

"I heard that Aikos caught the criminal, and the city guard has now agreed to give interviews to outsiders. I suppose they have investigated all the causes and consequences by now."

Because of the pretense of being a reporter for a newspaper, it didn't seem abrupt for me to ask about it.

The official hesitated for a moment, then said, "Well, not yet... To be honest, I'm not optimistic about the investigation."

After saying that, his expression turned serious.

"I can reveal some information, but before the case is finally closed, please do not disclose it to the outside world under any circumstances," he earnestly advised.

Wayne exchanged a glance with Chris and nodded.

"—There is more than one perpetrator in this case."

Chapter 467 Really, won't you reconsider?

He informed Wayne and others about the latest developments in the "pig-man case".

“Our previous investigation had some problems. We just guessed that the pigman might be a villainous magician and kept trying to find commonalities in several cases that had almost no connection with each other. But in the end, we never expected that the pigman was not a specific person, but a mask shared by those who wanted to cover up their crimes.”

Chris seemed somewhat shocked upon hearing this.

But Dave probably already knew, and didn't show any surprise.

"How could this be?! This is too unbelievable... Didn't anyone notice the problem? Where are those who reported it?" Chris couldn't help but ask.

The senior official gave a wry smile.

"Several highly suspicious suspects have been arrested, but there may be more undetected criminals behind the scenes."

"Fortunately, Lady Aikos is still investigating this matter privately... otherwise, with the city guards that have recently reorganized their personnel, they really wouldn't have discovered this trick in a short time," he said with a hint of relief.

Chris suddenly perked up at the mention of Aikos.

"Is Lady Aikos with the city guard right now?" she asked curiously.

"Uh...no."

Chris was slightly disappointed after receiving a negative reply.

"How can there be a job with such lenient requirements? Doesn't that mean you can slack off whenever you want?" Wayne heard her muttering with great dissatisfaction.

Naive girl~ The person you want to see is sitting right next to you, and they're not slacking off.

Wayne changed the subject with a somewhat ambiguous mood.

"So, agreeing to this interview was just to send a signal to the outside world that this matter has been resolved?" He filled in the unspoken subtext for the other party.

"That's right." He looked somewhat conflicted as he said this.

He seemed to be hesitating, wondering if he should be so transparent with these outsiders.

But he quickly made up his mind and explained straightforwardly: "Because we can't even determine how many people are trying to escape punishment, we have to release the news to appease the public and prevent panic in the capital... And those who want to get away with this will realize after seeing the interview that their little trick has been seen through."

"If a similar incident were to occur again, people would not think that there was some kind of legendary monster, but would instead think about urging the city guards to catch the criminals as soon as possible."

Wayne could not refute this claim.

To be fair, he never had much faith in the city guards to begin with, so he couldn't really feel disappointed.

Chris, on the other hand, frowned deeply.

However, since she was on someone else's turf, she didn't say anything disrespectful.

It wasn't until the group from Leaf Publishing House left the City Guard headquarters building and were on their way back in the carriage that Chris couldn't help but complain: "He said a lot of things that seemed to make sense, but he probably didn't really intend to investigate properly."

"Of course we'll keep investigating..." Wayne lifted a corner of the carriage curtain, looking at the sky outside. "Like he just said, isn't there still Aikos? The culprit will always be caught."

"But... but we can't put all the blame on Miss Aikos alone."

After truly experiencing how terrible her colleagues were, Chris even felt some sympathy for Aikos.

Noticing that she seemed to have a different impression of Aikos, Wayne turned his gaze away from the window.

There were only the two of them in the carriage; the other employees of the publishing house were sitting in another carriage in the back, so they didn't have to worry about outsiders hearing their conversation.

“He did try to cover for his own people a little,” Wayne said with a slight smile. “He said he didn’t want the people of the capital to worry, but he just wanted to take credit for it.”

After glancing at the interviews that Barto and his team had collected, Wayne understood what those people were thinking.

Although Aikos's contribution was mentioned, it was only briefly mentioned and then glossed over. The credit for this matter was extensively attributed to the entire city guard.

Even Simon, who was basically not involved in the matter, was mentioned briefly because of his role as acting commander. It was as if the great progress was made because of his attention and leadership.

In other words, I've essentially given them a free ride on my seniority.

This left Wayne speechless.

Although seniority is meaningless to him, and it would be easier for him to lower his profile, he still felt that those people were being too unscrupulous in their actions.

It's probably because of the persona that Aikos has always projected that they've misunderstood something.

They didn't even think to give themselves a larger share of the task funds. Do you think it's so easy to steal credit for my work?

While Wayne was still plotting how to vent his anger, Chris simply sighed softly.

"...It's worrying that the city guards are like this."

Wayne, seemingly unconcerned, replied, "Hmm, what are you worried about?"

—When the sky falls, there are always tall people to hold it up.

For example, me.

"My wish in this life is to live a good life, eating and waiting to die..." Chris placed her hands flat on the small table in the center of the carriage and rested her head on it.

The excellent shock absorption structure made the carriage travel very smoothly, so much so that it could easily make tired people feel sleepy.

She closed her eyes and whispered, "If these people really go too far, how can I live a carefree life of just eating and waiting to die?"

Wayne was silent for a moment.

Then he suddenly laughed and said, "We still have a very, very long time to live in this life. Don't we really want to think about our life's wishes a little more?"

Chris did not open her eyes, nor did she give an answer.

……

The Beijing Morning Post published an explosive feature report.

With this as a starting point, everyone's attention in the capital was instantly drawn back to the "Pig-Man Case".

It is said that even His Majesty the King was shocked by the bloody truth hidden in the legend of the "Pigmen" and ordered the execution of the criminals who had woven such a huge lie.

While the public condemned those utterly depraved individuals, the reputation of the city guards also rose significantly.

"It seems there are still some people in the city guard who are actually doing things..." This kind of exclamation always comes at the end of people's conversations.

"Yes, yes! I heard that after Lord Simon took over, he discovered something amiss while reviewing the files, which is why he sent Lady Echos, the most capable officer in the city guard, to investigate..."

It was spread as if they had all witnessed it themselves.

In addition, there were some "special" voices mixed in with the rumors.

"—Lord Simon is much more capable than Bulwer. Bulwer spent so much time investigating but found nothing, while the case was solved as soon as Lord Simon took office."

Chapter 468 Important Bargaining Chips

Wien found these comments rather uninteresting.

The bard Herbert had suggested several times that he leave Lornes and travel to other countries.