Chapter 15

Chapter 15

Seeing the live chat comments, Liang Xinghua acted moved by his fans' concern, thanking them repeatedly while also throwing Liang Xuan under the bus, implying his son cared less about him than his online fans did—another round of playing the victim card.

But Liang Xinghua's live stream fans actually fell for it, and in their emotional state, they sent him even more tips.

Looking at today's tip earnings, Liang Xinghua could barely wipe the smile off his face, while also feeling regret—if he'd known live streaming was this easy money, he should have gotten into it long ago.

A sudden knock on the door came, the sound a bit urgent.

"Who is it?" Liang Xinghua asked with a frown.

"The landlord. The downstairs neighbor said the bathroom is leaking, so I came to check," the landlord's voice came through.

Liang Xinghua didn't turn off the stream and got up to open the door. In his view, a quick check would only take a few minutes, and turning off the stream would just waste time.

Besides, having the landlord appear on stream was a good thing—it gave him more topics to talk about.

If the landlord had a good attitude, he could say he'd met a kind-hearted person while renting and play the victim; if the landlord had a bad attitude, that would be even better material for his pity act.

The door was thin, and Liang Xinghua's footsteps were heavy. Hearing him approach to open the door, the landlord glanced at the police officer beside him, scared stiff, but kept up an impatient look, like he was just dealing with an annoying necessity.

The landlord was kicking himself now—he should've left the place empty rather than rent to a criminal!

Just from the number of cops who showed up to make the arrest, he could tell Liang Xinghua must have committed a serious crime. Was the guy packing?

Probably not—if he did, the cops wouldn't have let him stand there.

As he reached the door, Liang Xinghua suddenly felt uneasy. He hesitated for a second and peeked through the peephole.

Only the landlord was out there, looking impatient. Liang Xinghua let out a sigh of relief and opened the door.

The second the door swung open, the landlord stepped back and cops rushed in, surrounding Liang Xinghua.

The sight of Xiao Ze's uniform made Liang Xinghua's mind go blank. He instinctively turned to bolt, but caught himself—he couldn't run. Running would be as good as admitting guilt. Maybe this was about Liang Xuan.

Liang Xinghua conveniently ignored one thing: if it were about Liang Xuan, the police would have knocked on the door openly, not sent the landlord to trick him into opening the door.

"Liang Xinghua, someone reported you as a wanted fugitive. Please cooperate with our investigation," Xiao Ze said, flashing his police badge.

The moment he finished, the officers had Liang Xinghua in cuffs.

Liang Xinghua went stiff. He tried to reassure himself—maybe they were just bluffing. That case was years ago; who could prove who he was?

"Fine, I'll go with you," Liang Xinghua said, playing weak. "Officers, I'm really not a fugitive. Could you ease up a bit? These old bones can't take this kind of roughing up."

"Take him away." Xiao Ze didn't bother responding.

Back in the squad car, Xiao Ze texted Shen Dongqing about the arrest. He'd promised to let Shen Dongqing know once they caught the guy.

Shen Dongqing was surprised to get the message. He'd figured the police would need a few more days to investigate before arresting anyone, but only a few hours had passed—way too fast.

This one was on Liang Xinghua.

If Liang Xinghua hadn't been live streaming, the police would've had to track him down, scout the area, set up surveillance, and plan the arrest—all time-consuming stuff.

But Liang Xinghua had been streaming the whole time. The cops watched and knew exactly where he was, making the arrest a cakewalk.

...

Zhang Feiyu was live streaming, unaware that Liang Xinghua had been picked up by the cops, but fans with fast sources soon found out and spread it in the chat.

"Brother Yu, huge drama! That old geezer who was mooching off your fame got arrested!"

"Really? That's not just a rumor, right?" someone questioned. They hated Liang Xinghua too, but making up a story about him getting arrested was too far.

"What rumor? He didn't even cut the stream when they got him—everyone in the chat saw the cops take him away. How could that be fake? If you don't believe it, go check Daddy Liang's stream, the replay's still up."

Zhang Feiyu saw the chat and immediately went offline to get the tea.

Before logging off, Zhang Feiyu glanced at his viewer count and winced. In under a minute, a third of his viewers had bailed, and numbers were still dropping—everyone had gone to check out the drama.

Zhang Feiyu had initially felt it was a shame to end his stream for gossip, but now he had zero guilt.

Zhang Feiyu didn't just keep the tea to himself—after watching the arrest video, he quickly forwarded it to the three-person group chat, inviting Zhou Jiayi and Shen Dongqing to join in.

"Liang Xuan's mom came to see me these past couple days, trying to get me to forgive him so he'd get a lighter sentence. I heard she even went to a temple to pray. Looks like the Bodhisattva answered her prayer in reverse," Zhou Jiayi said with a sneer. She had zero love for the Liang family.

"What temple's got that kind of power?" Shen Dongqing popped up, while also replying to Zhang Feiyu, "Feels like you finally got even, huh?"

"Heh, not exactly a big score, but it does feel pretty damn satisfying. Thanks to the cops. I wonder what he did—will they put out an official notice?" Zhang Feiyu said.

"They probably will. I checked, and it's already blowing up. The cops should put out a statement—just wait a bit."

Seeing how curious the two of them were in the chat, Shen Dongqing quietly put his phone away. He really wanted to fill them in, but he couldn't.

Liang's mother didn't know yet that Liang Xinghua was in trouble. She'd been running around these past few days, either bothering Zhou Jiayi or trying to scrape together money for Liang Xuan.

Liang Xinghua had no relatives and refused to borrow from anyone, so she could only turn to her own family and friends. But the relatives all knew how much gambling debt Liang Xuan had—when she called, they either made vague excuses or flat-out refused to lend.

After another failed attempt to borrow money, Liang's mother felt like crap. She found a bench to sit on. When she saw a relative calling, she thought they'd changed their mind and answered excitedly.

"Auntie! Uncle got arrested—you should go to the police station and check!"

Liang's mother collapsed onto the bench. It took a while before she came to, with passersby shaking her awake. She refused their offer to call an ambulance, asked which station, and didn't even bother saving money—she cabbed it straight to the criminal investigation unit.

Meanwhile, the police had already matched Liang Xinghua's fingerprints to the murder weapon and confirmed his identity.

"Captain Xiao, it's really him," the officer running the fingerprint match said, barely able to contain his excitement.

Looking at the match results, Xiao Ze's lips curved into a slight smile.

"Contact the local detective unit where the case happened and give them the good news."

Liang Xinghua—no, Xia Yong—had been on the run for so many years that he was probably a thorn in the side of the local cops. They were probably on edge waiting for the results. If they didn't hear soon, they wouldn't sleep tonight.

"Captain Xiao, Xia Yong's wife is here asking about him."

...

Liang's mother stumbled out of the criminal investigation unit in a daze. Before coming, she'd imagined all sorts of scenarios—maybe it was about Liang Xuan, maybe Liang Xinghua had done something behind her back—but she never expected his identity to be fake. Liang Xinghua's real identity was a wanted fugitive.

Now, the cops had finally caught him.

Liang Xuan lay in his hospital bed, eyeing the cops outside the door with fear in his eyes.

These past few days, it had finally sunk in that he'd be spending years in prison. Now that it hit him he'd lose his freedom for a long time, he'd finally started to get scared.

And once he realized Liang Xinghua wasn't coming to help him anymore, Liang Xuan could only beg his mother to save him. But every time she came back, she only brought him disappointment.

After waking up from a sleep and seeing that Liang's mother still hadn't returned, Liang Xuan could only pass the time by playing on his phone. As time ticked by minute by minute, and it was already eight in the evening with no sign of her, Liang Xuan felt that something was wrong.

His phone rang, and seeing it was his mother calling, he answered with irritation: "Where have you been? Why..."

"Are you the patient's family member? The patient has a high fever and fainted..."

Liang's mother had collapsed before she even left the police station, and the police rushed her to the nearest hospital. Luckily, they got her there in time, so nothing serious happened, but she was too drained to take care of Liang Xuan.

If Liang's mother still had money, she could have hired a caregiver for Liang Xuan, but Liang Xuan had gambled away all her money, so there was no way she could hire anyone.

Liang Xuan put up with it for one night, but he couldn't stand being left without care any longer, so he called his mother.

"Mom, you really don't have any money left? Can't you borrow some from Uncle or Auntie? I can't manage on my own here..." As soon as the call connected, Liang Xuan complained.

"You're a grown man, and it's been days now—the doctor said you can get up and move around. It's not like anyone's asking you to do heavy labor. Can't you take care of yourself for once? Alright, stop bothering Auntie and let her rest. I wonder who's gonna take care of you when you're in prison." A female voice he didn't recognize came from the other end, and Liang Xuan realized it was his cousin.

"My dad'll take care of me." Liang Xuan didn't want to seem weak in front of her, so he talked tough.

"Oh, yeah, that's true. Your dad can't take care of you out there, but he can take care of you in prison." The voice on the other end mocked.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Liang Xuan's expression changed.

"Your dad has already been arrested by the police."

"No way, you're lying to me?" Liang Xuan refused to believe it.

"Why would I lie to you? If you don't believe me, look it up yourself—there are videos of your dad getting arrested online."

Liang Xinghua had been arrested while livestreaming, and it was all over the news. Liang Xuan didn't even have to search; the moment he opened a website, the arrest video popped up.

Liang Xuan watched the video, trembling, and felt like everything was over.

...

At the Criminal Investigation Unit.

Everyone was in a great mood after smoothly catching a wanted criminal who'd been on the run for over twenty years.

"If only all criminals were this easy to catch," Du Wei remarked with a sigh.

"Keep dreaming," Xiao Ze shot him a glance. This was a special case—Liang Xinghua hadn't noticed anything off and wasn't on guard, so they caught him easily.

"Brother Xiao, how do you think the tipster figured out they were the same guy?" Du Wei looked at Liang Xinghua's current photo, then at the wanted poster, puzzled.

He'd wondered about this before, but back then they couldn't confirm Liang Xinghua's identity, so he'd just said it offhand. Now that his identity was confirmed, looking at the wanted photo again, he really admired the tipster's sharp eyes.

"Want to know?" Xiao Ze asked.

Du Wei looked up, curious: "Brother Xiao, you know how they figured it out? Right, you believed the tip right away, so you must have seen it too—how did you recognize him?"

Xiao Ze smiled and waved over the other officers in the unit to take a look together.

If it were just about recognizing the face alone, Xiao Ze wouldn't have done this, since his knack for identifying people was a personal talent that couldn't be taught.

But the identification techniques Shen Dongqing had mentioned could be useful to the other officers, and Liang Xinghua made for a perfect teaching example.

Of course, he only had this one teaching case.

When they heard Xiao Ze was going to teach them facial recognition, the officers without pressing tasks gathered around, carefully comparing the two photos, eagerly waiting for Xiao Ze's explanation.

But after listening for a while, the other officers' faces fell.

No luck—they couldn't follow it.

The things Xiao Ze could point out, they could only see vaguely, and they hadn't learned anything.

"Brother Xiao, this might be a bit too advanced—we can't jump to that level in one step. Do you have any simpler examples?" Du Wei asked with a grimace.

"I'll have to check," Xiao Ze replied after a moment of thought. "Someone else taught me this identification technique—I don't know if he has any simpler examples."

When he heard the real teacher was someone else, Du Wei perked up right away.

In his view, Xiao Ze was just a natural talent, not great at teaching regular people, but a teacher who could break down identification techniques was more his speed.

The other officers were also hopeful—being able to quickly recognize faces was an important skill for police work, and who wouldn't want to get better at that?