48: Chapter 48 Kingpin's Fury

This was said for Old Jack's benefit, but Yan Zheng knew in his heart that the real good stuff is never left lying on the ground waiting for someone to pick it up.

May 19th, 9:00 PM.

In the bedroom on the second floor of the Antique Shop, Yan Zheng leaned against the headboard with an old radio resting on his knees.

It wasn't a real radio.

The casing was from a radio, but he had gutted half the components inside and replaced them with a signal receiver, tuning it to a very narrow frequency band.

"I swiped this from the toolbox of that underground Doctor of Liu Kun." Yan Zheng turned the dial, and the noise in his earphones gradually became clear. "The effective range of the micro-listener is only three hundred meters, just enough to cover the control room backstage at the Underground Fighting Ring."

Yan Zheng: ( ꐦ ˘ ᴗ ˘ )

"The one I casually stuck to the bottom of the control console while setting the scene last night should come in handy right about now."

First, there was a series of footsteps in the earphones—heavy, with at least four people moving at once.

Then came Wesley's voice.

"Mr. Fisk, I am on the scene now."

The voice from the other end came through the phone speaker, muffled by the signal, but every word was clearly audible.

Silence.

Yan Zheng counted; the silence lasted for a full eleven seconds.

Then, a deep voice spoke, like granite slowly crushing gravel.

"Wesley, describe it."

"All six guards are dead. The fatal wounds are concentrated on the neck and torso, and the angle of the blade marks is uniform, consistent with The Hand's 'Shadow Fall' swordsmanship."

Wesley's voice was flat, like he was reading a document.

"Four Mutant targets have disappeared. The iron cages were physically torn apart. Seven hexagonal throwing stars and two shattered masks were left at the scene, and The Hand's 'Black Sky Hand' emblem is on the wall."

"Residue from incense was also detected; it's the standard component for The Hand's smoke bombs."

Another silence.

Yan Zheng: ( ꉺ ꒳ ꉺ )

This silence was longer—fifteen seconds.

Yan Zheng picked up his water glass from the nightstand and took a sip. It was cold, but he was used to it.

Then Kingpin's voice sounded again, speaking even slower than before—so slow that there was a gap between every word wide enough to slide a blade into.

"What about the genetic data?"

"The safe was pried open. All the blood samples were shattered on the floor, and the hard drive is gone."

Yan Zheng tapped his finger against the water glass.

"The hard drive is gone?" Kingpin repeated. His tone didn't change, but those three words sounded heavier in the earpiece than anything said before.

"Yes, sir."

"There are no signs of forced entry on the safe. It was opened with the code, which means the attackers either obtained the code beforehand or had inside help."

Yan Zheng: ( ꐦ ≖ ‸ ≖ )

"Wesley."

"Yes."

"The data is more important than the people. Find that hard drive."

"I have already arranged for a technical team. They are tracking the backup records of the Underground Fighting Ring's surveillance system and the communication logs of Mr. Liu. There will be results within forty-eight hours."

"Not enough."

For the first time, there was a temperature in Kingpin's voice, but it was below zero.

"Let them know the price."

Wesley paused for a beat.

"Sir, are you referring to The Hand, or everyone?"

"Everyone."

"The Hand stole my property, so let the entire Hells Kitchen pay their debt."

"Starting tonight, send out everyone I have at my disposal—mercenaries, thugs, including those working with the Ninth Precinct."

"Turn every known base of The Hand upside down. Five hundred thousand for every base found."

Yan Zheng: ( ✦ ‿ ✦ )

"Wesley, one more thing."

"Please, go ahead."

"That fighting ring owner, Liu what's-his-name."

"Liu Kun."

"Investigate him. Investigate everyone around him, especially every new face he has come into contact with in the last three months."

"The hard drive was opened with a code, and only Liu Kun and his Doctor knew the code."

"If you find out anyone touched that hard drive, no matter who it is, break their fingers off one by one. I want to watch it personally."

Wesley's voice replied steadily with a single word.

"Understood."

Then the communication ended.

Yan Zheng took off the earphones, turned off the radio, and placed it beside his pillow.

He stared at the ceiling for about twenty seconds.

Yan Zheng: ( ꐦ ⌓ ꐦ )

"Investigate new faces around Liu Kun."

"In the last three months."

"I just happen to be the new face who started contact with Liu Kun three months ago."

He sat up on the bed, stepped barefoot onto the cold wooden floor, and walked over to sit at his desk.

"Kingpin's technical team is checking the Underground Fighting Ring's surveillance backups. That path is a dead end; the surveillance hard drive was already pulled by Skeleton Soldier No. 1."

"But checking Liu Kun's communication records—that path is viable."

"My call logs and text records with Liu Kun were all made using public phone numbers."

"If Wesley's people get their hands on Liu Kun's call list, they will see a phone number registered under 'Echoes of the Past Antique Shop' that has contacted Liu Kun no less than twenty times in the last three months."

Yan Zheng opened the drawer, took out the portable hard drive he had retrieved from the fighting ring's safe, and placed it on the table.

The black plastic casing lay quietly under the desk lamp, like a grenade with the fuse still intact.

"First, this hard drive must disappear within forty-eight hours."

"Not hidden away, but physically obliterated."

"Second, the communication trail between me and Liu Kun needs to be handled."

He picked up his phone, scrolled through his chat history with Liu Kun, and frowned.

"It's too late. I can't delete the records on the telecommunications carrier's server side, and it's impossible to remotely clear the records on Liu Kun's end."

Yan Zheng put down the phone and leaned back in his chair, the lenses of his gold-rimmed glasses reflecting the dim light of the desk lamp.

"Then I'll take a different path."

"Don't delete the records; add a layer of cover."

He picked up the phone again and dialed Liu Kun's number.

It rang twice before being answered; the voice on the other end was trembling and fractured.

"Boss Yan?"

"Boss Liu, don't panic. Listen to me."

Yan Zheng's voice was as steady as a late-night radio host.

"Wesley's people are going to investigate your communication records next. They will definitely see the call logs between us."

"It's over, it's over, it's over!"

"It's not over."

Yan Zheng: ( ꐦ ˘ ꒳ ˘ )

"From now on, what you need to do is simple."

"When explaining my identity to anyone, only say one sentence: 'Mr. Yan is the antique sponsor for the fighting ring; he helps the fighting ring procure antique-style ornaments for decoration, and our cooperation is purely a business relationship.'"

"Antique sponsor? Who would believe that!"

"Wesley will believe it."

Yan Zheng's fingers tapped silently on the desktop twice.

"Because tomorrow, I will display a batch of antique-style boxing trophies and decorative daggers in the Antique Shop that match the fighting ring's style, and I will also backdate a fake procurement contract by three months."

"When Wesley investigates me, he will see a properly registered Antique Shop owner with a business license and tax filings, whose main business is procuring antiques and providing decorative arrangements for various venues."

"As for why I contacted you frequently, it's because you are my client, and I was coordinating the weekly procurement list with you."

"Does that make sense?"

"A Chinese person running an Antique Shop in Hells Kitchen doing business with a Chinese person running an Underground Fighting Ring—isn't that perfectly normal?"

Liu Kun was silent for three seconds.

"Boss Yan, how do you always manage to make things sound so normal?"

"Because most things in this World are perfectly normal to begin with, Boss Liu."

Yan Zheng hung up the phone, placed it on the table, and let his gaze fall back onto the hard drive.

"The first matter is resolved: identity cover."

"The second matter: the hard drive."

"This thing cannot remain in the shop, nor can it simply be smashed and thrown away."

"Kingpin said 'The data is more important than the people.' The weight of that sentence is far heavier than a five-hundred-thousand-dollar bounty."

Yan Zheng: ( ˵ ꐦ ˘ ᴗ ˘ ˵ )

"He doesn't care about the life or death of those three Mutants; he cares about the data."

"A mob boss, so obsessed with Mutant genetic data."

"The real buyer of this deal is not Kingpin."

"Kingpin is just a middleman, procuring live samples and data for a real laboratory."

Yan Zheng flipped the hard drive over, pried open the screw cap on the bottom with his fingernail, and exposed the circuit board and disk platter inside.

"Tomorrow, after importing the data into the system panel, this hard drive will be dissolved in acid."

"Not even the dregs will be left."

He snapped the hard drive back together, locked it in the bottom secret compartment of his desk, and stood up to walk to the window.

Outside the window, Hells Kitchen was unnaturally quiet in the night; even the barking of dogs was less than usual.

The calm before the storm.

Yan Zheng drew the curtains, walked back to the bed, lay down, and closed his eyes.

"Kingpin is going to scour the World to settle scores with The Hand, and The Hand is busy trying to prove their innocence."

"Two hungry dogs are about to collide."

"When they collide, a lot of bones will fall to the ground."

He turned over and pulled the quilt up to his chin.

"And I just need to wait on the sidelines to pick them up."

"Boss Yan." He said to himself, his voice so soft it was like reciting a hypnotic spell.

"Your greatest talent in this life is letting others fight for you, and then collecting their corpses."