Chapter 53 # Thorough Investigation of Three Generations of Ancestors

Downstairs.

The streetlights on both sides of the street flickered to life.

It was currently dinner time, and the flow of people was much heavier than when they had first arrived.

Fortunately, as soon as Liu Baoguo appeared, Xiao Zhang and his men immediately brought him under control, preventing any crowd from gathering.

With him cornered against a wall, passersby didn't pay much attention, assuming it was just a group of friends chatting.

"Brother Mo, this is Liu Baoguo's bag. There's three hundred thousand in cash inside. He probably planned to take Li Yao and flee."

After speaking, Xiao Zhang glared fiercely at the trembling Liu Baoguo by the wall.

This money also revealed a piece of information: the children had already been handed over to the person behind the scenes.

Before Brother Mo arrived, Xiao Zhang had shown Liu Baoguo all the existing evidence at Captain Long's direction.

The goal was to make the man abandon all resistance immediately and cooperate with them to catch the mastermind.

The longer they delayed, the greater the danger to the two children.

"Where are the children?"

Chen Mo stared into his eyes and asked coldly.

Before he could answer, Chen Mo added, "You should know exactly what the buyer's goal is. If the children fall into their hands, they're dead."

"Whether you're sentenced to death for intentional homicide or just reform through labor for simple human trafficking—the choice is yours."

These words immediately triggered Liu Baoguo's survival instinct.

If the police hadn't come for him today, he wouldn't have given it a thought.

But now that they had caught him, he had to side with the police if he wanted to live.

He wasn't a fool; if the children really died, being sentenced for intentional homicide wouldn't be an exaggeration. He had known the buyer's intentions from the very beginning, making him an accomplice with prior knowledge.

"I'll talk! I'll tell you everything!"

He had cast aside all his schemes; he was now more desperate to catch the employer than Chen Mo was, as his own life was on the line.

"Where is the buyer?"

"In... in..."

Liu Baoguo wished he could spill everything he knew right then and there.

But when it came to this specific question from the police, he found himself at a loss for words.

"What are you dazed for? If the children die, you're dead too!"

Xiao Zhang was infuriated by his behavior. At a time like this, he was still stalling.

"I—I never actually met him. According to the plan, I was to drive to Weishan, and a black business van would be parked nearby. I'd put the children in the car, take the money, and leave."

Only now did he realize that he didn't have a single piece of useful information about the buyer.

"Do you know the license plate number?"

"There was no license plate. No plates at all."

Xiao Zhang was fuming. They were so close to catching someone, only for the trail to go cold again.

"Calm down."

Sensing Xiao Zhang's frustration, Chen Mo patted him on the shoulder.

He was anxious too. From the moment the children were handed over, the countdown to their deaths had begun.

Every second counted.

But at this moment, panicking would only cause chaos and wouldn't help at all.

"How did you contact each other before going to Weishan?"

"The phone! Yes, I have his number!"

Prompted by Chen Mo, Liu Baoguo slapped his forehead and suddenly became excited, quickly pulling a phone from his pocket.

He showed the phone number to Chen Mo.

A quick glance at the number prefix was enough for Chen Mo to tell it was an unregistered SIM card.

The kind you could buy with cash without registering any personal information.

This meant tracing the owner's information through the phone number was impossible.

"Call him. Tell him you kidnapped another child and want to make more money."

He didn't know if the other party had discarded the card after the transaction, so he could only try his luck.

"Okay... okay."

Liu Baoguo took a breath and tapped the call button.

—Beep.

—Beep.

After two beeps, the call connected.

Hope flared in everyone's hearts, including Chen Mo's.

"Why are you calling me again? Did you forget the rules?" a voice on the other end questioned angrily.

"I have another..."

Before Liu Baoguo could finish, the other side suddenly roared.

"F*ck you, Liu Baoguo!"

Beep, beep, beep.

The call ended.

Clearly, the buyer was alert.

Calling again after the transaction was suspicious in itself.

Long Hao, who had been silent, felt his heart sink.

At this point, there were no more leads to trace the buyer.

The buyer being spooked by the call meant the case had hit a dead end.

Even the seller, Liu Baoguo, couldn't provide any leads.

No matter how capable they were, they couldn't track down someone who had never shown their face with the current clues.

He walked up to Chen Mo and said, "You did your best."

If the case failed, it wasn't Chen Mo's fault at all.

They could only blame their bad luck.

Despite how quickly the investigation had progressed, the trail had vanished at the most critical moment.

Xiao Zhang and the others also looked at Chen Mo.

If even Brother Mo was going to give up, then the investigation would truly be over.

"Don't be so discouraged."

Snapping out of his thoughts, he noticed the faint glimmer of hope in everyone's eyes as they looked at him.

As he spoke, he took Liu Baoguo's phone, played the call recording, and held it to his ear.

After listening to it five times, a smile appeared on his face.

"Actually, there was a surprise in that call—a surprise big enough to directly identify the buyer."

"There's something off about the man's accent. It's a local accent, yes, but the rhythm and tone are wrong. He sounds like a foreigner."

In his past life, Chen Mo had come across a short video tagged #InvestigateTheAncestryForThreeGenerations.

The protagonist of the video imitated a Japanese general, saying, 'There is an old Chinese saying: "A wise man submits to the circumstances."'

Everyone could understand the words, but the intonation was clearly not something a native speaker would use.

"You mean a foreigner?" Long Hao also listened closely. Focusing on the tone, there indeed seemed to be an issue.

But without Chen Mo's reminder, none of them would have noticed.

They hadn't even considered that possibility.

His eyes filled with surprise.

One moment he was ready to call off the search in disappointment, and the next, Chen Mo had given him such a massive breakthrough.

He thought to himself, "I can always count on Chen Mo!"

"Investigate! Contact the immigration authorities immediately. Look for collectors and foreigners who have stayed locally for a long time!"

...

...

Ten minutes later.

The results were in.

There weren't many foreigners in Muhe to begin with, and adding the hobby of collecting narrowed it down to a Japanese man named Yamamoto Hidetoshi.

"Yamamoto Hidetoshi, 40 years old. His reason for entry was to manage business here. He is currently a board member of Japan's Pinnacle Group, a real estate company."

"He frequently attends various auctions and has a great fondness for ancient relics. He is known for being a big spender in those circles."

"According to his registered address, he lives at No. 12, Lijing Residential Area in the East District. I've been there; it's all three-story detached villas."