Dude, something's really wrong with your abilities.

Chapter 33 New Case

When Sun Tiemei entered the director's office, it was filled with smoke, and Lao Zheng was opening the window to ventilate it.

Director Liu, whom she hadn't seen in a long time, stubbed out his cigarette and gestured for Sun Tiemei to sit down.

Sun Tiemei noticed that after not seeing him for several months, Director Liu's temples had turned gray.

"During this training trip to the higher-ups, the General Administration reported three incidents reported by local bureaus." Director Liu picked up a folder from the table and handed it to Sun Tiemei. "Although these incidents differ in form from the cases we just cracked, it is clear that they all have one thing in common: the criminal organizations are colluding with the local bureaus."

"Because this is not an isolated case, and coupled with this case here, the General Administration has reason to suspect that there may be some kind of force infiltrating the Superpower Bureau in an organized manner, with a very wide scope and a considerable number of participants."

Old Zheng put down his teacup: "The self-investigation actually started a long time ago. When Old Yuan's batch of banned drugs surfaced, I felt that the distribution channels were too clean, as if someone had cleared the roadblocks in advance. But Old Yuan was unaware of this, and the relevant clues were handled very cleanly, making it impossible to investigate further."

Sun Tiemei patiently reviewed the three cases reported above. In Fenhe City, three field operations within six months had failed; each time, the Bureau of Supernatural Abilities arrived only to find the personnel inside had already left, leading to suspicions of leaks. The case in Guli City was even more troublesome. The intelligence department had apprehended a person acting as a lookout, who confessed that the person who gave him the information used the Bureau's encrypted communication frequency, but that frequency had long been discontinued.

The case in Chengxia City is simple, but the situation is serious. The ability analysis reports of all the staff of the local ability bureau have mysteriously appeared on the black market. The internal investigation has been going on for nearly a year, but there are no results.

"Don't make a big fuss about investigating the mole," Director Liu said to Sun Tiemei. "Right now, only the three of us know about this, so the information is limited to the three of us. Also, continue with your daily work as usual, and announce to the public that the Red Falcon case has been closed and filed."

After Director Liu finished speaking, he turned to Old Zheng and said, "I'll mention at the bureau's leadership meeting in a couple of days that the General Administration requires us to conduct a self-examination of discipline and conduct, and to carry out a self-examination campaign. We need to muddy the waters. Director Zheng, you'll have to do the work; you'll be in charge of the specific tasks."

"no problem."

After finishing his business, Director Liu seemed to remember something else: "By the way, Tie Mei, do you remember Director Zhang Jian'an of the General Administration's Logistics Department? He used to be your father's colleague, and he's also a local. I ran into him during this training, and he specifically asked about you. He's quite concerned about you. Contact him when you have time; he's an elder, so it's good to let him know you're safe."

Sun Tiemei nodded.

The next morning, as usual, the people in Group Five lingered in the office.

Fatty and Su Xiaohe kept stuffing steamed buns into their mouths; there were still about ten left in the plastic bag on the table. Ever since Fatty witnessed Su Xiaohe's prowess at the dinner table yesterday, he felt a sense of excitement, like he had finally met his match, so they decided to have a steamed bun eating contest.

"Brother Daqiang, you've already eaten six, but you're eating the seventh one much slower."

"Don't give me that. You started eating slowly and deliberately when you were only on the fifth one. Don't think I didn't see it."

Chen Shi was not interested in their self-harming behavior. After the falcon died, he kept thinking about one thing.

He knew that someone from that organization would come looking for him again, and he didn't know who would come next or when. But he couldn't always wait for someone else to shield him.

The fat man shielded him from an explosion, Chang Biao took a punch for him, and the team leader arrived at his house just in time to save him. He couldn't always be the one being protected.

With nothing to do, Chen Shi wanted to practice something. He couldn't hope to improve his physical fitness, as his ankle still hadn't fully recovered.

But his special ability seems to have great potential. If he could use empathy more proactively, instead of passively receiving others' emotions, he could actively influence them, which might come in handy next time. The problem is who to train with. People won't do; the people in Group Five are all acquaintances, and they're already immune to his emotional field. Besides, he doesn't want to use his own people as guinea pigs.

He squatted down in front of Wang Jianlou. The dog had eaten too much last night and had been lying here since morning, chin resting on its front paws, eyes slowly rolling around, looking like it knew everything but was too lazy to care about anything.

Chen Shi stared at it for a while. The dog, Jianlou, twitched its ears but didn't lift its eyelids. Chen Shi thought that emotions were universal; humans had instincts, and dogs had instincts too. Since he could perceive the emotional spectrum of humans, theoretically he could also perceive that of dogs. He just didn't know if he could influence it in the other way around.

Chen Shi squatted down and said in a low voice, "You can definitely understand what I'm saying, so stop pretending." Wang Jianlou didn't react.

Chen Shi said, "If you understand, wag your tail." The tail didn't budge.

Not only did its tail not move, but Wang Jianlou also closed its eyes.

Chen Shi was not discouraged. He changed his posture, from squatting to lying down, so that he was at eye level with Wang Jianlou.

"Stop pretending, I know you understand. Every time Fatty shouts 'Dinner' you run faster than anyone else, as soon as Chang Biao opens his drawer you run over and lick his hand, and before the team leader even enters the door you stand up and wag your tail. You're smarter than half the people in the bureau."

The dog's tail swept across the floor.

"Speaking of the team leader, I asked you, isn't she your favorite? You're always the most enthusiastic when you see her," Chen Shi lowered his voice, "but have you ever thought about it? The team leader might not like sycophants, like Zhou Xin, she hates them the most. Think about it, aren't you also sucking up to her?"

Wang Jianlou's eyelids twitched.

"I'm not saying you're bad, I'm saying that if you treated everyone equally and showed some reaction to everyone, the way you are now, only sucking up to the team leader, makes the whole team know you're a snob, and it won't sound good if word gets out."

The fat man, with a steamed bun stuffed in his mouth, chimed in, "Aren't you bored, kid? If you have nothing better to do, come and be the referee for us. This girl cheated just now."

"Who cheated, Brother Daqiang? You're cheating by swallowing your food whole."

Chen Shi ignored them and continued disciplining the dog. Chang Biao simply smiled at his colleagues throughout; what he was busy with was obvious to everyone, so I won't elaborate.

Sun Tiemei pushed the door open and came in. Everyone in Group Five immediately stood at attention, and even Wang Jianlou returned to his post. Clearly, he didn't take Chen Shi's words seriously.

Sun Tiemei placed the folder on the table.

"A murder occurred at the No. 3 Middle School in this city. The deceased was a female teacher in the senior year of high school. She was found dead in the school's art room this morning."

The fat man chimed in, "Boss, this kind of ordinary case is fine with the patrol team. Why was it assigned to our team?"

Sun Tiemei opened the folder: "The deceased has become a statue, and no trace of a second person was found at the scene."