Animal Detective

At this moment, Lakshen and his group were on horseback, following Tian Kui as they searched for Sangbu east of the camp.

According to Sangbu’s parents, he had ridden his motorcycle eastward when he left.

"Chief, even if the kid wanted to kill himself, he wouldn’t have run this far, right?" Old Chen muttered.

They had set out sometime after ten o’clock. It had been two hours, and they had covered more than ten kilometers, but they still hadn’t found any sign of him.

If he was just upset after being rejected and wanted to go out to clear his head, he wouldn’t have gone this far.

The same was true if he intended to take his own life.

If he were going to do something drastic, why run this far? Wasn’t he worried no one would find his body?

"Don’t talk nonsense," Lakshen quickly cut in.

’You have to hope for the best.’

As they were riding, Lakshen’s satellite phone rang.

It was a call from Liao Lei.

"Chief, the poachers... those two poachers came to the camp. They wanted to steal the falcon, but they’ve run off now."

Liao Lei’s voice on the phone was halting and broken.

But that one sentence was enough to make Lakshen’s eyes widen, a chill shooting straight up his spine.

"What happened? Are you okay? Where’s Shen Xin? Are you both alright?" Lakshen yelled into the phone.

The four men with him stopped in their tracks, their gazes snapping to Lakshen in unison.

Hearing that Shen Xin had gone to town after getting a lead on Tianxiong, just missing the incident, and that Liao Lei had been alone at the camp, Lakshen breathed a slight sigh of relief.

But his relief quickly turned to tension.

’Alone at the camp, facing two poachers—armed ones, at that. How incredibly dangerous.’

"Don’t move! Don’t run off! Grab a gun and guard the camp! We’re heading back right now. If they return, don’t you hesitate—open fire!" Lakshen ordered urgently.

At the mention of a gun, the expressions of Tian Jian and the other three men changed drastically, and they anxiously asked what was wrong.

As he continued to give instructions over the phone, Lakshen waved for the four men to turn back at once.

Hanging up, Lakshen didn’t have time to explain. He immediately dialed Duan Zijie’s number.

The main force, of course, had not yet been withdrawn.

Duan Zijie was currently at a border outpost.

He hadn’t had any rest when he received the call.

The dragnet had been cast, but after several days, there were still no results.

The suspects were armed. Who would dare to rest? Who could possibly sleep?

Duan Zijie was still inclined to believe the pair would try to flee across the border. If they stayed on this side, they might not be discovered right away.

But without supplies, they wouldn’t be able to hold out for long.

The border was incredibly long, and some sections weren’t fenced with barbed wire.

Besides, in the more remote areas, they could still cut through a fence to get across.

Such situations were unavoidable.

But it still stood that crossing the border through an unpopulated zone was far too risky.

Even if they managed to get across, checkpoints were everywhere. They would only end up trapped and dying in the unpopulated wilds.

At that very moment, Duan Zijie was with several representatives from the border management office, the border patrol forces, and other departments, discussing the plan for the next day’s manhunt.

That’s when he received Lakshen’s call.

Upon hearing that two poachers had attacked Camp Two of the Huergan Police Station and assaulted the officer on duty, Duan Zijie slammed his hand on the table and shot to his feet.

"Fucking looking to die!"

He roared, his eyes practically splitting with fury, his stern face radiating killing intent.

Attacking a police outpost and assaulting an officer—this was crossing a line.

At the same time, Shen Xin had already met up with Zhang Qifeng.

The group was excitedly heading toward the Wugai Grassland.

On the road ahead, Zhang Qifeng’s car suddenly slammed to a halt.

Shen Xin slowed, pulled up alongside it, and rolled down his window to ask what was wrong.

Zhang Qifeng, in the passenger seat, had just hung up the phone. He rolled down his window, his face ashen, and said grimly, "Those two poachers attacked our camp! They were armed!"

"What!"

Shen Xin cried out, his scalp prickling in alarm. "What about Liao Lei?!" he demanded.

’They must have attacked the camp to steal the falcon.’

’But what about Liao Lei?’

’Please, let him be okay!’

He was the one who’d asked Liao Lei to stay behind. If anything happened to him, Shen Xin would never be able to forgive himself.

Zhang Qifeng shook his head. "Liao Lei’s fine. They didn’t shoot."

Shen Xin’s grip on the steering wheel, which he had been clutching tightly, finally loosened. A cold sweat prickled his back.

Zhang Qifeng continued, "Shen Xin, I have to get back there immediately. You should probably go look for Tianxiong on your own."

With something this major happening, he had to go back.

"I’m going too," Shen Xin said at once.

As for Tianxiong...

Shen Xin glanced into the boundless darkness ahead of them and said, "Let the people from the Forestry and Grassland Bureau handle the search for now. They have more than enough people."

The police station at the scenic area had already been notified, along with the Forestry and Grassland Bureau. They had brought tranquilizer guns to help with the search.

The two situations had different levels of urgency; they had to prioritize this one.

Zhang Qifeng hesitated for a moment, then gave a slight nod. He immediately whipped the car around and sped off.

Someone in Shen Xin’s car slammed their hand on the seat in anger. "That’s just outrageous."

In the passenger seat, Doniya clutched Teddy, her face pale with shock.

Shen Xin didn’t say a word, just silently floored the accelerator.

’That’s right. It’s completely outrageous.’

’For crossing the line like this, they had to be shown the meaning of true fury.’

However...

But amidst his anger, Shen Xin suddenly realized something wasn’t right.

’Search parties and checkpoints were everywhere, a massive dragnet was in place. So how did they manage to go against the grain and show up at Camp Two, a relatively populated area?’

Compared to the unpopulated border region to the north, the area around the camp was practically bustling.

’They had a gun but didn’t use it.’

’Did they just happen to barge in, realize only Liao Lei was there, and decide not to use it?’

’Or was it something else?’

’For instance, they knew only one person was left at the camp, so they attacked. Two against one. They must have thought they could subdue Liao Lei without using their gun.’

Shen Xin’s pupils contracted. He realized it at once: they must have been lying in wait near the camp for some time, observing the situation.

’They saw Lakshen’s group leave, they saw me leave, and only then did they act, once Liao Lei was by himself.’

Damn it!

Shen Xin slammed a hand on the steering wheel.

The camp was on the outskirts of the village. At night, with no streetlights, someone hiding in the dark would be nearly impossible to spot.

The main thing was their audacity. They really had some nerve.

"Shen Xin, calm down." Doniya, sitting beside him, was startled by his reaction and gently grabbed his arm.

Shen Xin didn’t reply, just kept his eyes on the road and drove.

Over an hour later, Shen Xin and his companions finally returned to Camp Two.

There was no helping it; rushing was pointless. The roads were treacherous, making it impossible to drive fast.

When they arrived, the area around the camp was already packed with police cars and military vehicles.

Armed sentries were already posted on guard.

The surrounding hillsides were brightly illuminated, presumably by the searchlights of the teams combing the perimeter.

Duan Zijie was still on his way. The first to arrive on the scene was Yu Shenghua, the on-duty deputy captain leading the manhunt from a nearby location.

Lakshen and his men had also returned.

Tian Kui was nowhere to be seen; he must have already been sent out to track the poachers.

Shen Xin hurried out of the car. Teddy flapped its wings, wanting to follow, but Shen Xin ignored it and locked it inside.

Inside the camp, crime scene investigators were examining the mess hall.

In the main office, Yu Shenghua, Lakshen, and the others were anxiously questioning Liao Lei.

When he saw Shen Xin and Zhang Qifeng burst in, Liao Lei was startled. "Why are you guys back?" he asked urgently.

"I’m fine! You should go look for Tianxiong," Liao Lei said, frustrated.

Seeing his red-rimmed eyes, Shen Xin’s heart grew heavy.

Needless to say, a massive manhunt was about to begin.

Soon, a report came in: a stray black horse, likely the one ridden by the suspect, had been found wandering on a nearby hillside.

Not long after, motorcycle tracks were discovered nearby.

The suspects had switched their mode of transport.

Based on the tracks, they had fled to the northeast.

Shen Xin immediately volunteered to ride out and join Tian Kui in tracking the suspects’ movements.

This would allow him to provide real-time updates to help the command center coordinate their next moves.

At that moment, Shen Xin couldn’t know exactly how many people had been mobilized, but he could imagine it was a massive number.

They would find those two, even if it meant filling the entire grassland with people.

In the endless night, a single glance revealed a grassland that seemed to be illuminated, dotted everywhere with the lights of vehicles.

Just then, a tremendous roar echoed from behind him as a brilliant beam of light washed over the ground, spreading rapidly in his direction.

Shen Xin looked up and immediately identified it: a police helicopter.

The helicopter roared past at low altitude, its searchlight bathing a vast stretch of the grassland in light as it flew off into the distance.

The camp had been attacked sometime after midnight. It was now two-thirty in the morning, more than two hours after the incident.

The pursuit itself hadn’t started until almost two o’clock.

In other words, they were more than an hour behind the suspects.

On a motorcycle, they could have covered sixty or seventy kilometers by now.

Mobilizing personnel took time, and forming an encirclement took time.

But Shen Xin didn’t think this was a major issue.

The previous search efforts had failed because the suspects were constantly on the move, constantly in hiding.

The resources mobilized had also been limited.

But now, first of all, the scale of the operation was completely different.

Secondly, they had exposed themselves.

Before, it had been a directionless search across thousands of square kilometers.

Now, they had a location and had mobilized every available asset. They could definitely trap them.

Therefore, their greed-driven decision to attack the camp was nothing short of suicidal.

Shen Xin, along with Tian Kui, pursued them for over half an hour without a break, covering about ten kilometers. Suddenly, Yu Shenghua, who was accompanying them, received a phone call.

To the northeast, about twenty kilometers from the border, the search helicopter had spotted the criminals.

It was pitch-black in the dead of night.

Fleeing on a motorcycle, the suspect had to use the headlight for illumination.

From its high vantage point, the fast-moving helicopter could see a great distance. By flying in a single direction, it could scan a wide area, making it easy to spot an anomalous point of light in the darkness.

When cornered, the criminal not only refused to surrender but even opened fire.

The search party members who arrived on the scene decisively returned fire, injuring the criminal.

"How come there’s only one of them?" Lakshen, who was with the group, asked in surprise.

When they spotted him, there was only one person on the motorcycle. The other suspect’s whereabouts were unknown.

Yu Shenghua said grimly, "They must have split up midway through their escape. The problem is, we don’t know what mode of transportation the other one chose."

"The one they found was shot in the abdomen. He’s being sent to the hospital now, so there’s no way to question him."

Shen Xin frowned. Something felt off.

’Fleeing on a motorcycle in the dead of night would obviously make you an easy target to spot.’

’On the other hand, if you ditched the motorcycle and went on foot, you could just lie flat in the grass. It would be nearly impossible to be spotted, even with a helicopter flying right overhead.’

’But without a motorcycle, you couldn’t move fast enough and would easily be caught in the dragnet.’

’The suspects had to make a trade-off.’

’And now the two of them had split up.’

’The one on the motorcycle, making a beeline for the border... Shen Xin had a feeling he was a decoy, a pawn sacrificed to draw the police’s attention.’

’In other words, this person was practically expecting to be caught, all to cover the other’s escape.’

Shen Xin’s gaze sharpened.

’If that’s the case, then they had to be extra careful with Tian Kui’s tracking.’

’The point where the two of them split up would be crucial. They couldn’t afford to miss it. That was the only way they could successfully track the second man.’