The Omniscient

Chapter 8: Captured

“Huang Ji, why are you wandering up the mountain in the middle of the night? Are you okay?” Wang Meng asked as he brushed the dust off Huang Ji’s clothes.

Huang Ji gave a simple, honest smile but didn’t answer.

Wang Meng, seeing this, didn’t press further. Instead, he ruffled Huang Ji’s hair affectionately and said, “Don’t go running around at night again. Your grandfather will worry about you.”

Huang Ji nodded.

Everyone assumed, based on Liang Yuan’s explanation, that Huang Ji had wandered up the mountain randomly and stumbled into the situation by sheer coincidence. His silence was perfectly in line with his persona as a “fool,” which served as explanation enough.

Huang Ji didn’t need to justify why he was there. Nobody suspected he had deliberately found the location. If he had tried to explain himself, it would have seemed out of character and suspicious.

Wang Meng’s question was casual, and Huang Ji’s vacant stare ended the matter. No one gave it much thought.

The group made their way down the mountain, with Lü Zongmin and his accomplices escorted to the waiting police vehicles. Along the way, despite Captain Chen’s repeated questions, Lü Zongmin and his men remained silent.

After enduring a day of torment, she deeply regretted trying to escape responsibility for her past crimes.

“I was involved in the 107 Case and in last year’s theft of the Tang Dynasty Golden Buddha from the Luoyang Ancient Tomb Museum,” she admitted.

“My parents… they’ve probably fled by now, haven’t they?”

Captain Chen stayed quiet, but Wang Meng gave a slight nod, earning a glare from a young officer with a buzz cut beside him.

Liang Yuan let out a bitter laugh. “I deserve this. My current state is my own fault. I’ll tell you everything I know, but I really don’t know where the Golden Buddha is. Based on what I know of my parents, they wouldn’t have taken it with them. They must have hidden it somewhere. If you want to recover it, you’ll have to catch them.”

The locals didn’t know much about the artifact cases. They were here to solve the kidnapping. The case had been cracked within two hours of being reported, thanks to a blunder by Lü Zongmin, who had sent a ransom note to the police.

Captain Chen, sensing Liang Yuan’s sincerity, nodded slightly.

He glanced at Lü Zongmin and his gang, who, though compliant, remained silent with dark, brooding expressions. A cold smirk crossed his face.

“Which one of you is Lü Zongmin?” he demanded.

Lü Zongmin’s expression didn’t change, though his eyes flickered slightly.

Hu Feng and Wang Zhen looked puzzled—they didn’t even know each other’s real names.

Inside, Lü Zongmin was in turmoil. How do they know my name? This is impossible. I’ve never exposed it. Even back then, when I was caught, people only knew me as ‘Glasses.’ Řã𐌽ỌᛒΕŚ

Despite his shock, he maintained an air of confusion, pretending not to know who Captain Chen was referring to.

Captain Chen didn’t press further. With a small nod, he said, “Take them back. We’ll question them slowly.”

He turned to Liang Yuan. “We’ll take you to the hospital first. If you have more to say, you can tell us after we’ve treated your injuries.”

Liang Yuan nodded. As she was about to get in the car, she turned back, ruffled Huang Ji’s hair, and smiled. “Thank you, Huang Ji. You saved my life.”

Huang Ji smiled back and said, “My grandpa says people should have a conscience.”

Liang Yuan paused, then nodded firmly. “Your grandfather is right. People should have a conscience.”

A gentle smile spread across her face. Despite the scars that marred her features, the clarity and acceptance in her heart made her expression radiant.

“Officers, I’ll leave it to you now,” she said, turning to sit calmly in the police car.

Huang Ji watched as the police drove away.

Hesitation only leads to deeper entanglement. If she had severed ties with her adoptive parents and their hollow affection sooner, her life would never have reached this point.

Huang Ji understood that Liang Yuan had let go of her past. From now on, her only focus would be atoning for her mistakes and starting over. With her full cooperation, Huang Ji saw no need to meddle further in the case.

“You’ll need to give a statement too, but get some rest first. I’ll come by tomorrow,” Wang Meng said with a smile.

Huang Ji nodded, smiling as well. Wang Meng, after some thought, decided to escort him home.

The next morning, as expected, the police arrived to question Huang Ji.

Wang Meng stayed by his side, and the entire process was light and easy. At one point, the Village Head even dropped by, showering Huang Ji with praise.

The police, fully aware of Huang Ji’s reputation as the village fool, had already concluded that he had stumbled upon the kidnappers by sheer chance, leading to a scuffle that ended with their arrest when the detectives arrived.

The case was already framed in this way, so the questioning was straightforward. After recording his statement, the officers left.

Later, a representative from the prosecutor’s office came to ask, “Would you be willing to appear in court?”

Huang Ji stared blankly at the question, and the villagers quickly interjected, “Why would he need to testify? Dr. Liang already knows everything!”

A few days later, a large group of police officers suddenly descended upon the village, accompanied by several elderly experts sporting thick beards.

The villagers were puzzled, wondering if the case had taken an unexpected turn.

Huang Ji, however, remained calm. From the moment he saw them, he knew their purpose—they were here for the Golden Buddha.

Liang Yuan’s parents had been apprehended, and their crimes fully confessed. Today, the police had come to pinpoint the location of the stolen artifact.

This development didn’t surprise Huang Ji in the slightest.

Kidnapping their own daughter while fleeing made no sense, especially since the ransom note specifically requested that Liang Yuan’s parents be located. With such glaring inconsistencies, there was no way the police would let them escape.

Huang Ji leaned in close to Wang Meng, who explained, “They didn’t even make it out of the province before they were caught. Now they’ve confessed everything. They claim they spent nearly all of the four million, leaving only a few hundred thousand. As for the Golden Buddha, they said it’s hidden in the reservoir. That’s why everyone’s here—to confirm the location!”

Huang Ji’s expression turned slightly strange at Wang Meng’s explanation.

Quietly, he edged closer to some of the police officers and subtly eavesdropped while observing their movements. With his acute sense for information, he quickly understood more than Wang Meng—or even the officers present.

No, he knew more than anyone there.

Four million spent? What nonsense.

The Golden Buddha was an invaluable artifact, strictly prohibited from trade. The elderly experts accompanying the police were there to assist with its retrieval and preservation.

While the couple had indeed been truthful about the Buddha’s location, their claim of squandering the entire four million was a blatant lie. They had only used one million for their fugitive lifestyle. The remaining three million were buried in another location.

It was a cunning move. Clearly, they had planned ahead, making sure not to put all their eggs in one basket.

The Golden Buddha and the stolen money were kept separate. The couple’s plan was simple: if caught, they would confess the location of the more significant Golden Buddha, claiming the money was spent, except for a small amount that could be handed over as a token. In reality, the three million yuan would remain hidden, waiting for them to retrieve it after serving their sentence.

“Three million, huh?” Huang Ji’s gaze shifted to a specific spot on the far side of the reservoir.

Two meters beneath the ground there, the money lay buried.

No one could hide the truth from Huang Ji.

As the couple pointed to a location in the reservoir, the police took photos, and a team from the museum began draining the small reservoir to excavate. While outwardly guiding the police to the Golden Buddha’s burial site, the couple’s thoughts betrayed them: Three million is stashed over there…

Huang Ji didn’t need to spend much time perceiving their thoughts. He quickly pinpoint the exact location of the hidden cash.

However, he chose to remain silent about it.

Though it was stolen money, Huang Ji had already decided to keep it for himself.

There was simply no reasonable explanation he could offer for how he knew about such a secret. Since it couldn’t be justified, revealing it wasn’t an option. And if he didn’t speak up, what would happen? The money would eventually be dug up by the couple, funding their post-prison life?

“Not a chance…” Huang Ji thought, glancing up at the vast sky.

The world was far more complex than it seemed. Humanity was unknowingly being farmed by an alien civilization. Knowing this secret, Huang Ji felt compelled to act. To do so, he would need an enormous amount of money—far more than he could easily earn.

Though he already had countless ideas for generating wealth, stumbling upon three million yuan was a convenient windfall.

For him, this case was already over. The stolen money, which the police wouldn’t pursue, would serve as his starting capital.

As for the ransom note, the clever Lü Zongmin had already claimed ownership of it.

Faced with irrefutable evidence and testimony from Liang Yuan and others, Lü Zongmin had opted for a calculated confession. He stated that he had written the letter and signed it with his real name to escape the “control” of Wang Zhen and Hu Feng. He claimed that his intention had been to turn himself in indirectly, feeling guilt and remorse as he wrote it.

This narrative was crafted to appeal to the judge, and it was a strategy suggested by his lawyer. Even though the reasoning was flimsy, a skilled lawyer could make it plausible.

Huang Ji, through his perception of those present, had confirmed this was the plan.

Although the police found the circumstances suspicious, they couldn’t determine the truth and chose not to investigate further.

Why? Because the outcome was already perfect.

Everyone involved had been apprehended. Once the Golden Buddha was recovered, the case would be considered closed. Minor inconsistencies in the investigation would be ignored.

“As long as the result is satisfactory, people will naturally rationalize the insignificant gaps in the story,” Huang Ji thought, making a mental note of this valuable lesson.

Though the ransom note didn’t raise much suspicion, Huang Ji still felt his handling of the situation was less than flawless.

“I’m still too clumsy,” Huang Ji reflected.

In that critical moment, he hadn’t been able to think of a better way to alert the police, so he had simply taken the kidnappers' place and written the ransom note himself.n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om

Of course, he had used a random piece of paper picked up from the ground, ensuring that no clues were left behind.

For someone like Huang Ji, no trace could escape his keen perception. Unless the police possessed the same kind of Information Sense as he did, there was no way they could ever determine who had written the letter.

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