Chapter 103: Stolen Information

“Why are you here again?”

Hearing the rustling sounds, Lao Da perked up his ears and poked his head out. Sure enough, he saw the same purebred German Shepherd that had shown up the night before.

Aofeng raised an eyebrow and said, “What kind of greeting is that? I even gave you a heads-up this morning. What, pretending not to know me now?” He was referring to the loud howl he let out when he came in earlier, giving the dogs a chance to clear out in advance.

Lao Da looked puzzled. “You’re not human. Shouldn’t it be ‘pretending not to know a dog’?”

“Whatever,” Aofeng said casually. “Where’s your little buddy, Lao Jin? I brought him something.” He nudged a small bottle on the ground with his front paw. The label read “Safflower Oil¹” in big letters. Aofeng had swiped it from Song Changfeng’s drawer earlier that day.

Lao Da took a step back, covering his nose with a paw, a look of disgust on his face. “What is this stuff? It stinks!”

“Safflower Oil. It helps with bruises and sprains. Didn’t Lao Jin get his leg smashed? If he applies this daily, it’ll heal faster,” Aofeng explained. Honestly, he thought it smelled awful too. He’d felt the same way even back when he was human.

Lao Da leaned in for a sniff, then recoiled with a green face. He really hated that smell. Looked like he’d better keep his distance from Lao Jin until the guy was fully recovered.

“Woof! Woof! Woof!!” A series of urgent barks rang out. About five minutes later, a limping dog emerged from deep within the junkyard. It was Lao Jin.

“Lao Da, you called for me?” Lao Jin greeted Lao Da first, then turned to Aofeng. “Hello, Officer. We meet again.”

Aofeng grinned and nodded at him, his eyes drifting to Lao Jin’s injured leg. He had no idea what Lao Jin had been up to all day, but the swelling had gone from barely noticeable yesterday to looking like a small hill today. Thankfully, the bone hadn’t been broken. Otherwise, it would’ve been a much bigger problem.

Lao Jin stood still as Aofeng applied the pungent oil to his leg. Surprisingly, the leg that had been painfully swollen suddenly felt a burning sensation, and once that passed, it felt much lighter.

“Thank you!” Lao Jin said, sounding much more enthusiastic than before.

“No problem,” Aofeng replied, now completely enveloped in the strong scent of Safflower Oil. He felt like his nose was about to rot. “Actually, besides bringing the medicine, I came to ask you something else.”

“Go ahead.”

“Can you tell me more about that man from the day before yesterday? Like what he looked like?”

This was actually a bit of a blind spot for Lao Jin. Most dogs couldn’t remember human faces. They usually recognized people by voice or scent. Lao Jin tilted his head in thought for a while, then offered a clue: the man had something dark on the back of his hand. To help Aofeng understand, he lifted his own left front paw as a reference.

Aofeng perked up. A birthmark? That was perfect for identification. When they did another round of visits, they could pay special attention to people’s hands. Unfortunately, this information couldn’t be shared with others. If it could, tracking the guy down would be a lot faster than searching blindly.

After chatting with them a bit longer, Aofeng headed back to the police station. This time, the trip took even less time. There were still several hours before dawn, so he enjoyed a good sleep and greeted Song Changfeng the next day full of energy, successfully avoiding getting caught for his little “prison break.”

After breakfast, Aofeng went out with Song Changfeng to continue checking on the remaining twenty-eight people who had received the rabies vaccine. Since these people lived in scattered locations, the tasks were divided so that each officer handled those living in the same general area.

In one morning, Song Changfeng visited six neighborhoods. After confirming that everything was fine with the vaccinated individuals, he looked at the final address on his list.

No. 32, Long Alley, Old Street. Just hearing the name, you could tell it would be hard to find. Unless you were a local, it was almost impossible not to get lost in Old Street. Even with GPS, people often ended up completely disoriented. So, as soon as Song Changfeng entered Old Street, he started asking for directions instead of trying to find it himself. After asking three people, he finally located the right place.

But the padlock on the gate was a letdown. It looked like no one was home. On top of that, the phone number for the household wasn’t working either. He’d tried calling several times, but no one ever picked up.

Song Changfeng knocked on the doors of the neighbors on both sides, asking about the homeowner. They all said they hadn’t seen him leave and had no idea when he’d be back. When Song asked whether the man liked to wear dress shirts, the neighbors laughed and said they’d never seen him wear one in all the years they’d known him. “He’s a big fat guy,” one of them said. “Why would he wear something like that?”

That caught Song Changfeng’s attention. Judging from the bloodstains on that torn piece of fabric, the wound on the suspect must have been quite serious. And since he’d been bitten by a stray dog from the junkyard, the risk of infection was even higher. That meant the suspect would not only need a rabies vaccine, but also an injection of immunoglobulin².

The vaccine dosage isn’t related to body weight, but the immunoglobulin is. It’s administered based on weight, about two units per kilogram. Based on the dosage recorded by the disease control center, the person who received the immunoglobulin should weigh around seventy kilograms. But from what the neighbors said, the homeowner weighed over two hundred jin³. That didn’t add up.

Something was off. Song Changfeng’s instincts were sounding the alarm. Getting a rabies vaccine requires registering with an ID, but most people don’t pay attention to whether the person and the ID match. After all, who would use someone else’s identity just to get vaccinated?

“Do you know where Zhou Peng usually hangs out? I need to find him urgently.”

The neighbor looked at Song Changfeng and, seeing how anxious he seemed, replied, “He doesn’t have a job or anything. Just drifts through life. One place he goes to a lot is some foot massage parlor with ‘Tao’ in the name. I’ve heard him mention it a few times.”

Something-Tao Foot Massage Parlor? A flash of insight hit Song Changfeng. He blurted out, “Do you mean the Letaotao Foot Massage Parlor?”

“Ah, yes! That’s the one. He even asked me to go with him once!”

Song nodded along, but his mind was racing. That parlor again. Nearly every key piece of information in this case had some connection to that place.

According to interrogations from other departments, the parlor was involved in prostitution, gambling, and drugs. The owner had already been arrested, and the others involved were still in custody. So maybe the reason Zhou Peng’s phone couldn’t be reached was because he’d already been arrested too? And now someone was using his identity to get vaccinated. Whoever had access to that kind of private information and could use it must be very close to him.

With that thought, Song Changfeng hurried back to the station with Aofeng and asked the officers to check whether anyone named Zhou Peng was among the suspects from the Letaotao Foot Massage Parlor.

The officer flipped through the list of suspects, pulled out a page, and handed it to Song. In the top left corner of the file, the name Zhou Peng was clearly written. Song’s eyes lingered on the name for a moment before moving to the photo in the top right. Just as the neighbors had said, Zhou Peng was quite fat. His face was so round with flesh that his eyes were nearly squeezed shut.

Further down, it showed that Zhou Peng had been caught red-handed in the basement level two of the Letaotao Foot Massage Parlor. He was acting as the banker at a gambling table, surrounded by a crowd. The amount involved was over a hundred thousand yuan, making it a serious offense.

Song Changfeng decided to question Zhou Peng, using him as a breakthrough point to get to the bottom of things.

When Zhou Peng was brought out, he looked exhausted and dejected. Seeing two officers sitting across from him, clearly ready to start another round of questioning, he sighed.

“Officers, I’ve already told you everything I know. What else do you want from me?” Just yesterday, he’d given three statements—either confessing his own crimes or pointing fingers at others.

“Be serious! Cooperate with the questioning!” the officer said sternly, frowning at Zhou Peng’s attitude.

Song Changfeng said, “What I’m about to ask has nothing to do with your illegal activities. It’s about something else. Please answer truthfully. Zhou Peng, where were you at 4:10 p.m. the day before yesterday?”

That was the exact time the disease control center recorded Zhou Peng receiving the rabies vaccine and the immunoglobulin.

“The day before yesterday afternoon…” Zhou Peng looked confused. He thought for a moment, then said, “I remember I was home sleeping all afternoon. Around seven in the evening, someone called and asked if I wanted to play cards, so I went out.”

“Are you sure you were home the whole time? Is there anyone who can confirm that?”

Zhou Peng replied, “I live alone, so there’s no one who can vouch for me… Wait, my neighbor can! He saw me at home the whole afternoon the day before yesterday.” His expression grew a little agitated.

“How can your neighbor prove it?”

“He’s got a security camera installed above his front door. It has a clear view of my front door. If you don’t believe me, go check it out. I swear I didn’t step outside at all that day!”

“Then how do you explain this?” Song Changfeng pushed a file from the disease control center toward Zhou Peng.

Zhou Peng picked it up and studied it carefully, looking a bit bewildered. “I went to get a rabies vaccine?” The personal information matched him exactly, even the scanned ID photo was identical. This was seriously bizarre.

“Officer, I was really at home that afternoon. I didn’t go get any rabies vaccine. I wasn’t bitten by a dog, so why would I waste money on that? If you don’t believe me, just look!”

Zhou Peng stood up, swiftly pulled off his T-shirt, spun around in place, then reached for his belt.

It all happened in a flash, so fast that neither the two officers nor the police dog could react in time. No one had expected him to do something like this. Just as he was about to pull his pants halfway down, Song Changfeng quickly jumped up to stop him. No joke, if he undressed any further, it’d turn into a full-blown interrogation mishap.

“Put your clothes back on. We believe you didn’t get the vaccine!” Once Zhou Peng was dressed and seated again, Song Changfeng said, “But you need to think carefully. What kind of person would steal your information to get a rabies vaccine? The data is so detailed, an average person wouldn’t have access to that, right?”

Translator’s Notes