Chapter 120: First Portrait of Poison Drawn Through Deduction, Feint in the East to Break Through Rose!

The luxury items in question were most likely sports cars.

The conclusion Su Ming reached made everyone present light up.

Compared to traditionally female-targeted luxury goods like jewelry, handbags, and clothes, sports cars and watches had a far greater allure for men—and their prices dwarfed the others.

A single sports car could easily cost several million, and once someone bought one, they often wanted a second.

This wasn’t an exaggeration.

Buying just one wasn’t enough to satisfy vanity. Once someone got a taste, they only wanted better.

And watches were even more outrageous.

An ordinary-looking watch, once packaged with marketing like “handcrafted by a master” or “atomic movement,” could be sold for tens of millions without any difficulty—it practically sold itself.

On top of that, judging from the suspicious car accident involving the Tie San family, it was reasonable to deduce that Poison had an in-depth knowledge of cars. Therefore, sports cars were very likely the main luxury item he splurged on.

Yes, drug dealing made serious money.

But if Poison were truly spending big, that income alone wouldn’t sustain it for long—not without quickly running dry.

That’s why, after the first subordinate was arrested, Poison—who had gotten a taste of sudden wealth—brazenly approached Tie San.

He did so not just to maintain his existing drug trafficking network, but more importantly to ensure the money kept flowing.

And after two years of experiencing the power of the organization firsthand, Poison had transformed from timid to arrogant and confident.

He was sure that threatening Tie San’s family would force him to sell drugs without resistance or reporting to the police. That’s why he held a gun to Tie San’s head right from the start.

…

Although Liu Yang wasn’t part of the special task force, he was required to fully cooperate. When he heard this part of the deduction, he couldn’t help but suck in a breath of cold air, shock and disbelief flashing across his face.

Because—

This kind of purely deductive crime-solving was absolutely insane.

In Longguo today, most investigations relied on surveillance footage, fingerprint/DNA technology, and high-tech tools, as well as interviewing neighbors and investigating victims’ interpersonal relationships.

Sherlock-Holmes-style pure deduction to identify suspects was almost unheard of.

Of course, part of the reason for that was…

Technology had become so advanced that criminals couldn’t cover all their tracks. High-tech investigations were the most efficient.

But when it came to old cold cases or capturing members of a highly intelligent drug trafficking network, those modern methods were often ineffective.

In those cases, only the smallest details and painstaking deductive work could yield results.

Just now, for example, Lan Jing had used criminal psychology to analyze Poison’s mood swings and personality changes over time, deducing that—

Poison likely came from a poor background, and once he got rich from drug trafficking, he would’ve gone on a massive luxury shopping spree.

Then Su Ming, based on other case details and the category of luxury items, concluded that sports cars were likely his biggest expense.

Now keep in mind—

Gusu wasn’t a major city like Modu or Jingdu. There weren’t many rich people obsessed with cars.

So by checking license plate registrations and doing proper legwork, they could definitely dig up which sports cars had been added to Gusu’s streets in recent years.

At that thought—

Liu Yang didn’t hesitate at all. He immediately opened his mouth without reservation.

“Hold on, we’ve already determined that Poison might’ve bought a bunch of sports cars, right?”

“Then why don’t we organize a coordinated operation and have each department investigate? Wouldn’t that help narrow down the targets?”

“Compared to catching Rose, wouldn’t this be way easier? Why don’t we just…”

“We’re already here—why not take down Poison first? That would ease my nerves too. Otherwise, what if this case ends up back in the hands of our Xiangcheng Criminal Unit?”

It was obvious—

Compared to solving crimes, Liu Yang—now much more adept at navigating bureaucracy—had no desire to hold onto this hot potato.

Anyone with eyes could see…

The higher-ups were taking this drug ring much more seriously than before.

Even though a task force had been established, if a city’s cold case remained unsolved and they couldn’t root out the drug traffickers, they’d face criticism and repercussions for sure.

If they could crack the case early, they’d escape the storm early.

Bai Yu, seated nearby, adjusted the collar of his suit and shook his head in rebuttal.

“Director Liu, it’s not that simple.”

“So far, we’ve only identified a potential area of high expenditure for Poison. We haven’t actually uncovered him, nor confirmed his identity.”

“From surveillance footage—”

“When Poison was spying on Skinny Dog’s family in Modu a few days ago, he was already wearing a human-skin mask.”

“Despite the arrogance and confidence, deep down, his cowardice still made him act extremely cautiously.”

“When buying a sports car, he could’ve registered it in another province and then transferred it to Gusu.”

“So checking Gusu’s sports car owners is basically useless. Expanding the scope to the whole country would be a massive undertaking.”

“So I think…”

At this point—

Bai Yu placed a black gentleman’s hat on his head, narrowed his eyes, and spoke with confident determination.

“Based on what Brother Ming just said—”

“Poison knows car mechanics very well, so he definitely didn’t buy sports cars just to collect them.”

“He must be into street racing, circuit racing, or even participating in or organizing racing clubs—basically, any car-related activities that have a certain barrier to entry.”

“If we want to quickly narrow down our targets, checking the biggest racing club in Gusu might not be a bad place to start.”

“But the odds of finding Poison that way are still slim.”

“Because we haven’t uncovered or deduced the crucial clues needed to complete his profile.”

“It’s like—”

“How the Huaihai Criminal Unit deduced Zhou Shirui’s occupation to identify him as the killer in the dismemberment case. That job detail was the key.”

“Right now, Poison’s profile is still too vague. We can’t pinpoint any real suspects.”

Bai Yu’s statement was objective.

If identifying Poison could be done based on just one extravagant sports car purchase, this massive drug ring wouldn’t have troubled Longguo for so long.

To find out who Poison really was, they had to narrow the field much further.

At this moment—

Su Ming felt more at ease than ever. Working with smart people clearly saved him a lot of explaining.

He walked to the whiteboard in the meeting room.

Picked up a marker and wrote two names on the board, separated by a vertical line—Poison and Rose.

Pointing to the word “Poison,” Su Ming spoke with deliberate seriousness.

“Remember—”

“Our main target isn’t Poison. It’s Rose.”

“What looks like a deep dive into Poison is actually a smokescreen—to throw off the entire drug network.”

“But right now, the clues and evidence on Poison are far from enough to trick their leader.”

“At the very least, if I were the leader of this drug ring, I wouldn’t believe that a special task force sent from above could only dig up this little bit.”

“So let’s return to the case itself and continue seeking out or deducing new leads on Poison.”

“If we can uncover his identity, that would be best.”

“But even if we can’t, as long as we gather enough clues to throw off the organization, that’s good enough.”

“Because…”

Su Ming then pointed to the word “Rose,” eyes narrowed with razor-sharp intensity, and declared:

“She is the key figure in this entire organization.”