Disappearing for a bit to make a point is fine, but it’s been 9 days, and that’s a bit too much. Looking at the haggard appearance of the mother in front of , it’s clear she hasn’t rested well these past 9 days.
"Auntie, don’t worry just yet. What’s your daughter’s phone number? Let call her from my phone and see."
Li Xiang is quite enthusiastic. He could have chosen to ignore it, casually saying a few words, and let her go ho to wait for news. But he felt the girl’s actions needed a bit of criticism. As children, how can they just disappear?
If they find their parents annoying, they can just go out to work and not co ho, but they need to stay in contact. Otherwise, it just makes parents more worried, like the aunt here now.
He wants to advise her properly from the perspective of soone who’s been through it.
After dialing the number, an automated system voice ca through the phone: "Hello, the number you have dialed is currently turned off. Please try again later..."
"Still turned off?"
Li Xiang couldn’t understand. Usually, running away from ho is just to give their parents a hard ti. At most, they wouldn’t answer their parents’ calls. How could the phone be completely turned off?
Could it be she wants to cut off from the world?
"What to do? I don’t even know if sothing happened to her."
Wu Qiufen clapped her hands anxiously. She had tried everything she could think of and had no choice but to seek help from the police again.
"Don’t worry just yet. I’ve noted it down. When our director returns, I’ll report the situation to him. You should go ho and wait for news. Who knows, maybe she’ll return today. If she does, please let us know."
Convinced by him, Wu Qiufen went back. Li Xiang didn’t have a better solution, so he continued to docunt the situation and planned to report it once Deputy Director Cai returned.
Just before the end of the day, Cai Yongqing returned. Li Xiang quickly reported the day’s incoming reports to him.
"Is it that Wu Qiufen? I rember her. Her daughter hasn’t returned yet? Young people these days, why are they so reckless? They just leave without thinking about their worried parents?"
Cai Yongqing was evidently aware of the situation, but he also didn’t have a better solution: "Let’s just file a missing person report. Currently, the situation doesn’t et the case initiation criteria. She might return once she’s had enough fun."
Cai Yongqing’s approach was the routine procedure for the police station. Without clear leads, the police wouldn’t put much effort into investigating.
But Li Xiang felt sothing was amiss: "Director Cai, people usually return after a couple of days of running away. Even if they don’t, they wouldn’t keep their phone off. I think this might not be so simple."
Just as Cai Yongqing was about to leave, he stopped at Li Xiang’s words and looked back at Li Xiang, who had recently made quite a na for himself.
"In our Hongqiao district, with over thirty thousand households, almost every day there’s a chance of receiving similar cases. If we were to assist everyone who reported soone missing, with our current staff of just over twenty, even two hundred people wouldn’t be enough. Would we have ti for anything else?"
The lack of police power at grassroots stations is a nationwide issue. They have to prioritize based on the severity and urgency of cases. Trying to handle everything would be exhausting and impossible.
"But this disappearance case is really suspicious, and I think it needs to be thoroughly investigated."
"Don’t think just because you earned so credit recently that you’re unbeatable. Situations like yours might not happen in decades. Be practical. Stop daydreaming about achievents. If you want to investigate, do it on your own."
Cai Yongqing thought that Li Xiang had beco a bit arrogant lately, seeing problems with every case. So, he decided to let him stumble, thinking it might humble him a bit.
"Yes, I’ll need Sun Zhidong to co with ."
"Fine, he’s not much use around here anyway."
Cai Yongqing agreed readily, as it didn’t affect him negatively.
When Li Xiang found Sun Zhidong, he was grinning at his phone, probably chatting with his wife. So, Li Xiang quietly walked behind him and patted his shoulder, imitating Zhao’s voice, saying, "What are you doing!"
"Whoa, you startled . Li Xiang, what are you doing here?"
Sun Zhidong was obviously startled, hurriedly stuffing his phone into his pocket. Turning back, he saw it was Li Xiang and heaved a big sigh of relief.
"Nothing much. You seed a little free, so I thought you might want to do sothing."
"Nah, I’ll stick to taking it easy. Slacking makes happy."
Upon hearing he had to work, Sun Zhidong lost interest, pulled out his phone, and sat back down.
"Really not coming? Weren’t you the one who said you wanted to achieve sothing last ti? You said I never think of you when opportunities arise. Well, now I’m thinking of you, but it seems you aren’t very interested. Guess I’ll go by myself."
Hearing this from Li Xiang, Sun Zhidong put away his phone imdiately: "Don’t, I was wrong. It’s good that you’re considering . What’s the good deal?"
"A missing person case. I find it a bit problematic and want to investigate."
"Investigate a missing person case? Just the two of us community officers?"
Sun Zhidong was puzzled. Two auxiliary officers investigating a missing person case?
How would they even go about it?
"Stop asking so many questions. Just follow and drive."
Seeing Li Xiang’s confident expression, Sun Zhidong had no choice but to suppress his curiosity and went to get his car.
The reason Li Xiang wanted to bring Sun Zhidong along was because of his car, so he could have a driver. Otherwise, handling matters would be really inconvenient.
While Sun Zhidong went to get the car, Li Xiang downloaded the police report and docuntation on Wang Liping’s disappearance to bring with them, then got in the car.
"Where to?"
"To the city bureau, to find soone for help."
Both of them were just auxiliary officers, without any authority. Investigating a missing person was like flying blind—they had no idea where to start.
At this ti, Li Xiang thought of soone, Mao Ji of the task force. His computer skills were sothing Li Xiang had witnessed firsthand in the task force: quick and accurate in gathering intelligence, quite impressive. To find out more about the missing person, he could only ask for his help.
Sun Zhidong knew Li Xiang had just returned from the task force. Heading to the city bureau now probably ant he was seeking help from the task force. So, he didn’t say much. Knowing the task force’s detectives sure had its perks.
Once at the city bureau, Li Xiang called Mao Ji.
Back in Jinling, when Li Xiang had helped catch Yue Cheng, saving Mao Ji from a penalty, Mao Ji had a good impression of Li Xiang. So, Mao Ji put down what he was doing to greet him.
"Mao, I’ve got sothing to ask of you. Among everyone I know, you’re the best with computers."
"Oh, not at all. What’s up? Tell about it, and I’ll see if I can help."
Mao Ji spoke humbly, but when it ca to his area of expertise, he was rather confident.
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