The night grows deep, the bright moon shining high.
A gentle stream flows through the geotrically designed plaza, tall lush greenery surrounds the water, isolating the plaza from the bustling street outside.
"This is Kailuo’s ho?" Vigina raised her head, glancing at the apartnt building wrapped in flowing water and greenery, with dim golden light emanating from the walls.
"Yes, his ho is on the 19th floor. When I ca to pick him up earlier, he was already gone. The apartnt’s surveillance captured him leaving, but when we followed the direction he went, we found nothing, and we can’t reach him by any ans." The young agent beside her also gazed at the towering building, quickly answering.
After speaking, he stared silently at the luxurious apartnt building before him.
The apartnt he rented was nearby, a run-down building with peeling walls, cramped space, and no elevator.
"Alright," Vigina nodded gently, lifting her foot onto the stepping stones over the water, heading towards the building, "I’ll go check it out."
The automatic sensor doors opened, and Vigina walked inside, glancing at the lobby filled with self-service tea and drinks.
She then headed straight to the apartnt’s front desk.
Before the neatly dressed, attractive female staff behind the desk could speak, she presented her badge with the Olive Shield Badge emblem, "Federal Bureau of Investigation, the tenant on the 19th floor is missing. We now suspect he is in life-threatening danger and need to inspect his premises."
"We’ve just been here." The young agent beside her quickly added.
"Do you have a search warrant?" However, the front desk seed to have changed personnel and did not recognize the young agent. She took Vigina’s badge, glanced at it, and then slowly returned it, cautiously asking.
"The situation is urgent now. According to federal law, a search warrant can be processed later," Vigina quickly said, noticing the front desk’s hesitation, "Isn’t this apartnt under the Kewort Group? Just call your general manager; they know about it."
"Okay." The front desk promptly nodded, picked up a phone, dialed a number, and quickly reported.
After a while, as if the call was transferred a few tis, she finally hung up, unlocked a drawer with a fingerprint lock, and handed a black room key card to Vigina, "Director Vigina, this is the key card for the 19th floor. You can swipe the card to enter."
"Thanks for your hard work," Vigina took the key card and walked towards the elevator. Holding the card, she waved to the young agent, "I’ll go up and take a look, you stay in the lobby and observe if there are any suspicious people."
"Yes!" The young agent nodded heavily, watching her back.
And Vigina had already swiftly entered the elevator.
She glanced down at her bracelet, which showed no new information.
Paxiu told her to co to Kailuo’s place but didn’t say he would co himself. Logically, he should, but if he does, where would he appear?
This guy can be quite elusive at tis.
The silent elevator swiftly ascended.
And just as Vigina frowned in thought, a gentle voice sounded behind her, "This Kailuo is not ordinary."
"Ah?" Vigina was startled, turning around to see ’Paxiu’ standing behind her, eyes wide open, "When did you get in here?"
"I ca in with you just now." He Ao glanced at her, speaking casually.
"How can you be so sneaky?" Vigina patted her beating chest, speaking with lingering fear.
"You should be more alert." Looking at her expression, He Ao shook his head, speaking softly.
To He Ao, Vigina indeed seed a bit lacking in vigilance.
"So if I’m more alert next ti, I could sense you behind sooner?" Vigina pondered.
"No," He Ao replied calmly.
Vigina: ······
Ding——
The elevator opened, revealing a small foyer and a closed door in front of them.
"When you said this Kailuo is ’not simple’, what did you an?" Vigina collected her thoughts, exiting the elevator and approaching the closed door.
"According to the information I’ve obtained," He Ao walked alongside Vigina, recalling the data Eve found on the way, "Kailuo originally worked for Kopes Mining as a mid-level manager in Vitland."
He paused slightly, continuing, "But later, he seed to offend a director at Kopes Mining, got fired by the group, went through several companies, and was quickly dismissed, eventually ending up in Ains.
"He finally got hired in the Kewort Group’s Ains branch as an ordinary clerk."
"Is there a problem with this resu?" Vigina pondered, not seeing the issue.
"In theory, even if he jumped directly from Kopes Mining to Kewort Group, it wouldn’t be surprising," He Ao calmly said,
"Major consortiums often poach from other similar-field consortiums, but most of the ti, these ’non-pure blooded’ foreign employees won’t access the consortium’s core business.
"About three months after Kailuo entered the Ains branch, a vacancy appeared in the Denno branch, and he smoothly transferred from the Ains branch to the Denno City branch. After that, you know, he steadily rose to beco the second-in-command at the Denno City branch,"
He Ao shifted his gaze, seeing Vigina still sowhat puzzled, continued, "Most of Kewort Group’s rare earth mines co from the Denno City branch, and the entire rare earth mining is the Kewort Group’s lifeline,"
His voice lowered, "The Denno City branch has only changed its CEO once in recent years. The previous CEO has already been promoted to the Kewort Group’s headquarters, becoming the group’s CEO and joining the board of directors."
Hearing He Ao’s words, Vigina was a bit stunned, organizing her thoughts, "Are you saying that a forr Kopes Minerals employee took just over three years to enter the Kewort Group’s core and access its vital business?"
She paused, pondering, "Could this guy be a business spy for Kopes Mining? But how did Kewort Group conduct the background check such that a person of such identity could enter the power core?"
"That’s possibly why he had to get hired through Ains," He Ao said softly, "The entry check for Denno City branch is very strict, but though Ains is in Ains, its status within Kewort Group isn’t very high. An ordinary clerk doesn’t need to spend a huge amount hiring a background check agency,"
He glanced at the tightly closed door in front of them, "His previous two work experiences perfectly cover his Kopes Mining resu. There’s no perfect process or system in this world; if one searches patiently, loopholes will always be found."
"Indeed," Vigina nodded lightly, taking the room card to swipe the door lock, "The person who transferred him to Denno City might also have so issues. If we can find that person, perhaps we can learn sothing."
Ka——
The sound of the door unlocking echoed in the silent darkness as Vigina pushed open the door.
"He’s already dead," He Ao said offhandedly, looking up as he glanced inside the doorway, continuing, "In the second year of Kailuo’s entry into the Denno City branch, the manager who transferred him was attacked and killed during a wilderness trip."
At this, his gaze suddenly halted, and his words stopped abruptly.
"Sounds like a silencing," sighed Vigina, then noticed the pause in He Ao’s words, curiously looking ahead in the direction of He Ao’s gaze, "What’s wrong?"
```
Subsequently, her words paused slightly.
Directly opposite the door was a stone wall designed like a ’screen’, blocking the view from outside the door.
Thin streams of water slid down the edge of the stone wall, creating a light mist by the wall, and directly opposite the door hung a black and white smiling mask.
The bizarre mask quietly watched the door, as if observing all the visitors from outside.
"What is this?" Seeing the mask, Vigina seed to rember sothing and spoke hesitantly.
"’K’s mask." He Ao entered the room, stopped in front of the black and white mask, and reached out, directly removing it.
The mask seed to be made of so special exquisite glass, much more lustrous than ordinary plastic masks.
It didn’t look cheap.
Gazing at the mask, He Ao was sowhat silent.
"Is this guy a believer of ’K’?" Vigina gazed at the mask and frowned slightly.
"Doesn’t look like it." He Ao shook his head slightly.
In the information collected by Eve, this Kailuo had provided many ’rights’ for miners in various promotional materials of the Kewort Group. anwhile, during the years he held power, the on-site miner mortality rate in Denno City had been decreasing year by year.
But, the living conditions of miners in Denno City hadn’t improved. The miner mortality rate dropped because previously, the Kewort Group would let dying miners continue working, eventually causing them to die in the mines. Kailuo, on the other hand, would dismiss them when they were near death, significantly reducing the mortality rate.
This also reduced the potential public outcry and compensation disputes caused by miner deaths.
In recent years, the rare earth output of the Kewort Group’s Denno City branch had been increasing significantly every year, with profits climbing annually.
He Ao reached out, placing the mask on the nearby table.
As He Ao moved, a decorative piece hung on the table began to sway gently.
It was a black and white mask ornant, intricately carved and gleaming brilliantly.
"It looks like natural black and white two-tone tourmaline; this gradual color, this size, and the carving craft," Vigina pinched the tourmaline mask and said softly, "This thing is probably worth a fortune."
She put down the mask ornant, paused silently, "This guy isn’t afraid of inviting divine punishnt by keeping these things at ho?"
Even though she hadn’t been here long, with her position as director, she had encountered quite a bit of information regarding the Kewort Group, understanding well the conduct of those top executives.
Her brother at least maintained so semblance of humanity while he was in charge; now it’s just getting worse.
She sneered, "He wouldn’t really believe that K would protect him, would he?"
He Ao glanced at Vigina beside him.
He could feel the anger suppressed beneath the calm facade of the woman next to him.
He withdrew his gaze and said in a low voice, "Let’s start searching first."
"Okay." Vigina nodded gently.
Then she turned to look at the tourmaline mask ornant on the table, reached out, and took it down, placing it on the table.
At that mont, He Ao also took out a data cable and connected his bracelet to the intelligent system of the entire room.
The apartnt occupied the entire floor; it was spacious, and although most of the areas were designed as open spaces, there were still five or six rooms.
Most of the predominantly public areas in the room were equipped with caras, and these caras were not necessarily for surveillance but possibly positioned with AI algorithms for localization.
Simultaneously, the room was also filled with nurous sensing systems to enable coordination and localization for the robots and the owner.
Humans couldn’t understand the perspectives of these localization systems, but Eve could.
While Eve was scanning the public areas of the room and analyzing past perception data from the intelligent system, He Ao looked at Vigina, "Start searching from the rooms, I’ll go over here."
Saying that, he walked towards the master bedroom.
Vigina nodded, heading towards the area that seed to be the study.
The master bedroom had no sensing systems; it was purely ’private space’. The room contained a large bed, so rather expensive-looking oil paintings, so simple cabinets, and directly across from the bed, a black and white mask.
The entire bedroom was very simply decorated.
He Ao opened the cabinets; they were clean, containing so simple daily necessities.
Besides these cabinets, there seed to be no other places to store things around.
Thinking, He Ao glanced at the mask directly across from the bed.
The edges of the surrounding paintings had faint dust traces, but the mask’s edges did not.
This mask was frequently removed.
He walked over, reached out and took down the mask, then placed his hand on the wall behind it, finding a pressable switch.
Click—
With a light sound, the wall slid open to the sides, revealing a small safe about thirty centiters wide and long in front of He Ao.
Looking at the safe, He Ao directly reached out, grasped the handle, his Divine Sense entered the box, unlocked it, and then opened the safe.
Inside the box were so obvious outline marks, but the box was currently empty.
Evidently, certain small items had been stored here for a long ti, but now, the contents were already taken, and not long ago.
"What’s the situation?" At this mont, Vigina also heard the sound and walked over.
"He’s preparing to leave after everything is ready," He Ao said quietly, gazing at the empty safe.
"Analysis complete," at this mont, Eve’s voice sounded in He Ao’s ear, "Number of potentially useful pieces of information detected: 2."
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