Chapter 36: Three Embers

At 2:08 a.m., Song Zhao’s knuckles pressed against the brass lock of the camphor wood chest, the faint crack of splintering wood sounding unusually clear in the attic.

As the musty scent mingled with jasmine fragrance spilled out, his Adam’s apple bobbed—this was his mother’s favorite sachet aroma when she was alive. The last time he saw her was the seventh day after his father’s accident; she tucked the jasmine sachet into his arms and said, “Zhao Zhao, be good. Wait for mama to finish looking for something, then I’ll come back.”

“Song Zhao.”

Su Wan’s voice was like a fine needle, puncturing the haze rising in his mind.

She wore ivory dust-free gloves, spreading a navy cotton jacket on the lid of the camphor chest. Her hair tips brushed his hand as she lowered her head. “The lining of this jacket.”

He followed her fingertip.

Along the faded blue lining, the stitches were as intricate as a seamstress’s craft, but at the right shoulder, the seam abruptly misaligned by half a centimeter, threads knotted over threads—a sign of hurried closure.

Su Wan’s nail gently pried it open, cotton fluff rustled down, and a black USB drive, no bigger than a fingernail, rolled into her palm.

“No serial number.” She turned the drive in the moonlight, the copper at the connector tinged dark green. “The oxidation matches the time your mother passed away.”

Song Zhao’s fingers hovered two centimeters above the USB, his throat tightening.

It was the first time he actively touched evidence directly tied to his mother. The burning sensation of the “Eye of Truth” had not yet surged, but memories rushed forth—on a stormy night when he was ten, his mother crouched in the entryway, unpicking his cotton trousers, murmuring, “Zhao Zhao’s growing tall, last year’s cotton isn’t thick enough.”

He was lying on the sofa doing homework, hearing the spool roll, a sound identical to Su Wan dismantling the jacket now.

“Want to try?” Su Wan pressed the USB into his palm.

The chill of metal crept up his fingertips and into his veins.

Darkness exploded before his eyes, then swiftly coalesced into a vision: in the old house twenty years ago, the lampshade slanted to one side, his mother’s hand trembling, knuckles pale as she squeezed this USB, hiding it in the jacket lining.

Her voice, thick with tears but enunciated clearly: “Jianguo, you said… as long as all three copies exist, the truth will never die.”

The vision snapped.

Song Zhao’s fingertips burned, but the usual headache did not arrive.

He stared at the USB in his palm, suddenly recalling how three days before his father’s accident, he had crouched by his bedside and said, “Zhao Zhao, remember—sometimes the truth is hidden in the hands of those closest to you.”

He had taken it as a bedtime story then. Only now did he realize his father had already placed the key in his mother’s sewing basket.

“Song Zhao?” Su Wan’s hand covered his, “You look pale.”

He took a deep breath and placed the USB in the evidence bag. “To the library. Dong Lan said the shielded terminal in the technical isolation zone can verify the hash.”

At 10:23 a.m., the technical isolation zone on the second basement floor of the city library glowed with cold white light.

Dong Lan’s fingers flew across the keyboard. Three USB drives lay side by side on the console like black seeds.

“The first copy you extracted from the old dashcam, data is intact.” She pushed up her gold-rimmed glasses as a green progress bar flashed across the screen. “Second copy…”

The progress bar stalled, turning red.

Su Wan leaned in, the jasmine in her hair blending with the burnt scent of electronics. “Missing the last seventeen seconds?”

“Not deleted.” Dong Lan pulled up a comparison, the hash values diverging at the seventeen-second mark. “It’s replaced. The original data was overwritten with meaningless gibberish.”

Su Wan tapped the timestamp. “Look here—the last write was April 12, 2003. Friday.”

Chill crept up Song Zhao’s neck.

April 12, 2003, was Chen Mo’s first day transferred to the city bureau’s information department.

He remembered meeting Chen Mo at the bureau that day; the man had clapped his shoulder and said, “Little Song, I’ll cover you on everything data-related.” Back then he thought it was just a senior’s reassurance. Now, how much weight did that “cover” truly hold?

“He was protecting it,” he murmured. “Using false data as a shield, like faking ledgers for auditors.”

Dong Lan’s mouse froze. “The third copy is a compressed summary from the central bureau’s mail, which matches the first copy’s initial section exactly. That means—”

“All three are mirrors, the genuine file is hidden at the intersection,” Su Wan continued, her eyes brightening. “Just like ‘triple-collation’ in ancient text restoration.”

Song Zhao pulled out his phone. On the screen was Lin Wei’s text from last night: “Little Black’s found, in your hallway. The collar broke so I took it to be fixed.” Little Black was Chen Mo’s cat. Three months ago, when it went missing, Lin Wei had begged him, tearfully, to help her find it.

He had thought it was just neighborhood trouble. Now he realized the cat might never have been a mere pet.

At 12:45 p.m., Lin Acheng’s fountain pen blotted ink over the name “Lin Wei.”

On the surveillance footage, a woman in a blue shirt stood beneath Song Zhao’s apartment building, holding a bag of cat food printed with fish.

He pulled up the call log. Yesterday at 19:07, Lin Wei called him, her voice light and excited: “Officer Song, Little Black’s in your hallway, probably drawn by the scent of your fish stew.”

“The collar broke.” He repeated the phrase to the air, tapping the keyboard.

The Foundation’s access system popped up: the guest chip embedded in Little Black’s collar had “director-level” clearance.

An encrypted call came through. He answered, eyes glancing at the safe’s “Lin Family—Purge List.”

On the second page was “Lin Wei,” annotated: “Chen Mo’s spouse, no threat level.”

The pen spun twice between his fingers. He finally crossed out “Lin Wei,” noting: “Emotional anchor, retain for now.”

At 4:11 p.m., disinfectant wafted through the alley behind the old city pet clinic.

Song Zhao crouched at the iron cage. Little Black rubbed its head against his hand, the bell on its collar tinkling.

Su Wan stood at the door, keeping watch, a clinic register in her lab coat pocket—Lin Wei had indeed brought the collar for repair at ten this morning, “said it was fixed,” but the owner hadn’t touched the chip.

“This isn’t for access control,” Su Wan whispered. “Those use high-frequency chips. This one…”

Song Zhao pried open the collar’s inner layer with tweezers; a rice-grain-sized storage chip glinted silver in the sunlight.

Dong Lan’s video call popped up, her voice crackling with static. “It uses the same encryption as your mother’s file!”

The moment his finger touched the chip, darkness surged again.

This vision carried the warmth of fireworks: in the old house of 2003, Chen Mo knelt to fit Little Black’s collar. Lin Wei emerged from the kitchen with fish soup, complaining, “Spoiling it again.”

Chen Mo looked up, eyes reddened: “If I ever disappear, give this to… the policeman always looking for the cat.”

The vision splintered into stars.

Song Zhao gazed at the cat in the cage, suddenly recalling Chen Mo’s saying, “Cats have nine lives,” but now realized he’d tied the tenth around its neck.

At 8:36 p.m., the riverside viewing platform wind carried a damp chill.

Song Zhao imported three sets of data into his tablet; the complete ledger unfolded on the screen. Zhou Mingyuan’s name appeared repeatedly in the “Land Transfer” column, and the 1998 arson case note read “Clean LJ-097 deed”—the code for the Yong’an Orphanage land.

“If Chen Mo is a pawn…” Su Wan watched the flickering cruise lights on the river, “Is the player also trapped in the game?”

His phone vibrated.

Dong Lan’s message was brief: “Disciplinary committee received an anonymous tip accusing you of illegally obtaining state secrets. The IP is from the provincial bureau’s intranet, account: ‘Chen Mo—Backup.’”

Song Zhao looked across the river’s lights and suddenly smiled.

Chen Mo always called him “stubborn as a stone.” Now he understood—the stone had long been carved into a key.

He handed the tablet to Su Wan, his finger tracing “Yong’an Orphanage.” “Some games require staking your life—that’s what Dong Lan said twenty years ago.”

At 1:17 a.m., weeds at the old Yong’an Orphanage site reached his ankles.

Song Zhao stood at the door to the electrical room, flashlight beam sweeping over a rusted vent.

As the wind cut through the broken wall, he heard a sound like Morse code—was it rain on the tiles, or someone on the other side, tapping the same rhythm?

He pulled out his father’s badge, the tip aimed at the vent’s screw.

Amidst the scrape of metal, his mother’s words echoed from the memory: “As long as all three copies exist, the truth will never die.” Now all three were here, so—

The screw fell with a click into the grass.