Chapter 9 Old Zhang, What Did You Do?

"Does he think... we’re scammers?"

Zhou Qin and his apprentice Wang Qian exchanged glances, a mixture of exasperation and amusement on their faces.

These days...

It was the scammers who were rampant, yet the actual police were mistaken for them.

After listening to the call records, they had rushed to Jin City, wanting to investigate the truth of the matter.

"Master, what do we do now?" Wang Qian, facing such a situation for the first time, couldn’t help but turn to Zhou Qin.

Zhou Qin shook his head helplessly. If they couldn’t get the other party to come over, they would have to visit in person to understand the situation.

Actually, after arriving in Jin City, they had gathered information from various sources. It turned out that Zhang Qingyuan was just an ordinary old man. He had never done anything outrageous.

As for the recording on the phone, it could only be used as a reference. Theoretically, it wasn’t enough to press charges. After all, in reality, many people just liked to talk big.

"We’ll have to make the trip ourselves," Zhou Qin said with a wry smile, shaking his head helplessly.

Once bitten, twice shy. The other party probably wouldn’t believe such calls anymore.

Afterwards, he took his apprentice Wang Qian, along with some local staff, and headed to the retirement home.

「Two hours later.」

「Retirement Home.」

"Checkmate!"

Zhang Qingyuan, still playing chess with Qin Mu, shouted out triumphantly. He had been losing all afternoon. Finally, he got to puff out his chest and savor a win. If this were in the retirement home’s chess circle, he could boast about it for a lifetime.

"Hehe, Xiao Qin, you’re not up to par this round. How could you lose to me if you weren’t playing on your phone?" Zhang Qingyuan said while resetting the chess pieces, looking across at Qin Mu.

Qin Mu said nothing.

That afternoon, relying on the ’Grandmaster’ feature of his phone, he had almost cleaned Zhang Qingyuan out. Eventually, feeling a bit guilty, he had put down his phone, choosing to compete with his actual skills. He originally thought that after three years of playing high-level chess, he could at least have a decent back-and-forth game with Zhang Qingyuan.

But unexpectedly, without resorting to any tricks, he really couldn’t beat Zhang Qingyuan. Zhang Qingyuan, with a few quick moves, decisively checkmated him.

"Come on, another round! Your turn with red first," Zhang Qingyuan urged, seeming to have developed a chess addiction.

"Old Zhang, you still have the heart to play chess? The police are here looking for you! What have you done?"

At that moment, Li Weiguo rushed in frantically from outside.

Zhang Qingyuan was startled and somewhat puzzled.

"Just now, some officers from the police station came to our retirement home asking for Zhang Qingyuan by name," Li Weiguo added, explaining in detail.

Zhang Qingyuan became even more confused.

The police... What could they want with him?

He hadn’t been swindled, nor had he swindled anyone.

However, since he had a clear conscience, he wasn’t particularly afraid. He immediately put down his chess pieces and followed Li Weiguo.

"I’ll go too." Qin Mu’s expression brightened; he had a good idea what this was about. He followed them, since, after all, this matter had started because of him.

Soon, Zhang Qingyuan met Zhou Qin.

"The scammers... caught?" Zhang Qingyuan asked, stunned for a moment before a delighted expression appeared. He exclaimed happily, "Those damn scammers! They got what they deserved!"

Zhou Qin gave a wry smile. "Old gentleman," he continued, "we’re here this time mainly to ask about that phone call from yesterday..."

Zhang Qingyuan blinked, then waved his hand. "Oh, that call! I was almost scammed, but thankfully Xiao Qin was beside me and warned me, so I avoided falling for it." As he spoke, he pointed at Qin Mu.

Zhou Qin’s expression flickered as he looked at Qin Mu. He praised, "As expected of a young man, quite vigilant. It’s truly fortunate you weren’t deceived."

Qin Mu smiled.

Zhou Qin turned back to Zhang Qingyuan, returning to the main purpose of his visit. He asked bluntly, "It’s like this: about that call yesterday, you later said... your son was responsible for thirteen homicides and had also killed someone on the spot. Old gentleman, do you recall that?"

Hearing this, Zhang Qingyuan’s mouth fell open, and he couldn’t help but swallow. Realizing what was implied, he quickly looked at Qin Mu again. "Comrade," he denied, "this has nothing to do with me! Xiao Qin was using my phone to talk to the scammer at that time."

Zhou Qin frowned, somewhat displeased. "Old gentleman," he said, "now you’re not cooperating. I’ve listened to the recording of the call; it was your voice throughout the entire conversation."

Zhang Qingyuan’s eyes widened, suddenly finding himself at a loss for words.

Indeed, when the scammer had called yesterday... it had been his voice throughout, and Qin Mu hadn’t said a single word.

Fortunately, at that moment, Qin Mu stepped forward and explained the whole story.

Half an hour later, Zhou Qin, Wang Qian, and the others finally processed the truth.

"You’re saying... you impersonated Zhang Qingyuan’s voice to deal with the scammer?"

"Those voices on the call—that was all you acting?"

"And this person you mentioned—the one who supposedly died—was that actually the late Mr. Li?" Zhou Qin asked. He then pointed at Li Weiguo, looking at Qin Mu in disbelief.

And Qin Mu, to prove his claim, immediately repeated one of Zhou Qin’s sentences in Zhou Qin’s own voice.

The voice was identical, with no discernible difference.