Chapter 461: Surveillance
“What was her goal in doing all this?” This kind of thing wouldn’t necessarily be difficult to investigate. Even if it really happened, in this era it would just be treated as a bit of gossip. Their squad’s strength alone wouldn’t justify this kind of elaborate scheme.
“Her goal…” Xing Lu sneered. “If it worked, maybe she could extort some resources or crystal cores. If it didn’t, I’d just say it was all orchestrated by Ling Zhaoyang. That way, she could use your hands to suppress his power.”
“Aren’t they close siblings?” Zhuang Mingxu asked.
Xing Lu laughed coldly. “Close? Of course they’re close—how bad can the relationship be when they’re sleeping in the same bed?”
Zhuang Mingxu, relying on years of experience navigating business politics, kept his expression controlled, but he couldn’t completely hide his shock. “Didn’t Ling Zhaoyang marry a daughter of the Wen family?”
Wen Jing, the second young master of the Wen family, had been Zhuang Mingxu’s classmate and business partner before the apocalypse, and they had maintained a decent relationship. After the apocalypse, he only learned during Eric’s secret retaliation mission to the Mengbei Base that the strongest squad there—“The Ruthless Squad”—belonged to the Wen family, and the only Wen daughter had married Ling Zhaoyang of the Zhaoyang Squad.
“Who would expect something between biological siblings? Besides, they do have disagreements and schemes between them,” Xing Lu sneered. Even the people close to them at most just thought the two were unusually affectionate. “And they only had each other growing up—it’s not that strange to be close.”
Ling Shengge and Ling Zhaoyang’s parents had divorced early and each remarried. Neither of them took the siblings with them. At first, the siblings lived with their grandparents, but after the elders passed away, Ling Zhaoyang raised his sister on the allowance given by their parents.
Living so dependently gave Ling Shengge a serious brother complex. She couldn’t tolerate anyone trying to take her brother away. Before the apocalypse, she would just throw tantrums and play tricks. After awakening her powers post-apocalypse, she became more overt.
At that time, Ling Zhaoyang had to rely on her, which gave her the idea that they could live together forever. So she secretly drugged him. After waking up from a drunken night, Ling Zhaoyang felt guilty and remorseful, and they spent a period in harmony. But as Ling Shengge’s powers grew, so did her possessiveness, and Zhaoyang became a kept and imprisoned man.
Eventually, Ling Zhaoyang learned that their first night together had been a trap set by Ling Shengge. Around the same time, he also awakened his own powers. He told no one and asked his sister for control of the squad. Managing the crystal cores himself, he leveled up in secret and began assigning missions using her people, gradually depleting her forces until he had the power to seize full control. Only then did he reveal his hand.
Coincidentally, the environment at the Changhong Base had started to deteriorate, with constant internal strife. The siblings tacitly agreed to work together against outside threats. By the time they turned their attention back on each other, they were no longer easily manipulated.
“Ling Zhaoyang probably couldn’t shake off his sister’s entanglement, so he approached the Wen family’s daughter.”
“Do the Ruthless Squad members know about this?” Among the people who came from the Mengbei Base this time were representatives from the Ruthless Squad. Though not direct members of the Wen family, they were still core figures.
Xing Lu shook his head.
Zhuang Mingxu suddenly became very curious about the possible chain reactions if this matter were exposed.
“This time, Ling Shengge probably just wanted to use your hands to cripple Ling Zhaoyang’s powers. She had been studying this topic for some time, and even had a prison chamber specially built beneath her villa—for him.”
Zhuang Mingxu bowed his head slightly, listening silently. After a long pause, he finally asked, “Then… why were you the one chosen?”
He recalled Ling Zhaoyang’s furious and self-righteous outburst earlier. If someone wanted justice, it made no sense that the girlfriend—Ling Shengge—didn’t step forward, but the brother-in-law was overly proactive. It was strange.
Zhuang Mingxu looked Xing Lu up and down.
“…We were each other’s first love,” Xing Lu said without hiding anything.
Zhuang Mingxu ran through the tangled relationships in his mind, at a rare loss for words.
With that kind of history, Xing Lu really was the most effective way to provoke Ling Zhaoyang.
“A person who dared to force someone back in high school is no good,” Xing Lu’s eyes were filled with open hatred. “Those siblings deserve to destroy each other—just don’t let them walk free.”
“Ling Zhaoyang doesn’t know about his sister’s scheming?”
“He might not know the full extent, but he’s definitely aware of the small things. He probably thinks she’s still bitter over losing control of the squad. But Ling Shengge’s years of effort weren’t for nothing, and now that her powers are strong too, if he really kills her, the Zhaoyang Squad would probably be eaten alive by other squads in the base. Besides—”
Xing Lu paused for a long time, his expression tinged with sadness. “Ling Zhaoyang would never truly harm her. That’s his sister, whom he raised with his own hands. They depended on each other. No one else could ever matter to him the way she does.”
Zhuang Mingxu sorted through all the newly acquired information and mentally reconstructed the whole event. Then he asked, “Is there anything else you want to say?”
Just when Zhuang Mingxu thought he wouldn’t speak again and was about to get up and leave, Xing Lu suddenly asked, “…How are you going to handle them?”
“What would you want to happen?”
“Of course, I want th— for them to get what they deserve,” Xing Lu’s words took a sharp turn at the last second.
Zhuang Mingxu straightened his clothes and said meaningfully, “We’ll take it into consideration.”
After arranging the next day’s interrogation, he exited the building. In the courtyard of the Security Squad’s office, Lu Weiyi had already returned and was sitting in the open car, watching Zhuang Aiyi and Taotao chase each other around.
Before Zhuang Mingxu even got close, a stinky, pungent smell hit his nose. He paused, and under the dim light, he saw Lu Weiyi’s face looking like he’d lost the will to live — and in his hand, a plate of stinky tofu.
The moment he saw Zhuang Mingxu approaching, Lu Weiyi immediately shoved the dish toward him. If Zhuang hadn’t reacted quickly, the whole mess might’ve ended up on him.
“Look at what your son is eating! I’ve been marinated in this stink.”
Even Lu Weiyi didn’t realize how much he sounded like a typical wife complaining to her husband.
Zhuang Mingxu, who had just been forced to listen to some disgusting drama, was amused by his words. He sniffed the air exaggeratedly, leaned in, and finally dropped a kiss on Lu’s lips. “Confirmed — not spoiled.”
Lu Weiyi glared at him and got in the car.
“Aiyi, Taotao, time to go home,” Zhuang Mingxu called out to the two kids not far away.
“Okay!”
“Coming…!”
The clear voices of children accompanied by the sound of running footsteps approached.
That night, one of Lu Xiao’s men — who had been dispatched to monitor the Chaoyang Squad — sent back a report. They had located one of the individuals Lu Weiyi had mentioned and secretly transferred them to the Security Squad’s facility, ready to testify the next day.
With a witness secured, the case was already more than halfway complete. The investigation ordered by Zhuang Mingxu into the grudge between Xing Lu and the Ling siblings had also returned results.
Xing Lu’s so-called “first love” wasn’t just a casual phrase. He and Ling Zhaoyang had been high school classmates, but the story wasn’t simple. When they entered high school, Xing Lu’s family was rich and influential. He surrounded himself with a group of lackeys and bullied others to assert dominance. Ling Zhaoyang, who had no parents, became the prime target of campus bullying.
Karma came quickly. A year later, Xing Lu’s family collapsed, and he became the one getting bullied by his former cronies. Meanwhile, Ling Zhaoyang had risen in popularity thanks to his grades and likability.
Those former bullies tried to curry favor with Ling Zhaoyang by bullying Xing Lu in his place. Zhaoyang stopped them, and everyone praised him for being magnanimous — not realizing he used subtler ways to humiliate Xing Lu. Their physical closeness eventually ignited emotional feelings. At their best, they had even planned a future together. But their relationship ended bitterly after Ling Shengge discovered it and orchestrated a series of misunderstandings between them.
Their post-apocalypse reunion was even more dramatic. A powerful older man at the base had taken a liking to Xing Lu’s younger sister. To curry favor with the man, Ling Shengge personally sent the girl to his bed.
The girl didn’t survive the night. By the time Xing Lu finally made it to the Changhong Base, he found only her body. Ling Zhaoyang, fully aware of what had happened, comforted him as if nothing was wrong and even hinted at wanting to keep him close.
Ling Shengge, knowing about their past, didn’t want Xing Lu to get close to her brother again. Xing Lu, too, gave Ling Zhaoyang no chance to explain — instead, he struck a deal with Ling Shengge and started living as her boyfriend. With the new identity of “brother-in-law,” Ling Zhaoyang couldn’t confront him directly without losing face.
Ling Shengge agreed. From then on, Xing Lu danced between the Ling siblings while secretly plotting revenge against those responsible for his sister’s death.
More than two years had passed. Now only the Ling siblings remained — but he couldn’t touch them, so he turned his sights outward.
“So… what exactly is he trying to do?” Lu Weiyi asked after hearing the twisted drama, still unclear on everyone’s motives.
“Ling Shengge wants to use us to suppress Ling Zhaoyang. Xing Lu wants us to wipe out both siblings — using their plan against them. As for Ling Zhaoyang…” Zhuang Mingxu deleted the new intel from his phone. “At first, he probably didn’t know. But after being provoked, he showed up, and now he’s definitely realized he’s being used.”
Riiing riiing…
A call came in. It was Lin Mo, the one sent to keep tabs on the Ling family.
Zhuang Mingxu answered, and Lu Weiyi leaned closer.
“Commander, Ling Zhaoyang has made a move. He suddenly gave orders to find two people and kill them silently — no witnesses, no noise.”
Zhuang Mingxu raised an eyebrow at Lu Weiyi. “Anyone we’ve seen before?”
“Ling Shengge. The siblings had a fight. They’re both powerful ability users, so I didn’t dare let anyone get too close to eavesdrop. Not sure what was said, but when he came out, Ling Zhaoyang threw a major tantrum.”
“Alright. Have part of your team shadow his subordinates. As for the other target, if we can control them, good. If not — the one we already caught will be enough.”
Not long after Zhuang Mingxu hung up, the Security Squad sent word: someone from the Chaoyang Squad had come looking for Xing Lu, apparently trying to take him away. Xing Lu refused and then applied for personal protection.
