Chapter 56

Everyone around Ye Fan and Lin Xi—Anyone who could come into contact with Ye Fan or help him—Zhang Chen had covered all of them.

He had them investigated, then offered a generous reward—

One million yuan!

All they had to do was relay a message to Ye Fan when they ran into him.

A simple task.

And if they completed it, they got a million.

“As expected of the child of fate—they always bump into familiar faces at crucial moments.”

Zhang Chen had banked on that.

It was really like casting a wide net. There was no guarantee it would work.

But now, less than a day in—

It had already yielded results.

“Brother Zhang, why go through all this trouble?”

Division Chief Wei knew what Zhang Chen had done.

But he was a bit puzzled.

So after Zhang San left, he asked, “We could’ve just used the media to spread the news. Why go to all this trouble fishing in the dark?”

Of course, Zhang Chen’s approach had worked—

Wei was just curious.

Zhang Chen simply smiled. He couldn’t exactly say Ye Fan was a “child of fate” who was paranoid and overly cautious, could he?

“Your method would work too, Brother Wei—but it might alert Ye Fan and make him suspicious.”

“Hmm?”

“Of course, both approaches have their merits. We could do both. But we’d need to handle the media side with a bit more finesse.”

Zhang Chen smiled as he explained.

Very soon—

Wei understood Zhang Chen’s thinking.

They would still use the media—

But not the official outlets.

Instead, they would leak it to tabloid-style minor news sites, like gossip rags.

“Brother Zhang, your idea is brilliant!”

Wei’s eyes lit up after learning the plan.

“If we leak it this way, the average person’s first reaction will be:The Lin family’s heiress is seriously ill, but the news was kept secret! It only got out because some nosy paparazzi discovered it!”

Reverse psychology. A simple trick—

But very effective.

It would make Ye Fan, upon seeing the news—

Completely believe it.

Zhang Chen smiled. He understood Ye Fan far too well.

Suspicious and guarded to the extreme.

“Hearing it from someone close to him, combined with so-called ‘leaked gossip’ like this—”

Wei couldn’t help nodding. “If I were Ye Fan, I’d buy it too.”

Zhang Chen accepted the praise without flinching.

He also smiled and said, “What comes next is in your hands, Brother Wei.”

“Don’t worry. If he dares show up at the hospital this time, he won’t escape like last time!”

Wei’s voice was grim.

One failure was already humiliating.

If it happened again—

He might as well resign as the Jiangdong Division Chief of the Demon-Slaying Bureau.

Zhang Chen didn’t believe in luck.

Ordinary tactics wouldn’t work against a child of fate.

Even things that seemed like hopeless situations to normal people—

To someone like Ye Fan, they were barely obstacles.

So, he had other plans already in motion.

He would never give Ye Fan a chance to turn things around.

In truth, Ye Fan’s level of caution exceeded everyone’s expectations.

He hadn’t fully believed what Ding Ying said.

After leaving,

He didn’t go straight to the hospital.

Instead, he checked into a cheap motel.

“Can’t be rash! It could be a trap!”

In his room, Ye Fan began carefully analyzing and reviewing the situation.

He was running low on cash.

His bank account still had the 500,000 that Lin Xi had lent him—

About 400,000 remained.

But he didn’t dare use it.

He knew patrol officers could trace his location through any transaction.

He understood this much at least.

He hadn’t even turned on his phone—

He was afraid it would be tracked, and patrol officers would show up in minutes.

“Just one look. Just one peek!”

Ye Fan hesitated for a long time.

Eventually, he turned his phone back on.

But he was smart about it.

He had removed the SIM card in advance.

Disabled GPS.

Then connected to the motel’s WiFi.

When he opened WeChat, he found his university group chat was buzzing.

After reading through the chat for a few minutes—

Ye Fan’s expression grew increasingly grim.

In the group chat:

“Did you guys hear?”

“Forget it, here’s the link!”

Then someone dropped a news link.

“The Lin Group’s heiress? Isn’t that our school’s campus belle Lin Xi?”

“It’s her!”

“Hospitalized with a serious illness? What happened? She looked fine before!”

“No idea. I only found out from this news too.”

“Fake news maybe? These tabloids usually exaggerate.”

“Yeah, anyone close to her? Can confirm if it’s real?”

“Nope. She’s way out of our league.”

“I know someone in her department. I’ll go ask!”

“Hurry!”

“Never mind, I just got back from shopping with my girlfriend—she’s in the same department as Lin Xi. It’s legit.”

“For real? What kind of illness?”

“Not sure. But the school has been officially notified by her family. She’s taking a one-year leave of absence.”

“A whole year off? That’s confirmation!”

“Beauty always suffers a tragic fate?”

“Hey! Don’t jinx it! She never wronged you!”

“Yeah, yeah! Hope she gets better soon!”

“Men. Rolls eyes”

The news that Lin Xi had been hospitalized and was taking a leave from school—

Had stirred up quite a commotion among students at Jiangdong University.

She wasn’t just any student.

She had fame, beauty, wealth.

And a great personality, too.

“Look at this news link.”

Another student shared a second link.

Everyone checked it out.

“Her family is filthy rich. Even has a pharmaceutical company?”

“The Lin family is the richest in Jiangdong!”

“They even developed their own special medicine? Some people are just born in Rome…”

“Don’t be bitter. She’s seriously ill—be respectful.”

The chat kept buzzing.

Ye Fan stayed silent.

He skimmed through the records quickly.

Then opened the two news links.

They were indeed tabloid-style gossip pieces, not from official outlets.

But precisely because they weren’t official—

Ye Fan’s final doubts completely vanished.

“Special medicine! She didn’t lie to me! The Lin family has a real cure!”

That’s human psychology.

Ye Fan reasoned—Lin Xi was the precious daughter of the Lin family.

Now gravely ill. No way would her family stand by.

If a cure existed—

They’d use it.

Combined with Zhang Chen’s carefully planted hints—

Ye Fan now fully believed it.

“With that medicine, I can save Yiyi!”

A cold glint flashed in Ye Fan’s eyes.

His original plan was simple: convince Lin Xi to help him secretly.

To trick the Lin family into handing over the antidote.

But then things went wrong.

His plan failed.

Now he had no choice but to take a risk.

Just as he was about to shut off his phone—

He saw a private message pop up on WeChat.

From Ding Ying.

A simple sentence: “I went to the hospital again. I overheard nurses in the VIP ward saying the new medicine would be delivered tonight.”

Ye Fan read the message—

Then immediately turned his phone off again, doing everything possible not to expose his location.

“Captain Xu! Ye Fan’s WeChat account just logged in!”

Jiangdong City Police Bureau.

One officer immediately reported after detecting Ye Fan’s online activity.

No matter how careful Ye Fan was—

He still underestimated modern surveillance tech.

His location had already been locked in.

Soon, a squad of officers rushed toward the small motel where he was staying.

But at the same time—

Someone leaked the information—

To another person entirely.

“Tracked?”

Lin Hongyang’s expression darkened when he got word from his informant—

No one would have guessed—

He had eyes inside the Jiangdong Police Bureau, too.