The Choice

Of course, if a second path indeed could not be found, all hypothetical speculations were mere empty talk.

However, currently, even the first path before him was nothing but empty talk. Such a situation was indeed difficult to handle.

But Liang An was best at not being anxious or impatient, maintaining the lowest psychological expectations from beginning to end.

After all, he was a person who did not even dare to use his real, upright identity to investigate cases.

Liang An had a very clear self-awareness regarding his own timidity, which was often praised as "caution."

It was not unusual for there to be empty space directly above the elevator. As a machine-room-less elevator, the mechanical components of this elevator in the Tangjing Building, which went directly to the high floors, were located at the top of the elevator shaft rather than in a dedicated machine room on the top floor. The space required for daily maintenance was also included inside, but it was absolutely not large enough to accommodate an entire person, and normally, it was impossible to enter or exit from the higher 28th floor.

According to previous information gathered, even if maintenance was required, it would usually only activate a certain backup procedure, entering and inspecting from the highest floor under normal circumstances, which was the 27th floor entrance. Naturally, there would be no opportunity to directly connect with the 28th floor.

Liang An did not come to investigate through official channels, so he could not grandly go down again to open the elevator maintenance passage to investigate the outward passage inside the high place. That would be far too troublesome; he only needed to find proof from the outside in.

There were several walls around the elevator shaft, plastered with a layer of paint that had long since dried and accumulated dust. The daily exposure to the sun had turned the originally pure white walls into a pale yellowish-grey. This could probably prove that the building's cleaning work did not include this area, and correspondingly, there were naturally no traces of secret passages—it was entirely a solid, honest wall.

This was not surprising, because over four years, there were indeed many times when one could have tampered with it. Liang An naturally did not expect that he could open a door and see a formal secret passage wide open to him—it was just that some things could absolutely not be faked, and even the passage of time could not fill them.

Modern technology often came in handy at times like this.

Liang An very smoothly took out some tools and several different evidence bags from his pocket. On the suspicious flat wall surfaces that might serve as passages, he scraped off small pieces of plaster at varying depths, exposing the inner core, and even went around to the other side of the wall.

This could absolutely be called illegal obtaining of evidence, completely inconsistent with the rules and regulations of police evidence collection under normal circumstances. Liang An had never been one to follow rules, and this time was especially so—his actions this time were not driven by conventional motives or purposes; as long as he could confirm the facts, anything would do.

Four years had passed, and given Jiang Zhuo's cautious nature, it was impossible for him to leave behind evidence that could point to himself. It could not be used as evidence to bring down Jiang Zhuo, nor did he need to target Lu Yekang, who was already imprisoned for other reasons. This meant that the evidence obtained from this investigation would not appear in court at all.

In that case, he could be a bit casual and not add too many constraints to himself.

Although this was a decision made through gritted teeth under countless difficulties, he could comfort himself by saying that everything was for the sake of a long-term plan.

After all, a day or two, or a case or two, wouldn't make much difference.

Outside of this, the external situation of the building also needed to be confirmed...

The initial idea of using fire hoses as ropes to move up and down the exterior seemed absurd, but it was not entirely implausible. After all, at a height like the 28th floor, even if one was working in the open air, the people on the ground might not necessarily see them—the biggest problem with this point lay in the sole suspect, Lu Yekang himself.

As an old man whose career mainly consisted of clerical work, Lu Yekang was not particularly strong even in his youth. Believing that he could freely climb dozens of floors on a high-rise building was obviously unrealistic. But if it was assumed that he only needed to operate upward through the elevator's blind spots, lacking only the steps from high to low, then due to the required human physical strength, the possibility of moving downward was much greater.

But if it was a situation where he only needed to go from high to low, perhaps some simple mechanism could be utilized on the exterior?

Although the empty elevator shaft could also be taken into consideration, during this period, one also had to consider the uncertainty faced when others used the elevator—the elevator shaft was not a climbing wall, so it was naturally impossible for a person and an elevator to pass through at the same time, and there were not that many places to enter and exit. The police investigation at the time also involved those who used the elevator, and no related abnormalities were found.

By comparison, the exterior was a simpler choice.

Although the police had thoroughly checked the surveillance of every floor, the area of the 27th floor, combined with several hundred square meters of space per floor, made it a pipe dream to collect everything in every corner. As long as one could cross the initial chasm of several floors to reach a hidden passage on any given floor, the possibility of entering and exiting through some devious method was not entirely nonexistent.

However, this was also content that required visual observation: after all, whether the building actually had such blind spots and whether they could be applied in Jiang Zhuo's design remained unknown.

Entering the building was already enough to get his current behavior discovered. Wandering around the exterior would make his target all too obvious if anyone noticed him. The remaining time during the lunch break was short, and Liang An remembered that Song Qiaoyu might still be nearby, so he stood at the stairwell and called him.

As a former sniper turned criminal police officer, Song Qiaoyu might rely on his partner or colleagues in the vast majority of decisions, but there were some traits that were his personal strengths, traits that could surpass the vast majority of people. This was one of the reasons why, besides his special identity and powerful combat capability, Liang An had ultimately decided to recruit this man—his visual identification ability was impeccable.

Song Qiaoyu quickly answered the phone.

"Are you near the Tangjing Building right now?"

At this very moment, Song Qiaoyu stood motionless amidst the crowd of people running back and forth to the front desk to pick up takeout. Suddenly hearing his direct supervisor ask such a question, he first looked left and right.

A crystal chandelier hung in the center of the lobby ceiling. Below it, the flow of people coming and going was heavy, all active white-collar workers from the office area. The vast majority of their destinations were the takeout shelves at the entrance—which were currently piled high with colorful takeout bags according to the last digits of their mobile phone numbers.

Although there were many people, unlike a certain guy who was born face-blind, Song Qiaoyu only needed a rough scan to determine that there were no familiar faces of colleagues acting as lookouts in the crowd.

Although he was a bit puzzled as to how the other party knew his whereabouts, Song Qiaoyu was brief and to the point, answering every question without saying more: "Yes. I'm in the lobby downstairs."

That meant he hadn't entered the turnstiles yet.

Liang An immediately gave the order: "Go outside first, walk around the Tangjing Tower, and look up."