Chapter 95 (1/2)

What Do You Want to Do?

Back home, Xia Lei connected the portable hard drive to his old Lenovo laptop and looked at what was saved on it.

The hard drive had many videos on it, mostly of Huang Yi-Hu or Li Yu-Lan bribing officials. The bribery was offered in many forms, some was a direct handing over of cash, some in the form of antiques, famous calligraphy and paintings. There were also unsightly bribes where direct arrangements were made for a young woman to sleep with the official.

Xia Lei quickly found the original copy of the video Huang Yi-Hu had of Qin Xiang. The video was of Qin Xiang entering a gold shop and he was easily recognizable even though his face was covered. He liked to dress in a feminine way, especially leggings which showed off the curves of his hips - Xia Lei had no words.

“Delete it!” Qin Xiang was quite excited, “That bastard won’t be able to threaten me anymore!”

Xia Lei deleted the video and said, “Come look at these videos and make a name-list for me. Transfer all these videos to my computer. This portable hard drive must be destroyed.”

Qin Xiang was shocked, “Why do you want to destroy such an important thing?”

“Modern technology is very advanced. Even if we delete the video Huang Yi-Hu used to threaten you with, the police technicians will be able to recover the file. Do you want to go to jail?”

Qin Xiang paused, then smiled, “I didn’t think of that. Okay, I’ll do as you said.”

It wasn’t difficult to make a name-list from the videos since both Huang Yi-Hu and Li Yu-Lan would greet the official by their official positions. The official’s information could then be looked up on the official government website.

Qin Xiang set to work making a name-list of the bribed officials and Xia Lei looked through the paper documents they had stolen. The documents were mostly business contracts and engineering contracts as well as some project acceptance reports.

The business contracts and engineering contracts looked fine but the project acceptance reports were fishy. The project acceptance reports contained quality issues such as poor quality building materials, inferior quality steel and so on, resulting in a huge safety risk. He compared these project acceptance reports to project contracts and found that the numbers matched.

‘Huang Yi-Hu is using New Moon Real Estate to construct buildings with inferior building materials and to sell them to people at high prices. These reports have been locked away in a safe so he must have bribed someone to get the construction approved. He must have kept these reports to keep those officials who accepted his bribes in hand. I have these reports now - you can make preparations for suicide, Huang Yi-Hu!’ The corners of Xia Lei’s lips curled in a sneer. He picked up the leather-bound book next and opened it.

Xia Lei was floored by the contents.

This book was a true ‘black ledger’. It held records of every bit of income Huang Yi-Hu had from his underworld operations. There were records of revenue from illegal gambling dens, protection fees from a market area, the sex industry and everything illegal except for drugs. These sources of revenue were all collated and washed clean through his legitimate businesses to become legal income.

The ledger also recorded the names of officials who had accepted his bribes, their ranks, the exact dates and amount paid to them. It seemed that the videos on the portable hard drive were only part of it. The ledger held early records of the bribery while the video records of bribery were only from the last two years. Huang Yi-Hu’s methods of saving evidence and recording material for blackmail had changed with the times and he had switched over from paper to electronic.

Xia Lei had thought that the leather-bound notebook would contain something that linked Huang Yi-Hu and the Gu clan but he found nothing after looking through it.

“Lei, I’ve finished making the name-list,” said Qin Xiang.

“Have you saved the videos too?” asked Xia Lei.

“All saved. What do you plan to do next?” said Qin Xiang.

Xia Lei walked to the computer desk, “Let me do it.”

Qin Xiang got up and gave Xia Lei the seat.

Xia Lei sat himself and selected some ‘wholesome’ videos, then uploaded them to a few video-sharing websites. The titles of the videos were all made to look like it was posted from a first-person perspective - ‘I want to report XXX’.

Qin Xiang looked at what Xia Lei was doing and frowned as he said, “I don’t think anyone will believe that Huang Yi-Hu would report these himself.”

Xia Lei smiled, “You’ll see.” He took up a pen and some writing paper and started writing an informant’s letter.

Qin Xiang watched Xia Lei write and quickly saw that something was not right and said in astonishment, “Your handwriting! How is it the same as Huang Yi-Hu’s handwriting? This is impossible - I’ve seen his handwriting and this looks exactly like what he had written himself!”

Xia Lei continued writing the letter. The Huang Yi-Hu in the letter wrote of being persecuted by some powerful person and was in fear of his life, pleading with the prosecution to provide protection. Once he had protection, he would turn in all the corrupted officials and reveal all illegal records. Xia Lei put in some information from the black ledger at the end.

“You want the police to arrest him?” asked Qin Xiang.

Xia Lei shook his head, “The police would want to arrest him but some people won’t.”

“Are you talking about those officials who were reported? They can’t do anything about Huang Yi-Hu,” said Qin Xiang.

Xia Lei smiled, “Huang Yi-Hu is the Gu clan’s dog and the dog has started to bite people. Who do you think will act first?”

“You’re saying…” Qin Xiang’s mouth dropped open, “The Gu clan!”

Xia Lei put the letter into an envelope, “Let’s await a grand show.”

“I’ll go post it right now,” Qin Xiang said eagerly.

Xia Lei handed the envelope to him and gave him a reminder, “Find someplace to hide after you post that. Don’t show your face for a few days. Even a rabbit would bite when cornered, let alone a vicious wolf like Huang Yi-Hu.”

Qin Xiang nodded, “You be careful too.”