Pristine Darkness

Chapter 120

Was anyone wondering what the other members of the Scooby Gang were doing? Wonder no more, as Fang Qing and An Yan are on the case, and it looks like they've pinpointed the location of the stronghold! Meanwhile, did you think everything would be smooth sailing since Bo Jinyan did away with Gu An, the masked killer? Well, think again . . .

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Translator: shl

Editor/ Proofreader: Anks

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This was the temporary police command centre. At the moment, Zhu Tao was occupied with leading a team to comb through all the clues linked to Bo Jinyan and Buddha's Hand. Fang Qing was standing in front of a map, his eyebrows scrunched up in concentration, a cigarette in his left hand and a pen in his right, completely lost in thought. He had already marked the map with various scribbles.

An Yan sat in front of a few computers, and his delicate eyebrows were also furrowed. He was continuously searching for a signal, but could not do anything as the signal was too weak. He could only ascertain the approximate direction without pinpointing the precise position.

Fang Qing stared at a corner of the map for a long time before he tossed the pen to one side and turned his head to ask, "What progress are you making?"

An Yan turned the computer monitor towards him. He pointed at it and said, "I can only determine that they are in this area. There's probably not much power left in Jinyan's reading device, so the signal is very weak. The Internet in the surrounding area is poor and there's too much interference. Aiya, it's my fault for not thinking it over carefully. I should have decked him out from head to toe in signal transmitters."

Fang Qing laughed and said, "It's not as if we have no results at all. I have also determined that Buddha's Hand's stronghold is in this area, totally in accordance with the results of your monitoring."

"How did you reach that conclusion?"

Fang Qing brought out a photocopy of the information that Zhu Tao had and said, "Jinyan told Captain Zhu that, with this information and more time, he could deduce the stronghold of Buddha's Hand. In recent years, the routes that Buddha's Hand has taken when committing crimes, their escape routes, the trails of their coming and going, combined with the roads and highways in the periphery, the state of the waterways and the geological features of the surroundings -- I understand what Jinyan was saying, it's like solving a complex multi-factor equation. The solution to the equation is the coordinates of Buddha's Hand's stronghold. This is actually a question featuring probability and logic. I've marked all these factors on the map. The area that has been the centre of all of Buddha's Hand's activities in the past few years, and has a complex network of waterways, is this area."

An Yan said, "But this area on the map has several remote towns; Zhu Tao has already sent men to secretly survey the area by sea, land, and air, and they have even visited a few towns. However, they have not found any traces of Buddha's Hand. That area is vast and sparsely populated. Apart from a few, easily counted, small towns and villages, there is almost no sign of human habitation. If they are hiding in the mountains, there is no way for us to detect them. If we search the area inch by inch, it would take us a good few years."

Fang Qing said, "No, it's not really possible that such a criminal gang would be able to hide deep in the mountains and remote forests, isolated from the rest of the world, for such a long period of time. They need to live, to go out, to womanise, to conduct their shady business. At the very least, they have to stay in a small town."

The two of them fell silent for a while before Fang Qing said, "As Sherlock Holmes said, 'when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth'. Hey, boy, check if there's a small town in that area which does not appear on a map and is also almost disconnected from the outside world. This would be even more in accordance with the conditions that Buddha's Hand considered when choosing a location for their stronghold."