Chapter 212: The Miserable Girl

Chapter 212: Chapter 212: The Miserable Girl

No body, no photos, just a single, ordinary-looking piece of clothing.

’Find its owner?’

’How are we supposed to do that under these circumstances?’

Zoe Sawyer’s mind was full of questions, but with others in the conference room, she could only suppress her doubts for now and continue listening to the chief’s briefing.

After all, a request like this was bound to raise questions from everyone else, too.

Sure enough, just as the chief finished speaking, a young man sitting on the other side raised his hand. "Is this all we have? Are there any other clues?

Gender, age, or at the very least, any stray hairs on the clothing?"

Even as he asked, he could see the jacket still had its tag on. It looked brand new, unworn.

The chief shook his head and pressed the button again. Another image appeared on the screen.

It was a rather blurry photo showing just a few scattered lines of a conversation, all sent by the other person.

Though the photo was blurry, the content was still mostly legible.

"I can’t take it anymore. I’m going to carry out my final mission."

"Goodbye, my friend."

"I wish you the best, and I wish me the best, too."

The chief pointed to the photo and said, "The chat log in this picture has been enhanced for clarity. According to the person who filed the report, the two exceptionally blurry characters spelled out the word ’mission’."

’Go on one last mission?’

’Does that phrase have some kind of special meaning?’

Just as everyone expected to see another image, the chief turned off the projector.

’That’s... it?’

Zoe Sawyer and the others stared in stunned silence.

It wasn’t that they’d never encountered a situation like this before, but they’d never had so little evidence to work with!

"Something’s not right about this," Sean Hughes said, turning his head to whisper to Hayden Shaw beside him.

Not right. Very not right.

’With just this,’ Zoe Sawyer thought, ’I can’t even lock onto a target. My ability is useless!’

"Let’s see how it plays out. There has to be more to it than this," Hayden Shaw replied, his expression grave, his eyes fixed on the front of the room.

The chief set down the remote and stood before the table, looking at the murmuring crowd. He spoke again, "I know you all have a lot of questions, but don’t get ahead of yourselves. Hear me out."

The chief pointed to a woman sitting in the corner. "That is the person who filed the report. She came in today saying an online friend she’s been chatting with has suddenly become unreachable. She suspects the person is planning to commit suicide and hopes we can find them and save them."

Hearing this, Zoe Sawyer raised an eyebrow in surprise. The request sounded perfectly normal.

’Have the cyber police find the IP address, then trace it back to the online friend and confirm their safety.’

’Wouldn’t that solve the case?’

But the fact that the chief had specifically called them all in for this meant the matter wasn’t as simple as she imagined.

And sure enough, after hearing the chief’s explanation, Zoe Sawyer finally understood why she had been summoned.

The person who filed the report was Ms. Sherman.

Ms. Sherman was thirty years old and enjoyed making friends online.

The person she suspected of being suicidal was a young girl she had met in a chat room six months ago.

According to her description, the girl was only about sixteen or seventeen years old—a minor.

The reason she thought the girl might commit suicide was because of the world-weary sentiment that colored everything her online friend said.

The girl’s family situation was complicated. Shortly after she was born, her parents both had affairs and ran off with their old high school sweethearts.

They abandoned the child to their own parents and, for over a decade, hadn’t paid a single cent in child support.

It was her grandparents who raised her, working as cleaners and sanitation workers, collecting scrap, and scraping by to bring the girl up.

But just as the girl was starting her second year of middle school, the parents who hadn’t been home or seen her in over ten years suddenly returned.

Everything they said made it clear they wanted the house the girl’s grandparents were living in.

The grandparents and the girl later found out that their old family home was slated for demolition. The compensation wasn’t huge, but it was enough for the couple to squander for a while.

Plus, they were short on cash, and since they were still legally married, they agreed to come and split the money.

At first, the girl’s father didn’t want to split the money with his wife and wanted a divorce.

But the girl’s mother refused, stating that if the money wasn’t split fifty-fifty, he shouldn’t blame her for playing dirty. It would get ugly for both of them, and neither would see a dime.

The girl’s father, desperate for the money and unwilling to get entangled with this "crazy woman," finally agreed to his wife’s demand.

Throughout their entire argument, neither of them paid any attention to the grandparents and granddaughter in the corner.

Finally, the grandmother walked over and declared that the demolition compensation was to be saved for her granddaughter’s education and living expenses. They wouldn’t get a single cent.

For the past decade and more, they had acted as if they were dead, never once caring for their child, so they had no right to show up now and destroy their peaceful life.

It was unclear which of her words had provoked her son, but as soon as the grandmother finished speaking, a slap struck her across the face.

The force sent the frail old woman flying. Her head hit the ground hard, and she died on the spot.

Her grandfather, who witnessed the whole thing, was overcome with a fit of rage and collapsed, passing away right after her.

In less than three minutes, the girl had lost the grandparents who cherished her.

With the grandparents out of the picture, they felt even more justified in taking the compensation money for themselves.

The couple gave the elderly pair a simple send-off, burying them hastily according to local custom.

Then they stayed in the house, waiting for the demolition notice to arrive so they could take the money and live it up.

As for the daughter they had cast aside since birth?

She had never been a part of their considerations.

How was she supposed to live with no home, no family, and no money? That wasn’t their problem to think about.

But just then, the couple suddenly received a notice: the rumor about the demolition was false. It was never going to happen.

Their beautiful dream shattered in an instant. In a fit of rage, the couple took it out on the girl and beat her.

After they calmed down, the wife looked at her daughter cowering on the floor and said in a flat tone, "Do you want her? If not, I’m throwing her in a factory. She’s still a bit small, but she can work."

’Her wages will come to me,’ she thought, ’as compensation for the hardship of carrying her for ten months.’

’And I won’t have to raise this dead weight. Thinking about it that way, it doesn’t seem so bad.’

Hearing this, her husband didn’t object. He just made another demand: "Fine. But you have to transfer half of her monthly wages to me."

And so, the two of them made their decision, without once asking the girl for her opinion.

After all, in their eyes, the girl’s opinion didn’t matter.

And just like that.

A girl, not yet fourteen years old, fresh out of her remote, rural hometown, was thrown into a sweatshop.