Chapter 89: To Arrest or Not to Arrest?

Jiang Zheng harbored both anger and disgust toward swindlers. Swindlers cared only about cheating people out of their money, never considering what that money meant to those they deceived.

After some thought, Jiang Zheng called Zhou Quanyi.

“Fourth brother, what’s up?” Zhou Quanyi answered.

“Big brother, what do you think about second brother getting swindled?” Jiang Zheng asked.

“I don’t have any particular opinion. We’ve warned him many times, but he never listened. If he’d paid attention earlier, none of this would have happened,” Zhou Quanyi replied.

“That’s true, but are we just going to let him be?” Jiang Zheng pressed.

“What else can we do? The money’s already gone; how could we intervene now? The only thing I can do is let him postpone paying back what he owes. He definitely has to repay it, though—I’ll mention it to the others. Five thousand isn’t much to me, but it’s a lesson he needs to learn,” Zhou Quanyi said.

“I understand, he must repay the money,” Jiang Zheng agreed, recognizing the truth in that.

Then Jiang Zheng changed the subject: “Big brother, you have a wide network—do you happen to know any hackers or people like that? Second brother has his own reasons for getting swindled, but the real culprits are the swindlers themselves. They can’t be allowed to keep running free.”

Zhou Quanyi was silent for a moment, then said, “I do have connections in that area.”

Jiang Zheng felt a surge of hope, but before he could speak, Zhou Quanyi continued, “But I won’t reach out to them.”

“Why not?” Jiang Zheng couldn’t understand.

If the connections were there, why not use them? Even if the money couldn’t be recovered, letting swindlers run free was unacceptable.

“Fourth brother, do you know how much it would cost to hire a computer expert who could track down a swindler?” Zhou Quanyi posed the question.

“I don’t know,” Jiang Zheng admitted honestly.

He had no concept of such things.

“Let me put it this way—the price wouldn’t be less than ten thousand. You could hire an expert, but the money you recover wouldn’t even cover their fee, and there’s no guarantee you’d get the money back at all. What’s the point?” Zhou Quanyi explained.

“But are we really supposed to let swindlers run free? Just because the cost is too high, we give up?” Jiang Zheng challenged.

“Fourth brother, you’re still too naïve. There are countless swindlers in the world—even if you catch this group, there are plenty more out there. Can you catch them all?

Besides, catching swindlers is a job for professionals—it has nothing to do with you or me. We don’t need to worry ourselves over it.

Catching one group won’t change anything,” Zhou Quanyi said.

His words were realistic—almost cruel.

Can all swindlers be caught? Of course not.

New ones will always emerge.

Jiang Zheng understood this, yet he felt that letting things slide amounted to helping the swindlers.

It was because everyone thought this way that swindlers could keep running free.

The two fell silent. After a while, Zhou Quanyi said, “Fourth brother, don’t think too much. It’s already happened—let’s treat it as second brother’s lesson.”

Jiang Zheng pursed his lips. “Big brother, I disagree. There are many swindlers, and we can’t catch them all, but that’s not a reason to let them go.”

“You… well, you’ll understand someday. The reality of this world is always cruel,” Zhou Quanyi said.

“Don’t use reality as an excuse for giving up. Darkness and cruelty are not reasons to lie down and accept things. It’s precisely because the world is dark and cruel that we should strive toward the light,” Jiang Zheng said.

“You don’t understand me now, and I get that. Someday you will. But let me be clear—I won’t help with this,” Zhou Quanyi said.

“I’ll find a way myself,” Jiang Zheng said.

He hung up, feeling a surge of frustration.

Their arguments were nothing new; they’d had similar disagreements before.

It was normal—everyone had different values, and arguments were part of life.

This wouldn’t affect their relationship much.

At that moment, Jiang Zheng was thinking about how to catch the swindlers.

Just as Zhou Quanyi had said, catching one group wouldn’t change much. There were endless swindlers, and the cost was high.

But if he could catch just one group, fewer people would be deceived. Not changing everything didn’t mean nothing could change; at least there would be some small improvement.

And that gave the effort meaning.

Jiang Zheng pondered for a long time but couldn’t find a good solution.

From Yang Po’s account, it was clear he had no idea who the “Little Fish Customer Service” was—not even their gender. The contact was lost.

It was as if the other party had vanished into the vast crowd.

With only the online alias “Little Fish Customer Service,” there was no way to find them.

The trail ended there.

At that moment, Jiang Zheng wished the system would give him a task, so he could use some skills to bring the swindlers to justice.

The desire was intense.

But he couldn’t figure out how the system triggered tasks.

At first, he thought he could figure it out after a few tasks.

He’d tried to summarize trigger conditions, like when someone said, “If you think you can do better, go ahead.” He even created alternate accounts online to provoke some hostility.

But it was useless—he couldn’t trigger a task.

Other conditions were the same.

It left Jiang Zheng confused—the system’s task triggers were too random.

Even with strong desire, he couldn’t actively trigger a task.

Suddenly, a voice echoed in Jiang Zheng’s mind:

[Task: Catch the swindlers. Don’t let them run free. Time limit: three days.

Temporary skills:

Web Marauder: Possess top-level hacker abilities.

Programmer’s Might: Possess world-class programming skills. Using it causes hair loss.]

When Jiang Zheng saw the task, he was overjoyed. But when he read the details of the temporary skills, his heart sank.

The “Web Marauder” skill was fine, but “Programmer’s Might” was… enough to make anyone hesitate.

Jiang Zheng didn’t want to be prematurely bald—that wasn’t the life he wanted.

So he decided to avoid using “Programmer’s Might” unless absolutely necessary.

The “Web Marauder” skill should be enough.

After carefully considering the two skills, Jiang Zheng realized they could complement each other.

Hacker skills were best for infiltration and cybersecurity; programmers excelled at writing code.

If both skills were used together, perhaps their abilities would be enhanced.

That was Jiang Zheng’s guess—but he didn’t dare try. His hair was precious.