Chapter 9: The Return of the King 9.1 The truth comes out

The gilded chandelier of the courtroom cast a pale glare over the defendant's bench. Zhao Tianye's forehead glistened with fine beads of cold sweat, his designer suit collar askew, revealing a jagged scar on his neck—a souvenir from a "freak" explosion three years prior. Camera flashes erupted like strobe lights from the gallery, reporters pressing against the railing like vultures circling the scent of blood, their lenses fixed on his trembling fingertips.

Lin Mo sat in the plaintiff's seat, a cowhide folder spread across his lap. The wax seal on the folder had long cracked, exposing yellowed pages with charred, curling edges, as though licked by flames. His fingers unconsciously traced the corner of the folder, where a dark brown stain—blood—marred the surface.

"On July 15, 2021," the prosecutor's voice cut through the silence like an ice pick, "Zhao Enterprises transferred $12 million to the 'Black Bee' organization via an offshore account. The memo reads: 'Cleaning fee.'" The projection screen displayed the transfer record alongside an autopsy report. The image showed the former chief financial officer of StarSea lying on an autopsy table, a close-up of his stomach revealing squirming black fungal-like matter. "The neurotoxin in the victim's system matches the substance forcibly injected into Professor Zhou Wenshan."

Gasps rippled through the gallery. The camera swung to the witness stand, where an elderly professor with trembling, vein-streaked hands pushed up his sleeves, revealing a patchwork of bruised needle marks. "They kidnapped my granddaughter," the old man rasped, his voice like sandpaper, pulling a bloodstained copy of his experiment log from his jacket. "But I hid the antidote formula in the watermarks of every document... By the time Mr. Lin found it, the child was already..."

The judge's gavel slammed down, drowning out the rest of his choked words.

Zhao Tianye lunged upward, his manacles sparking against the metal railing. "Forged! All of it!" His bloodshot eyes bulged as he pointed at Lin Mo. "That bastard's the real puppet-master! He'd even sell his own mother—"

"Objection!" Lin Mo's lawyer strode forward, slamming a stack of photos onto the judge's bench. "The defense is slandering my client!"

The photos magnified on the projection screen—a fire scene from a decade-old slum, charcoal walls still bearing faint chalk graffiti: "Pay your debts—Zhao Credit." Lin Mo stood slowly, unbuttoning his shirt to reveal a centipede-like scar glowing faintly red under the lights. "This scar," he said, pulling a charred scrap of ledger from the folder, "was from when Zhao Tianye tried to silence me fifteen years ago." The camera zoomed in on the singed paper. "And Zhao Credit's illegal loan records? Zhao Tianye burned them himself a decade ago."

The live stream's comment section exploded:

"So StarSea's rise was revenge all along!"

"Zhao tried to kill Lin Mo 15 years ago?!"

Zhao Tianye's legal team fell silent. They knew the verdict was sealed when the bailiffs wheeled in the smoking safe—its remnants of ledger fragments planted by Lin Mo's decade-long mole, who'd infiltrated Zhao's finance office during last night's chaos.

Deep in the night, Lin Mo walked alone through the deserted corridors of StarSea Tower.

Inside the lab's blue isolation chamber, Professor Zhou stared at a petri dish. Black fungal tendrils dissolved in the antidote, revealing a needle-sized metal sliver at their core—shaped like half a bee's wing.

"Found this in Zhao Tianye's blood," the old man said, handing over a microscope photo. The serrated edge of the sliver matched a hand-drawn pattern in Lin Mo's mother's diary.

His phone buzzed. An unknown number had sent a message:

"Pier Warehouse B. Got a show for you. ▲"

Attached was a video of a woman in a bee-wing necklace tied to a chair—Lin Mo's mother, missing for two decades.

Lin Mo's knuckles cracked as he gripped the phone. Turning to his safe, he entered the code—the door popped open automatically. His mother's diary hovered in holographic projection: a rain-drenched night, a woman stuffing an infant into a basement, the flash of a bee-wing pendant at her throat. The final frame froze on the infant's ankle tag, the number "09" mirroring Lin Mo's scar.

At the customs pier, brine and diesel fumes filled the air.

Lin Mo pushed open the iron door of Warehouse B. In the dim light, Zhao Tianxiang—Zhao Tianye's younger brother—toyed with a bee-wing dagger. The bound woman raised her head; age had carved grooves into her face, but her eyes burned with eerie familiarity—the same gaze Lin Mo saw in the mirror.

"Surprised?" Zhao Tianxiang licked the blade. "Think taking down my brother's enough? The 'Black Bees' were never Zhao's dogs. They were..."

A gunshot cracked.

Blood bloomed in Zhao Tianxiang's forehead as he collapsed. From the shadows emerged a man in a tang suit, his revolver still smoking. "Just housekeeping," he said, retrieving the dagger. The "09" engraved on its hilt stabbed Lin Mo's eyes. "Now, Mr. Lin... care to discuss your mother's real identity?"