Translator: CinderTL
It was a corner about a few meters away from the Gate.
Because it was quite dark, no one had noticed it before.
From there, at a height of about one meter from the ground, half a face emerged.
Due to the clarity, the face appeared very blurry.
But it was obvious that the face was looking in the direction of Nan Huaili's office.
At this time, the displayed time was 11:39.
In other words, this face had suddenly appeared just a few minutes before Lin Huaili went out to get coffee.
"I used a software that can detect whether an object has moved in a static video," Du Feng explained, his face covered in sweat. Clearly, this result was far beyond his expectations.
"This... this face is completely invisible in the normal playback. It only appeared for a very short time and then disappeared."
It seems that Nan Huaili's disappearance is likely related to this eerily appearing face.
After all, a normal person would definitely not stay up late at night, hiding behind a corner.
"Who else is on duty at the company at night?" Jiang Cheng asked.
Wei Wei must have known about this face, but seeing it again with her own eyes, she was still trembling with fear.
Jiang Cheng had to ask her twice before she responded.
"No one," Wei Wei shook her head. "Only Chairman Nan is on this floor. The nearby floors are also empty. The surveillance near the stairs and elevators didn't capture anyone coming."
Looking at the enlarged and frozen face in the center of the video, Jiang Cheng suddenly had an ominous premonition.
Not long after, Wei Wei suddenly burst into tears. At first, she could suppress it, but soon, she started crying out loud, "Chairman Nan must have had an accident. He has already..."
Lin Wan'er turned her head, looking at Wei Wei's face. She had remained silent from beginning to end, not expressing any opinion. The questions she was interested in had already been asked by Jiang Cheng.
"Why do you say that?" Jiang Cheng asked.
Even if something had really happened, it should be the police who notify Nan Huaili's family. She was just an assistant. Why was she so sure that Nan Huaili had already... But what surprised Jiang Cheng even more was Wei Wei's next sentence.
"The person who appeared afterward was not Chairman Nan!"
After sorting out his thoughts, Jiang Cheng couldn't help but feel a chill down his spine from Wei Wei's judgment. She meant that the Nan Huaili who returned after getting coffee... was fake? If this were in a Nightmare, Jiang Cheng would calmly accept all of this and immediately start determining the clues.
But this was the real world, not that absurd Nightmare world.
After calming down, Jiang Cheng asked in a calm tone, "Why do you say that?"
"From Chairman Nan's office to the coffee machine outside, then getting a cup of coffee, and finally walking back, there isn't enough time," Du Feng spoke up, his emotions slightly eased.
He opened the original video and found the time nodes of Chairman Nan's two appearances, discovering that they were only 1 minute and 34 seconds apart.
It was indeed quite short.
"We tested it. Even if you run, including the time to get the coffee, the fastest round trip would take nearly 2 minutes."
Du Feng didn't say the rest, but it was obvious that the Nan Huaili in the footage was not moving quickly.
He was moving slowly, giving the impression that he was floating.
"Moreover, the posture of Chairman Nan after his return was also off," Weiwei seemed quite familiar with Chairman Nan's physical condition, pointing at the screen where Lin Huaili was walking back, saying, "Look at the hand he's using to hold the cup."
Jiang Cheng looked but didn't notice anything unusual.
Lin Huaili was holding the cup with his right hand, and his expression didn't seem problematic either.
Then, following Weiwei's cue, Du Feng continued to move the video forward to the moment when Lin Huaili opened the door and came out.
Jiang Cheng noticed that as soon as Lin Huaili came out, he was holding the cup with his left hand.
"Are you suggesting that Lin Huaili is left-handed?" Jiang Cheng looked at Weiwei, "So he's accustomed to using his left hand to hold things?"
"Not just that," Weiwei said excitedly, "On the morning of the day Chairman Nan disappeared, his right wrist was injured, and he couldn't lift anything."
"On the way back, I was the one driving the car."
"So... so the Chairman Nan who came back wasn't Chairman Nan himself, he was... he was a fake!" Weiwei's emotions were on the verge of breaking down again.
Jiang Cheng could understand her well; after all, she was just an ordinary person, and seeing such a bizarre scene, it would be strange if she could remain calm.
However, having such keen observational skills, this assistant wasn't just for show.
But Jiang Cheng withdrew his gaze and looked at Du Feng, who was in a daze, "How did you think of using software to check the video?"
Jiang Cheng wasn't very knowledgeable about computer technology; he was just raising questions from the perspective of an ordinary person.
"It was... it was Sister Wei who first mentioned that there was something wrong with the video, and then I initially thought whether the video might have been tampered with, so I thought of using software to check it, and then... then..."
Jiang Cheng nodded; it sounded reasonable for the time being.
"Take me to Lin Huaili's office to have a look," Jiang Cheng said.
As soon as he finished speaking, there was a knock on the door outside, but it wasn't the door to the room they were in, just that the sound was unusually urgent, carrying an inexplicable sense of unease.
Just as Weiwei frowned, ready to walk over and open the door to see what was going on, Jiang Cheng stopped her.
For no particular reason, it was just a feeling.
Looking at the door to his room, he suddenly had a strange feeling.
"What's wrong?" Weiwei looked at him with a puzzled expression, with a hint of panic, "Mr. Jiang."
"Nothing," Jiang Cheng said dismissively, "Ignore it, let's continue our conversation."
Nodding, Weiwei seemed to suddenly realize something, "Mr. Jiang, you want to go to Chairman Nan's office to have a look, right?"
"Yes," Jiang Cheng said, "Make a call, get some people over here."
Weiwei was stunned, puzzled, "Get people? Who?"
Staring at the door, Jiang Cheng keenly noticed that the knocking sound had disappeared, although he also thought it might be his own paranoia, but being cautious never hurt.
This was also a good habit developed from the Nightmare.
"Anyone nearby, anyone will do, get a few more people, have them come over here together," Jiang Cheng said, "Come here."
Weiwei looked confused; she didn't understand, the man who had wanted to minimize the impact and have fewer people know about it was now the one asking to call more people over.
What was he playing at? But since Mrs. Nan had repeatedly insisted on full cooperation, she didn't ask any more questions and made a call, summoning three or four people.
They were all employees of the company.
After meeting up, Jiang Cheng subtly inquired if they had encountered anything unusual on their way here. Everyone looked confused and said no, as this place was quite remote and people usually didn't come here without a reason.
Just as they were about to leave, Du Feng was packing up his laptop from the table. But the moment he glanced at the screen, he suddenly froze.
The screen had somehow switched to the moment when that strange face appeared.
The image was frozen there.
The next second, just as Du Feng was trying to figure out what was wrong, the face hidden around the corner suddenly twitched.
(End of the Chapter)
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