Gu Ji stood under the scenic area forest route map, glanced at it, and instinctively took a photo with his phone.

Unexpectedly, when he turned around, he saw the group of young people who had been fighting over the camping spot yesterday. They chose a wild path, grabbing tree trunks as they dove in. Finally, the buzz-cut blond guy even deliberately stopped to shake his backside at everyone.

“Hey, guys, we meet again!”

Just as Gao Bo was about to curse them out, a middle-aged man in a green softshell jacket came chasing over. He had small eyes and a light mustache, accompanied by a plain-looking middle-aged woman.

It was the overly enthusiastic middle-aged couple from yesterday!

Having been warned by Zeng Dan yesterday, Wu Kang was already on alert, so he just made a fake greeting and ignored them.

But the middle-aged man was like a social butterfly; even if others ignored him, he would actively stir up a conversation and said to himself, “We really are fated to meet! Are you all from the same workplace? What about you, young lady?”

“Sir, I’m still a student.”

Ding Lan saw the middle-aged man staring at her persistently and had to reply politely.

Unexpectedly, the middle-aged man wouldn’t let go of the topic.

“You must be a top student, what’s your major?”

“English.”

“There’s a shortcut ahead, let’s take that way, maybe we’ll discover some small animals!”

Afraid that Ding Lan might slip up, Zhou Yang suddenly pointed at a steep, narrow path ahead to the right and called out.

The others immediately got the hint, quickly changed their route, and disappeared into the dense forest, finally shaking off that “enthusiastic” middle-aged couple.

Ding Lan wasn’t a fool; she noticed something was off with everyone’s attitude and realized something was fishy.

Zhou Yang’s girlfriend briefly explained the reason, which shocked both of them, as they couldn’t have imagined that those two people could be spies.

In fact, today’s meeting seemed coincidental.

But it was actually inevitable.

Because the path they took was the entrance to the Tianhu Mountain scenic area, whether taking the main route or the wild path, one must pass through there first.

Therefore, the middle-aged couple only had to wait at the entrance early to inevitably encounter them.

Zeng Dan slowed his pace, took out his phone, and started chatting about something, most likely notifying colleagues in Wuzhou to secretly investigate the suspicious middle-aged couple.

Although they temporarily changed their route to avoid “spies,” they were soon captivated by the scenery.

One plum tree after another, thriving with lush foliage, the grass was lush green like a fresh green carpet, adorned with colorful flowers and mushrooms of all sizes. As it was next to Tianhu, the air in the mountain stream was damp in the morning, with sunlight filtering through the mist, creating a tinting effect similar to the Tyndall effect, with streaks of amber, silver-gray, and dark purple, like a fairy shaking a colorful brocade in the air.

Gu Ji was also immersed in it, temporarily forgetting the life-and-death battles and intense pressure in the game levels.

Even when they hit a dead end, the group did not get anxious. Zhao Hua even released a drone to capture many beautiful videos for everyone.

At one o’clock in the afternoon, feeling tired from walking, they took out a camping mat from their backpack, laid it on the ground, and chatted while snacking.

Gu Ji originally planned to try Chen Zhiyu’s cookies.

But unexpectedly, this girl seemed to have lost her temper for some unknown reason, with a puffed-up face.

Just as he was about to speak, Gao Bo kept calling out from the side, so Gu Ji had to set aside his question for the moment and got up to go over.

“Take a look, this seems to be a solar-powered device here!”

“This is a forestry fire monitoring camera, used for monitoring important forest area parameters such as wind direction, wind speed, temperature, humidity, and rainfall, and it transmits on-site weather and images in real time to the fire command center. It’s powered by both a battery and a solar panel, with a maximum endurance of one month.”

Gu Ji looked at an orange pole resembling a surveillance camera in front of him. It had a solar panel on top, a wind speed gauge, and a spherical camera on either side, with a control box in the middle.

Gao Bo listened to him speak knowledgeably about various facts, and he couldn’t help but remark in surprise.

“Wow, you know all this?”

“I just came across it in a video once.”

Gu Ji replied offhandedly. In fact, his enhanced skills in natural disaster fields had already made him well-versed in various forest fire-prevention knowledge.

Gao Bo drew closer and only then noticed the spherical lens, which he hadn’t seen before because it was smeared with a large patch of mud.

He was just about to reach out and wipe it off, but Gu Ji stopped him.

“Something’s not right, the mud marks aren’t like they’re naturally splattered, but rather deliberately smeared…”

Gu Ji muttered, pointing at the fingerprint marks on the mud. He instinctively glanced at the surrounding grass and indeed found several trampled spots, “Gao Bo, are these footprints yours?”

“No, I didn’t come from that direction at all.”

Gao Bo shook his head as his expression gradually turned grim.

Noticing something was wrong, the others got up and walked over, also carefully avoiding the route of the suspicious footprints to ensure the evidence on site was preserved.

Zhao Hua, a technician from the municipal police special forces intelligence center, conducted a simple inspection of the traces.

“It looks like someone came around from behind the camera to deliberately block the lens. Could it be…”

“It’s possible they’re poachers. The Tianhu Mountain area is rich in marten, squirrels, and other wildlife, and poachers frequently hunt and sell them. Report this to the local forestry bureau.”

Saying that, Gu Ji took out his phone and made a call to the forestry bureau.

About twenty minutes later, two foresters in orange reflective vests arrived at the scene. They first unlocked and checked the control box, ensuring there was no internal damage, before removing the internal memory hard drive.

One of the foresters, who had dark skin, reached out and smiled:

“Thanks for your report. We’ll make sure to investigate this thoroughly.”

“My pleasure, just doing my part.”

Gu Ji shook hands for a moment, and in the next second, his ears instinctively twitched.

“I think I heard someone shouting in the woods, from the northeast direction…”

“I heard it too!”

Liu Weijun immediately turned his head.

So, everyone quickly set off towards the northeast direction. As they got closer to the source of the sound, the shouting became clearer.

“Xing! Sis!”

“Where are you? Come out quickly!”

…

There was more than one person shouting in the woods. It wasn’t until Gu Ji ran up to them that they stopped and turned, asking:

“Have you seen a man and a woman? The man has a blonde buzzcut and the woman is…”

“Is it them?”

Gao Bo asked in surprise.

It’s a small world after all. These people were the same young group from before who fought over the campsite. They intended to go for a wild adventure, but around lunchtime, the blond guy and his partner suddenly found an excuse to leave alone, and everyone knew they went for a private dalliance.

But after more than half an hour passed, the blond guy and his partner still hadn’t returned.

Eventually, their companions called the blond guy, only to find his phone was off, and his partner’s phone wouldn’t connect at all. Left with no choice, they searched as they called out.

Though there had been past unpleasantness,

Upon hearing of a missing person, Zhou Yang’s group, as special forces officers, instinctively felt the urge to help.

Gu Ji, though, squinted slightly, recalling the fire monitoring camera had its lens deliberately obstructed. He felt the situation’s severity might be scarier than just a disappearance.

“Which direction did they leave in?”

“To the southwest!”

Sure enough, the southwest direction was where the footprints covering the camera originated.

His mind quickly assessed the situation, and his superior reaction mechanisms allowed him to promptly perform a law enforcement evaluation based on the scene.

“Zhao Hua, quickly send the drone flying toward the southwest; hurry! Forester brother, please contact the fire control center to check all surveillance cameras in the southwest direction of Tianhu Mountain to see if you can find the missing persons; Gao Bo, call the police immediately!”

“Alright!”

“I’ll make the call right away, kid!”

“Understood!!”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep