“Hello, um… yes, this is Zuo Yan… No… Evelyn and I are not in the kind of relationship you imagine… Well… anyway… do you know what happened? Okay… um… he’s standing right in front of me… Okay.” After Zuo Yan spoke briefly into the phone, he looked up at Sheriff Doust and said, “Sheriff, would you mind taking this call?”

“Huh?” Doust was instinctively stunned when he heard this, thinking to himself, “Is this kid looking for a beating? You’re the one who came to my door saying you had a lead, then you suddenly start making calls in the middle of the conversation, and now you want me to take the call?”

“What call? Whose call? What the hell are you doing?” Doust asked loudly, three times in a row.

These were more like three rebukes than questions.

Zuo Yan replied helplessly, “Uh… the Minister of the Interior would like to say a few words to you.”

“Who?” Doust’s eyes widened, and he turned his head to bring his ear closer to the other man. He clearly suspected he had misheard.

“The Minister of the Interior…” Zuo Yan repeated those four words again, but his voice grew softer and softer, until the last syllable was almost inaudible.

“Heh…” Doust laughed in anger. “Why don’t you say the Prince of Wales is calling?” As he spoke, he snatched the phone from Zuo Yan’s hand and shouted at the screen, “Hey! You moron, do you know what the consequences are for playing pranks on the police?”

After saying this, Doust held the phone and listened for about three seconds, then the smile on his face froze.

Soon, Doust turned around and, in a trembling voice, hesitantly replied, “S…ss…se…sir! I’m sorry, I didn’t recognize your voice!” He supported his chin with his hand and slowly returned to a normal speaking rhythm. “Yes, yes… I’m Doust… I’m so flattered that you remember my name! Yes, yes… I remember that dinner, you greeted me…”

What Doust said after that was only known to him and the Minister of the Interior, because as he spoke, he had already left the room with the phone and gone somewhere private.

About seven minutes later, Doust returned to the reception room and looked at Zuo Yan with a very complex expression, handing the phone back politely.

“So… you’re a detective too.” Doust’s tone when speaking to Zuo Yan was still not very friendly, but compared to his attitude seven minutes ago… it was much better.

Zuo Yan thought for a few seconds and nodded. “I guess you could say that…”

In fact, deep down, he wanted to deny it…

Because he was with a great detective like Vidocq all day, Zuo Yan always felt that he was not qualified to call himself a “detective.” Therefore, under normal circumstances, whenever someone asked him this, he would deny the identity and emphasize that he was just the president of the university’s mystery club.

However, this situation was special. In order to stay at the scene and get involved in the investigation, Zuo Yan did not hesitate to “use his connections.” At this moment… to forcibly deny his identity as a detective and cause further complications… would be a bit much.

“What do you mean, ‘I guess’? Classmate Zuo Yan is a very厉害 (lihai, awesome) detective.” The next second, Feng Bujue said to Doust with a smug look, “Mr. Sheriff, we Chinese are generally very humble and low-key. Please forgive us for our unintentional show of force.”

Although he did not directly hear the content of the phone call, Feng Bujue had basically deduced the ins and outs of the call from Zuo Yan and Doust’s fragmented words…

According to the setting in *Second-Rate Detective and Cat*, Zuo Yan attends a fictional university called “Di Feng.” What kind of place is this school? Let’s just say… it’s probably even harder to get into than Hogwarts, and it’s for normal humans.

Students who want to study at Di Feng must generally meet three conditions: ability, wealth, and status. Among these, the first two… are still relatively easy to handle. As long as you can pass Di Feng’s self-made perverted entrance test and your family happens to have tens of millions of dollars, you meet the requirements. But “status”… how should I put it… it’s best if you’re a crown prince; it doesn’t matter which country. If not royalty… a little less, nobility is also okay… anyway, as long as you can be related to nobility within three generations. If that’s not possible, the children of bureaucrats or chaebols are also acceptable. After all, some countries have short histories and no nobility at all… But these children of officials and businessmen will definitely have to pay more in sponsorship fees. After all, you people are more “vulgar.” If you want to enter Di Feng as a second-class citizen… you have to give the school several million a year.

In short… this is a school that could never exist in reality. Long Aotian (and Mary Sue) types are as common as carp crossing the river at Di Feng; it’s no big deal. Those who are not named “Long Aotian” due to their looks or bloodline are just academic geniuses and rich second generations. These people… can’t find girlfriends at Di Feng.

Now, let’s talk about Zuo Yan… As the protagonist of the novel, he is, of course, different.

Zuo Yan’s parents are both “archaeology” experts, traveling around the world all year round and rarely seen. Since he was a child, Zuo Yan called his parents “Bonnie and Clyde.” As for the reason… you can figure it out for yourselves…

Although his family is wealthy, he can’t really be connected to any powerful people by blood. In theory, he shouldn’t have anything to do with a school like Di Feng.

However, as luck would have it, in the year Zuo Yan took the college entrance exam, Di Feng tried a “reform.” When recruiting students, the school relaxed the “status” requirement a little. As a result, Zuo Yan, this “commoner,” took advantage of the “policy” and slipped in…

Of course, “commoner” is just a derogatory term used by some people at the school to refer to Zuo Yan. In the eyes of outsiders, he still falls into the category of Long Aotian…

In summary, the fact that Zuo Yan can talk directly to a foreign Minister of the Interior seems very normal and ordinary.

To put it bluntly… he called a classmate on the way here and asked for a favor. Then that classmate called their family and explained the situation. As a result… in less than half an hour, that classmate’s family had settled the matter.

From Feng Bujue’s point of view, even if Zuo Yan hadn’t handed the phone to Doust in front of him, it wouldn’t be difficult to guess Zuo Yan’s method of getting involved in the case… After all, Brother Jue already knew the other party’s background information.

Now that Brother Jue has heard keywords like “Evelyn,” he naturally knows exactly who Zuo Yan asked for help.

“Okay, okay, two great detectives…” At this moment, Doust’s expression and tone contained not only helplessness but also a hint of hidden joy. It seemed that his tense nerves had finally been broken by a sense of throwing caution to the wind. “In order to avoid being stifled at work and eating shit in my life… from now on… I’ll retreat to the second line and be a spectator.” He paused. “You two… can do whatever you want. Please feel free to investigate. When you’re done, please point me in the right direction.”

As he spoke, he took out a small metal bottle from the inside pocket of his jacket. The bottle’s cap was connected to the bottle mouth; it opened with a flick. Doust picked up the bottle and poured a mouthful of some unknown liquid into his mouth with one hand.

“Uh… is that wine?” Zuo Yan had already smelled the alcohol; it was a rhetorical question.

“No, this is my blood. My ex-wife uses it to make afternoon tea every day…” After passing the buck, Doust’s mysterious sense of humor suddenly came online. He seemed to be using this self-deprecating吐槽 (tu cao, roast/吐槽) to respond to Brother Jue’s earlier comments on his living situation. “…Do you want a sip?”

“He’s not old enough yet.” Before Zuo Yan could reply, Feng Bujue interjected and casually took the small bottle of wine from the sheriff’s hand. “And you… my dear sheriff, what you need now is not this cheap stuff…” With that, he tilted his head back and drank the remaining bit of cheap wine in the small bottle in one gulp. “I think we can start by checking John’s wine cellar… to see if there are any clues inside.”