For Sui Yuesheng, this was just another ordinary workday.

There were no meetings scheduled for Wednesday afternoon, and most of the documents accumulated from the trip to the Western Continent in July and August had already been reviewed. However, there was still a significant amount of paperwork generated from the normal operations at the Tao’s corporation that needed his attention.

Even though he was alone in the spacious office, Sui Yuesheng still wore a full suit, with only the button of his jacket undone, and his tailored vest neatly in place.

Sitting upright at his desk, he occasionally sketched details with a fountain pen on the documents, flipping to the last page to write his comments.

His phone alarm rang every hour, prompting him to stand up and stretch, rest his eyes, and then return to his busy work a few minutes later.

He maintained this orderly work rhythm until his assistant, Zhou, opened the office door, interrupting him.

“Boss, I’m here to report the remaining schedule for today.”

Sui Yuesheng’s gaze remained on the document as he circled something with his pen, responding with a nonchalant “hm.”

“At 7 PM, Mr. Wang from Dongyao Construction arranged to dine with you at Qingyue, and he mentioned he would bring family…”

Sui Yuesheng frowned slightly. “Are there any other arrangements?”

Zhou checked his tablet and shook his head. “No, there was a temporary meeting that has been moved to tomorrow.”

Sui Yuesheng nodded slightly. After Zhou quietly exited, he leaned back in his chair and sighed.

—It was obvious that Mr. Wang’s family member was his omega son, still in college. After meeting Sui Yuesheng at an event recently, the son had shown great interest, leading Mr. Wang—who had no prior business dealings with them—to invite him to dinner.

Sui Yuesheng had no intention of dating, but since the other party hadn’t made any overt declarations, he couldn’t outright refuse. In the business world, maintaining face was essential.

He silently sighed again in his heart and redirected his attention to the documents. Yet, just as he was closing the file after reading less than two pages, the door opened again and Zhou rushed back in.

After being interrupted twice in quick succession, Sui Yuesheng looked up, somewhat displeased. Zhou spoke quickly.

“Boss, you have a call from Cheng Hai.”

Cheng Hai? The bodyguard picking up Tao Fengche? Sui Yuesheng’s heart skipped a beat, an inexplicable sense of foreboding washed over him.

His sixth sense had always been accurate.

Cheng Hai spoke rapidly; once the call connected, he quickly reported, “Master Sui, something has happened. Five minutes ago, when we arrived at the school gate, we found that most of the students had already left, and the phone for the young master showed it was off. After asking the security at the gate, we learned that classes had been dismissed early today. I’ve sent a colleague to look for him around the school with the security, but we haven’t received any updates yet.”

Sui Yuesheng took a deep breath, closed his eyes briefly, and said in a low voice, “I understand. Have them keep searching, and personally check the surveillance room for the school footage.”

Hearing that Sui Yuesheng wasn’t immediately assigning blame, Cheng Hai relaxed, hurriedly agreeing, but cautiously asked, “Should we broadcast a search? Maybe the young master is just hiding somewhere…”

“No,” Sui Yuesheng firmly rejected, his voice icy, “Don’t make it known for now. Inform me immediately when you have any news.”

Zhou, standing a few steps away, couldn’t hear the entire conversation, but from Sui Yuesheng’s clipped responses, he could guess something was amiss. He cautiously observed Sui Yuesheng’s expression, which had grown serious since hanging up the phone. His smooth, gray hair fell to the side, obscuring his profile. Zhou couldn’t see Sui Yuesheng’s face but could feel the tension in the room.

After a moment, Sui Yuesheng made a decision and turned to Zhou. “Call Mr. Wang’s assistant for me. Make up some excuse that I’m tied up and need to cancel tonight’s engagement. Ask for his understanding and say I’ll arrange another time to apologize.”

“Understood,” Zhou replied, leaving quickly.

The office returned to silence. Sui Yuesheng lost all interest in the documents, setting them aside. He tapped his fingers lightly on the desk, the unease in his heart growing stronger.

Tao Fengche was not someone who disregarded the bigger picture; even if he disliked being followed by bodyguards, he wouldn’t deliberately go off the grid. Even if his phone had unexpectedly died, he would borrow someone else’s phone to check in.

It was unthinkable that he could forget to remember his own identity.

As this thought crossed his mind, Sui Yuesheng pulled out his personal phone to check for any missed calls.

A strong sense of foreboding gripped him—Tao Fengche had likely been taken, or perhaps… kidnapped.

But the Tao family had many enemies, and numerous competitors waited for the family to falter, ready to seize the opportunity. Additionally, there were ruthless forces lurking around. In other words, the list of suspects was long; if Tao Fengche had truly been kidnapped, Sui Yuesheng couldn’t pinpoint who was responsible.

Because everyone was a suspect.

He contemplated for several seconds when suddenly an idea struck him—

Recently, Tao Fengche had stumbled upon information regarding artificial pheromones; could it be…?

Sui Yuesheng quickly scrolled through his phone’s contacts and found Zhao Jiayang’s number. Although they hadn’t interacted much personally, they had exchanged contact details.

He stared at the call button, deep in thought.

Since receiving a notification from Jiang Jingyun in June about the appearance of someone injecting artificial pheromones, Sui Yuesheng had instructed Jiang Jingyun to hold off for now but had been closely monitoring the lead and secretly investigating. Unfortunately, given the vastness of the territory, there hadn’t been any significant progress.

By mid-August, Jing Ning had called to say Tao Fengche had inadvertently discovered the production line for artificial pheromones. At the time, Sui Yuesheng was in the Western Continent and instructed Jing Ning to hold off until he returned, not expecting that Tao Fengche, eager to prove himself, would act impulsively and directly confront Liu Tianlei, shooting him and causing quite a scene.

Although Sui Yuesheng immediately sent people to imprison Liu Tianlei in the hospital and had bodyguards keep a close watch, they had still raised alarms.

He had accelerated the investigation and interrogation of Liu Tianlei, but once he learned Zhao Jiayang was involved, he decided to keep things under wraps for now and gather more evidence—after all, Zhao Jiayang was the “second-in-command,” and he didn’t have enough to take him down.

But just a few days later, Liu Tianlei had inexplicably committed suicide in the hospital.

Sui Yuesheng realized the situation had become dire and immediately increased security measures for Tao Fengche, even resorting to house arrest, yet an incident still occurred.

But Xu Song had said Zhao Jiayang had watched Tao Fengche grow up; they were like father and son…

Could it really be him?

Would he harm Tao Fengche?

Yet if it were him… this would be a complicated situation.

Sui Yuesheng was struggling to connect the dots when he pressed the call button, deciding to probe—planning to test the waters—he would say he had been busy since taking over the Tao business and finally had some free time, wanting to invite Zhao Jiayang to dinner to seek his advice.

Just as he finalized his excuse, the voice on the line was flat and without inflection.

“Hello, the number you have dialed is turned off…”

Sui Yuesheng held his breath, his heart momentarily stopping. Murphy’s Law had struck again.

He no longer wanted to wait for Cheng Hai’s update. He suddenly stood up and quickly dialed a number: “How many people can we mobilize? Maintain security, and bring as many as you can, armed. Surround the artificial pheromone production line and make sure all employees, as well as anyone coming to transport goods, are contained inside.”

“Understood, Master Sui. Should we bring signal jammers?”

“No.” A cold gleam flashed in Sui Yuesheng’s gray-blue eyes, “What I want is for them to send information out.”

Before hanging up, he added, “Try to avoid bloodshed.”

“Yes sir.”

His next call was to Jiang Jingyun.