Chapter 3: A New Case! |
Hearing the sound, Xu De offhandedly remarked as he clocked out.
"Handled."
He said nothing more after that.
In the midst of the crowd's bewildered stares, he pushed open the law office door.
In an instant, the noise of the outside world poured into his ears, and the scenery belonging uniquely to the year 2002 flooded his vision.
He stopped overthinking, mounted his bicycle, and rode off in the direction of home.
Got to test out these skills!
After Xu De's figure disappeared, several attorneys in the lobby immediately broke into expressions of surprise.
"He wrapped up the Room 103 case that fast?!"
"Attorney Xu seems a bit different from before?"
The female attorney from earlier chimed in, chattering away.
"He really does... his whole bearing has changed... though looking closely, you can't quite put your finger on what."
"Ha, all I know is that bastard Sun Hao definitely didn't see this coming — Xu De actually pulled it off!"
Someone said it with a laugh.
None of them had much love for Sun Hao's conduct either.
And now, Xu De had gone and completed the case against all expectations...
One could only wonder what kind of face Sun Hao would make when he heard the news.
Speak of the devil.
"What are you all laughing at?! Is this a chatting hour or a working hour?!"
Sun Hao's voice suddenly rang out.
The attorneys in the lobby turned to look, and there he was — Sun Hao, not far away, walking toward the time clock.
He strode over, scolding them as he went.
"Heh, it's after hours now," someone muttered, rolling their eyes.
Not a shred of credentials to his name, rose through the ranks on connections alone, and yet he loved to manage them!
Sun Hao was about to fire back when, unexpectedly, the attorney's eyes darted sideways — and then he broke into a grin as he looked at Sun Hao.
"Congratulations, Group Leader Sun. Someone from your team just closed another Specialized Consultation case."
A consultation closed by one of his subordinates?
"That can't be right. None of my people had time to take consultations — they're all tied up with liti—"
Sun Hao stopped mid-sentence. Taking in the mockery lurking in the eyes around him, a name suddenly clicked, and it came out before he could stop himself:
"Xu De?"
When it came to Specialized Consultations, Xu De was the only candidate.
But... was Room 103's consult really something that easy to crack?!
The client wanted a divorce without splitting a single coin — it was flat-out impossible to achieve!
The case had been sitting untouched at the firm for half a month. Nobody had been able to make headway. Sun Hao had counted on precisely that when he'd assigned it to Xu De — he'd even privately savored the thought of the man losing sleep over it for nights on end.
And yet...
"He actually finished it?!"
Sun Hao's face fell in stunned disbelief.
Coincidentally, the finance room staff were also clocking out at that moment. Sun Hao immediately grabbed Cashier Li as she walked past.
"Cashier Li — did Xu De actually resolve the Room 103 consultation?!" Sun Hao demanded anxiously.
Cashier Li heard the question and nodded. "He did. The client has already signed."
He really finished it.
Sun Hao's expression turned ugly at once. Still refusing to accept it, he pressed further:
"Did the client just get worn down after being passed around and give in out of exhaustion?"
Cashier Li looked puzzled and shook her head.
"No. The client was very satisfied. He even tried to tip Attorney Xu two thousand yuan — but that's against policy, so in the end he could only add an extra 999 yuan."
999? Add that to the base seven hundred and that's 1,700 yuan?!
At that, not just Sun Hao — even the other attorneys in the room couldn't hide their surprise.
"1,700 yuan... damn, that's more than the average person's monthly wage!"
"All told, I only made 2,800 last month."
"He earned half a month of some people's pay in under an hour. Group Leader Sun's got himself a real ace, huh!"
Someone said it, then smoothly steered the conversation back onto Sun Hao.
Now every pair of eyes in the room was on him — blazing into his face like red-hot brands.
His complexion went iron-grey.
He'd tried to set a trap and ended up springing it on himself. He'd wanted to make things difficult for Xu De, but instead had handed the man a performance win on a silver platter.
"What are you all still doing here after hours?!"
Sun Hao snapped, his embarrassment curdling into anger.
"Ha, alright, alright, we're leaving — going out for dinner. We'll congratulate Attorney Xu properly tomorrow morning."
The others didn't push further. They laughed it off and dispersed.
As for Sun Hao...
He stood before the time clock, his expression shifting between dark and stormy.
"A consultation case — that's nothing..."
"You want me to hand you a real case? Fine."
Sun Hao's thoughts turned cold. Clearly, he already had a plan.
What made a case big? Criminal cases. That's what made a case big.
Unlike civil matters, one wrong move in a criminal case could end a career entirely.
And furthermore, Xu De may have gotten lucky enough to resolve one civil case, but criminal law... didn't run on luck. It ran on competence.
"As it happens, the legal aid organization just sent over a criminal case — no money in it, all headache, pure time sink..."
Sun Hao murmured to himself.
"I'd like to see... how you plan to get out of this one."
---
...
...
That evening. Six o'clock.
Lüsen City. Hongfeng Residential Community. Unit 404.
Click.
The light switch flicked on, and a somewhat run-down rental apartment appeared before him.
"Tch. Same as my last life."
Xu De swept his eyes across the thirty-square-meter space, its humble state leaving no ripple in his heart.
He was an orphan. His mother had died at his birth; his father, in his early childhood. Every step he'd taken in life had been an uphill battle — clawed forward through hardship, every inch of it earned. A decent home had never been part of that picture.
The memories surfaced briefly, leaving him momentarily distant, but he didn't dwell. He pushed the thoughts aside.
Xu De summoned the Luminous Panel. Without hesitation, he poured all ten Gratitude Coins into Culinary Arts.
[Gratitude Coins Consumed: ×10]
[Innate Skill: Culinary Arts Lv.1 (0/10) — Upgraded to — Culinary Arts Lv.2 (0/20)]
He then headed to the kitchen.
Whoosh~!
With the sound of a burner igniting, the bustle of cooking breathed a thread of warmth into the otherwise silent apartment.
Truth be told, his cooking ability before had been average at best — but with [Culinary Arts] behind it now... whether it was knife work or tossing the wok, everything moved with a sense of effortless command, as if his hands were simply doing what they were born to do.
After some time.
Sizzle~!
Xu De set several steaming dishes onto the dining table.
After washing his hands, he sat down, picked up his chopsticks, lifted a piece of food to his mouth — and the moment it touched his tongue, a rich, savory depth unfurled across his palate.
Xu De's brow arched. He kept eating.
A little while later...
"Hm. Roughly on par with a restaurant doing solid business."
Xu De pushed back from the table satisfied, a pleased look on his face.
It seemed the system's standard for ranking levels was exceptionally strict. The maximum — Level 5 — must be benchmarked against the caliber of a state banquet chef. Ordinary people, and even most professional cooks, probably hadn't even cracked Lv.1.
"But... civil consultations are only good for grinding experience. The truly useful skills... those only drop from criminal cases."
Xu De fell into thought, murmuring quietly.
According to the system's description, civil cases yielded more Gratitude Coins but had an extremely low innate skill drop rate. The [Culinary Arts] skill had been a lucky fluke.
Criminal cases were the opposite.
"I need to find a way to take on criminal cases — and then leave Jinmao Law Office."
Xu De sat back in his chair. His path forward was taking shape with clear definition.
Leaving the firm...
Relying on his own judicial talent... building a top-tier law firm from the ground up was not out of reach.
He shelved the thought.
He turned to look at the largely untouched dishes still on the table.
He picked them up and walked toward the old refrigerator.
Click.
The refrigerator door swung open, revealing the leftovers inside — packed in tight.
Xu De struggled to squeeze his freshly cooked dishes in alongside everything else.
"Tch, that's a lot of leftovers..."
He stared at the crowded refrigerator with a slight headache.
He couldn't just throw it out — but he couldn't eat it all either...
"If I remember right... there's a pair of scrap-collecting brothers somewhere near here?"
Xu De's mind drifted back.
In his previous life, there had been a pair of parentless scrap-collecting brothers near this very neighborhood. He'd fed them quite a few times — but then one day they'd simply vanished, and he never found out where they'd gone.
"They're here in this life too."
The image of two grubby, gap-toothed kids surfaced in his mind.
"I'll swing by on my way to work tomorrow and drop it off."
With that settled, Xu De let it go and walked to the bathroom to wash up.
While washing, his mind drifted — and the face of Zhang Hu surfaced unbidden.
"Given the timing... he should have met up with his wife by now."
Xu De looked at his reflection in the mirror, thinking of his very first Specialized Consultation client in this world, one eyebrow lifting slightly.
"Wonder what he's up to."
---
...
...
What was Zhang Hu up to?
At that moment, inside a villa — in the spacious living room — he was sprawled out on the sofa watching the color television mounted on the wall.
Shortly after.
Click~!
The front door of the villa swung open.
Zhang Hu heard it and turned around. A full-figured, reasonably attractive middle-aged woman stepped inside.
This was...
"Bai Jie."
The name left Zhang Hu's lips instinctively — and the woman before him was, indeed, his adulterous wife.
Bai Jie paid him no mind. Her eyes carried a smile; she was clearly in good spirits. After stepping into the living room, those hot, greedy eyes swept across the surroundings.
Just thinking about walking away with a few million yuan after the divorce, Bai Jie couldn't quite contain the anticipation welling up inside her.
Once the divorce was done, money in hand, she'd be an independent woman — answering to no one!
At the thought, she glanced over at Zhang Hu on the sofa, reined in her expression, put on a cold face, and pulled a document from her bag, tossing it at him.
"This is a contract I had a lawyer draft."
"It's a fair division-of-marital-assets agreement. Take it to any other lawyer and they'll tell you this is the most you could ever hope to fight for."
"Sign it, and we'll find a time to head to the civil affairs bureau and finalize the divorce."
Zhang Hu's anger flared inwardly.
Fair?
Since when was carving up his money considered fair?!
He was about to let loose — but then he remembered what Xu De had told him.
In that instant, something clicked, and right in front of Bai Jie, Zhang Hu tore the contract in two.
Riiip!
The agreement split apart cleanly.
Bai Jie's brow furrowed. She opened her mouth. "What's that supposed to mean? I'm telling you, this is already my biggest concession — you—"
But before she could finish—
Zhang Hu spoke up.
"I'm not getting a divorce."
Not... not divorcing?
Bai Jie froze, her face blanking, brow creasing. "What do you mean?"
"My dear wife, I actually love you. I don't want a divorce."
Zhang Hu's eyes held no warmth, but his face carried a smile.
Bai Jie was thrown. She knew for a fact that just recently, the man had hated her so fiercely he'd wished her dead.
How had a single day turned that into I love you?
"You... what are you playing at?"
Bai Jie hesitated, uncertain what trick he was pulling.
"I truly love you," Zhang Hu said.
Bai Jie paused, a thought turning over in her mind, then spoke: "I've had my eye on a pair of earrings lately — darling, could you..."
Back when Zhang Hu had loved her, he'd certainly never been stingy.
But—
Zhang Hu smiled pleasantly.
"No money."
Bai Jie tried again: "What about that handbag? It's fairly cheap—"
Zhang Hu kept smiling.
"Still no money."
Bai Jie's voice cracked with fury: "What the hell are you playing at, Zhang?! I'm telling you, you'd better sign the divorce agreement — it's better for both of us!"
"Not happening."
The smile on Zhang Hu's face grew wider and wider, taking on a faint edge of amusement. He spoke:
"The divorce... is simply not happening."
No divorce. No money. No matter what she asked—
"My dear wife, I love you."
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