Chapter 15 — Profile 9:17

'The Cliff' restaurant is located on the top floor of Liberty Hotel, where it can cover the entire magnificent scene of Saigon at night. The winding strips of street lights are like glowing blood vessels, nourishing an urban body that never sleeps. But tonight, that romantic space is covered by a chilling, stuffy and cold atmosphere.

Trinh Vu sat sipping a sip of red wine, calm eyes gliding across Le Nhu Van's tense face. "Why don't you order, Van? The chef here makes excellent pan-fried Wagyu beef."

"I didn't come here to have dinner," Van replied, her voice clear, not as scared as she thought when facing a demon in human form. She pulled out the USB from her bag and placed it firmly on the glass table. "And I don't think you invited me here to discuss an urban planning project. The password is 'JusticeIsDeath', Mr. Vu. A very ironic password for someone who considers himself the executioner of justice."

Vu looked at the USB, the corners of his lips slightly raised, forming an unreadable smile. He didn't show any surprise or anger. On the contrary, his eyes flashed with approval.

"I've always appreciated your acumen," Vu leisurely leaned back in his chair, clasping his hands together. "You're like your father in that respect. Le Van Sang is a very smart person. It's just a shame that he's so naive about how the world works. You've seen the files in there, right? The plan to purge Do Trong Thang, Tung's true identity, and the Nam Huong Project?"

"Why did you do that?" Van huffed, her hands gripping the edge of the table until they turned white. "You used my father's death, used my pain to stage a play to overthrow Do Trong Thang, just to pave the way for your 'Council' to take over the real estate market? You people are no different from vultures pecking at the dead bodies!"

"Don't use such emotional words, Van," Vu poured more wine into his glass, his voice still soothing as if he were lecturing a law lesson. "This world is not divided into black and white. It is a giant gray area, where the power belongs to those who know how to set the rules of the game. Do Trong Thang is a greedy, stupid and out of control person. His cutting down on materials that caused the collapse of the Tan Cang Bridge directly threatened the stability of the entire system. He must be eliminated."

"So what's the difference between you and him?" Van smiled bitterly. "He gutted a bridge, and your organization plans to swallow an entire coastline with the Nam Huong Project? You use the Steering Committee to change the 'New Acceptance Standards', eliminating all environmental appraisal steps to legitimize a future ecological disaster?"

Vu leaned forward, his eyes suddenly becoming cold and sharp. "The difference, Van, is that the 'Council' never allows stupid accidents like the collapse of the Tan Cang Bridge. We build structures that last, we run the economy, and we control everything perfectly. In return, we take a fair share of the profits. It's a fair trade to maintain order. Do Trong Thang broke that order, so he must pay the price."

"And you give yourself the right to judge that?" Van looked at Vu with extreme contempt. "You said you brought it back order, but in reality you are just replacing one tyrant with another, more sophisticated group of tyrants."

"The law you worship is just an instruction manual for the weak," Vu said, pointing out the gorgeous Saigon scene outside the window. "I use corrupt people to destroy other corrupt people. My hands are involved so that this city is planned according to its correct trajectory. That is a kind of justice that you will never be able to understand."

He paused for a moment, changing his voice to a softer one. "Van, I saved your life more than once. I helped you put your father's enemy in prison. I don't want to harm you at all. She has rare intelligence and courage. Join me, become part of the new system. The 'new acceptance standards' need competent supervisors like her. Don't choose the path of self-destruction like your father did ten years ago."

Vu's suggestion was like a sugar-coated poison. Power, money, and a bright future are laid out before the young girl's eyes. But the image of his late father's gentle smile, his mother's unjust tears, and the choked sobs of the old fisherman in Vung Tau continuously echoed in Van's mind.

She slowly stood up, grabbed her bag, leaving the USB on the table. "I would rather die with my face up to the sky like my father, than live like a hunting dog in your rotten system. Mr. Vu, the resentment between us is over. From tomorrow, we are enemies."

Vu did not stop Van. He turned the glass of wine in his hand, his eyes following the resilient back of the young girl disappearing behind the elevator door. "You have chosen a very difficult path, Van," Vu mumbled, picking up the phone. "Tung, inform the 'Council' that the nightingale has escaped its cage. Initiate a media blockade."

At ten o'clock that night, Van walked out of the Liberty Hotel, clutching the phone in her hand. She immediately called Hoang Minh.

"Mr. Minh, I met Vu. Everything was exactly as we predicted. Distribute that entire file, immediately! We must show the whole country the true nature of the Nam Huong Project and that damn organization!”

On the other end of the line, Hoang Minh's voice was choked. "Van... I've uploaded all the data to the editorial server and a series of anonymous forums. The article will be published in five minutes. Be careful, you're angering those who can cover the sky."

At exactly five minutes past ten, the second media bomb titled "THE SECRET PROJECT SOUTH DIRECTION AND THE BLACK HANDS OF THE COUNCIL" officially exploded in cyberspace. The sea reclamation designs destroyed the ecological environment, the recordings exposed the Steering Committee's conspiracy, and the true identity of "anti-corruption hero" Trinh Vu was mercilessly exposed.

Public opinion is once again boiling. Those who had just praised Vu yesterday were now shocked and angry when they realized they were just puppets in a sophisticated media manipulation play. Angry comments flooded the posts, demanding that authorities immediately suspend the Nam Huong Project and investigate Trinh Vu.

But Van underestimated the true power of the "Council".

Just thirty minutes later When the article was posted, a strange phenomenon occurred throughout cyberspace. The article links on Hoang Minh's electronic newspaper suddenly reported error 404 (Page not found). Anonymous forums were simultaneously taken down by massive distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks. Any post on social networks containing the keywords "Nam Huong Project", "Trinh Vu", "Council" is identified by algorithms and automatically deleted in a snap.

Instead, a new stream of information, sponsored by huge advertising budgets, began to flood message boards. Analytical articles from anonymous "economic experts" simultaneously spoke up, criticizing Hoang Minh's article as a "slanderous fake news product fabricated by the remnants of Dinh Phat Group to take revenge on Lawyer Trinh Vu". The recordings were accused of being a product of artificial intelligence (AI) cutting and fabricating. The official press quickly followed suit, calling on people to be alert to "distorted arguments aimed at sabotaging the city's infrastructure development".

Van stood rooted to the sidewalk, staring at the phone screen that continuously displayed whitewashing articles for Trinh Vu. No sooner had her truth flashed than it was crushed and buried by a giant, ruthless and terrifyingly effective media machine.

Vu did not kill her with a gun. He is killing her voice, turning her from a brave whistleblower into a rumor-monger serving the remnants of Do Trong Thang's faction. Under the sky of Saigon, the darkness of the "Council" has not been dispelled, but it has just begun to spread its giant wings, covering all hope of true justice.

The phone in Van's hand vibrated continuously. Not words of support, but hundreds of messages from strange accounts. Someone sent a photo of her mother's house taken a few minutes ago. Someone knows the license plate number of the car she rented. One text message contained only the coordinates of the cemetery where her father lay and the question: "Want to lie next to him?"

Van turns off the screen but does not turn off the device. She stood under the awning of the convenience store, watching the stream of cars passing through the street wet with lights. Two men in white shirts left the hotel lobby a few minutes after her. They don't look straight, just walk slowly on both sides of the sidewalk, keeping a steady distance. Van walked across the street when the signal light had three seconds left. Both also changed direction.

She didn't come home. She entered the subway station, went down one floor, then suddenly turned back up on the opposite escalator, passing through a group of tourists pulling suitcases. When the two people following her realized it, Van had boarded a bus that had just closed. She didn't sit but stood close to the back door, got off at the next stop, walked through the night market and took a taxi with cash. The evasion skills Hoang Minh once showed her while investigating the Tan Cang Bridge incident have now become the lifeline.

The taxi stopped in front of a photocopy shop that opened overnight in an old residential area. Van chose this place because the shop owner is a student, there are many customers coming in and out and no one notices a girl who needs to print a few documents. She plugged the spare memory card into a computer that was not connected to the network. Before the meeting, she copied part of an important file from Vu's USB. There is not all the data, but there are enough drawings, meeting minutes and a table comparing the two versions of acceptance standards.

She printed it as six set. Each set was put in a different envelope, with the names of a lawyer, an environmental lecturer, an elected representative and two social organizations that her father once believed in. The last set was unclaimed. Van deposited it in the automatic locker at the station, set the unlock code to the last four numbers of the file 9:17 and then took a photo of the receipt with an instant film camera purchased at the souvenir shop.

"Are you in trouble?" The student on duty asked when he saw her constantly looking at the door.

"Just a difficult essay," Van replied, trying to smile. "Can you help me stamp the time on each envelope?"

He took the store's document receipt stamp, stamped the date and time on the edge of the paper and signed to confirm the page number. A normal operation, but for Van, it created an independent trail proving the document existed before the "Council" could declare it all fake. She paid and left a sealed envelope in the store's safe with instructions: if you don't come back within three days, send it to the listed address.

Leaving the store, Van borrowed a phone from a restaurant to call Minh. The bell rang for a long time. When he answered the phone, in the background were the sounds of people arguing and the sound of drawers being yanked.

"They're searching the newspaper office," Minh said softly. "The server is sealed. The editor-in-chief is required to sign a decision to suspend me. You absolutely should not come here."

"The cards are gone, but I still have the paper copies. Six sets in six places."

"It's not enough, Van. They will say the signature was copied, the drawings were edited. We need the origin of the documents and the handover chain that an investigation agency cannot deny."

Van leaned her forehead against the glass wall of the phone booth. She remembered the dinner at The Cliff, the raised glasses and the pauses in Vu's words. He let her bring the USB, looked at it lying on the table without even checking. A careful person like Vu cannot be careless. Either he knew in advance she only had copies, or he himself wanted the document released to identify everyone who would share it.

“We are being led,” she said. "USB is the bait. Vu used this release to gauge the reaction, making a list of journalists, lawyers and accounts who dared to speak up. The blockade process is not just deleting posts; it is targeting each person."

The other end of the line was silent. Minh understood that meant that everyone who helped them could be in danger.

"I will tell them to withdraw," Minh said. "But where are you?"

"I will change seats continuously. You also leave the editorial office as soon as possible. Don't use your car, don't bring your main phone."

Van put down the phone before Minh could ask more. At the beginning of the street, a black sedan passed by very slowly. She turned to face the shop, looking at the reflection on the glass cabinet. The car did not stop, but a person in the back seat raised his phone toward the store.

She walked through the kitchen, asked the shop owner to open the back door for delivery, then merged into the alley filled with the smell of grilled charcoal. Rain started to fall. The water from the corrugated iron roof flowed down her shoulders, cold, but it helped her stay awake. Van took off her high heels, put them in the trash, bought plastic sandals from a roadside stall and put on a blue raincoat like hundreds of people driving around.

In her pocket, there was an item taken from the dining table that Vu didn't notice: a paper coaster with a pen mark he unconsciously drew while talking about "New acceptance standards". It is a triangle surrounding the number 12 and its three initials. Van has seen this symbol in the corner of acceptance records Nam Huong. It's not Vu's signature, but rather an internal stamp of approval from a higher group. If she finds the original document bearing the same symbol, she can connect Vu to the "Council" using physical evidence instead of electronic data.

She took a photo of the coaster with an instant camera, tore off the part with the restaurant address in half, and stored the two halves in two places. Then she took a motorbike taxi to a small motel that did not require reservations through the app. The room only had a hard bed, a ceiling fan, and a window overlooking a patchy wall. Van pulled back the curtains, wedged a chair under the doorknob, and spread the six most important documents on the floor.

She doesn't read the content anymore. She read the traces: the printer code, the document number, the delivery person's name, the changes to the meeting time, the inked stamp. The three minutes were all printed at Dinh Phat's office before the group collapsed. A remittance table mentions "reserve fund HD-12". The symbol on the coaster and the fund code match. Dinh Phat was not just a target for elimination; That corporation was once a vault and may still hold the original records of who ran the system.

Near morning, Minh contacted him using an unfamiliar number. He escaped the newspaper office, but his bank account was locked and his press card was confiscated. Van told about the code HD-12. Minh remembers that in old investigation files, a steel factory of Dinh Phat in Bien Hoa was exempted from distraint because it "no longer had asset value". A land area of dozens of hectares was left behind too easily while all other assets were being fought over.

"Maybe they didn't abandon the factory because it was worthless," Minh said. "Maybe they left it because they didn't want anyone to inventory what was underneath."

Van looked at the pale gray dawn appearing behind the edge of the curtain. She understood the article had failed, but the investigation was not over. To pull the truth out of the trace-erasing machine, she must find someone who both knows its structure and hates those who are operating it. A person has lost power, lost property and no longer has a reason to protect secrets.

The name Do Trong Thang appeared in her mind like an old scar being re-opened. The thought of facing the man who helped kill her father made her cold. But if he was once a front for HD-12, he could hold a chain of evidence that no algorithm could erase. Van gathered the documents into her bag, locked the coaster in the motel's small safe, and then sent a message to Minh to prepare paperwork to enter the prison. When the city wakes up under fake news, she chooses the hardest path: returning to the old monster to find the bigger monster's heart.