Episode Summary
In this episode, Zheng Weiwei is rescued, leading the police to focus on finding the traffickers' "transfer station." With the help of a former victim, Lian Qiao, they locate a ranger station used as a front. After a tense stakeout and a raid, they rescue three more girls and capture several traffickers. A key interrogation reveals that the ringleader, "Fei Ge," has a limp, a detail that connects to Deng Yan's past. The episode ends as a new lead emerges from a raid on a local bathhouse.
Spoiler Alert
The episode opens with the aftermath of Zheng Weiwei's rescue from the trafficker, Baiban. She is found severely beaten and barely alive. When her divorced parents arrive at the hospital, they immediately start blaming each other for the tragedy. Zheng Weiwei's father, in his anger, also lashes out at Chang Rui, faulting him for not rescuing his daughter sooner. Chang Rui is left speechless, while Deng Yan is deeply troubled by the parents' anguish. Fortunately, after intensive medical care, Zheng Weiwei pulls through, bringing immense relief to her parents.
The investigation continues as Yan Lei and Yang Jiajia interrogate a captured trafficker. He recalls another trafficker named Qingpi mentioning a "transfer station" where blindfolded girls were brought. To find this station, Deng Yan and Chang Rui decide to seek help from Lian Qiao. They visit Lao Mo's convenience store, only to find his son, Mo Lin, in a state of distress, having locked himself in his room over Lian Qiao. When they ask about her, Mo Lin brandishes a knife, fearing they will take her away.
Just then, Lian Qiao emerges and agrees to cooperate. She remembers being held in a run-down house in a forest near a river. Based on her description, Yang Jiajia identifies three potential locations in the Mangjiang area. With help from local police solicited by Yin Jiansheng, they quickly narrow down the location of the transfer station. As Deng Yan drives Lian Qiao to the site, they pass a railway, which triggers a memory for Lian Qiao. She recognizes it as the place where she fell while blindfolded, and through a gap in the cloth, she got a clear look at her surroundings.
Lian Qiao guides them deep into the forest to what appears to be a ranger's station. Chang Rui poses as a hiker to scout the area but is stopped by three men claiming to be rangers. Their suspicious staring at Deng Yan, Yang Jiajia, and Lian Qiao raises alarms. Deng Yan creates an excuse to leave, but not before strategically placing a camera equipped with a listening device on a table.
The "rangers" are indeed traffickers awaiting a new group of victims that night. One of them discovers the camera. As the team listens in, Yan Lei keeps watch with binoculars. As night falls, four more traffickers arrive with three blindfolded girls. When the group enters the house, the audio from the listening device cuts out. Fearing for the girls' safety and unable to reach Director Ge for backup, Deng Yan decides to lead a raid. They storm the building but find that the traffickers have already escaped through a window.
Deng Yan finally gets through to Director Ge, who arrives with reinforcements and surrounds the fleeing traffickers. One of them, Li Danong, takes a girl hostage. While Deng Yan negotiates, Chang Rui seizes an opportunity to rush in and subdue him. The three girls are successfully rescued.
During interrogation, Li Danong is initially defiant. However, after Chang Rui and Deng Yan reason with him, he confesses. He reveals that the traffickers who deliver the victims are Baiban, Ke Liang, and Zhao Ge, while Qingpi and Lao Huang Gou handle the receiving end. Their leader is a man known as "Fei Ge." Li Danong has never seen his face, as Fei Ge always sends them away when he visits, but he knows one crucial detail: the boss has a limp. This information strikes a chord with Deng Yan, who recalls that the man who abducted her childhood friend, Lin Ranran, also had a limp. Lost in thought, she retreats to her room.
Meanwhile, in a lighter subplot, Sun Wenhan helps Auntie Zhang with plans to renovate her restaurant, adding a room to shelter homeless children.
Connecting the dots, Deng Yan is now certain that the limping "Fei Ge" is the head of the trafficking ring. She requests an intensified crackdown on illegal activities to flush him out. The episode concludes with a new lead: during a raid on a bathhouse, police find a "help me" note on a client, who recalls receiving it from a girl a month prior. Deng Yan immediately heads to the police station to investigate.
