Mistook a Mute Man for a Voice Scammer

I had just walked out of the supermarket when three burly men pinned me hard against a car hood.

A young woman stepped out of a Porsche and shoved a chat log right in front of my face.

You've been calling me 'babe' with voice messages in the game every day and scammed me out of five million dollars. Think you can run now?

"That breathy voice of yoursI'll never forget it!"

The gangster thugs beside her went straight for my jacket, pulling out scissors to cut my hair.

"Look at you, all clean-cut on the outside, but you're a damn scammer. If you don't cough up the money today, we're stripping you naked and parading you through the streets!"

Passersby immediately crowded around, their contemptuous stares stabbing into me like knives.

"So young, and instead of doing honest work, he's running online romance scams."

"Serves him right for getting caught. Scammers like him deserve to be publicly shamed!"

I was being choked until my eyes rolled back. I flailed my hands desperately trying to gesture something, but couldn't make a single sound.

Breathy voice? What breathy voice?

I'm mute!

Vincent's fingers felt like steel rods.

My face turned beet red as my feet kicked uselessly against the ground, my shoe soles scraping out harsh sounds.

"Sign language? Are you still fucking acting for me?" Vincent gritted her teeth, tightening her grip even more.

With her other hand, she held up her phone. The screen showed a chat interface scrolling madly with voice messagesall over a minute long.

"Just now at the supermarket checkout, that voice was exactly the same as when you scammed my money!

You really think I'm a fucking idiot?"

I gripped her wrist with both hands, my nails digging into her flesh.

It was useless.

Mario beside her grabbed my hair and yanked it backward violently. A tearing pain shot across my scalp.

"Vincent, why waste words on this bastard!" Mario spat.

He pressed his rusty scissors right against my scalp. The cold metal touch crawled up my entire spine.

Snip. A lock of short hair fell onto the Porsche's hood.

"If you don't cough up that five million today, I'll shave you bald first, then strip you naked and throw you on the main street!"

The circle of onlookers tightened around us.

Countless phones were held up in the air, their camera flashes forming a blinding white net.

A woman carrying plastic bags pushed to the front, her finger almost poking my nose.

"Oh my God! Young men these days have no shame! They've got hands and feet but choose to run scams!"

A woman in a checkered shirt beside her loudly chimed in: "Don't go easy on him! Scum like this should be reported to the police and thrown in jail!"

"Right! Strip him! Let's see if he'll ever dare show his face again!"

The shouting was like a tsunami flooding into my ears.

I opened my mouth like a fish thrown on shore, only able to make "heh heh" sounds of airflow from my throat.

I used all my strength to pry Vincent's fingers loose.

My right hand rapidly gestured in the air.

I pointed at my throat, then waved my hands forcefully.

"Still playing mute?" Vincent sneered and suddenly released her grip.

I lost support and fell heavily onto the hood, my knees hitting the car logo. The pain was excruciating.

Before I could catch my breath

Smack! A slap landed hard on my left cheek.

My mouth instantly filled with a thick taste of blood.

"I'll teach you to act!" Vincent kicked the car door, making my whole body go numb. "Five million! I never even met you face-to-face, and you ran off with all the money!"

Mario stepped forward and grabbed my collar.

"Vincent, I don't think he's given up yet."

He raised the scissors, aiming at the buttons on my chest.

"Strip him! Let's see if he keeps acting!"

The crowd burst into laughter, some even whistling.

I desperately protected my collar, fumbling to reach into my coat pocket.

"Trying to grab a weapon?" Vincent stomped on the back of my hand.

Her shoe ground down hard on my hand.

I convulsed in pain, tears falling uncontrollably onto the car hood.

But I still desperately clawed at that thing in my pocket.

Risking broken bones, I violently pulled my hand out.

I slapped a certificate right in Vincent's face.

The certificate fell to the ground and opened.

Bold black letters were printed on it:

Disability Certificate.

Disability Type: Speech Impairment.

Disability Level: Class One.

The laughter around us stopped abruptly.

Everyone's eyes locked onto that booklet.

I took advantage of Vincent's moment of shock, pushed her away, and slid down against the car to sit on the ground.

I gasped for air in large gulps, pulled out my phone from my pocket, and with trembling fingers opened the notes app.

The keyboard clattered as I typed.

I turned the brightness to maximum and held the screen up to Vincent's face.

[I'm mute with congenital vocal cord damage. I've never made a sound in my life.]

[The voice at the checkout was my phone's text-to-speech function.]

[Now I'm calling the police to report you for assault.]

Vincent stared at the words on the screen, then looked down at the disability certificate on the ground.

The arrogance froze on her face.

The people who'd been cursing the loudest just now shut their mouths.

The woman with plastic bags shrank back, muttering: "So he's mute? But then how does the voice match..."

But Mario kicked the disability certificate on the ground away.

"Vincent, don't let him fool you!"

He pointed at my nose and cursed: "Fake certificates only cost fifty bucks nowadays! He got this thing specifically to avoid fraud charges!"

"Have you ever seen a real mute person walk around with text-to-speech enabled on their phone?"

"He's obviously got a guilty conscience!"

Vincent's expression darkened again.

"Right, I almost fell for your trick!"

She grabbed my hair and forced my head up. "Fake certificate fraudthat's another charge! Even if you were a corpse today, you'd still have to cough up that money!"

The pulling made my scalp go numb. I endured the pain and typed quickly on my phone with one hand.

I held the screen up to her face again.

[Did your brain get caught in a door?]

[Go check the number on the disability certificate.]

[Can't even tell a real certificate from a fake oneno wonder you got scammed out of five million.]

Vincent read the words on the screen and started shaking with rage.

"You're asking for it!" She raised her fist to strike.

"Stop! What's going on here!"

Sharp police sirens stopped at the supermarket entrance. Two officers pushed through the crowd and strode in.

Vincent's fist froze mid-air.

Mario immediately put on a pitiful expression and rushed up to grab the officer's arm.

"Officers, you came just in time! This man is an online scammer who swindled us out of five million!"

"He's even trying to use a fake certificate and pretend to be mute to escape charges. Arrest him quickly!"

The officer glanced at the disability certificate on the ground, picked it up, and looked through it.

He turned to look at me: "Are you Johnson?"

I nodded, pointed at my throat, and shook my head.

Then I typed a line on my phone and handed it to the officer.

[I have congenital vocal cord damage. The city hospital has all my medical records. This certificate is genuine.]

The officer verified the photo on the certificate and the anti-counterfeit stamp.

"The certificate is real." The officer turned to Vincent. "You claim he committed fraud. What evidence do you have?"

Vincent panicked and pulled out her phone to show the game interface.

"Officer, it's this game account! He used voice chat in the game every day to seduce me and tricked me into buying him a house and car."

"Just now at the supermarket checkout, that voice was exactly the same as in the game!"

The officer took the phone and glanced at it.

"Voice similarity alone can't prove guilt." The officer said, "Do you have any other evidence?"

Vincent's face turned ashen.

Mario suddenly shouted from the side: "Check the IP! Officer, you can see the login IP in the game!"

The officer opened the account details page.

"Last login was ten minutes ago, IP address shows..." The officer paused, looked up at the surroundings. "Right near this supermarket."

Vincent instantly perked up.

"You hear that! Ten minutes ago he was at this supermarket!"

"You still dare say it wasn't you!"

Mario took advantage of my distraction and suddenly lunged forward, snatching the phone from my hands.

"Give it back!" I silently screamed, trying to grab it back.

Mario kicked me to the ground.

"Officer, check his phone!"

He forcibly unlocked the screen with my fingerprint and rapidly swiped across the home screen.

Suddenly, he stopped and held up the phone screen with a sharp, piercing laugh.

"Found it! This game right here!"

The officer took the phone. On the screen, an app called "Star Voyage" was running in the background.

Opening it, the account was logged in.

And the game ID was exactly the same as the scammer account on Vincent's phone.

The crowd instantly exploded.

"Irrefutable evidence! The game account is logged into his phone!"

"He was playing the victim just now, using the disability certificate to fool people. How vicious!"

"Officer, arrest him quickly! Don't let him run!"

The woman with plastic bags jumped out again, pointing at my nose and cursing:

"I knew he looked like a player! So what if he's mute? Mutes can still send voice messages online to scam people!"

Mario looked at me triumphantly, his smile stretching to his ears.

"Mute? I bet you used a voice changer!"

"Vincent, I told you he's a scumbag, but you didn't believe me."

Vincent stared at my phone screen, her teeth grinding audibly.

"What the fuck do you have to say for yourself?" She walked forward and kicked me hard in the ribs.

A sharp pain hit me. I curled up on the ground, cold sweat instantly soaking my back.

"Officer, the evidence is clear. Can we arrest him now?" Vincent turned and shouted at the officer.

The officer frowned and put away my phone.

"Johnson, you're now suspected in a five-million-dollar fraud case." The officer took out handcuffs. "Please come with us to the station for questioning."

I forced myself through the rib pain and used my hands to push myself up from the ground.

I didn't reach for the handcuffs.

I pointed at the surveillance camera above the supermarket entrance, then at my phone, frantically shaking my head.

I gestured in sign language: I never opened that game!

The officer understood what I meant.

"You're saying check the surveillance?"

I nodded vigorously.

Mario sneered: "Check away! The surveillance footage is crystal clear. Let's see how you deny it!"

The officer turned and walked into the supermarket. Vincent and Mario followed closely behind, afraid I'd run away.

I clutched my ribs and limped after them.

The supermarket owner was a woman in her fifties with a receding hairline.

Hearing the officer wanted to check surveillance, she scratched her head with an embarrassed expression.

"Officer, really bad timing."

"Two nights ago there was a heavy rainstorm. The store's wiring short-circuited and fried the surveillance mainboard. Haven't had time to fix it yet."

The owner pointed at the dark camera overhead: "That thing's just a prop right now."

The blood in my body instantly turned cold.

How could this be such a coincidence?

Mario burst into sharp laughter.

"Even God isn't helping you!"

"The surveillance is broken? Now you've got nothing to say!"

Vincent stepped forward and grabbed my collar, lifting me up.

"Let's go! To the police station! I'll strip that skin off you today if it's the last thing I do!"

She flung me forcefully. I lost balance and crashed heavily into the Porsche door outside.

My knees hit the hard ground, my palms scraped a large patch of skin off, blood flowing freely.

I lay on the ground, my line of sight falling through the half-open car door onto the carpet of the passenger seat.

A silver bracelet lay there quietly.

The bracelet's pendant was an extremely rare four-leaf clover design with diamond chips set around the edges.

My pupils suddenly contracted.

This bracelet...

I turned to look at Mario standing to the side with a smug expression.

On his left wrist was a clear indentation markthe kind left from long-term wear of jewelry.

And that bracelet's styleI was all too familiar with it.

Because it was a globally limited custom design from my company's jewelry brand.

In the entire city, there were only three.

The officer walked out of the supermarket with a serious expression.

"Johnson, since the surveillance is broken, we can only proceed based on existing evidence."

He shook the silver handcuffs in his hand. "Please cooperate."

Vincent leaned against the car door, lit a cigarette, and blew out a smoke ring.

"Cuff him already! This kind of lying scammer should be locked up and starved for three days!"

I stared at the handcuffs in the officer's hands and took a deep breath.

I suddenly stood up and rushed to the officer, pointing at his police device.

I grabbed my phone and typed rapidly.

[Game accounts must be verified with real identity information before you can make purchases and transactions.]

[Check the identity information bound to this account!]

[Check where that five million went!]

The officer glanced at the screen and nodded.

"We can check."

He took out his police device, entered the game ID, and began querying the backend data.

Mario rolled his eyes and crossed his arms.

"Still struggling pointlessly? When they find your name, how will you turn black into white?"

Vincent flicked her cigarette ash and sneered: "When the real-name information comes out, let's see how you keep up the act!"

Information popped up on the police device screen.

The officer's eyes scanned across the screen, his brow furrowing tighter and tighter.

The surroundings became so quiet you could hear a pin drop.

"Officer, did you find it?" Vincent eagerly leaned in. "Is it his name?"

The officer looked up at me.

"The account's registered identity information is Johnson."

"The ID number matches the number on your disability certificate exactly."

Those words hit me like a sledgehammer to the back of my head.

My vision went dark and I nearly lost my balance.

Impossible!

I'd never registered for this game. How could my identity information be bound to it?

Just then, the radio on the officer's belt crackled.

"Calling 03, feedback from the Anti-Fraud Center. The five million in question ultimately flowed into a credit card ending in 8821."

"Account holder name: Johnson."

"Identity information verified."

The voice from the radio echoed through the empty street, completely condemning me.

The crowd erupted in deafening curses again.

"You hear that! The bank card is in his name too!"

"What else is there to investigate? Just execute him!"

Mario laughed so hard he doubled over, pointing at me: "Keep making stuff up! You wanted them to investigate, right? Now it's investigatedthe money's all in your card!"

Vincent threw down her cigarette and stomped it out.

"Officer, what are you waiting for? Arrest him!"

The officer put away his device and walked toward me.

"Johnson, the evidence is now conclusive. The account is yours, the bank card is yours, and the money is in your name."

"Please come with me to the station immediately."

The cold metal ring of the handcuffs touched my wrist.

A suffocating feeling drowned me like a tide. All the evidence pointed to me.

A perfect setup.

I bit my lip hard until I tasted blood.

My gaze moved past the officer's shoulder and landed on that bracelet on the Porsche passenger seat carpet.

Then I turned my head and stared hard at the glaring indentation mark on Mario's wrist.

I pushed the officer's hand away, grabbed my phone, and frantically typed on the screen.

The screen lit up. I held it up in front of everyone.

[I know who the scammer is now.]