Cui Feng’s arrest at the banquet is the decisive confrontation between Li Yan and the man he suspects of murder: Li arrives armed and close to acting on his anger, but arrests Cui Feng under a warrant rather than taking revenge. Staged among officials and guests, the encounter makes the choice public. Cui Feng is led away in handcuffs, while Li’s restraint distinguishes the demand for justice from the impulse to punish him personally.

Background and investigative stakes

The arrest comes after the investigation has raised questions about both the scale of the crimes and how they were carried out. In an earlier discussion, Li considers the possibility that the killer was mentally disturbed, in part because of the suspected operations on eighteen women and possibly more. Dai points out that administering Midazolam and operating an Ambu bag would have required another person’s involvement. Li accepts that the crimes may have been collaborative and redirects the detectives to their immediate task: identifying the victims. The exchange leaves the number of perpetrators unresolved, but broadens the investigation beyond the image of a solitary killer.

The inquiry also depends on recognizing what its accumulated details mean. After learning that Chai Rui, a twenty-two-year-old woman also known as Cherry, had a young daughter, Margaret Campbell reflects on how knowing a victim’s name and family changes the experience of examining the case. The fact that Chai Rui had given birth prompts Margaret to reconsider what the evidence might connect; she berates herself for allowing too much information to obscure what was obvious and describes her realization as the answer to a riddle. At the autopsy table, Li asks what obvious link she has missed. These scenes establish the investigators’ effort to read individual details together, although the evidence presented here does not state the full substance of Margaret’s discovery or establish it as the direct cause of the banquet arrest.

The confrontation at the banquet

Shortly before Li reaches the banquet room, Dai reports by radio that American surgeon Daniel F. Stein has been intercepted at the airport while trying to board an Air India flight to Delhi. Stein has a briefcase full of computer disks that may contain significant material. Li gives no audible response before the scene moves to the banquet, so the evidence does not specify what he knows about the airport interception at the moment he enters.

At the Xiaoshaoxing Hotel, Li walks into the largest banquet room, where Cui Feng is seated beside Director Hu. The guests turn toward the unexpected arrival; Director Hu rebukes Li for appearing without an invitation and invokes his rank. Li does not answer. He draws Huang’s Gun and points it at Cui Feng, moving through the room until he is within a metre of him. Cui Feng remains seated until Li is close, while the other guests recoil from the armed officer. The display of force shifts the gathering from a formal meal to a confrontation, but Li’s attention remains fixed on Cui Feng rather than on Director Hu or the surrounding guests.

Director Hu tells Li that his career is finished and orders him to put the gun down. Li ignores him and tells Cui Feng to stand. Cui Feng rises with apparent confidence, but notices that Li’s hand is trembling. His expression changes from arrogance to doubt and then fear. The narration presents Li as caught between the desire to end the confrontation by firing and the possibility of bringing Cui Feng to account through legal process; the two outcomes are not treated as equivalent.

Arrest and its significance

Dai’s quiet call from the doorway interrupts the moment. He and Qian are present behind Li, and the appeal implicit in Dai’s address gives Li time to choose. Li takes folded official papers from his jacket and holds up the warrant. He announces that Cui Feng is being arrested on suspicion of murder, with the count beginning at fifty-four and likely to rise. The figure is presented as the scale of the suspicions set out in the warrant, not as a conviction or a final count.

Cui Feng smiles as if Li’s refusal to shoot has secured his advantage. Instead, Li has chosen an arrest and the authority of law over immediate revenge. Dai, Qian, and uniformed officers move past Li, handcuff Cui Feng, and lead him out. The officers’ action completes the arrest, but the encounter’s moral turning point is Li’s decision to present the warrant when he could still have fired. The scene does not resolve Cui Feng’s guilt in court; it establishes that he is now in custody on suspicion of a grave series of murders.

After the officers leave, the banquet room is silent. Li turns to Director Hu, whose presence beside Cui Feng has placed him within the scene of the arrest, but whose own legal status is not changed here. Li tells him to choose his friends more carefully, using the proverb, “Marry a dog, stay with a dog; marry a rooster, stay with a rooster.” The remark sharpens the scene’s institutional tension: Director Hu has tried to assert authority over Li, yet Li has acted against Cui Feng in front of him. The arrest therefore closes neither the investigation nor the question of complicity. It marks a consequential shift from a threatened act of personal vengeance to a public, warrant-based seizure, while leaving the evidence about the wider network to be pursued.