cooperate
Those gray pupils looked bright and lively under the interplay of street lights and moonlight.
"You..." Although it was not the first time that Shi Youchen saw such heterochromatic pupils, this pair of gray eyes actually made him dazed for a moment.
"To show my sincerity, let me reintroduce myself to you." The young bar owner smiled. "You can call me Ah Xian. I was born in the year 150 of the new calendar, and this eye color is what I was born with."
The two stood facing each other under the street light, and Shi Youchen listened to Ah Xian's confession.
"Because my eye color is different from that of ordinary people, I have been bullied and excluded by my peers since I was a child. Even some adults are inexplicably hostile to me, so I have always used this method to cover it up."
Claiming to have an eye disease is actually a way to avoid other people's prejudiced looks.
Ah Xian shrugged and said calmly, "Can you trust me a little now? I really just don't want my store to get into trouble. I guess I'm just being kind."
At this point, although Shi Youchen did not completely trust the person in front of him, he basically believed that he was at least somewhat honest and did not seem to have any ulterior motives.
"Um, sorry." Shi Youchen said lightly, "I'm naturally suspicious."
Ah Xian chuckled, scratched the back of his head and said, "It's okay, it's good that we talked it out. Let's go."
On the way back, Ah Xian, seemingly having been pent up for a long time, started to talk non-stop. Shi Youchen actually managed to glean some useful information from his chatter.
"Do you know what happened to this place before it was demolished and rebuilt?" Shi Youchen coaxed.
Ah Xian took control of the steering wheel, but the car wasn't going as fast as when they came. He slowly turned onto the service road and said, "Actually, I haven't been in charge of MIST for very long. By then, the place had been completely demolished, so I don't really know much about what happened before that."
"Then why are you so sure about Tang Ke's mother's past job?"
Ah Xian smiled inexplicably after hearing this and said, "That's actually quite a coincidence. I really didn't think about it that way at first, but when I drove near her neighborhood, I suddenly remembered something."
He paused deliberately, as if waiting for Shi Youchen to ask more questions. However, he received no response for a long time, so he could only continue, "When I took over MIST a few years ago, I checked all the accounts from previous years and found that there was a big boss in the store."
Shi Youchen murmured, "Big Boss?"
"Yeah, he's a true boss. He spends an outrageous amount of money on the store every year, to the point where he could buy several stores outright. He even donates a lot of money."
"I later did a quick check on where the funds were going, and guess what? He was actually helping the store staff buy houses."
Upon hearing this, Youchen guessed something, "So you remembered that the houses in that community were the project funded by the big boss back then?" Not far ahead, the "MIST" sign was flashing in the night sky, and before they knew it, they were almost there.
Ah Xian replied, "How could Tang Ke, a young girl still in school, come to my shop to 'look for a job' for no apparent reason? This doesn't seem normal, does it?"
"She doesn't look like someone who hangs out in places like this all year round. Plus, her house has quite a few signs of life, and some of the furnishings are incredibly old. That's pretty much the conclusion I came to based on all that."
"Besides, her mother later said that 'she bought a house early on with the help of a noble person.'" Ah Xian parked the car on the empty street, and then heard Shi Youchen casually ask, "Do you have any other information about the big boss you mentioned?"
He pulled a handful of hair and said awkwardly, "I heard from an old employee that his last name seems to be Lu. 'Mr. Lu comes from a distinguished family, is handsome and wealthy, and is very generous to the women in the store.' That's what they said."
Shi Youchen paused with his five fingers on the car door handle, turned his back to Ah Xian who was sitting in the driver's seat, lowered his eyelashes, said thank you lightly after a while, got out of the car and left.
...
Inside a room at the Four Seasons Hotel, the bathroom was filled with steam, and the sound of running water finally stopped after a while. Shi Youchen pushed open the glass door and walked out. As usual, he didn't blow-dry his hair, but simply wiped it twice with a towel.
After parting with Ah Xian, he deliberately crossed an intersection, turned to the back door of the hotel, and swiped his card to go upstairs.
Today was his fifth day alone in City A, and the investigation had finally made a breakthrough. He walked to the bed and pressed the button on the bedside console, and the double curtains slowly opened to both sides.
The entire exposed floor-to-ceiling window was covered with scattered photos, arranged in a strange relationship.
He walked to the window and moved the front photo of the MIST bar on the edge to the bottom of the photo in Lu Shen's notebook. Although he could be said to have stumbled upon a new clue tonight, in any case, most of the information could be connected in this way.
According to Lu Ming's description of his younger brother and rumors from the outside world, Lu Shen is a playboy who is addicted to alcohol and sex, overestimating his own abilities and being unfilial and unfraternal.
However, based on the events revealed by Jiang Da's memory retrieval ability when the Area 9 base was attacked, as well as the impressions of others such as Song Yao and Jiang Rucheng, and the various evidence from Tang Ke's mother and A Xian, another side of Lu Shen is that he is a kind-hearted person who is willing to sacrifice himself to save others.
Shi Youchen tapped the tip of his index finger on the window, slowly sliding his finger from the photo of the base ruins to the photo in the notebook. At least at this stage, he was more willing to believe that Lu Shen was a good person than to accept unsubstantiated rumors.
A thought suddenly flashed through his mind. Lu Shen was considered such a dissolute second-generation rich kid by Lu Ming and the others because he always went to nightclubs and ignored advice. But what if he wasn't doing it for pleasure?
It's easy to see from his notes that Lu Shen didn't have much affection for the Lu family. He didn't even mention his family in his notes. On the other hand, Song Yao once revealed that Lu Shen was desperately short of money for a while. But with the Lu family's status, could they possibly afford to support a young master?
Unless, all the money Lu Shen used was earned by himself, rather than asking for it from his family. Then the logic would be more coherent.
Lu Shen's relationship with the Lu family wasn't harmonious due to his biological mother, and his preference for nightclubs over his family might also be related to his mother. He was generous to women working in nightclubs, even donating money and buying them houses, so that women like Tang Ke's mother were spoiled and became naive and foolish.
However, he needed to shoulder the huge expenses alone, so he had to take on difficult tasks and use the points he earned to cash in. This was why he made Lu Ming feel that he was "desperately trying to prove himself."
Thinking about it this way, it seems that both sides A and B in the rumors become reasonable.
If this is true, then the true identity of the woman in District 10 who seems to have an unclear emotional entanglement with Lu Shen becomes even more curious.
Shi Youchen was unraveling a web of clues, and during his high-speed brainstorming session he always felt like he had missed some information.
What kind of past does Lu Shen and that crazy woman have?
...
In an unknown place completely different from the bustling City A, the sea tide surged and the sound of conversation came from the cave under the cliff.
"I brought the clue to you as per our previous agreement. So what about the thing you promised me?" The person who spoke to 07 was Ah Xian, and there was a cunning light flashing in his gray eyes.
07 pulled a black pendant from his pocket and threw it towards Ah Xian, saying, "I remember reminding you that I don't like my partners to have other thoughts." A cold glint flashed in his pale eyes, "Don't forget this, 08."
07's figure disappeared the moment he finished speaking.
Ah Xian, or 08, was also the man who had invaded Lu Quezhi in the JU Bar in Z City, and who had induced Liu Chen's parents to join the Maintenance Bureau, and who had killed Xiao Qi and Mo Ling at the X City Cross-River Bridge.
He clutched the black pendant, and only after 07 left did he suppress the chill running down his spine. "How terrifying."
——
Shi Youchen woke from his dream for the fourth time. He tilted his head to check the time: 05:28. It was still early for dawn. Perhaps because he had been thinking too much before going to bed, his sleep was intermittent and extremely restless.
After hesitating for a moment, he got up from the bed and washed up.
The scene of the Maintenance Bureau declaring war on the Association not long ago is still vivid in his mind. Even though he has not experienced any battles since returning from District 9, large and small supernatural events have occurred in various districts during this period.
In addition, Ying Yungui has not contacted them for a long time. It seems that the headquarters has extremely strict control over the front-line combat teams.
"I wonder what the situation is like over there..." Just as Youchen was thinking this, the communication interface automatically popped up -
"Number: 8463, Shi Youchen, please assist the nearby association's psychics to complete the mission and return to the base. Mission points: 50. - Mission Management Center" On the electronic map that unfolded, his current coordinates were marked as a green dot, and two blue dots that were still moving slowly appeared about three blocks to the east.
This is... a mandatory task!
Aside from the previous rescue mission in City Z, this was actually the first time Shi Youchen had truly been assigned a mandatory mission on his own. Although he was reluctant, this was a special wartime situation and he had no choice but to accept it.
So Shi Youchen had to quickly pack his luggage, put on his hat and pulled up his collar, went downstairs and handed the room card to the sleepy male receptionist in the lobby on the first floor, then walked towards the east.
Li Ming and Mollier never imagined that the person who would come to pick them up would be Shi Youchen. When the three of them met, Li Ming was supporting Mollier on a bench in a small park. The park was remote and run-down, so it was rarely visited. So when he heard footsteps coming towards them, Li Ming's first reaction was to stand in front of the unconscious Mollier.
Shi Youchen looked at the boy's messy silver-white short hair and the earring on his right ear that gleamed with a cold light, and sighed softly, "Move aside, I'll check her."
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