Chapter 62: Ghosts Living at the Border
This was the first time Li Lin saw Captain Song, who was usually steady and reliable, with a frown on his face as if he was facing a formidable enemy.
"So... the eyeball-shaped dark angel left the foreign land it was parasitic on silently, without trying to contaminate or control anyone, and without leaving any 'offspring' behind?" Song Cheng listened to the reports of the two Secret Service agents in front of him, and after a long silence, he spoke, "Didn't you hear anything like 'high-dimensional whispers' in your mind during the whole process?"
"No," Xu Jiali shook her head, her voice low, "but that thing must have noticed us. For a moment, I could clearly feel that 'gaze'. Its sight was focused on where we were hiding. It was as if..."
Song Cheng frowned: "Just like?"
Xu Jiali recalled for a moment and said uncertainly: "It's like he's looking for something."
Song Cheng tapped the table with his fingers in annoyance and didn't say anything for a while.
After more than ten seconds, he took a long breath and turned to look at Li Lin: "When you came into contact with the man who called himself 'Yu Sheng', did you feel the 'heterogeneous' aura from him? Judging from your intuition, do you think he is more like a human, or like... something else?"
"It looks like a human. At least its speech, manners and common sense in dealing with others are like those of a human. If it is an entity disguised as a human, then we can only say that the disguise is too perfect - so perfect that it can be directly regarded as a human." Li Lin said with certainty.
"But he has long lived in a place called 'No. 66 Wutong Road' that does not exist in the real world. It is a foreign land that has never appeared in any official records," Song Cheng sighed. "Only 'entities' will be generated in the foreign land, but not...human beings."
Xu Jiali was silent for a while, then she said, "There are indeed some 'entities' in this world that are intelligent and can communicate. Some are particularly friendly or have something to ask of the world and can even cooperate with humans, such as the 'Storyteller' and 'Passenger 22'. They even look like they have certain human characteristics..."
"But the 'Yu Sheng' you mentioned is still a completely different concept from the one you mentioned - in terms of 'anthropomorphism'," Song Cheng shook his head and looked at Xu Jiali, "Can you confirm that he is the 'door opener' you saw on Emine-IX?"
"It can be confirmed, but he didn't recognize me at all," Xu Jiali nodded. "I was wearing a full set of power armor and a mental shield at the time. It seems that his perception ability cannot penetrate the above equipment."
"It has limited perception, but possesses highly developed personality traits. It has the ability to open the 'gate' at will, and can fight against the hungry entities that have been greatly strengthened by the 'Angel of Darkness'. However, the specific killing process at that time remains a mystery... It seems that it is intentionally concealing its own fighting methods..." Song Cheng slowly summarized the intelligence that he had obtained so far, and said while thinking, "And there is one more thing..."
"Very friendly to humans." said Li Lin on the side.
"Yes, he is very friendly to humans and is even willing to take the initiative to contact the Secret Service agents." Song Cheng nodded slightly, as if he wanted to say something, but the sound of footsteps suddenly came from the corridor outside the door, interrupting his next words.
There was a knock on the door, and then a short girl with short hair pushed the door open and walked in, holding a folder in her hand: "Captain Song, the archives department has sent the information over."
Song Cheng's eyes widened slightly in an instant: "...Is there really information about that 'Yu Sheng'?!"
"Yes, but if you search directly from the system, it will show that it has been cancelled. The cancellation time is the day when the current population archive system of the border area was established. In other words, this person was 'gone' from the beginning, even before the date of birth on his file. But after the cancellation time, this person's identity information has been in the 'activated' state. The word 'cancelled' is like an insignificant watermark in the system display." The short-haired girl put the folder on Song Cheng's desk with an incredible expression on her face. "You can even check some recent shopping consumption, social registration and traffic records under this ID card - all of which were carried out normally when the system showed that it was cancelled."
Song Cheng picked up the folder and looked up in surprise: "Such a serious bug, the system didn't report an alarm?"
"No, the Information Center has already arranged overtime for tonight. When I passed by, I saw Director Wu making a sharp noise..."
"...Let it explode. It has to explode a few times every month anyway." Song Cheng shook his head and looked down at the information in his hand.
From beginning to end, it looks like just an ordinary resident file, with ordinary life consumption records, except for the glaring red "cancelled" watermark on each page, and the address "No. 66 Wutong Road", which should not appear in the file system at all.
Song Cheng turned around his chair, turned on the computer on his desk, entered an internal application of the Secret Service, typed in several key words including No. 66 Wutong Road, and after pressing Enter, an error message was displayed directly.
"A ghost... a ghost living in the border area, casting an indelible shadow in our complex population management system. He didn't even appear recently. According to 'Yu Sheng' himself, he has lived in this city for more than 20 years, which is consistent with the records in the file," Song Cheng muttered softly, his face looking a little bad - of course, this is mainly related to his frequent overtime work recently, "No one has noticed it until now, not even the director's eyes have seen him - until now he took the initiative to jump out and contact us."
Li Lin and Xu Jiali looked at each other and saw a hint of solemnity in each other's eyes.
——Fortunately, this "ghost" has no interest in causing trouble, and even always thinks he is an "ordinary person".
At this moment, Song Cheng's eyes noticed a column of content in the information.
"...writer?" He raised his eyebrows in surprise, "This ghost still has a job?"
"A freelance writer who contributes to some small magazines and media accounts, writing some thriller stories or third-rate scripts, but not very famous, and has hardly written anything recently."
Song Cheng thought for a moment: "...Is it a failure?"
The short-haired girl said seriously: "If I can support myself, it doesn't count as failure."
"…What does he write?"
"There's a short story at the end of the file that I found in a magazine last year - I thought you might be interested."
Song Cheng immediately turned to the back of the document and took a quick look.
The short-haired girl looked at Captain Song with a hint of expectation: "How do you feel?"
Song Cheng was silent for a moment, looking embarrassed: "I... don't really understand the preferences of young people nowadays."
He coughed twice and calmly closed the folder. His expression was serious. “But anyway, this is a very interesting line. We should arrange for people to collect all the things written by Yu Sheng, do psychological profiling and personality analysis, and also keep an eye on his future… uh, ‘creations’.”
He paused for a moment and added, "A 'suspicious entity' who thinks he is a human being not only thinks like a human being, but can even create like a human being. His works will definitely reveal his truer way of thinking and emotions. This has never happened before, so you must take it seriously - but don't let him notice it."
"Roger that, Captain Song."
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The short-haired girl left the office with the information, and Song Cheng's gaze returned to Xu Jiali and Li Lin.
"Regarding the matter of creating the 'space rift' at the border, have you asked the other party about the situation?"
When Li Lin heard this, he looked at Xu Jiali next to him awkwardly. Seeing that she had no intention of speaking, he had no choice but to bite the bullet and say, "...I forgot to ask."
"How can you forget this?!"
"I was too nervous at the time, probably because I had seen the 'Angel of Darkness'," Xu Jiali, who was standing beside him, finally spoke up. The experienced Li Lin came to the rescue as soon as she spoke up. "Although I didn't ask directly, we also heard some intelligence while we were evacuating to the hiding place with Yu Sheng's two companions."
"You mean the puppet and the fox?"
"Yes, according to what they mentioned in their conversation, the so-called 'space rift' seems to be just... 'Yu Sheng' trying to open a door in order to rescue the demon fox trapped in the foreign land."
Song Cheng stared: "...Is that all?"
“That should be it.”
"…Just to find a way, open and close a few doors, and shake up the entire junction?!"
Xu Jiali pulled the muscles on her face and said, "In fact, it only affected the bureau..."
Noticing the look on the captain's face, he stopped talking.
Song Cheng sat behind his desk with his eyes wide open, trying his luck. After a long while, he waved his hand exhaustedly: "Alright, you two can leave first. This matter is a bit serious. I need to discuss it with the higher-ups."
Li Lin and Xu Jiali looked at each other, and Xu Jiali hesitated and said, "After that, when we formally contact that 'Yu Sheng', will we still follow the procedure?"
"Don't worry about it for now. This matter will most likely have to go through the director," Song Cheng sighed. "If Yu Sheng was really an 'ordinary person', I would have sent you two directly over, but the situation is not that simple now. Go back and rest first - ah, don't forget to go to the 'treatment room' first, get a checkup and fill out the form before leaving. You will be given three days off starting tomorrow."
(End of this chapter)
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