Chapter 43

Gu Yunshu.

To be honest, Xu Ming was not sure whether the other party knew this name. She just thought it was possible.

In this case, she might as well

take a gamble. Soon, Shi Mian's long silence made her realize that she was right.

But this matter seemed a bit difficult for Shi Mian. She hesitated for a while and did not give a definite answer. Xu Ming listened silently, apologized to the girl in her heart, and then added more fuel to the fire.

"Do you remember what I told you before, those undead who insisted on saving people in Hongqiang?" Xu Ming said, "Gu Yunshu is one of them. I met her in Hongqiang."

"When I met her, she was already very weak. Because she joined the demolition office, her condition gradually improved... She didn't remember anything, but when I picked her up, she still wanted to go home."

Xu Ming's voice couldn't help but lowered when he said this. Shi Mian on the opposite side was also silent for a while.

...To be honest, what she said was not a lie, it was quite in line with reality.

Xu Ming thought silently, and spoke again: "Because she saved me, I want to help her. But the Demolition and Relocation Office does not allow employees to check their own affairs before they died, and it is not allowed to help check...

"I know it's quite abrupt to make such a request suddenly, but I don't know who to ask. I'm just a newcomer who just joined the Demolition and Relocation Office and I don't have any connections. I thought of asking you because I heard from our director that Anxin Gardening has an advantage in this regard. "

Xu Ming said, his eyes inadvertently turned, and met the puzzled eyes of Lando beside him - his cognition was still at the stage where Xu Ming was called "Director Xu", so he was a little confused, not knowing where another "Director" popped up. Seeing

this, Xu Ming waved his hand lightly at him, indicating that he would explain it later. Almost at the same time, Shi Mian's voice rang in the mobile phone again.

The other party took a deep breath, as if she had made a great determination.

"I'm sorry." Xu Ming heard her say, "I also want to help. But this request is really beyond my authority."

...Sure enough.

Xu Ming couldn't help but close his eyes, and stroked the golden dog head that came up to ask for a touch. Just when he was about to say forget it, he heard Shi Mian follow up, "But I know who I can ask for this. Give me some time, I should be able to ask someone to find out for you."

"......!" Xu Ming's back, which had just sagged, straightened up again, and even the dog's head on her knees trembled.

"Well, thank you for trouble!" Xu Ming said quickly, "Thank you so much... Oh, by the way, on the day you come over, why don't you stop by for a meal?" After all, she had no other way to express her gratitude. But

Shi Mian refused again and again: "No, no, I'm the one who's bothering you. It's just a matter of convenience.

"Oh, by the way, it's still the matter I promised you before, and I already have some clues here. Then I may have to delay you for a while to add the records about Hongqiang."

...What was promised before?

Xu Ming was stunned for a moment, then he remembered that he had made an agreement with the other party before.

The other party would investigate the person who cheated Yun Jiegen away,

and in exchange, he would provide the true records in Hongqiang. ... To be honest, I agreed to this at the time because I was a little bit excited, and Shi Mian happened to have a business card with a leaf pattern printed on it... Now that I think about it, it’s quite embarrassing for her.

Xu Ming thought awkwardly, and just wanted to say something else, he suddenly heard the sound of a conversation from Shi Mian, as if there was something urgent; then he heard Shi Mian whispered an apology and hung up the phone in a hurry.

Xu Ming was left alone, still immersed in the ups and downs of emotions just now. After a while, he let out a breath, put down his phone, and stood up.

When she turned around, she met Lu Yueling's thoughtful eyes.

"You have a 'director' above you." She was a little surprised, "Doesn't he care about your work?"

She has been following Xu Ming for so long, but she has never seen Xu Ming go to work. She was wondering.

Xu Ming was silent when he heard it. It was her negligence that she forgot that Lu Yueling didn't know about it.

Just like Lando only knew that she was "Director Xu" and Fang Xueqing and the others only knew that she was an "intern", in Lu Yueling's perspective, she was just a "salesperson".

...But this kind of thing is too troublesome to explain. And it's a bit socially dead. So Xu Ming didn't explain much, just said that their unit is more free and there is no need to work in the office. If there is anything, just deal with it online.

Lu Yueling listened, and the thought in her eyes became heavier.

"Your unit doesn't allow dead people to investigate previous events... In other words, you hope that employees will leave everything in the past behind?" She asked again.

Xu Ming didn't know what to say for a moment, after all, she hadn't programmed this specific setting yet. After a brief thought, she only said: "Specific analysis of specific situations, in fact, there is no such a rigid rule. It's just that it's really inconvenient for me to investigate, so I can only entrust it to someone else."

She said it vaguely, and Lu Yueling didn't ask any more questions, just nodded as if she understood, and lowered her eyes again.

Instead, it made Xu Ming a little confused.

The blubber man was also confused - as an alien root that was heavily bound to the rule book, it was very alert to anything that might threaten the rule book. In the past two days, he has paid more attention to Lu Yueling than Xu Ming.

After secretly observing for so many days, it finally couldn't hold it in anymore. When Xu Ming went out to buy groceries, it secretly pulled her sleeve and asked her what she thought of Lu Yueling.

"I feel like she's still waiting for something." Xu Ming said bluntly, "There are some secrets, but I don't think she has any bad intentions."

"I think so too, but I still feel uneasy." The whale fat man pinched himself into an ice cream decoration, lying on Xu Ming's phone case, and said as he swayed with the phone, "It's a pity that your work badge is still too weak and has no one-way binding force. Otherwise, just give her one and everything will be fine, and you

don't have to guess here." "It's useless to have one, it's not like I haven't asked before." Xu Ming pretended to be on the phone, walking helplessly, "I asked twice, and she didn't want to."

"Is there a possibility that she is just arrogant?" The whale fat man tried to broaden her thinking, "I think the way that child speaks is a bit awkward."

"..." Xu Ming stopped and glanced at it with his peripheral vision. Although the sun was not very strong at the moment, the exposed whale blubber man still gave people a feeling of melting, which was surprisingly suitable for its ice cream shape at the moment.

"Do you think I'm a wooden man? I can't hear the arrogance?" Xu Ming couldn't help but say, "She really doesn't want to."

Anyway, all she felt from the other party was hesitation and resistance.

Hearing her affirmation, the whale man had nothing to say. He shrank back into Xu Ming's bag obediently.

However, the whale man's words reminded Xu Ming of another thing.

- The relevant usage rules of the work badge may need to be optimized.

It's not for any one-way constraint function. There are some main aspects that Xu Ming feels that some restrictions should be added. For example, the conditions for effectiveness and invalidation, etc. - Like this time, just because the woman with red shoes may have taken away an work badge, she was upset for a long time, to the extent that she would beat herself off the bed when she woke up in the middle of the night.

If, she said if, she could add some usage conditions to the work badge as the printer holder, once violated, the work badge would automatically become invalid... Then if she encounters such a thing again, at least it would be a backup plan.

Xu Ming is a person who is more proactive. After confirming the idea, he went back and started to try. It took him about half a day to finally prototype a semi-finished work badge, but he was troubled by who to find to try it out.

The condition she imposed on this work badge was that it would automatically become invalid when it was a certain distance away from her. It was written on the back of the badge. Unfortunately, Landor was out walking the dog, Gu Yunshu hadn't come back yet, and the whale man was bound by the rule book and couldn't walk that far.

There were lingering undead on the streets around the community... but their inner energy had long since disappeared, making it difficult to communicate, let alone let them help with experiments.

The remaining options were only A Jiao, who was listed in the rule book, and Lu Yueling, who was staying at Xu Ming's house. After hesitating for a while, Xu Ming gave priority to the latter.

Lu Yueling listened to her request, but her face was a little hesitant.

"Will this be automatically removed after I leave you a thousand meters?" She looked at the work badge in her hand and asked uncertainly, "What if it is not removed?"

"Then bring it back and I'll try again." Xu Ming said, "If you are not happy wearing it all the time, take it off and bring it back. Don't throw it away."

"..." Lu Yueling was stunned when she heard it.

"Can I pick this?" She looked at Xu Ming, then at the work badge in Xu Ming's hand, and her tone seemed very unbelievable, "Can I pick it myself?"

"Of course you can." Xu Ming thought her question was strange, "When the hotel organized the rescue, I should have mentioned this to others... Didn't you hear it?"

Lu Yueling: "..." I was hiding in the room at the front desk the whole time, how could I hear it.

Xu Ming: "..." Then I don't know what to say.

The two looked at each other in silence for a moment. In a split second, an extremely absurd thought suddenly flashed through Xu Ming's mind -

"You didn't want this before." She pointed at the work badge in Lu Yueling's hand, her expression becoming more and more subtle, "Are you afraid that you won't be able to take it off after wearing it?"

"..." Lu Yueling was silent for a moment, and finally whispered, "Our employment guidance teacher said that we must be cautious about our first job after graduation."

Xu Ming: ...You don't have to be so cautious.

We are a shell company, and there is no such thing as wasting the status of a fresh graduate.

In any case, after making it clear that she can "quit" at any time, Lu Yueling was finally willing to wear the work badge. Unfortunately, judging from the experimental results, the "rule" formulated by Xu Ming did not take effect.

The fat man guessed that this might only take effect in the Strange Tales area. After all, the only skill that can make this rule established by Xu Ming valid is "Paper Robe Authority", but "Paper Robe Authority" is only available in the Strange Tales area. Xu Ming was even more worried because of this. He flipped through his notebook, trying to find out if there were any more skills that could be used, but he was surprised to find another thing.

- The unlocking progress has moved forward again.

In other words, it had been accumulating slowly before, and it accumulated until the moment Lu Yueling put on her work badge, and it finally brought about a qualitative change.

But this time, what changed was not the three skills on the homepage, but the printer donated by Hongqiang.

I saw that two new clauses were added to the already complicated usage rules:

[New Clause 1: If the person you issue the ID card to already has other types of binding relationships with the rule book, you can choose to cover that layer of contact with the ID card. If the ID card expires, the contact will be automatically restored.

[New Clause 2: You can unilaterally cancel or modify the ID card by tearing up or modifying the ID card drawing page in the rule book. This operation is irreversible, and a ID card can only withstand a maximum of three modifications. And you can determine the current ID card holder by touching the name or work number on the drawing page. ]

"..." Xu Ming stared at the last explanation, feeling mixed emotions.

If you had told me earlier that this was the newly unlocked skill, why would I have to try it slowly by myself...

Fortunately, she didn't spend too much energy on this aspect, otherwise I really don't know whether to cry or laugh.

Sighing secretly, Xu Ming glanced at Lu Yueling's back not far away, and immediately flipped the rule book to the back, intending to first confirm which work card the woman in red shoes had. After a few flips, the paper was suddenly held down by a small hand stretched out from the side.

...It was really a small hand. The palm was only the size of a thumb.

She turned her head slowly, looked in the direction of the hand, and met the whale fat man's eager eyes.

"Work badge, work badge!" It called out from the bottom of its heart, and the tail that was pinched at some point was still shaking desperately behind it, imitating the shape of a golden retriever, as if trying to be cute, "You have given out so many work badges, if you don't mind giving me one more, just give me one? Huh?"

Xu Ming: "..."

*

From the perspective of the blubber man, it is understandable that it wants a work badge.

After all, wearing a work badge means that its original binding relationship with the rule book is covered. The range of its free movement is not only expanded, it can run tens of thousands of miles away.

"Of course, I will never run that far!" It assured Xu Ming, "I will just walk around the city, anyway, you can cancel my work badge at any time, right?"

"..."

Xu Ming actually didn't have any objection to this, and he even wanted to give it. But while she was drawing her work badge, the whale man couldn't help but start jumping around. During the jumping, bits and pieces of words kept floating into Xu Ming's ears——

"Bar! Bar!"

"Nightclub! Nightclub!"

"Yeah yeah yeah——"

Xu Ming: "..."

Her hand was shaking slightly while drawing. She tried to hold back, but finally couldn't help but look over: "You still go to nightclubs?"

"Ah, I've worked there!" The fat man stood with his hands on his hips proudly, "I've been a prince and a princess! When it was convenient to go abroad, I went to Thailand for further studies... In fact, many people like that."

Xu Ming: "..."

"By the way, are you still short of money?" The fat man continued with great interest, "If you can move freely, it will be easy to make money. Wait for me to study how to find sponsors these days... Speaking of which, I actually have a lot of experience in honey traps..."

Xu Ming: "…………"

After a brief silence, Xu Ming quietly put down the pen.

"Or, let's wait and see." She said with difficulty.

Recently, the crackdown on pornography and illegal publications has been very severe. She has never been to the police station except for applying for an ID card and a passport in her life, and she doesn't want to go in for other reasons, never.

Fat man: ...? ? !

"No, you don't have to help me. I know how to get out. I'm familiar with the process, really..." The fat man spoke in panic, but Xu Ming felt even more confused.

So you really have been in there, right?

Xu Ming was silent again, and amid the fat man's miserable screams, he firmly closed the rule book in his hand.

Facts have proved that the side effects of the newly unlocked skills are very obvious. At least for the next day, Xu Ming was forced to endure the fat man's various coquettish and cute nonsense. Finally, he couldn't bear it anymore and threatened to turn on the air conditioner, and the other party finally stopped.

And just another day later, Shi Mian finally visited.

"-I'm so sorry, there are a lot of things going on recently. It took so long."

Shi Mian sat down slowly opposite Xu Ming and smiled embarrassedly. Xu Ming quickly said no, and quickly scanned the surroundings.

She had greeted everyone before Shi Mian came over, so at this moment, except for the whale man hiding under the bed, everyone else temporarily hid out. Only Gu Yunshu, who was still outside, had not received the news, and there was a possibility that he would suddenly come back.

But it didn't matter. Xu Ming had already revealed her existence to Shi Mian, so it wouldn't be strange even if she showed up.

Thinking of this, Xu Ming couldn't help but look at the opposite side. As if seeing through what she was thinking, Shi Mian quickly took out an envelope and pushed it in front of her.

"This is the current address of Gu Yunshu's family." She said softly, "But please open it when you are alone, otherwise you won't be able to see it."

Xu Ming: "?"

"Sorry, this is the usage rules, I can't do anything about it." Shi Mian showed a helpless smile, "I asked a teacher in the unit to help me find it. Her identity is quite special... her methods are also quite special. Because you are also an insider, and for Hu Yang, she is willing to help."

She said, and pointed at the envelope again. The thick kraft paper texture looks very retro.

"After you finish reading it, you can share the contents inside according to your heart. But remember, don't let others see it before you."

Xu Ming nodded sharply, carefully put away the envelope, and thanked the other party seriously. Shi Mian waved her hands repeatedly, saying that she was happy to be able to help, and then took out a folder and opened it in front of Xu Ming.

"Also, the person you mentioned before, the one who deceived Hu Yang..." She carefully flipped through the information she found, "I did find something here..."

Xu Ming raised his eyes again when he heard this. Then he heard Shi Mian say:

"From the time point and behavior, she should have been an employee of Anxin Gardening. But she has already left."

"Oh..." Xu Ming nodded slightly, not particularly surprised by this.

The next second, he heard Shi Mian say: "As for the reason why she did this, we can't be sure here. But from the results, she is most likely 'that kind of person'."

...?

After this, Xu Ming was stunned.

After a while, she whispered, "What kind of person?"

"That kind..." Shi Mian didn't seem to know how to describe it for a moment, and looked at Xu Ming with some hesitation. Xu Ming realized that the so-called "that kind of person" should be an internal term like "tree" and "dodder". His eyes turned quickly, and then he smiled awkwardly.

"I'm sorry, I really don't understand." She said directly to Shi Mian, "I have only been in the industry for a short time, and the business contacts at the Demolition Office are all ghost talk parties. I really don't understand some of the terms on the human side."

"Oh, so..." Shi Mian blinked and believed it. Then she pursed her lips, as if thinking about how to start, "If that's the case, then I have to explain everything from the beginning."

"Come to think of it, Miss Gu, when did you find out that your physique was special?"

Shi Mian said, looking up. Xu Ming paused for a moment, undecided whether to tell the truth, but then he thought that since the other party had the background to investigate, it would not be difficult for him to investigate his past. In that case, there was no point in lying.

So he said directly: "I probably could feel it when I was in elementary school and about to enter junior high school. But when I was in college, I suddenly couldn't see it anymore. It was not until I joined the demolition office recently that I started to get involved in that aspect again."

"Oh..." Shi Mian nodded thoughtfully, and couldn't help but sighed, "Then Miss Gu, you are really lucky."

Xu Ming: "?"

"Since you had a supernatural physique before, then you must have felt it." Shi Mian continued, "The current environment is very different from before."

This is true.

Although he didn't know why the topic turned to this, Xu Ming still nodded sincerely.

The world before was very safe. Normal humans only live in a normal world, surrounded by order. You can't see the existence from another world, and you can't cross the boundary leading to another world.

This is a crisis that only people like Xu Ming with the so-called "psychic physique" will encounter.

There is no mechanism for the dead to spread ghost stories, and there is no rule book. Moreover, the form of the ghost story area seems to be much simpler than it is now - the current ghost story area, at least from the perspective of Hongqiang and Butterfly Building, the map is much larger than what Xu Ming has encountered before, and the mechanism is more complicated.

In the past, when she encountered similar ghost story areas, she could always find something wrong at the first time, and then as long as she ran into the crowd before going deeper, she would have a high probability of running out; if she really encountered a place where she couldn't run out, she would try to stay in it for a while, and she could always hold on until she found the exit, or wait until the aunt who raised her came in to save her.

And what about the current ghost story area?

They don't even specify the escape methods and exits in the rules. The two strange stories I encountered in a row were that if I didn't have a rule book in my hand or get help from outside forces, it was basically equivalent to no solution...

and so on.

Thinking of this, Xu Ming's heart suddenly moved.

A larger impact range. A more complex internal mechanism. A more unsolvable hunting method. This sounds just like -

"Evolution." Shi Mian said softly.

"Ms. Gu, you are a fresh graduate last year, right? That's why I say you are really lucky.

" "Because during your time in college, both the way the stories were spread and the difficulty of solving the stories pointed to a very bad fact:

"The stories are evolving. And they have already completed a major evolution."

The expansion and reorganization of their unit also took place during that time - the predecessor of Anxin Gardening was originally a special event handling unit under the government. In order to cope with the amazing changes in the stories, it has slowly evolved into "Anxin Gardening" and split off into a mutual aid unit "Da Li Zhi Weeding" in the form of a private enterprise.

Of course, Shi Mian did not tell Xu Ming in detail about this part. She only mentioned that humans made another major discovery during this time.

The rule book.

"I don't know how you think about this thing, but at least in our opinion, this is the only thing that humans can rely on at present." Shi Mian said seriously, "Therefore, in the past few years, to be precise, the year when the rule book was just discovered, Anxin Gardening has been focusing on finding humans who hold the rule book, and we have also been trying to cultivate and support them internally."

"Well..." Xu Ming raised his eyes slightly, "Then?" "

Then, I don't know since when, some humans who hold the rule book suddenly started to have a strange saying." Shi Mian continued, his voice slightly lowered. At

that time, in order to facilitate communication among humans who hold the rule book, they also specially built a special forum. Both official and private holders can browse and discuss. Then came all kinds of private chats, small groups... By the time they noticed it, the rumor had already spread widely among the internal groups through various channels.

That rumor believed that the evolution of ghost stories was far from over. Or, in other words, the so-called "evolution" now was just a prelude, a transitional stage.

The real challenge would come after the transitional stage was over.

"They believe that by that time, ghost stories will completely invade reality and turn the entire world into a playground for ghost stories." Shi Mian said softly, "All human beings, whether normal or born 'abnormal', will be forced to enter ghost stories. The order of the entire world will be reshuffled, and whether one can better adapt to the challenges of ghost stories, whether one can survive the challenges, or even stand out, will become the only criterion for judging whether a person is successful and outstanding."

"By then, the rule book will no longer be the reliance of a few people, but a standard prop that all human beings will have. People like them who have already obtained the rule book are equivalent to the 'internal test users' before the game is officially launched..."

"Wait." Xu Ming frowned when she heard this, "Game? Internal test?"

Of course she knew what these two words meant. It is precisely because of knowing that she feels inexplicably unhappy——

"What do they think of all this?" She couldn't help but ask, "This is a matter that could kill people."

In response to her, Shi Mian gave her a complicated look and shook her head slightly.

"I can't say for sure." Shi Mian whispered, "But from what I understand, all those who believed in this statement later called themselves the same code name as a code to confirm their identities to each other."

"They call themselves, 'players'."