Chapter 209: Chapter 209 – Do You Need It Urgently?
“Perhaps, could you have been dreaming as you were suffocating?”
Ren Suo correctly guessed the result, but not the person who turned up.
“Why are you here instead…” Ren Suo probed.
“The Deputy Director sent me here because he felt that I’m close to you,” Qiao Muyi replied calmly. She said, “If you had really been dreaming, the Deputy Director thought that I would be in a better position to snap you out of it with my stronger persuasion skills.”
—— What persuasion skills, he clearly wanted to take advantage of your ability to convince and influence me to give up!
Qiao Muyi laughed and questioned, “Why, are you looking down on me? Mind you, you’re only a tier 1 Practitioner while I am a true tier 2 Practitioner?”
“…” Ren Suo scratched his head and asked, “Alright, so did you guys really not find anything?”
“We’ve been searching the whole morning,” Qiao Muyi said as she looked at Island Lake, sparkling under the sun. She continued, “The only thing we’ve not done is for the diving team to plow through the sky. We’ve done the best we can, and there’s nothing else we can do if that is still not enough.”
“Moreover, as you requested, all of those who dived in were Practitioners. After all, you mentioned that breathing currents were key to triggering the extraordinary phenomenon.”
“We have been searching for such a long time, and it’s also time for us to wrap up.”
“After all, there were no casualties, and the testimonies are also one-sided, coming only from you and Gu Yueyan. Your testimonies are essentially the only evidence now. The Countermeasure Division still has its rules and regulations, and they would never waste their resources on such cases. In fact, our Team 7 is only here because you have ‘special connections’ with the Lianjiang Countermeasure Division and Deputy Director Yu; otherwise, we wouldn’t have come here.”
Qiao Muyi emphasized the words “special connections” in a significantly louder voice, and the Countermeasure Division personnel clad in their black vests close to her all turned to look at Ren Suo in admiration and respect. They remarked:
“I didn’t expect him and Deputy Director Yu to be…”
“Regardless, it still seems that Deputy Director Yu is the stronger one…”
“The Director of the Countermeasure Division and an emergency doctor… Ahhhh, I’m so done.”
Ren Suo sighed and waved his hand in front of him. He said, “There’s no other way then, since it still cannot be found. Thank you for your hard work.”
Qiao Muyi said, “Although we are going to wrap up now, we will still continue checking the area for a while once more. You may leave first. Oh, by the way, the Deputy Director also said that you will have to submit one more thesis report this month in repayment.”
“Nonetheless~” Qiao Muyi continued as she suddenly leaned closer to Ren Suo’s ear. She whispered, “Why were you on a date with Gu Yueyan in Xiang City?”
“It’s because she wanted to Awaken a second time, and she asked me to be her accompanying healer,” Ren Suo replied as he moved away from Qiao Muyi, as if he was afraid of venom spurting out from her mouth. He added, “That was not a date, it’s for work.”
The corners of Qiao Muyi’s mouth turned upwards as she asked, “What would happen if I tell Dong Chengling about this?”
“Eh? I will have one less story to talk about during our meals then,” Ren Suo replied.
He glanced at her and said, “I was still planning to mock Gu Yueyan during our next meal for falling into the water while taking selfies.”
Qiao Muyi seemed a little surprised. She looked seriously at Ren Suo, trying to determine if he was speaking the truth. She asked, “Are you not afraid?”
“Afraid of what?” a confused Ren Suo questioned.
The expression on Qiao Muyi’s face changed, as if she was studying a wonderful work of art. She eventually nodded her head forcefully and said, “You are amazing.”
“… That’s rare to hear from you, I shall shamelessly accept your compliment then,” Ren Suo replied.
Qiao Muyi covered her eyes with her hands and gestured to Ren Suo to scram, as if saying: “Get out of my sight, your presence irks me”.
As she watched Ren Suo flag down a taxi to leave, Qiao Muyi leaned on the trunk of a willow tree beside the lake. She took a glance at the personnel at work on Island Lake, then looked down at her mobile phone and broke out in smiles.
[Gu Yueyan has sent you a message.]
The corners of Qiao Muyi’s mouth curved upwards intriguingly, and a wide grin emerged on her face. She muttered happily to herself, “This is really… so… interesting.”
The personnel of Team 7 who were nearby and noticed the particular expression on their team leader’s face instantly trembled as they broke into cold sweats.
They knew that, whenever such an expression emerged on their team leader’s face, it meant that someone was going to meet with great misfortune.
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When Ren Suo arrived home in the afternoon, the first thing he did was naturally to submit a report of the incident at Island Lake onto the intranet as suspicious information.
It was his personal experience this time, which was a sufficient reason for him to upload that information. As for the other arenas in the game, Ren Suo did not dare to upload any information about them even if he knew their exact locations. He would be digging his grave if he did so and someone questioned him for the source of his information—he could not possibly say that he had an Awakened Ability of prophecy.
Mmm? It seemed like a decent move to put forward himself as one with an Awakened Ability of prophecy, as long as he added the restriction of “having an uncertain scope, frequency, and target of prophecies”…
However, Ren Suo deliberated over that for a long time and eventually decided to give up on such a move. The main reason was that the Countermeasure System could begin to watch him to protect him, as his prophecies were perfectly accurate. In that situation, their expectations for him would be extremely high, and if they protected him too well, how would he be able to play the games?
It was more suitable for Ren Suo to be “a researcher with extraordinary deduction skills”, as compared to being “a prophet”.
Moreover, when Ren Suo browsed the information on the intranet usually, he would also post replies and engage in discussions from time to time. That matched perfectly with the typical actions of a researcher—to express views that were not necessarily original. In terms of big data, the accuracy of Ren Suo’s answers was actually not high, but if his answer was selected, it would be extremely accurate.
Accordingly, Ren Suo went to post replies that were not completely new and original again, attempting to make himself seem like an ordinary researcher as much as possible.
When it was time for dinner, Ren Suo headed over to Dong Chengling’s house again to eat. Unexpectedly, Gu Yueyan did not turn up.
“Gu Yueyan isn’t here, how strange,” Ren Suo criticized.
“She said that she had developed a cold and did not want to affect others by going out. I told her that I could cook porridge for her and send it over, but she refused,” Dong Chengling said in a helpless tone. She added, “What a good girl.”
“By the way, you did not come over to eat last night and in the afternoon too. Did anything happen?” Dong Chengling asked.
Ren Suo originally wanted to make fun of Gu Yueyan during dinner that night for falling into the water while taking a selfie. However, since she was not present, Ren Suo was also too lazy to talk about it. He replied honestly, “I made a trip to Xiang City and many things happened there. Sigh, I even had to perform a search with the Countermeasure Team this morning.”
Dong Chengling blinked and asked, “Did something dangerous occur?”
Remembering the Holy Grail, a lingering fear still remained in Ren Suo’s heart. He replied, “It was quite dangerous. I met with a peculiar, mysterious situation and was almost trapped there.”
“Oh,” Dong Chengling said. She did not continue probing into what happened.
After Ren Suo washed the dishes and left her house, Dong Chengling picked up her mobile phone to make a call, instead of starting her night-time Practice session immediately.
A female’s voice was heard from the other end of the line, saying, “I was still thinking that it was about time for you to call me…”
Curious, Dong Chengling asked, “Muyi, what makes you say that?”
Qiao Muyi replied, “It’s just… my intuition, I suppose. Go ahead, what’s up?”
Dong Chengling said, “Oh, I just wanted to ask, when would the portable space positioning device arrive?”
Qiao Muyi asked, “The accessory that would allow you to pull people to you from far away? The Countermeasure System is currently working on it, and the first batch of them would be completed soon. Why, do you need it urgently?”
Dong Chengling hesitated for a moment, then said with certainty, “Yes.”
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[You have acquired a new key. Remark: Verbal reminders were not given as you were in a dangerous situation when the key was acquired.]
As soon as Ren Suo turned on the Mini Worlds game console, he received the above message from the system. He was instantly bewildered.
“It even had such a setting? How considerate, it would have been disastrous if I heard the verbal system prompts in the middle of a fight… However, I don’t remember maintaining contact with someone who was sleeping for more than 5 minutes though?”
Could it have been Gu Yueyan? It did not seem like she had lost her consciousness completely, however. Furthermore, even though the struggle in the water appeared intense, it actually only lasted for one to two minutes in reality.
Although Ren Suo did not know when exactly he acquired the key, he quickly forgot about those details. What was important now was that he currently possessed four 1-star keys and one 2-star key. Together, they could be combined into a 3-star key—
He could finally activate his first 3-star treasure chest!