Chapter 126: “You still smoke.”
Yang Erci was a person with a keen intuition.
Just like the last time she saw her father, she felt that he seemed to be leaving her.
She still remembers that day, the wind was strong, her father was wearing a gray wool coat, and he made her favorite cream chicken stew, almond chocolate pie, and borscht, foods he usually found too high in calories and was reluctant to make.
But that day, Yang Erci was under a lot of study pressure and very busy, so she didn’t have time to sit down and eat properly, and left in a hurry.
Her father unusually talked a lot that day.
[The air has been dirty lately, remember to wear a filter mask when you go out, take care of your eyes, rest as much as you can, and don’t let yourself get too tired.]
At that time, she didn’t take these words to heart.
[By the way, Erci, do you remember where I stored the electronic password for the trust fund and savings? I can’t seem to recall.]
She was in a hurry, so she casually repeated the information to her father before leaving.
On her way home from school, after she finally finished her work, she suddenly felt something was wrong. Outside the window was a dazzling array of neon lights, but in her mind, she kept seeing the expression on her father’s face when he saw her off, his actions, and some unusual details.
Her father’s memory was always the best, why would he forget?
Yang Erci hurried home, the house was empty, no one was there, and only the food that had been on the table was moved to the kitchen to keep warm.
She had a hunch that her father had left, so she searched every place her father might have gone and contacted every acquaintance of her father’s that she knew, but to no avail.
The family savings and assets were all well-preserved, as if prepared for her. Yang Erci stood alone in the kitchen, eating the borscht her father had made, the red color reminding her of her mother.
When her mother died, she had vomited a lot of blood, just like this soup.
As a child, she had experienced her mother’s departure, always relying on her father. She didn’t understand why her father had to leave too, without even giving her an explanation.
Over the years, Yang Erci grew up alone, becoming silent and reserved due to a lack of security, doing only what was beneficial to herself, being precise and decisive. She never gave up investigating her father’s disappearance, going to great lengths to join the company her father worked at before, but strangely, she couldn’t find any records of her father, as if they had been deliberately erased or hidden.
However, she discovered many of her father’s research results, proving he had indeed worked at Sha Wen.
More and more secrets, the more she investigated, the more missing people she found, making Yang Erci unable to stop. When she learned about the altar, she unhesitatingly joined, believing that the more dangerous the place, the more likely she was to find her father.
This was what she believed.
Just like when she was left alone by her father, Yang Erci had a negative premonition that what An Wujiu wanted to tell her alone wouldn’t be good news.
She took An Wujiu to the rooftop of the building. Unlike at night, the city at night is covered in darkness, rendered in neon, hiding even the most dilapidated places, making them easy to overlook, but in the daylight, under the sun, any dirt and flaws are exposed.
The air was gray, An Wujiu stood still and began to speak to Yang Erci: “In the last game, we encountered your father.”
Yang Erci raised an eyebrow, reaching into the pocket of her wide and worn-out blazer to find something, finally pulling out a pack of cigarettes.
“And then?” She lit one, putting it to her lips, looking somewhat indifferent and nonchalant.
It seemed that An Wujiu was the one unwilling to face it.
He lowered his eyes, speaking softly: “We were assigned to different factions by the Altar.”
An Wujiu looked up, through the swirling white smoke, into her eyes, “Actually, you could say that your father died because of me.”
He shifted all the responsibility onto himself, as if by saying so, Yang Erci could vent, could accept that all her efforts had been in vain, and feel a bit better.
An Wujiu understood all too well what it felt like to have all one’s beliefs collapse; he had experienced it many times.
But Yang Erci in front of him didn’t react much. She just smiled, placing the cigarette between her slender fingers, turning around to lean against the rooftop railing.
“An Wujiu, do you think I don’t understand you?”
Her leaning posture was casual, but her back always seemed lonely. An Wujiu walked to her side, without speaking.
Yang Erci flicked the ash off her cigarette, looking at the gray sky and the desolate concrete jungle, the noisy, oppressive crowds below like ants fighting for food, eager to trample each other.
“The law of the Altar is survival of the fittest, the strong win, so the winner doesn’t need to apologize. Besides, I know very well, you’re such a saintly person, if you could save everyone, you would risk your life to do it.”
After finishing, Yang Erci lowered her head, letting the wind blow against her, “But I’m really unlucky, after so many times, not once did I encounter him, in so many rounds with you, it had to be the one we were separated in that he appeared.”
“Damn Altar,” Yang Erci cursed softly.
That’s all she could do because she knew very well that the fault didn’t lie with anyone who was her father’s enemy. She couldn’t blame her father for abandoning her, so how could she blame the innocent An Wujiu?
The only true culprit was the Altar.
An Wujiu didn’t know how to comfort her, and he understood that Yang Erci didn’t really need his comfort.
For someone like her, even breaking down would only happen internally. Even if she didn’t want to believe the truth, she would pretend to accept it calmly. Exposing it would be cruel.
“Did he die in the game?” Yang Erci asked.
An Wujiu knew what she meant, but he couldn’t lie to her, “Yes.”
“Then… there shouldn’t be any chance of…” She spoke in a broken, soft voice, as if reminding herself, trying to wake herself up.
A silent sorrow slowly flowed between them, like liquid about to freeze but not completely frozen, still perceptible in its flow.
An Wujiu’s guilt rendered him unable to say another word, because no matter what he said, Yang Erci would certainly say it had nothing to do with him.
After a long silence, each lost in their own thoughts, it was An Wujiu who broke the silence first.
“Your father said something to me. Coincidentally, he happened to know my parents.”
Yang Erci looked at him, “It seems you’ve remembered a lot this time.”
“Yes.” An Wujiu intermittently told Yang Erci everything he remembered, including the revolution project both his father and Yang Erci’s father had participated in, and the anomalies he encountered in his childhood, his father’s suicide, his mother’s madness. The only thing he didn’t mention was Shen Ti.
Yang Erci had guessed some of this, but other parts shocked her. She had considered the possibility that An Wujiu might be some sort of clinical test subject for human enhancement, but she never imagined there would be a so-called human revolution project, creating experimental subjects like him.
There was even the existence of so-called supernatural evil gods.
At this moment, looking at the crazed people on the street, Yang Erci’s mindset had completely changed. She extinguished her cigarette, took a moment to calm herself, trying to temporarily step out of the shadow of her father’s complete departure.
“Never thought…” Yang Erci said with a frown, “our parents would be connected.”
“Yes,” An Wujiu said, “to be precise, they were once colleagues. The human revolution project wasn’t initially so cruel and extreme. My father wasn’t a perfectionist. After his death, I was forcibly taken there, and your father became a double agent, sidelined in the revolution project group while joining another mysterious organization. Now that I think about it, the person who took me and forced your father to reluctantly continue serving Sha Wen must be the same, and if it wasn’t someone hostile to my father, they wouldn’t have specifically taken me.”
His analysis was logical, and Yang Erci accepted it completely, “That person can only be Russell, Sha Wen’s top seat.”
“Yes, I think so too,” An Wujiu continued, “and according to Zhou Yijue, the Altar was initially funded by the Sha Wen Group, but Sha Wen eventually abandoned the Altar. I think Sha Wen, or rather Russell, didn’t want to abandon the Altar but let it develop on its own.”
Yang Erci thought carefully, recalling some memories from when she still worked at Sha Wen, “When I first joined the company, a senior colleague warned me that Russell was a capricious man, very autocratic and dictatorial. I wasn’t surprised. Anyone who could build a commercial empire wouldn’t be a simple person.
But that senior colleague, who had worked at Sha Wen for a long time, told me that Russell wasn’t like this initially. He was approachable, very friendly, and often had breakfast with them. But he fell seriously ill, needing internal organ replacements. At that time, he used the most advanced artificial organs, but it was to no avail, only extending his life.”
“Later, for some reason, he suddenly recovered and was even better than before, but his personality changed drastically, like a different person.”
Seeing An Wujiu frown, Yang Erci said, “You think something’s wrong too.”
“Yes, he owns a commercial empire like Sha Wen, which monopolizes global biotechnology and advanced medical care. If these high-tech means couldn’t save his life, I can only suspect he used other methods to extend his life.”
Yang Erci nodded, turning to lean against the railing, “Before you mentioned this, I couldn’t figure it out, but now I have similar suspicions.”
For a researcher like her, accepting such surreal and supernatural things wasn’t easy. But ever since Yang Erci embarked on the journey to find her father, she had encountered too many bizarre events. Those people either disappeared, went mad, or self-immolated, burning their families and friends with them.
And these people had similar traits, uttering incomprehensible languages when they were about to die or go mad.
But her father was different. He was like Yang Erci, both digging deeper into the investigation, getting more deeply entangled.
Thinking back now, Yang Erci felt a chill all over.
Her mother’s death had been bizarre too.
“If we want to investigate Sha Wen now, it will be tricky.”
Yang Erci regretted her decisive departure, finding it difficult to get back in.
Seeing Yang Erci in a daze, An Wujiu was about to ask what she was thinking when a call came in. Yang Erci snapped out of her trance and answered the call.
Although An Wujiu couldn’t hear the content, he guessed it was Zhong Yirou from Yang Erci’s slightly relaxed expression.
Yang Erci only said “yes” a few times, mostly listening to the other person, then suddenly looked up at An Wujiu.
From her eyes, An Wujiu could also read information about himself.
“Okay, we’ll go back right away,” Yang Erci said.
An Wujiu intended to leave with her, but Yang Erci paused, seemingly still listening to the other person.
“We didn’t go anywhere else, we just came to the rooftop. Okay, we’re going back.”
An Wujiu waited a bit, thinking that Shen Ti really wasn’t worried at all.
But then he reconsidered, realizing there weren’t many who could touch him.
Yang Erci hung up the phone and, along with An Wujiu, walked down the stairs from the rooftop to the top floor to wait for the elevator. It was always particularly quiet when it was just the two of them.
Halfway up, Yang Erci suddenly asked, “Do I smell like smoke?”
An Wujiu stayed put and took a non-offensive sniff. “Not too bad.”
Yang Erci nodded and eventually took off her coat, draping it over her arm. Until they got into the elevator, went down, and returned to her apartment, An Wujiu watched her place the coat at the entryway, not bringing it inside.
She flawlessly concealed her pain, walking towards Zhong Yirou without any apparent burden. Only An Wujiu knew what she had just gone through.
“You’re back!” Zhong Yirou didn’t get up, seemingly talking to someone, but waved at Yang Erci to come over and also waved at An Wujiu.
However, halfway to her, An Wujiu was grabbed by Shen Ti, or more accurately, by Shen Ti lying on the sofa with a book open on his face.
An Wujiu didn’t even know how he managed to reach out at just the right moment.
“Where did you go?” Shen Ti tilted his head, causing the book to fall to the floor. He stared at An Wujiu upside down, motioning for him to squat down.
“I went to the rooftop to talk with Erci for a bit.” An Wujiu crouched down as directed, getting closer to Shen Ti, while still thinking about Noah’s earlier discomfort. “Where’s Noah?”
“Sleeping in the room,” Shen Ti answered casually.
With An Wujiu close to Shen Ti’s head, he reached out to tousle his hair and touch his earring, thinking it looked like a hair-washing posture.
The earrings were beautiful, like drops of blood.
As An Wujiu admired them, Shen Ti suddenly leaned up, still upside down, and kissed his lips.
An Wujiu was stunned for a moment, his fingers still holding the earring.
Shen Ti, however, was quite pleased, as if he had completed a very amusing prank, smiling contentedly.
Wu You on the other sofa seemed to have a nightmare and woke up suddenly. Nan Shan, beside him, had covered him with a blanket, so Wu You fell back asleep.
“What are you staring at?” Shen Ti flipped over, lying on the sofa, lightly scratching An Wujiu’s face with a bent finger, then suddenly sat up and leaned in to sniff, almost burying his nose in An Wujiu’s chest.
“Why do you smell like smoke?” Shen Ti muttered to himself.
Zhong Yirou heard this and glanced over at them. An Wujiu immediately switched to a scapegoat mode, naturally admitting, “I was smoking.”
He heard Zhong Yirou say to Yang Erci, “No wonder I smelled smoke.”
Shen Ti laughed, pinching An Wujiu’s chin. “You smoke?”
An Wujiu raised an eyebrow. “Of course.”
Shen Ti’s lips curved into a smile, his voice becoming soft and light.
“Little liar.”
An Wujiu wasn’t one to be easily handled. Hearing this, he stared at Shen Ti, slowly scrutinizing his face, a softer defiance in his gaze than usual.
“Same to you.”
“Wujiu,” Zhong Yirou hung up her call and said to An Wujiu, “one of my previous clients who had me replace his prosthesis has connections in the police department. I asked him to look into your sister’s case for me. After all this time, he finally found some leads.”
Hearing this, An Wujiu immediately stood up and went to her side.
This was an unexpected joy for him, but he was also afraid to hear it because he was terrified it might be bad news.
He couldn’t bear to lose anyone else.
“This is the list he gave me,” Zhong Yirou showed him the list, “it includes some missing girls around your sister’s age in Country A. Fortunately, there’s the restriction of being Asian, which narrows it down a lot. Since you don’t have a citizenship chip, I guess your sister doesn’t either, so I filtered out some. See if any of these faces look familiar.”
An Wujiu looked at each one; several didn’t resemble his sister when she was young.
“She should look a lot like me,” An Wujiu said.
“That’s what I find strange,” Zhong Yirou had already reviewed the girls on the list, “if she looked a lot like you, she should stand out. There are quite a few pretty girls here, but none of them seem to resemble you.”
Yang Erci suggested a possibility, “Is there a chance Wujiu’s sister has had plastic surgery?”
“It’s very possible,” Zhong Yirou explained, “plastic surgery is very common and advanced now, changing a face isn’t difficult.”
She propped her chin on her hand, looking at the girls on the list and their possible current residences.
“How about we split up and check them out one by one?”
An Wujiu added, “About your father.”
