Published at 8th of October 2024 3:04 am

Chapter 1030: The Arrival of the Corpse

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“First, let’s make sure of one thing,” Lin Sanjiu said in a low voice, her peripheral vision focused on the crooked entrance to the guest room. “That old lady is indeed an ordinary person with no abilities, right?”

Bohemia nodded. “Definitely. I’m particularly sensitive to this.”

After all, in the Twelve Worlds Centrum, if they couldn’t even get this right, they wouldn’t have survived until today.

Although it was not impossible for there to be a Special Item or ability that allowed a posthuman to disguise themselves as an ordinary person, the chances of encountering such a situation when they casually sought shelter in a residential house during the rain were extremely low.

Lin Sanjiu raised her chin towards the door. “Go and see where the old lady is. I want to turn on the television again.”

“What are you looking for?” Bohemia asked softly, quietly approaching the doorway.

“There’s something strange about the image we saw earlier.”

Lin Sanjiu reopened the television, this time remembering to find the volume button and turn it down to the lowest level. As expected, the screen still displayed the breaking news about the two mentally ill women who disturbed the entrance center and were currently on the run. If they counted from when the posthuman police officers had left, it had been playing in a loop for at least twenty minutes.

She stared at the screen, slowly furrowing her brows.

It wasn’t just two front-facing images; they were in a 360° panoramic shot. She had turned off the television too quickly before, and now as she watched it more closely, she realized that she and Bohemia were like two actors who had been captured from head to toe, slowly revolving like 3D models, with the background of the building’s small hall. Anyone who watched the news would even know what their hair looked like from above.

But… how was that possible?

Flashes of lightning occasionally pierced through the dark room, repeatedly illuminating the faces of the two on the screen. The rain outside seemed to be getting heavier, and the sound of rain drowned out the ambient noise in the guest room. When a metallic collision sound came from the corridor and reached Lin Sanjiu’s ears, she immediately looked up.

“What was that sound?”

Bohemia, who was standing at the door, pushed the soft and elastic door frame with her hand to peek, and whispered, “The kitchen is at the end of the corridor… It seems like she’s checking if the food in the pot is ready.”

Something clicked in Lin Sanjiu’s mind, and Bohemia happened to lock eyes with her at that moment. In the dim and gloomy guest room, where her facial features were barely discernible, only her large eyes flickered with a faint sheen. “Esculent Alethia! Could it be related to this food?”

“I don’t know—”

“It must be.” Bohemia suddenly became confident, eagerly looking around. “Let’s wait for her to come back and see what she brings this time.”

“Come here,” Lin Sanjiu called out as she looked at the screen, startling Bohemia. Reluctant to move, she hesitated to respond. Like an untrained dog, she needed to be called two or three times before she finally approached the television.

“What’s the matter?”

As soon as she uttered these words, Bohemia was startled by Lin Sanjiu’s actions. Lin Sanjiu suddenly crouched down, grabbed the hem of Bohemia’s skirt, held her ankle, and carefully examined it before letting go.

Bohemia’s face turned red, and she stammered, “Are you… are you crazy?”

“You did tie a silver bell to your right ankle,” Lin Sanjiu said pensively.

“And you still don’t have a brain in your left skull. What are you trying to say?”

“You see,” Lin Sanjiu remained calm and pointed at the television screen, “the reason I knew about the bell on your ankle is because of this.”

In the news footage, the rotating Bohemia did indeed have an identical silver bell tied to her foot—her skirt length had been intentionally shortened a bit, revealing it.

“We’ve been together for such a long time, and I didn’t even notice it,” Lin Sanjiu said. Just as she spoke, she heard a faint sound coming from the kitchen at the end of the corridor despite the pouring rain. It sounded like the old lady was about to come out. She quickly turned off the television, pulled Bohemia back to sit down, and whispered, “We were in the entrance center for less than ten minutes. How could even such a small detail be recorded by the surveillance cameras?”

Bohemia stared blankly for a moment. The leisurely footsteps in the corridor were indeed approaching the guest room, occasionally accompanied by the sound of pots and pans clanging. Suddenly, Bohemia leaned in closer, her voice filled with hesitation. “Surveillance cameras?”

She didn’t know? Oh, right, the Twelve Worlds Centrum seemed to have different names for many things—

Just as this thought crossed Lin Sanjiu’s mind, she couldn’t help but shudder. She suddenly understood what had been bothering her. However, just as she was about to delve deeper into this thought, the shadow of the old lady slowly entered the guest room, instantly putting them on guard.

The old lady held a faded old book under her arm and carried a small serving pot in her hands, placing it on the coffee table. She worked swiftly, quickly removing the tea snacks and replacing them with some small dishes and utensils. Seeing that the tea snacks of the two of them had hardly been touched, she didn’t say anything.

“Here, you can look for the address in the book while I serve you some stewed meat,” the old lady said.

Lin Sanjiu took the thick book but couldn’t understand a single word. In this heavy rain, the old-fashioned guest room was filled with dampness, giving off a musty smell permeated by various odors over the years. The thick, sticky air, combined with the aroma of the stewed meat, made it difficult to resist covering their noses.

The old lady seemed completely absorbed in enjoying her food, seemingly unfazed that they hadn’t touched their food at all. She ate and drifted into memories triggered by the food: “The first time I invited him to have dinner at my place, my mother made this pot of stewed meat… He used to make fun of me, saying that mushrooms and meat have the same texture, but refused to change the side dish. In reality, he always ate a lot.”

“Honestly, young people nowadays rarely want to find a partner and get married anymore… We used to consider having children as one of the most important things in life, but young people don’t seem to care. After all, everything is so simple and easily accessible nowadays. Can’t you find the garbage disposal site? Let me show you once I finish eating… Oh, I also baked lasagna. It’ll be ready soon.”

In the dim and gloomy small meeting room enveloped by the rumbling rain, it became even darker without a trace of light. The old lady was familiar with the position of every piece of furniture in the room and could enjoy her meal even in the dimness. The two of them sat quietly on the sofa, silently watching the flickering shadows across from them.

“He doesn’t like this dish, but I loved it,” the old lady immersed herself in memories, almost every dish was associated with a part of her past. Even in the darkness, her face, which kept getting briefly illuminated by the lightning flashes, carried a smile that seemed somewhat absent, as if the two across from her no longer existed.

“During my childhood, my mother often made fried dough strips for me to eat. I don’t know what they were called, and she didn’t know either. Because when she was a child, my grandmother made them for her, and my grandmother learned it from my great-grandmother… The recipe for this snack has been passed down from generation to generation, and it stopped with me. I often think that if my children hadn’t died on the battlefield, they might have made fried dough twists for my grandchildren.”

The old lady’s voice became heavy as she placed the unidentifiable food back into the dish and stared blankly at the entrance, lost in her thoughts. The meeting room fell into a quiet stillness, with only the endless sound of rain and the distant thunder outside.

Even though the old lady was an ordinary person who lacked the ability to capture or harm them, for some reason she seemed completely uninterested in notifying the police.

‘What was she planning to do?’

“Could she be suffering from senile dementia?” Bohemia asked in a hushed voice.

Lin Sanjiu looked at the figure across from her and pondered quietly for a moment. When she spoke, she mentioned something unrelated to the old lady in front of her, “The Access and Registration Center has at least twenty to thirty narrow doors, right?”

“Right.”

“That’s interesting.”

The old lady, with her diminished hearing due to age, didn’t hear their conversation amidst the continuous loud rain. She remained lost in her memories, seemingly unaware of everything else. Bohemia glanced at her before turning her head back to ask softly, “What’s interesting? Don’t just leave it hanging.”

“You reminded me of something… The surveillance cameras. Think about it now, where the hell did those damn cameras come from in and around the Access and Registration Center? There wasn’t a single one.”

If they were to monitor the situation at each entrance, there would need to be an equal number of cameras. But even without checking the stored subconscious images, Lin Sanjiu clearly remembered that there was nothing near the entrance—no cameras, no marks, not even a single sign.

What about after entering the small hall?

The entire ceiling was for lighting purposes, and if any cameras were installed, there would be noticeable dark spots. She couldn’t recall seeing any surveillance devices in corners or at the junctions of the ceiling and walls—more importantly, what kind of surveillance equipment could capture their 360° imaging from all angles with such detail?

The reason was simple: Unless it was a surveillance facility with cameras flying all around you, any installed camera could only “see” what it was capable of “seeing,” which led to the concept of “blind spots.” But in the directions where there clearly weren’t any cameras, what was recording their every move?

“Oh, right. That entrance-exit facility doesn’t have any video cameras,” Bohemia murmured. “Actually, even if we didn’t wear the head coverings, they shouldn’t have known what we looked like afterward…”

They had taken off their pillowcases after the posthuman police arrived and the hostages escaped to avoid suspicion. And if those posthuman police remembered their faces, how could they know every detail, such as the type of bell hanging on their ankles hidden in the tent?

A strange realization emerged, accompanied by even more doubts. While Lin Sanjiu bit her lip and fell into deep thought, the old lady suddenly let out a long sigh and resumed her actions.

“I’m someone who has always loved good food and loves trying new things,” her voice became slightly hoarse, as if tired from the surging emotions. The old lady wiped her eye corner and collected the dishes in front of her. “Now that I’m getting older and facing my imminent end, I can’t help but want to relive the memories of the food we shared… I’m sorry for keeping you waiting.”

Waiting for what?

They both felt a strong sense of foreboding. However, the old lady didn’t seem to be in a hurry at all. She leisurely took the leftover dishes back to the kitchen. As she walked back to the entrance of the meeting room, she suddenly made a “gaah” sound, as if the air was stuck in her chest and couldn’t flow. Then, the old lady convulsed, falling heavily to the ground, trembling, struggling to breathe, and appearing close to death.

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