Chapter 2138: Forged Declaration
Probably thinking that the hospital funded by the Tian Clan was relatively safe, and since the injured were far from the center of the storm, ordinary people wouldn't pay attention, only two people were guarding this severely wounded player. And these two were waiting for him to recover a bit before questioning him.
"His evolution rate isn't high." Zhao Zizhen looked at the two players in front of the door at the end of the corridor. "Taking them down won't be difficult."
"No need to cause a commotion." Xu Huo said. "This city is now full of armed robots, and the city government has also called in quite a few players. If we get into trouble, it'll be hard for us to get away."
Zhao Zizhen also understood the situation in the station city. Without hesitation, she sided with the outer zone players. "They're so on edge that they won't even allow discussions on the message collection terminals. It seems that whether it's District 008 or the Tian Clan, they've done plenty of shady things."
"Who knows." Xu Huo had already checked the corridor and nearby wards in advance, confirming there were no mental interference props or devices before releasing his spiritual realm.
He and Zhao Zizhen entered the ward. First, they introduced themselves as disciplinary members of the Tian Clan, stating that their purpose was to verify whether he had unknowingly leaked Tian Clan secrets, and to supplement information about the player who attacked him.
This player, who had barely been saved, still couldn't speak, so he had to communicate entirely through text input.
"Wang Cang, we can begin now." Xu Huo and Zhao Zizhen each held a recorder. They first asked supplementary questions about the attacker's information, then moved on to matters concerning the Tian Clan.
Because Zhao Zizhen had added something to the medication the doctor had injected into Wang Cang, the man didn't show significant emotional fluctuations under the gradual induction. After about ten minutes, Xu Huo saw him looking tired and proactively said, "You can rest for three minutes."
With that, he nodded to Zhao Zizhen and voluntarily left the room.
"That's it?" Standing outside the room, Zhao Zizhen couldn't help asking. "There wasn't much important information."
"What's the rush?" After waiting about a minute, Xu Huo pushed the door open again and began questioning the man, whose eyelids had already drooped.
This time, the questions were no longer as conventional. But considering this was just a hired thug for the Tian Clan, he didn't ask about secrets involving the Tian Clan's combat layout. Instead, he inquired about any ongoing experimental projects the Tian Clan had recently, and whether he had heard about the murder cases in the Double-Bright Bird Administrative District and nearby cities.
Wang Cang wasn't very familiar with the details of the Tian Clan's experimental projects, only mentioning generalities. Surprisingly, he knew a bit about the murder cases. First, the murders hadn't actually stopped; the city government and player organizations had simply reached an agreement. Since the beginning of this month, they had stopped publicly disclosing the murder cases. In other words, they were sweeping it under the rug. Because more and more outer zone players were being implicated in the murders, it was causing a lot of trouble for District 008. Rather than exhausting themselves solving the cold cases and sending those outer zone players away, it was better to keep them stuck in District 008. As for whether the subsequent murder cases would actually be solved or stop, District 008 didn't care.
Second, the victims of the murders weren't just ordinary people, but also players. Two of them had worked in the Double-Bright Bird Administrative District for the Tian Clan. Many players in the Tian Clan knew about this, but they had concealed it from the local government. The reason the Tian Clan knew was that the two players' manner of death was identical to that of the murder victims. From this, the Tian Clan deduced that the killer wasn't a single person, but an organization—one with the strength to kill players, and one without the strength to kill ordinary people.
However, Wang Cang didn't know exactly which places those two had been to.
Xu Huo asked a few more supplementary questions before leaving with Zhao Zizhen.
"I thought it was strange. These two instance missions were unusually difficult. So it turns out there really is more than one killer." Zhao Zizhen said. "Should we head back to Double-Bright Bird now to investigate the itineraries of those two players?"
After leaving the hospital, Xu Huo said, "No."
"Wouldn't it be possible that the Tian Clan has already investigated the itineraries of those two players internally? If we find the right person, we might be able to pick up the ready-made results." Zhao Zizhen said, puzzled.
"We can't fully trust Wang Cang's words." Xu Huo said. "Have you paid attention to the medical development in District 008?"
Zhao Zizhen paused. "You mean Wang Cang might not have been completely hypnotized?"
"That's not necessarily the case." Xu Huo explained. "It's just that District 008 is already capable of combining drugs and surgical procedures to impose strong suggestions on people. When receiving external mental interference, they might instinctively seal off certain key information. It's like a hypnotist giving long-term suggestions to a person, fixing a certain word or scene to activate their internal defense mechanism. With the aid of technology, such an effect should be easier to achieve. Breaking through this defense mechanism might require continuous time and attempts, and we don't have that much time."
Zhao Zizhen nodded, but then said, "He might not have undergone such an operation either."
"True, but there's no need for us to waste time on this. Even if it's true, and we've locked down the intersection between those two players and the victims, the workload is still enormous." He looked at her with a smile. "Besides, isn't the purpose of this trip to investigate, one by one, the personnel who might have appeared in a certain public place six months ago?"
Zhao Zizhen also smiled upon hearing this. "That's not a bad backup plan."
The two didn't say anything more. They quickly returned to the Double-Bright Bird Administrative District and found a transportation company owned by the Tian Clan.
After observing from the outside for a while to confirm there was no ambush, Xu Huo handed a forged "declaration" to Zhao Zizhen. "I'll provide support from the sidelines the whole time."
Zhao Zizhen looked at the blank "declaration" and raised an eyebrow. "Not a single word written?"
"We'll talk after we get the transportation company's list." Xu Huo said.
This special paper, characteristic of District 008, was a popular "declaration" paper. To show the solemnity of the "declaration," special patterns were usually drawn on the paper. But this was just a smoke screen for them; there was no need to make too obvious a mark.
As for the list they wanted to get from the transportation company, it wasn't considered a very important list. The reason for going through this process was merely to attract the attention of the players inside the company.
Soon, Zhao Zizhen successfully infiltrated. With Xu Huo's cover, she smoothly opened the company's internal system and copied a transportation directory of the company's shipments to nearby Tian Clan properties or Tian Clan-related industries. The daily transport of vegetables and meat wasn't high-level, but the transport times and routes for experimental materials and large instruments still needed to be kept secret, especially those sent to certain confidential laboratories. Even the information for these laboratories on the transport orders was encrypted; directly copying it would only yield a bunch of garbled text.
"That's about enough." In addition to the transport list, she also found several paper copies of encrypted materials from the cabinet. After taking them, she sent a signal to Xu Huo.