Ordinary People Beneath the Anomalous City

Ordinary People Beneath the Anomalous City

If Chen Yu found out about this, he would definitely skin those two guys alive.

Thinking of this, he said gently, "Alright, we'll eat here today, and order everything from that place too!"

"Then I'll thank you on my sister's behalf, big brother!"

Ghost Doll looked extremely happy.

Chen Yu had no idea whether Ghost Doll could even eat food.

Later, the two of them arrived at Helens Restaurant.

Everything at Helens Restaurant was rather expensive.

"Hello, what would you like to eat?"

A waiter in a restaurant uniform came over and politely handed the menu to Chen Yu.

Chen Yu simply waved his hand and said grandly, "No need to look at the menu. Bring one of everything on it. Oh, and order everything on the menu from the KFC next door too."

Seeing that Chen Yu was dressed like a high school student, the waiter froze slightly. "You mean one of every item on the menu? Not ordering individually? And everything from KFC too?"

"Yeah. Hurry up, I'm starving."

Chen Yu had never acted this lavishly in his life.

The food at this restaurant was not cheap.

Buying everything once would cost more than fifty thousand in total.

But Chen Yu was rich now, so he did not care about that amount at all.

"Alright, right away!"

The waiter assumed Chen Yu was some young master from a wealthy family. He hurriedly nodded and went off to make arrangements.

Since the table they were sitting at could not hold everything, the waiter specifically had someone bring over a large round table.

Before long, the round table was covered with all kinds of food.

Ghost Doll's eyes gleamed golden as she said, "Big brother, can we eat all of this?!"

"Eat up. I got it all for you."

Chen Yu picked up a piece of fried chicken and began eating as well.

"I'm so touched I could cry! My sister and I have never eaten a whole, complete fried chicken or hamburger before!"

Ghost Doll trembled with excitement.

Tong Jian remained expressionless, but her eyes were fixed firmly on everything on the table.

Only after seeing Chen Yu start eating did she politely begin herself.

Chen Yu looked at Tong Jian, then at Ghost Doll.

To his surprise, he discovered that Ghost Doll could eat too.

Wasn't she a doll?

Did she even have a stomach to digest food?

Tong Jian seemed to have been hungry for days and ate without restraint.

Since the food had just come out of the fryer, it was extremely hot.

Chen Yu noticed that Tong Jian's lips had been scalded red, yet she did not make a sound. She merely blew on the food a few times in silence before continuing to eat.

Chen Yu began to wonder whether this girl was mute.

Did she really just dislike talking?

"By the way."

While eating, Chen Yu thought of something and asked, "What did you see at the orphanage?"

Ghost Doll shook her head while eating. "Sister can't remember anything at all, but Ghost Doll remembers a little." "Oh? Tell me."

Chen Yu asked curiously.

Ghost Doll answered, "The massacre at the orphanage seemed to have started with a female teacher. That's all Ghost Doll remembers. I don't know anything else."

Seeing that they knew nothing, Chen Yu did not ask further.

During a break from eating, Chen Yu took out his phone and opened the official Anomaly Era website again.

He had wanted to see whether there was any special news or new incidents on the official Anomaly Era site.

But as soon as he opened the forum, he saw a red 999+ notification on his private messages.

It was obvious that many people had messaged Chen Yu.

"What's this?"

Chen Yu frowned slightly.

999+?

Did that mean he had suddenly become famous?

Frowning, he opened his private messages. His hand stopped halfway to his mouth.

[Big bro, your thigh smells so good. Can I cling to it?]

[Bro, you're seriously awesome. I, Niu Aotian, respect no one but you. I never expected you to solve the Linjiang Central Hotel incident!]

[Brother, what organization do you work for? Can you tell me? I want to join too. Or you can start your own organization—I want to be the first to become your underling.]

[Handsome guy, do you have a girlfriend~? If not, I'm single. I have a great body and I'm really pretty too~]

[The person above, get lost. I don't need any status. I just want to be your lover. Please take me in. You can do whatever you want to me from now on~]

[Sir, I am Chen Qing from the Foreign Affairs Department of Anomaly Company. This is my employee ID number. Our company was deeply shocked and impressed to learn that you resolved the Linjiang Central Hotel incident, so we are willing to offer you an annual salary of ten million to invite you to join our company!]

[Holy shit! This is fake, right? It has to be some kind of scam, right? There were no anomalies in Linjiang Central Hotel at all. It was just hype, wasn't it?]

[Are you even human? You actually solved the Linjiang Central Hotel incident? I'm seriously impressed!]

[Brother, you're so strong. Can you help your little brother out? There's an anomaly wreaking havoc here. It kills anyone it sees, and I might be next. Can you come save me and deal with it?]

[This young lady is offering a huge reward to conceive a child. Requirement: it must be someone who handled the Linjiang Central Hotel incident. After it's done, contact number: 1787375***. You only need to cooperate and get me pregnant.]

Chen Yu's face darkened after reading those messages. He hurriedly exited, then opened the official bounty post from before.

The anomalous incident at Linjiang Central Hotel was still pinned.

"Shouldn't the bounty post disappear automatically after the anomaly is dealt with? Why is it still here?"

Chen Yu opened it curiously.

He saw Chen Yu's cringe online profile picture beneath the post, with the username [Nightfall].

There was another line beneath it—

[The anomaly has been dealt with. To honor the achievement, this post will remain pinned for one week.]

[The one who handled it is Mr. [Nightfall] above.]

[Everyone, please learn from and communicate with him more, and eliminate anomalies for Huaxia's rise.]

"This is fucking deliberate, isn't it?!"

Chen Yu discovered that the post had nearly ten thousand comments.

Almost all the comments were shamelessly praising him.

Chen Yu shook his head with a bitter smile. This was probably the Investigation Bureau's doing.

He had accepted the Linjiang Central Hotel incident on the forum using his own account. Now that the hotel incident had been resolved, the forum had directly exposed him.

Fortunately, the forum was highly private. No real-name verification was required to register, every phone could register one account, and duplicate usernames and profile pictures were not allowed. This meant no one could impersonate him, and his private information would not be leaked.

So those people were frantically leaving messages for Chen Yu on the forum, while Chen Yu knew nothing about them.

The official Anomaly Era administrators also seemed not to have revealed any of Chen Yu's information.

Therefore, all anyone knew was a cringe profile picture and a cringe username.

Yet on the private message page, Chen Yu noticed two conversations that had been automatically pinned.

For messages to be forcibly pinned, those two people definitely had some connection.

One username was [Curtain Call].

The other was [Xu Aotian].

The messages they had sent Chen Yu were largely the same: both wanted to get acquainted with him.

Who was Xu Aotian?

That username looked cringe at a glance. Chen Yu did not like it.

He swiped right and deleted it.

"This person called Curtain Call has a username that suits my taste. We both have the character 'curtain' in our usernames too. Guess we're fated."

Chen Yu opened Curtain Call's chat window and simply sent, "Hello."

Inside the Investigation Bureau.

"There's a message! There's a message!"

Luo Mu held his phone and shouted excitedly.

Everyone in the Investigation Bureau stopped what they were doing and gathered around Luo Mu, craning their necks to look at his phone.

"Quick, arrange a meeting with him! At any cost!"

The Director shouted excitedly.

"Okay, okay, okay!"

With trembling hands, Luo Mu hurriedly typed out a message, his tone extremely respectful.

"Meet me?"

Chen Yu did not want to reveal his identity, so he tactfully rejected Luo Mu. "Sorry, I've been a little busy lately."

Luo Mu looked at the reply on his phone and could not help feeling disappointed. "What do we do? Give me some ideas."

"Someone that capable must be busy. If a meeting is impossible, at least get his contact information."

Someone from the Investigation Bureau suggested.

"Right, right, contact information."

Luo Mu excitedly asked Chen Yu for his contact information. His attitude was excellent, and every word was filled with respect.

But Chen Yu still refused.

Just then, his phone vibrated again.

[Xu Aotian] had sent another message.

"Big brother [Nightfall], can we meet?"

Chen Yu refused again.

But [Xu Aotian] refused to give up. "As long as Mr. [Nightfall] is willing to join our organization, we are willing to give Mr. [Nightfall] a lot of money. Because the Anomaly Game Era has arrived, Linjiang City is considering shrinking the city's scale and building an anomaly safe zone in Riverside District. It will become the safest place in all of Riverside then.

"Once it becomes an anomaly safe zone, property prices in that area will soar. If you want to get ahead, you need to act first. Our organization can help you."

Seeing this message, Chen Yu was slightly stunned.

Riverside District was a godforsaken place in the outskirts of Linjiang City.

If this news was true, property prices there would absolutely skyrocket in an instant. Even "land worth its weight in gold" would not be enough to describe its value.

It could only be described as land worth ten thousand times its weight in gold.

In other words, as long as Chen Yu invested first, he would become a billionaire in the blink of an eye.

Chen Yu was not short on money now, so he brushed it off. "We'll talk about it later." After browsing the official Anomaly Era forum for a while longer, Chen Yu found nothing worth reading and put away his phone.

"Yo, Chen Yu?"

Just as Chen Yu was gnawing on a drumstick and chatting with Ghost Doll about something.

A startled cry suddenly rang out, followed by a crumpled piece of paper that had been used to wipe hands being thrown at Chen Yu.

Chen Yu could not help turning toward the source of the voice.

A boy around his age was sitting at the next table. Beside him sat a middle-aged man who looked somewhat similar to the young man, probably his father.

The others were all people in suits who looked like successful professionals.

"Li Kun?"

Chen Yu was also stunned. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm here with my dad to discuss some business with others." Li Kun spoke with a hint of showing off, his chin raised.

Chen Yu smiled. "I got paid for my holiday job, so I came to treat myself."

Chen Yu knew Li Kun's personality well. He loved showing off, was a typical rich second-generation heir, and always acted superior to others at school.

"Who's that? Your little sister?"

Li Kun saw Tong Jian wolfing down food and asked in surprise.

"Uh... yes."

Chen Yu nodded. Tong Jian's identity was still a mystery, and he could hardly say that he had brought her out of Linjiang Central Hotel.

At that moment, the middle-aged man beside him spoke as well. "Son, you know him?"

"Yeah, he's my classmate."

Li Kun explained.

Hearing that, Li Fanghua smiled. "Since you ran into a classmate here, invite them over to eat with us."

Li Kun had been thinking the same thing.

"Chen Yu, my dad wants you to come eat with us."

Li Kun said with a smile, his tone brimming with smugness. At school, he was the representative of being rich and loved showing off all day long.

Now that he had a chance to show off, he naturally would not let it pass.

"No need. I prefer eating this stuff."

Chen Yu smiled and tactfully declined.

Seeing that Chen Yu would not come, Li Kun naturally would not lower himself by calling again. He simply turned back and continued chatting with the others at his table.

Perhaps because Chen Yu was sitting at the next table.

As Li Kun chatted, his voice gradually became louder.

"By the way, have you heard about the recent surge in gold prices?"

Li Kun asked the others at the table.

Those people had come to curry favor with Li Fanghua in the first place, and Li Kun was Li Fanghua's son, so they were naturally very respectful. "A friend of mine who runs a gold shop told me about this and advised me to buy more gold to store away recently. At first, I didn't think much of it, but later I realized that gold prices had really shot up.

"And not by just a little, either."

"Yeah, I'd heard something about it too, but my family didn't stockpile any gold."

Several people chimed in.

One of them said in surprise, "By the way, Young Master Lin, didn't your family used to run three gold shops?"

As soon as he said that, the others remembered as well and were instantly stunned.

"Right, right! The Lin family used to run gold shops. I completely forgot!"

Li Kun said with a smile, "That's right. Our Lin family had stored away a lot of gold, and for some reason, gold prices suddenly skyrocketed recently. After we sold it, the price was nearly a hundred times what we'd paid for it!"

He spoke loudly, as if deliberately making sure others heard him.

Chen Yu was eating. Hearing this, he smiled faintly.

He'd sold the gold for a hundred times the price?

This foolish son of a landlord had no idea how much he had lost.

News of the Anomaly Era game had been blocked by the authorities, so most of those who knew about it were people whose phones had received notifications.

Those without notifications knew nothing about it.

Naturally, these people could not see the undercurrents churning beneath the surface.

Gold could temporarily seal away anomalies and even isolate them. It was something that could save lives.

Even if gold prices rose a thousandfold, or several thousandfold, it would not be an exaggeration.

(End of chapter)