The Discussion
"That concludes the content of this phone call."
Inside the Exchange Group's office, a group of professionals were analyzing Chen Xiyao's previous phone calls. Although most of them were meaningless, like casual conversation between long-distance couples, they still gleaned quite a bit from them, such as—
Can Weird Tale actively receive our thoughts?
The young man, who was often seconded to the Psychological Counseling Group, asked with some suspicion, because so far, all the Weird Tale they had captured, regardless of their level, lacked interactivity.
They even tried to teach the other Yan Country Language, but they would often disappear before the other party could have a basic conversation. The only difference was that when the Low-level Supernatural Tale disappeared, they were filled with fear and resentment, while the High-level Supernatural Tale mostly showed calmness or even relief.
"In my I Think, this is more like a judgment of one's own 'image'," said Old Wang, speaking relatively slowly, as if he were thinking as he spoke.
"We've made many guesses about Weird Tale, but all of them revolve around their 'needs'..."
"You think this is evidence from the 'memory' school?" Captain Li adjusted his glasses and frowned.
Due to the scarcity of samples, although Weird Tale have existed for decades, the results from various countries are very limited. Most of them involve small-scale methods such as how to preserve a small amount of Weird Tale materials (False Thing) or developing various derivative technologies based on Magical Item.
As for the demand for Weird Tale, opinions vary widely, with two main viewpoints in Yan Kingdom alone: emotion and memory.
Some believe that Weird Tale are like certain monsters in legends, surviving by absorbing people's emotions, which is why they kill to absorb emotions such as fear, anger, and hatred.
Others believe that Weird Tale need to be remembered, so they begin to be remembered for their evil deeds after good intentions have been forgotten.
Both of these arguments have merit, but Old Wang usually refers to them collectively as "cognition".
At this moment, he still didn't intend to distinguish between memories and emotions, and simply said to himself:
"Whether it's emotions or memories, it doesn't matter. What matters is that he clearly understands how we 'position' him. Take this 'Scandal Boyfriend' for example. It was just a joke during casual conversations in three groups, but he clearly confirmed it. In other words, whether we have goodwill or hostility towards him, he will be aware of it. I think this is also why he mentioned in the letter that he was unwilling to communicate with the authorities."
"But we haven't done anything hostile," another older group member said, but Old Wang shook his head.
"The absence of action does not mean the absence of thought; judging by intention rather than actions is the most troublesome thing."
At this point, he picked up the tablet in front of him, fiddled with it for a bit, dragged the transcribed dialogue, and highlighted several key paragraphs:
"Look here, he mentioned 'now it's Weird Tale,' and also mentioned the word 'nothingness.' This may mean that, compared to our terms for Low-level Supernatural Tale and High-level Supernatural Tale, the theory in Victoria that 'ghosts' and 'strange things' are two different species is closer to the truth."
"But the tissue samples we collected have a consistent structure, and they all have the characteristic of disappearing after observation stops..." The middle-aged woman who often helped out in the Inspection Group immediately refuted this. Seeing that the topic was about to fall into the old cliché of "whether the Supernatural Tale Itself conforms to objective laws," Old Wang immediately interrupted:
"That's not the key question. The important thing is why the other party was promoted within this year."
"Isn't it already a given that Low-level Supernatural Tale will escalate into High-level Supernatural Tale once they gain enough influence?"
Although he knew that Old Wang would definitely speak next, Liu Yingqiang still skillfully played the supporting role.
"That's the problem." Old Wang smoothly transitioned from the situation, his finger swiping across the screen to bring up information about the Ambulance Demon—
"As you can see, this so-called Ambulance Demon Weird Tale was not created by the code name [Instructor], but rather by countless private prisons and hospitals in Colombia. It can be said that, apart from the first few times, this Weird Tale has nothing to do with him. In fact, there may have been other cases of robbery of petty thugs followed by ambulance calls before his own."
"You mean, his promotion wasn't due to the legend of the Ambulance Demon?" The man whose nameplate read "Deputy Captain Zhang" stared at the Colombia's outrageous actions, pondering why Old Wang was emphasizing this point. After a moment's thought, he suddenly realized something—
"Could it be martial arts?"
After Deputy Captain Zhang mentioned it, everyone immediately realized:
In the nearly one year that followed, it wasn't just Colombia that saw the Ambulance Demon appear; the Yan Kingdom was also practicing the martial arts brought by the other side.
In other words, it's highly likely that the opponent actually advanced through martial arts manuals?
After Weird Tale undergoes a transformation, it undergoes a qualitative change. Although some countries may deliberately allow Weird Tale to transform in order to obtain more Magical Item, Yan Country usually handles the situation before it escalates. They even created programs like "Approaching Science" to reduce the influence of Weird Tale.
If a martial arts manual can truly help someone advance in their cultivation, then the manual they send you must be treated with utmost care.
Furthermore, not only the two new manuals, but even the Golden Bell Shield, which had already begun its third round of testing, had to be immediately halted.
"We still have to use it!" Suddenly, the military representative, who had been listening quietly without saying much, spoke up:
"The Golden Bell Shield is something we can't abandon. According to current experiments, it only takes six months to get a new recruit to the point where he can ignore small-caliber firearms, and the cost per person is less than 50,000 yuan. That's with a small number of people. If it's widely adopted, with mass production equipment and investment in medicinal herb cultivation, the cost per person could eventually be reduced to less than 1,000 yuan. Yet, this can greatly improve the soldiers' Combat Power and survivability. You should all understand what this means!"
Faced with the military representative's words, everyone fell silent. To avoid a supernatural Weird Tale that was still well-intentioned becoming stronger and disregarding the lives of 3.5 million military and police personnel, no one could bring themselves to say such a thing.
Perhaps the atmosphere was too silent, so Captain Li tentatively spoke up:
"Why don't we just ask the person in question directly?"
"But didn't he say he didn't want to communicate with the authorities? Are we going to have Xiao Chen ask for him?" Deputy Captain Zhang pointed to the "Don't want to chat with the authorities" message on his tablet, but Old Wang suddenly laughed:
"The other party doesn't want to communicate, yet they still sent over the secret manual. That's a stance in itself. We might as well be more open about our attitude. We can have Xiao Chen pass on the message, but don't have her ask for help. Just say directly that we want to talk, otherwise it won't be good if the other party harbors resentment towards Xiao Chen!"
P. S.: Regarding why we didn't go to the Eastern Kingdom to catch Weird Tale:
It's true that there are many Weird Tale in the Eastern Kingdom, but they are an organization in themselves. This means that if you want to capture a Weird Tale in the Eastern Kingdom, you not only need to figure out the rules of its arrival and disappearance, but you also need to be wary of the situation where it brings a large group of relatives and friends.
This also involves some information about the Eastern Kingdom and the Hundred Tales, which I won't spoil here. Simply put, the casualties that would result from capturing Weird Tale from the Eastern Kingdom are something no country would be willing to bear.