The person who posted that message on WeChat Moments was someone Xiang Kun didn't recognize; they were probably one of the customers from that bar.
However, he seems to have quite a few friends, judging from the long string of replies under that post.
"Holy crap! I thought Young Master Huang had discovered some new heavenly sound... My ears! Young Master Huang, don't you have any conscience...?"
"Just a few dishes, and you're already this drunk?"
"What kind of singing is that? Why didn't anyone else in the bar rush up and beat him up?"
"Heh, look at this guy's physique. If you were there, would you dare go up there? Obviously, no one could beat him!"
"Could this be the bar owner? Does he open a bar just to have a free audience?"
"Young Master Huang, you can suffer as you please, why bother posting this to make things difficult for us?"
"Why do I see that girl in the bottom left corner of the video looking so engrossed and focused? Is she that bald guy's girlfriend?"
Then came Huang Shao's own reply to the post on WeChat Moments: "When I first heard it, I thought it was fantastic, like being at a concert... but the video recording doesn't quite capture it. Now I think it's probably related to the atmosphere at the bar. It wasn't just me; the whole bar applauded after he finished singing."
Someone replied below, "Why are you all being so obsequious? Is his last name Ma...?"
The screenshot only shows a portion of the comments, Xiang Kun wasn't particularly concerned about the rest. What interested him more was how "Young Master Huang" would feel when he watched the video later.
After Xiang Kun finished his performance, the "Emotional Assimilation" had already ceased to have any effect. If any of the bar patrons recorded the incident, they would likely see the actual situation without any emotional interference when they reviewed the footage.
However, it's clear that "Young Master Huang" posted this video on his WeChat Moments not to incite his friends to criticize the singer, but because he was still somewhat unsure of his own judgment.
In other words, even after the direct effects of "Emotional Assimilation" have disappeared, the personal experience and memory of that experience can still interfere with their judgment. When watching the same video, they cannot make a completely objective judgment and their cognition will be interfered with by the memory.
Xiang Kun thus speculated that people who have been affected by "Emotional Assimilation" once are likely to become more easily influenced.
Tang Baona, of course, had no idea what Xiang Kun had been thinking about based on those few screenshots. She continued to message him, "Your singing ability is truly a mystery! The first time we played Dou Dizhu, your singing made us feel like we were the ones being punished... But on my birthday, you sang 'A Someone Like Me' so well. And then in this video, your level went back to what it was before. Is that the only song you're good at?"
"I am indeed more familiar with that song," Xiang Kun replied.
"When are you planning to have that rabbit meat feast?"
"Let's talk in a few days. I'm out taking care of some things right now. I'll contact you when I get back."
"OK, then we'll wait for your summons."
After ending his chat with Tang Baona, Xiang Kun continued to wander Yangcheng City.
Although he was just wandering around aimlessly, he had roughly studied the map of Yangcheng City before coming, so he actually had a general idea of the location and route in his mind.
It started with the area around Guo Tianxiang's home and clinic. Although they dared not get too close to these two places, the area within a kilometer should not attract the attention of the police who were monitoring the area.
Since Guo Tianxiang lived in Yang City, he must have left traces and memories around his residence and workplace. We can try to search for Guo Tianxiang's memories by looking at the surrounding scenery.
Secondly, based on some background images from Guo Tianxiang's memory, as well as logical deductions, we can determine the areas he might have visited.
This method did help him pinpoint many memories and determine the locations where those images and fragments occurred, but those were mostly fragments like "walking on the street and staring at the buttocks of the woman in front of me," or "staring at the thighs or other parts of a girl on the street," which were of little value to Xiang Kun.
Xiang Kun couldn't help but sigh again, this Guo Tianxiang was really like a teddy bear, besides thinking about how to make money and blood, all he could think about was women.
Moreover, he had a vague feeling that Guo Tianxiang seemed to be deliberately indulging his desires, trying to numb himself through it? Or was he trying to escape something?
It's a pity we can't go to his clinic or residence; otherwise, we could definitely find more valuable memory fragments for Xiang Kun in these private places.
He had previously considered organizing and systematizing Guo Tianxiang's vast and chaotic memory fragments to extract the information he wanted, find the reasons for the mutations, the process of the mutations, and the ways in which various abilities were acquired. It was unrealistic to rely on slowly reviewing and analyzing each memory fragment one by one, using his own brainpower to filter them. Although his brain's calculation and various thinking abilities were much stronger than before, completing this task would still take far too long.
Therefore, his idea is to use various methods to reverse analyze Guo Tianxiang's personality and way of thinking, and to link and anchor real-life scenarios with his memory fragments, ultimately obtaining a memory fragment storage system that can be easily accessed and retrieved at any time.
However, the arrival of the police disrupted his plans, forcing him to rethink his ideas or postpone them. If the police couldn't find any clues, they naturally wouldn't be able to maintain such a high level of attention and investment after a year or two, and then return to the same place.
As he was pondering this, Xiang Kun realized that he had unknowingly walked onto a bridge spanning a river.
Guo Tianxiang would definitely not walk across the river bridge, Xiang Kun prepared to turn back without thinking. But after taking only a few steps, he suddenly stopped and looked up at the river view outside the bridge.
He suddenly realized that he could use the scene and images in front of him to match the same memory fragments in Guo Tianxiang's memory.
Did that guy really once walk up to the bridge to enjoy the view?
Xiang Kun stood by the railing, his gaze rising from the dark river surface to the moon in the sky.
Today is the 14th day of the ninth lunar month. The moon is already very full, and in Guo Tianxiang's corresponding memory, it is also a full moon.
Xiang Kun frowned slightly. In Guo Tianxiang's memory fragments, he rarely saw such a simple "viewing the scenery" scene. Moreover, after this scene appeared, he immediately saw a man and a woman lying in a pool of blood.
The fact that the image of the man and woman appeared when Xiang Kun searched Guo Tianxiang's memories using the scene before Xiang Kun can only mean that when Guo Tianxiang was looking at the moon and the scenery here, these past scenes were constantly repeating in his mind, thus establishing a connection.
Xiang Kun had seen the scene of the man and woman lying in a pool of blood a few times before when searching his memories, but he hadn't paid much attention to it at the time. After all, this guy had killed quite a few people, so it was normal for any kind of bloody scene to appear.
But now he noticed something unusual.
The memories that Xiang Kun could obtain through blood were basically those that Guo Tianxiang himself had a strong impression of or that were relatively recent.
This memory, which seems to be connected with several other memory fragments and can be easily "activated," clearly holds a very special significance for Guo Tianxiang.
Xiang Kun immediately recalled a question that "August's Kasumi" had asked him when they were testing each other online:
Who was your first food?
Clearly, this was a question Guo Tianxiang asked the female hacker Mi Qiao. This question must have a very special significance; it could either help him determine Xiang Kun's identity or location, or it could determine Xiang Kun's strength or certain characteristics.
Could the man and woman in this memory fragment be the first and second victims who died at Guo Tianxiang's hands? Could this scene be the first time Guo Tianxiang drank blood?
Xiang Kun carefully reviewed the image of the man and woman lying in a pool of blood in his mind again, noticing that there was a knife beside each of them—a fruit knife and a kitchen knife. It seemed they had died in a struggle. Could they not have been killed by Guo Tianxiang?
In the memory, Guo Tianxiang was sucking blood directly from the wounds of the two men, without doing anything else; only his low, panting breaths could be heard as he drank the blood.
Did Guo Tianxiang know this man and woman? What was his relationship with them?
Perhaps, at this moment, Guo Tianxiang had just begun to mutate?
In that case, the images from this memory would be quite important.
After coming down from the cross-sea bridge, Xiang Kun thought he wouldn't get any more valuable feedback, but unexpectedly, when Xiang Kun inadvertently walked into a bar street, fragments of Guo Tianxiang's memory started to come back to him.
Judging from the footage that was sent back, Guo Tianxiang would occasionally come here to find bed partners who met his requirements and would spend the night with him.
Xiang Kun was focused on the memory fragments of a man and a woman lying in a pool of blood, intending to temporarily ignore these memories of searching for women, but certain moments in those memories suddenly made him realize something was amiss.
To verify the anomaly, Xiang Kun walked into a small bar and sat down at the bar. When the bartender asked him what he wanted to drink, an image of Guo Tianxiang sitting there, holding a glass, drinking and chatting with someone appeared in his mind.
"Red wine," Xiang Kun said.
"We have several types of red wine here, which one would you like..." The bartender pushed a menu over.
Xiang Kun instinctively wanted to choose the red wine that Guo Tianxiang had selected from the memory fragment, but before he could blurt it out, he noticed the price and swallowed his words back, instead saying, "Give me a glass of water first, and I'll order something to drink when my friend arrives."
The bartender didn't say much, poured him a glass of water, and then charged him 20 yuan.
Xiang Kun stared at the glass of water in front of him, his face expressionless, but his mind was in turmoil. He saw a fragment of Guo Tianxiang's memory, in which Guo Tianxiang picked up the glass of red wine and drank it sip by sip, chatting naturally with the woman sitting next to him.
This guy can drink red wine?!
Xiang Kun was extremely shocked because it was the first time he had seen images of eating and drinking in Guo Tianxiang's memory. After his investigation at the Western restaurant on the pedestrian street, he had assumed that Guo Tianxiang was like him, unable to drink or eat anything except water.
Why can he drink red wine?
When Xiang Kun tested what he could eat, he hadn't tried red wine. But according to his reasoning, apart from blood, the only difference between vomiting immediately and staying in the stomach for another twenty or thirty minutes after eating other things was that he would just vomit immediately.
Normally speaking, even if one vomits some time after drinking red wine, it's unlikely that Guo Tianxiang would specifically go to a bar to drink and vomit, right?
He's not the kind of person who needs to drink to find women, and judging from his actions before drinking in the footage, he seems to be genuinely tasting the wine?
Xiang Kun was a little puzzled, so after sitting for a while, he got up and went to the bar's restroom.
He wanted to see if he could see Guo Tianxiang to the restroom to vomit.
But when he got to the restroom, Guo Tianxiang tried to recall the surrounding environment, but to no avail.
Is there something special about red wine to vampires, or is there something special about Guo Tianxiang?
Xiang Kun didn't stay in the bar any longer. He had already seen all the memory fragments that the environment could retrieve and trigger, so there was no point in staying any longer.
He might want to try drinking red wine, but he certainly wouldn't do it here.
After all, he had suddenly discovered his mutation while drunk, and he couldn't be sure whether drinking alcohol would have any other effects, even if he didn't vomit.
After leaving the bar, Xiang Kun continued walking slowly along the roadside, still trying to recall Guo Tianxiang's memories by relying on the surrounding environment.
Occasionally, I'd pop into another small shop on the street, order a bottle of mineral water, and then wander around.
To Xiang Kun's surprise, he found a video of Guo Tianxiang urinating against a wall in an alleyway.
Seeing this scene from a first-person perspective made him feel somewhat bewildered for a moment.
Logically, after becoming a vampire, Guo Tianxiang should urinate much less frequently, and his ability to control urination should be quite strong. Besides, with so many bars and restaurants nearby, going in to use a restroom shouldn't be a problem; he shouldn't be unable to hold it in. Judging from Guo Tianxiang's attire, he's always been quite particular. Why would he do something so casual? Was he drunk?
After walking through the bar street, Xiang Kun didn't linger. Instead, he sensed the direction of the Ballpoint Pen Tip with which he had established a connection and went there.
In his perception, the bead had moved; it was no longer near Guo Tianxiang's clinic.
More than an hour later, Xiang Kun looked at the Yangcheng City building from afar and thought to himself, "Just as I expected."
The ball is currently inside the Yangcheng City, and the people monitoring Guo Tianxiang's clinic are indeed plainclothes police officers.
Xiang Kun suddenly had a thought: Should he find an excuse to go in and take a look? For example, he could report a case, saying that he had been pickpocketed and lost his money. When taking a statement, he could use his hearing to sense the nearby buildings and find the location of the two plainclothes officers who had been monitoring him during the day.
Then he was startled by his own thought and quickly muttered to himself, "Don't be reckless! Don't be reckless! It's pointless to do this, and it's exhausting and stressful. It's none of my business, so let it be..."
My tooth has been hurting these past two days... so I'll have to keep postponing the extra chapter... Thank you to the new leader "a1988ttttt", and on behalf of Liu Shiling, thank you to reader "Getting Something for Nothing, Wishes Come True, Impossible" for the character reward. Thank you to readers Lan Shiyu, 160915235305291, 20180827230804129, 20170212005248553, Ninth Master_, Cat Battles the World, Magical Mountain qz, Happy Energy Child, and reader 160915235305291 for the rewards.