Schemes Afoot / A Scathing Take

"It's so comfortable! I'm going to change my bed to this style when I get back." Elysia tossed and turned on the bed, which was big enough for three or four people to have a pillow fight, like a child, letting her body make maximum contact with the bed surface and enjoying the feeling of the fabric against her skin.

After all the commotion, the bed was covered in wrinkles and smelled of her fragrance. She lay there without covering herself with a blanket, her eyes closed, and slowly said to Lin, "Aren't you going to get ready?"

"What are you preparing?" Lin took out a contact lens-type terminal and put it on. The time in the lower right corner of her vision ticked away.

What else can a man and a woman do when they check into a hotel room?

"You know what? There's a lot of scenes like this in comics," Lin said, turning to Elysia. "Provoke someone, and then get killed and beg for mercy."

Elysia opened her eyes, tilted her head, and glanced at Lin, then smiled brightly, "You wouldn't dare~"

"..."

Lin shook his head, unsure what to say. He went into the bathroom and sat on the bathtub, lost in thought.

... Some people may misunderstand, but they come to book rooms, even presidential suites, not to do anything romantic.

After conducting two investigations, Lin felt that something was troubling him, and Elysia shared the same opinion. So, to verify the accuracy of this guess, they went to the hotel to check in.

When they went to the internet cafe to investigate, the clerk knew they were there to investigate the video recordings, so he had a strong motive to harm them. But later at the school...

In short, booking a room is about creating an environment, and booking a presidential suite is because there's no one else on that floor, so there's no need to worry about affecting other people.

As night deepened, the bright light bulb in the bathroom, shielded by his sunglasses, didn't cause too much damage to his eyes. Three hours had passed since they arrived.

Lin and Elysia were both waiting for something, patiently staying in their positions, until Elysia, who was dozing in bed, suddenly opened her eyes.

"They're here."

Outside the quiet corridor, two extremely faint, almost inaudible footsteps approached one of the only two presidential suites on this floor. One of them took out a pistol and a room key from his inner jacket pocket, while the other quietly took out a grenade from behind his back...

"Bang!"

The door to the room behind them, which should have been empty, was suddenly pushed open. Before the two could react, a dark figure crashed between them, pulled the hand holding the grenade out of its shoulder, and then delivered a swift, flying knee strike to the man's face, knocking him unconscious on the spot.

Then he turned around and lashed his right leg like a whip at the hand holding the pistol. Finally, he dodged the counterattack punch and landed an uppercut on the man's chin.

"Bang, bang."

The sounds of their bodies hitting the ground rang out one after the other.

Lin looked coldly at the two behind his sunglasses, casually disassembled the handgun he had confiscated, and nodded to Elysia was peeking out from behind the door.

"Um?"

The receptionist noticed that the man in sunglasses who had checked into the room earlier had come down again and headed out to the shop she had mentioned, but she didn't pay much attention and continued watching her show.

After a while, the man returned, holding... a rope?

The receptionist cracked open a sunflower seed, a common occurrence for wealthy people; they all enjoy these kinds of things.

Who knew that after the man bought the rope, he didn't go straight back to his room. Instead, he stood in front of the counter and stared straight at her. His gaze was so direct that it gave her goosebumps.

She had no choice but to force a professional smile and respectfully ask the man:

"Sir, how can I help you?"

The man looked her up and down for a long time before slowly approaching her, making it difficult for her to maintain her smile.

This guy... could it be that his female companion didn't satisfy him, and he's trying to take advantage of me? Please, no way, you rich bastards...

"You..." She had never heard such a cold and sharp voice before. Did this person grow up eating razor blades?

He approached slowly, his eyes behind his sunglasses looking at her. "You're very beautiful. Do you have a boyfriend?"

"..."

Ah! I knew it!

The receptionist smiled awkwardly, feeling that if he got any closer, she would grab her tablet and smash it on his head.

Then, to her astonishment, the man walked straight past the counter and into the reception area, heading towards her.

"Sir, this is really bothering me..." The receptionist's heart tightened, and her hand was already on her tablet.

"Whoosh."

In a flash, she saw the man's face wearing sunglasses.

Pervert... wait?

The receptionist wanted to shout "molestation," but the words stuck in her throat. She smelled a very pleasant, faint fragrance.

Is this perfume? No, perfume should smell much stronger...

The man was only wearing sunglasses and not a mask. She noticed that the lower half of his face had soft, feminine features, and even though she couldn't see his whole face, she knew he must be a good-looking person.

Her face flushed, and somehow she stopped resisting, letting that handsome chin approach her. She instinctively closed her eyes...

"Whoosh."

A gust of wind blew by, and she opened her eyes, staring blankly at the empty space in front of her, while the man had already retreated back behind the counter.

"Sorry, I misjudged you. You're not actually my type."

"..."

After leaving those words, the man waved without turning back and entered the elevator.

The receptionist watched silently as the elevator ascended, clenching her fists. "Men really are all... scum."

What she didn't notice was that a stolen room key had already been returned to the cabinet on her right.

Chapter 102 Conspiracy Unfolds

After tying the two people up, Lin threw them directly into the dressing room.

"Now we can confirm it, right?" Elysia watched him finish doing all this and then walked back to the window. "Some people in the branch have also been infected."

"Hmm." Lin drew the curtains, shutting out the city lights.

At school, the two of them tried their best to avoid attracting attention, choosing a secluded corner of the garden, but they were still found by the infected people, who also knew very well that Lin and Elysia were investigating.

Lin didn't believe that anything could spread online without leaving a trace, something even Prometheus couldn't find. At least, if it was just a simple video being circulated online, it would definitely be found one day.

Therefore, it is highly likely that this so-called urban legend is being operated by an individual or even a group behind the scenes.

Based on the information currently available, those infected after watching the video can behave identically to their original personalities, intentionally concealing the truth of the events and obstructing or even killing those investigating...

"The weapon models are all common ones on the market." Lin pushed the bullets out of the magazine one by one, scattering them onto the table along with the bullets on their bodies, like golden rain falling.

"A little clever... but not much~" Elysia took a bullet and placed it in her palm. "They just don't want us to associate the weapon model with the branch's people, right? But didn't they consider that the only ones who could confirm our terminal location are the Moth of Fire? And how could an ordinary person buy guns and grenades so easily?"

If the mastermind behind this is the Moth Chaser, then the lack of clues can be explained, since only the Moth Chaser possesses the technical skills to achieve this level.

"So what do we do now?" Elysia, though it was a question, she didn't seem nervous at all, still wearing a joking smile. "Let's go back right away, catch whoever we can, and subdue them all?"

Of course not. In fact, this is the only way Lin and his team can determine if anyone in the branch has been infected. If they go directly back to the branch, the infected people can simply pretend to be normal and Lin will have no way to find them. They certainly won't take action in the branch.

This goes beyond the category of "traitors." They were controlled, not capable of self-awareness and betrayal. The methods used to find traitors simply won't work.

So... what should we do...?

Lin was still actively thinking. The original consciousness of these infected people was just dormant, which meant that they could still be saved. What he had to do was to save the lives of each of them, which required finding out the true nature of the so-called "1:15 video".

Images, consciousness, moths drawn to flames, the internet...

These scattered thoughts connected in his mind, weaving into a net...

Give me the terminal.

Lin reached out his hand to Elysia.

Elysia looked at him with confusion, but still took out the terminal from her eye socket and handed it to him.

Lin casually tossed it out the window, along with his terminal, and it was swept away by a gust of wind and disappeared.

"Sleep."

Lin quickly slipped under the covers, while Elysia exclaimed in surprise, "Wait a minute, are we going to sleep in the same bed?"

"...That's true." Lin also felt that this was inappropriate. He poked his head out from under the covers and said to Elysia, "You should sleep in the bathtub."

After saying that, he pulled his head back.

"Pardofelis? Wake up..."

Pardo, who was drooling and dreaming of eating a lot, was shaken awake. She groggily raised her still-sleepy head and saw an anxious face.

"Uh... El... what was it again?" She felt a headache coming on, as if she had been hit with a stick. She had been hit once before when she was fighting with someone over a garbage dump on Dusk Street. She was dizzy all day and felt like her head was about to explode.

"It's Erwin." Erwin breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that Pardo had finally woken up. He had thought that Pardo would fall into a coma like those who had watched the video. "How are you feeling? Are you alright?"

"My head hurts so much..."

"It's a sleeping drug, isn't it?"

Erwin found a handkerchief laced with sleeping pills in the pocket of the student who was about to kidnap Pardo, indicating that they had come prepared.

This student was one of the people he was looking for; he had a friend who had fallen into a coma after watching the video, and he was one of the witnesses.

But why did this person kidnap Pardo?

Erwin easily subdued him. Even though he was not as good as the top Firemoth warriors, he was still a professionally trained soldier. He could take on ten of these ordinary students by himself.

But when he tried to ask the student why he did it, the student gave a chilling smile and then fainted.

"Where's your terminal?" Erwin noticed that Pardo's pupil color was different from before, indicating that the terminal had fallen out of her eye.

They searched for a while and found it in the bushes nearby. It seemed that the person had accidentally pulled out the terminal during the kidnapping.

"Give."

Erwin handed the terminal to Pardo and stood up with a serious expression. This mission had started off with something like this, so it didn't seem going to be easy.

Moreover, the crucial lead has gone cold; the only option is to wait for this person to wake up before interrogating him again...

To Erwin's surprise, the man never woke up after falling into a coma.

"Attacks of varying degrees?"

Upon hearing this report, the people in the command center raised an eyebrow, "Civilians attacking soldiers? What about the casualties?"

"There's no major damage for now, it's just..."

"Just what?"

"Only the Squad Thirteen leader and his adjutant lost their terminals and their locations could not be confirmed. One soldier was also nearly kidnapped."

He silently typed something on the keyboard, and after a long silence, he said, "The captain of the Squad Thirteen... is she Flame-Chaser? She should have her own judgment. Also, send two more squads to join the investigation. This incident has been upgraded to A-level. In addition to the original mission, we must find out the reason why the civilians attacked the Fire Moth."

"Yes."

As the situation escalates and more people are involved, this matter should be resolved quickly.

The commander who gave the order rubbed his temples. Lately, there had only been some minor incidents, and even small-scale Honkai were rare, making him feel like his body was rusting.

"The commander of the large-scale Honkai attack... should be arriving soon."

No one heard his whisper, and of course, no one noticed the eerie smile that flashed across his face.

Chapter 103 Sharp Commentary

"Doctor Spacy, it's been a long time."

"Didn't we just meet at the banquet? Doctor Mei really has a bad memory."

Spasi extended his one arm and shook hands with May, his expression revealing nothing.

His relationship with Mei wasn't bad, but it wasn't great either.

Spasi's view of May is complicated. May was the one who chose to abandon his wife and daughters, but there was nothing wrong with what she did, just as there was nothing wrong with what Lin did. It's just that Spasi needed an outlet to vent his anger towards himself.

But compared to Lin, who was born with a defect, Spasi found it difficult to develop any more affection for Mei.

She was someone who truly put the collective before the individual, using collective rationality to completely banish emotions.

Spasi understands this approach, but finds it difficult to support it.

"Because the Fifth Research Institute has a lot of experience in drug development, I hope that Doctor Spacy and your assistant can assist me in drug development this time."

"I will." Spasi's assistant was naturally Sue. He changed the subject to the incident that had brought him to headquarters, "The coma incident... The widespread Meme Contamination has polluted the minds and consciousness of the victims, causing them to exhibit aggression towards members of the Firemoth and to fall into a coma. Has anyone been found out who is spreading it?"