Chapter 9 Very Good at Dealing with People
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[Event detected, generating mission...]
[Mission Name: "Good Chef Teaches You How to Be a Person"]
[Mission Objective: Investigate the truth behind "soup dumplings"]
[Time Limit for Mission: 24 hours]
[Mission Reward 1: Experience Points*100]
[Mission Reward 2: Star Coins*1000]
Zhou Yuan lifted his eyes to the back of the boss, with a note popping up:
[Li Xu Tian, a distinguished chef graduated from New Northern Culinary Institute, don't be fooled by his simple and slow appearance; in truth, he is exceptionally skilled in dealing with people.]
"What an exceptional people person," Zhou Yuan muttered to himself.
The rewards for this mission didn't include any item packs or skill scrolls, indicating the difficulty wasn't high, but he couldn't afford to be careless and end up capsizing in a gutter.
Making a move right here was clearly unwise. Not to mention the surveillance cameras everywhere, those men in suits were probably still nearby, and any commotion would definitely draw them over.
Besides, the mission had a 24-hour time limit, which was fairly generous, allowing for action to be taken after Li Xu Tian returned home.
— "Child of Stardust," activate!
Zhou Yuan opened the game store and quickly found the appropriate item through keyword search.
[Name: Tracking Monitor]
[Quality: Common]
[Special Effect: Lock onto one target within a ten-meter radius for tracking their location.]
[Note: With this item, the success rate for infidelity cases at Yebi Detective Agency has reached 100%!]
[Price: 300 Star Coins]
[You have purchased the "Tracking Monitor," Star Coins-300]
The Tracking Monitor looked like a cellphone, which made it easy to disguise; the top was fitted with a scanning device for entering the biological information of the target to be monitored.
Zhou Yuan pretended to play with his phone, while his other hand slipped under the table, taking out the Tracking Monitor from his player's backpack and aiming it at Li Xu Tian, who was kneading dough.
A few seconds later, the monitor vibrated slightly, signaling the completion of the scan.
He silently put away the Tracking Monitor and continued to play with his phone for a while. Then, as if suddenly remembering something important, he stood up and said, "Boss, something came up suddenly, can you pack this up for me?"
"There are bags over there. Pack it yourself," Li Xu Tian said, showing his hands covered in flour, indicating he was busy.
Zhou Yuan also used this short time to size up the other person.
Li Xu Tian was about forty years old, with a crew cut and a slightly plump figure. His skin was poor due to years of exposure to cooking fumes, and his hands bore many fine scars from burns.
His appearance gave off the impression of being simple and a bit slow, the kind of diligent and honest worker that nobody would suspect of being a psychopathic killer behind the scenes.
After packing up, Zhou Yuan scanned a QR code to pay and left the shop, not lingering in the snack street any longer. He took a shared electric bike and went straight home.
His apartment was only a few blocks away from the snack street, close enough to quickly catch up to Li Xu Tian if he made any moves.
Back home.
Zhou Yuan looked at the soup dumplings in the plastic bag and was at a loss. It was clear he couldn't eat them, but if he threw them away, there was also a chance that some urban explorers on a wild search for treasure chests might pick them up and eat them, which felt disgustingly wrong.
"Forget it, I'll just put it in my backpack for now and find a place to dispose of it during the next dungeon mission."
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Nine o'clock in the evening.
After cleaning up the shop, Li Xu Tian pulled down the roller shutter, lit a cigarette, and leisurely walked out of the snack street.
His gaze wandered around, inconspicuously scrutinizing the passersby, as if picking fresh meat in a market.
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"This one is too skinny, this one too fat, this one has indulged too much, and this one is simply too ugly... These few are pretty, but the perfume on their bodies—I can smell it from three meters away, I'm afraid they're already steeped in it."
"Tsk, the quality is just too low."
Li Xu Tian couldn't help but think of the young man who had come into the store that afternoon, with excellent features, obviously maintaining a regular exercise regime, the flesh would definitely be top-notch, a pity that he might never encounter him again.
Parking lot.
Beep beep.
In a corner, an old van made a noise; its headlights flashed a few times, and Li Xu Tian walked over, opened the door, and got in.
An hour and a half later.
He drove to a village on the outskirts of Xinhu and stopped outside a two-story bungalow.
Just like every other day.
He lit a cigarette, turned off the engine, and got out of the car.
He went to the kitchen to prepare feed and threw it to the pigs that had been starving for a day, smoking a cigarette and smiling as he watched them rush to eat.
Then, with a cheerful mood, he peacefully fell asleep.
·
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"Damn it, why does this byd live so far away?"
On the quiet road at night, Zhou Yuan, who had transformed himself with a "Disposable Transformation Card," gritted his teeth, stood up, and pedaled his bicycle fiercely, almost creating sparks with the chain.
To hide his identity, he definitely couldn't ride a shared electric scooter directly here, and the old electric scooter that had been with him for several years had heroically sacrificed itself in a fire, leaving him no choice but to dig out a bicycle from the basement that he hadn't ridden in years.
Though his physical condition was slightly stronger than the average office drone or sedentary college student, he was still just at an average human level, and his legs were nearly broken from riding all the way here.
Finally, Zhou Yuan saw the light of hope, as the Tracking Monitor showed that Li Xu Tian was only five hundred meters away.
Li Xu Tian's residence was called Feng Nan Village, located on the rural outskirts of Xinhu, surrounded by large areas of farmland and woods.
This area has been designated for demolition seven or eight years ago, yet there has been no action until now; the villagers didn't dare to renovate their houses, fearing that they would get the demolition notice right after fixing them up, which is why the houses in the village are still those old one- or two-story bungalows, dilapidated and ancient.
It is also for this reason that there are very few surveillance cameras in and around the village, installed only at some major road sections.
Zhou Yuan, who had received anti-surveillance training during his time as a security guard at Stars Network, was able to dodge the few scattered cameras.
Now it's past eleven at night, and the villagers have already entered dreamland. The Feng Nan Village is pitch black, where one can't see one's own hands, as quiet as a graveyard. Only the occasional barking of dogs slightly relieved the deadly silence of the village.
Soon, wearing night vision goggles, Zhou Yuan found Li Xu Tian's home. The Tracking Monitor showed that they were less than thirty meters apart.
The Steel Rose Revolver still had one bullet left, enough for an ordinary person, but he feared Li Xu Tian was not an ordinary person.
Out of caution, Zhou Yuan had made a paralyzing bullet before coming.
A paralyzing bullet required 300 points of spirituality, but the effect was very powerful—once hit, it could paralyze a grown elephant in seconds, and even an extraordinary person would suffer greatly if shot.
Zhou Yuan activated the "Ghost Walker" skill effect, silently rushing into Li Xu Tian's home, heading straight for the bedroom.
In the bedroom, on the bed, Li Xu Tian snored like thunder, sleeping soundly.
The night vision goggles allowed Zhou Yuan to maintain normal vision even in the dark. He looked around, and when his gaze swept over the overhead cabinet, a remark popped out:
[Who keeps a diary if they're a decent person, but Li Xu Tian is not a decent person, so he keeps one.
Inside the first cabinet on the left, there's a safe, and inside the safe, he keeps his darkest secret.]
And just then.
A chill rose up Zhou Yuan's spine, making the hairs on his body stand on end.
The sounds of Li Xu Tian's snoring had stopped.