Can't We Just Talk Things Out?

"Where are Otto and the others now?"

While eating breakfast, Lin Wei took out the tablet with the broken corner again to check Otto's movements.

A person's energy is limited, after all. Lin Wei had to control the movements of Jackal, Otto, and Durandal, and it was really impossible to manage all of them simultaneously.

After leaving the university, Lin Wei had focused most of his energy on Durandal, and hadn't had time to monitor Otto's movements. He only knew that he was roughly acting according to his plan.

But he wasn't sure about the specifics, whether there would be any unexpected changes, or if it would be delayed. Although Lin Wei had been thinking about these things, he simply didn't have the mental energy to focus on them.

Only now, after dealing with the two troublesome guys, Durandal and Jackal, did Lin Wei finally have time to focus on Otto, the last, most troublesome, and possibly the simplest target.

"Huh? He's faster than I expected…"

He watched a blurry image of a motorcycle speeding past in one surveillance camera, then quickly switched to the next camera view. Then, another blurry image, and another quick switch to a new camera. This cycle repeated.

This screen flashing like a PowerPoint presentation even made Lin Wei feel a little dizzy…

"So this is Captain Jell of the Snow Lotus Squad? She's certainly an impressive person…"

Previously, at the central hospital, Lin Wei had gained a deeper impression of this A-rank Valkyrie through the memories of the Valkyries Yae Sakura had probed. Now, seeing it with his own eyes, he couldn't help but sigh.

"What a pity…"

For a moment, even Lin Wei himself didn't know what he was pitying…

He shook his head, throwing those inexplicable thoughts to the back of his mind. He tapped the screen, stopping the high-frequency flashing. Then, he swiped, projecting a 2D map of the entire city of Manila onto the screen.

With another wave of his hand, he brought all the cameras in the city, both public and private, under his control, and marked them all with small white dots on the map.

For a moment, the map was densely packed with small white dots, so many that it made one feel trypophobic.

"Tsk, I don't need this many…"

Lin Wei pursed his lips in disgust. After thinking for a moment, he simply removed all the unnecessary indoor surveillance cameras.

After this, although there were still many white dots on the map, they no longer made one feel uncomfortable.

Only then did Lin Wei nod in satisfaction.

Then, he tapped the screen, and some subtle changes began to appear. Every time Jell and Otto passed a camera, the white dot representing it turned red on the map.

In a short period of time, amidst this snowflake-like expanse of white, these conspicuous red dots began to quickly extend into a clear line.

Lin Wei frowned, still not satisfied with this. He snapped his fingers, simply reading the surveillance records of the entire city, and marking all the cameras that had captured similar images from 6 pm yesterday until now in red!

Soon, the short red line on the screen began to rapidly extend its tail, stretching all the way to the starting point marked as "Philippine National Central University."

"Hmm, that's more like it."

Lin Wei looked at this long and winding, yet fragile-looking, thin red line on the screen, looking at its small head that was still stubbornly extending forward, and nodded in satisfaction.

"Then, it's here…"

Lin Wei temporarily stopped looking at the red line, swiped the map, pulled the screen to another area of the city, and drew a big red circle at the location of Jackal.

Finally, he zoomed out the entire map so that the red circle and the red line appeared on the same screen, and then watched the red line on this large-scale map, slowly and steadily approaching the red circle.

Lin Wei stared intently for more than ten seconds, silently estimating the time it would take for this red line representing Otto to finally approach the red circle representing Jackal.

Finally, he gently swiped his hand, closing all the screens – he had gotten the answer he needed.

"Clap! Clap! Clap!"

Lin Wei slowly applauded, praising with a click of his tongue.

"Well done, as expected of Schicksal, as expected of Otto. They actually managed to find Jackal's approximate location on their own?"

He had already prepared. If Otto dropped the ball, he would step in and "help" him selflessly again.

"Sigh, I'm really working my heart out for Schicksal…"

Lin Wei gave himself a thumbs-up for his great wisdom and compassionate heart. But his hand gently activated Pandora, and in a burst of light smoke with a burning smell, he completely burned the tablet in his hand – from then on, this tablet, which had completed all its missions, was completely dead.

"Let's go, if we set off now, there will still be some time to chat with the esteemed Dr. Jackal."

Then, Lin Wei casually threw this piece of "unrecyclable garbage" in his hand into the trash can, patted the non-existent dust off his hands, and smiled.

"Otherwise, at Otto's current speed, if we delay any longer, it might be too late!"

"Mm."

Yae Sakura in the Stigmata space responded softly.

Although she felt a little speechless about Lin Wei's occasional antics, at this moment, she didn't say anything.

She felt tired just watching Lin Wei's various operations during this period. It was hard to imagine how complex the calculations Lin Wei was making in his mind every moment, and what kind of invisible pressure he had to bear for it.

She knew that Lin Wei was also fed up and had a bellyful of anger, but he just didn't want to show it in front of her.

But just because he didn't say it didn't mean she didn't know.

"Since he wants to mess around and vent, then let him…"

Yae Sakura thought silently.

But just as she was starting to think this, she found that Lin Wei's level of "messing around" made her flinch a little –

Lin Wei snapped his fingers, and from the void above the heads of the three World Serpent guys, black feathers with a faint glow drifted down, slowly falling in front of their empty eyes, and then gradually dissipating, returning to the void.

"Phew, I'm so tired…"

Lin Wei pulled out an eye mask from somewhere, put it over his eyes, pushed his legs lightly against the ground, and his body, along with the chair he was sitting on, slid out a bit with a "squeak."

Lin Wei straightened his body, stretched long and hard, let out a comfortable groan, and then slumped in the chair like a broken rag doll, muttering.

"There's still some time before the final scene, let me catch up on some sleep first…"

"…"

Yae Sakura in the Stigmata space was speechless. Can't you be a little more serious?

I said I didn't mind you messing around, but I didn't say you could mess around like this!

But she didn't have time to scold Lin Wei. Because the moment he slumped down, as if a switch had been pressed, the three World Serpent members who had been sitting motionless in the distance like puppets suddenly moved in unison.

"Hmm? Where was I?"

The leader was stunned for a moment. He only remembered that he seemed to be saying something just now, but how come he suddenly didn't know what he was supposed to say?

A teammate next to him recalled after much thought, and said with some uncertainty,

"We should report the mission status to Jackal-sama?"

"Oh right, right, right! I almost forgot, I'm so damn careless!"

The leader suddenly realized, half relieved and half annoyed, patted his forehead, then stood up, slightly straightened his collar, respectfully opened the communicator, and carefully reported,

"Jackal-sama, your subordinate has successfully completed the mission, please give your instructions."

As he spoke, he also moved the camera towards Lin Wei, allowing Jackal to clearly see the "unconscious" Lin Wei.

"Mm."

Jackal saw the man who had left a deep impression on her from the screen. Seeing the guy who had been extremely arrogant before now lying there like a dead dog, she couldn't help but feel a sense of revenge, and couldn't help but want to take a closer look at this rare scene.

This closer look, however, made her frown suddenly.

"You even put an eye mask on him?"

The leader looked back at Lin Wei, searched his memory, and hurriedly explained,

"The target is only in a coma, not dead. We were afraid that he would wake up and see something he shouldn't, so we blindfolded him…"

"Is that so? You're quite thoughtful…"

Jackal said with sarcasm disguised as praise, then raised her eyebrows and said furiously,

"Then why didn't you tie this damn guy's hands and feet?"

The three people around Lin Wei were instantly covered in cold sweat. The leader hurriedly explained,

"Jackal-sama is right, your subordinate will tie him up right away…"

"Hmph, forget it~"

Jackal hadn't actually noticed anything abnormal, she was just making a fuss. Then she said arrogantly,

"Since we've already used a sacred relic like the Staff of Underworld, I doubt he can cause any trouble!"

Saying so, she couldn't help but glare fiercely at the "unconscious" Lin Wei again, as if she wanted to gouge out a few pieces of flesh from him with her eyes.

"Yes, Jackal-sama…"

The leader couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief and wiped his cold sweat.

"So noisy…"

Lin Wei, who was half asleep, pursed his lips in his heart and complained with some dissatisfaction.

"Hmph, it's just a small matter, no need to fuss."

Jackal, far away on the other end of the network, naturally wouldn't know what Lin Wei was thinking. Now that she was in a good mood, she didn't bother to pursue those small details, and just asked about the process of the action on her own.

"Did you alert those Valkyries when you captured the target?"

Jackal was a greedy person. She had already captured one target, but she didn't want to give up the other.

If the Valkyries guarding the hospital were alerted, there might be an unexpected change on the other side with the second target, and she would need to abandon the plan of "luring the tiger out of the mountain" and take the initiative to forcefully capture her!

"Please rest assured, Jackal-sama!"

When the three-man group heard Jackal say this, they all puffed out their chests proudly. The leader even described the process of their actions in his memory with great confidence.

"After learning that Schicksal's defenses were tight, we adjusted our plan in time and ambushed the target on the only way to the central hospital from the outside. As soon as the target stepped into the trap we carefully laid, he was successfully captured by the relic, without alerting those Valkyries!"

"Is that so? And then?"

Jackal sneered again. If it was so smooth, why did it take so long for them to report to her now?

Were they trying to hide something?

"And then…"

The leader chuckled awkwardly, and another burst of cold sweat broke out on his forehead.

"Hmm?"

Jackal's eyes turned cold, her eyes staring, looking imposing without being angry.

"It's like this, Jackal-sama, the Valkyries in the hospital did not show any unusual movements! It's just…"

That guy struggled for a while, gritted his teeth, and said recklessly.

"It's just… Schicksal seems to have other Valkyrie forces ambushed nearby. Just as we were about to retreat, someone suddenly appeared flying around in the sky. We were afraid that she was looking for us, so we found a place to hide."

"And then?"

Jackal asked noncommittally.

"And then… and then she disappeared."

The leader explained fearfully.

"We cautiously stood guard for a while, and no one appeared to attack us. There was no one flying in the sky anymore either. Therefore, we thought that we were just scaring ourselves, and that there were no real flaws in our actions!"

"Therefore, when reporting the progress of the mission to Jackal-sama, we took the liberty of wanting to conceal this small matter… but we didn't expect Jackal-sama to be so insightful, to see through our little scheme at a glance… Please punish us!"

Jackal nodded. That was right.

She had indeed been worried that she had been tricked again by that scheming little man, Lin Wei, so she had been relentlessly questioning them.

But since the information in these guys' mouths was completely consistent with the information Raven had told her, there was no problem.

In Jackal's heart, the greatness of the Serpent was unmatched. She didn't believe that, as a cadre of World Serpent – even a former cadre – would have the courage and behavior to betray the Serpent.

But these low-level peripheral personnel, these guys she regarded as consumables, it was not necessarily so…

"Hmph, good that you know, don't let it happen again!"

Since they had passed her test, Jackal didn't want to waste any more time. He couldn't wait to cut open Lin Wei's body!

...

After an unknown amount of time, Lin Wei, who was sleeping soundly, suddenly felt the eye mask being taken off. The dazzling white light penetrated his thin eyelids and shot into his pupils. This stinging sensation quickly woke Lin Wei up, and he frowned to adjust to the light.

He slightly opened his eyes and carefully looked around. He found that his limbs were firmly fastened to the experimental table with metal buckles, and the ceiling was a high-wattage surgical lamp. No wonder the light was so bright.

"Heh, you're awake?"

Lin Wei followed this sarcastic voice and looked over. He saw Jackal in a white coat, with her arms crossed, looking at Lin Wei with a sneer, gritting her teeth and saying,

"Didn't expect to meet here, did you? How does it feel? Are you nervous? Scared? Regretful?"

The more Jackal spoke, the more excited she became, as if she had taken revenge, she shouted loudly:

"Do you want to beg for mercy?"

"Then you have to untie me first, don't you?"

Lin Wei moved his immobile limbs, smiled at Jackal, and said in a friendly voice.

"Didn't we just meet yesterday afternoon? We are such close friends, Can't We Just Talk Things Out?"