Xiao Lin shook his head uncertainly. "I saw this thing with my own eyes in the Middle East; he's a person."

"What do you mean?" Guard listened vaguely and casually took out a cigarette to light. "What exactly is this thing?"

"You've heard about the Xiao Family's taboo, right?" Xiao Lin hesitated about whether to hand this matter over to Guard.

"You're hesitating about whether to let me get involved, aren't you?" Guard easily saw Xiao Lin's hesitation, he crossed his legs and exhaled into the air. "Even if you don't say it now, I'll still investigate."

"That creature is the Xiao Family's taboo, you could say he's a person, but also not a person." Xiao Lin's hands were in his pockets, the midnight wind was still a bit cold. "Before coming here, I was with Dragon Soul, and Qing Yi was there too. The old man said they indeed saw that person dissolve into pus, and he repeatedly assured me he had done all the cleanup work, so there should be no one seeking revenge. But what are we seeing now?"

"Very interesting." Guard was a bit eager, this was more challenging compared to those tasks dealing with high officials and internal scandals. "I wonder if the old man missed someone during the cleanup. There's a big possibility of that."

"I've considered that too, but judging from his firmness, it's unlikely. So I'm wondering if that person from the Middle East has come back to life using someone else's body? And that forensic expert you've seen, he's one of them."

"I'll check it out; I can't guarantee any results." Guard jumped down from the long bench. "You need to understand not the present but the past; you want to know what those old guys were up to back then, right?"

"Yes! Right now, it's whatever, sooner or later I'll have to face it. If I can't know what happened in the past, then I can't evaluate the present, even though the old man talked about it, but I feel he's hiding something."

"Got it!"

"Guard, be careful." Guard ran a few steps forward, then came back again. "Don't worry, I'll take good care of myself. It's just you and Yi..."

"To me, he's just a traitor." It's like a thorn stuck in his chest, impossible to remove.

"This shows you're too concerned." Guard squatted in front of Xiao Lin, placing his hands on Xiao Lin's knees. "Yi has his own thoughts and difficulties. You can consider his feelings from his perspective, just like you do with me now. If it were me, I'd make the same choice as Yi did."

"But he's not you." Xiao Lin understood what Guard was saying; if it were him, he'd also make the same decision as Yi. He's angry about being kept in the dark; even at the end, Yi didn't say anything, he had chances to speak many times, but he gave them up, this is what Xiao Lin doesn't comprehend or understand.

"Young Master Xiao, don't you think Yi's behavior has been strange since Third Young Master came? I think it's necessary to investigate Third Young Master before handling your task."

"No need, I don't want to know more, whatever they want to do is irrelevant to me, as long as it doesn't interfere with me, I'll treat it as if I didn't see anything."

Guard said no more, even the strongest people have times when they become ostriches, he believed Xiao Lin understood, and he believed the knot will eventually be untied.

"Tonight, I plan to visit Liuli Factory. I'm a bit worried since Hong is there alone."

"From here, it's quite a distance!"

"I've brought your QQ back." Guard tossed the car keys to Xiao Lin. "As a return favor, give me a ride."

Xiao Lin affectionately stroked his beloved car, he hadn't touched it for a long time, missing it dearly. "If your woman saw you like this, she'd surely be jealous." Guard teased Xiao Lin.

"You're getting ruder." Xiao Lin started the car, the perfect engine sound roared into the silent night, racing off eagerly.

Hong cradled freshly heated milk, biting a watermelon-flavored lollipop, sipping the milk. An old monster was being cleaved on the screen when a ghostly face suddenly disrupted the near-complete kill, forcing him to exit the game, frustrated, Hong put down the cup and opened the hidden window, entering a string of numbers. The ghostly face gradually vanished, replaced by scrolling subtitles and numbers, continuously rolling, while Hong's fingers didn't stop. He took out glasses from the side, putting them on, searching amidst the circles of numbers, murmuring in various languages, spanning nearly all languages of the Eight-Nation Alliance. This doesn't mean he had great language skills, rather, he only knew those words used for cursing.

"What are you doing?" Guard approached and saw Hong engrossed at the computer, muttering, completely unaware someone had entered.

"Ah!" Hong shrieked in fright, dropping the lollipop on the ground, shattering it.

"How many times have I told you not to eat this stuff." Xiao Lin looked at the pink fragments with an urge to curse. Hong, with congenital diabetes, never listened to his advice, always secretly indulging in high-sugar foods. "How many times do I need to tell you, before I've developed a medicine, you'll die first."

"Might as well enjoy life before dying." Hong retorted Xiao Lin for the first time, because of his bad mood. That bastard was cunning, he could never find this guy's trace.

"Why are you throwing a tantrum?" Guard was also shocked by Hong's anger, looking at the screen's scene. "Why, attacked again?"

Shou Bukai unhappily got up from the computer desk, holding a cup as he sat on the sofa. He nodded, then turned to Xiao Lin, looking at his expressionless face, feeling a bit regretful about his impulsiveness, but he didn't want to apologize.

"Do you know who it is? Even in front of you, an IT expert, someone dares to mess around?" Shou affectionately ruffled Qing Yi's smooth hair and sat down beside him.

"The person who attacked the central system last time."

"Did you stop within half an hour?" Xiao Lin leaned on the desk, habitually picking up his glasses.

Qing Yi didn't dare to look up at Xiao Lin, only shaking his head. Xiao Lin took a step forward, and Shou quickly squeezed in between them. "What are you doing? He's just a kid."

"He can't always be forgiven just because he's a kid." Xiao Lin stood up straight and pushed Shou aside, standing in front of Qing Yi. "I don't care how you play around, but do you know the consequence of what you did?"

"Lin, don't say anymore." Shou still wanted to protect Qing Yi, he knew his wilfulness but also knew his good intentions.

"As one of the Five, I can let you do anything, but this time you're outrageously wrong. Your competitiveness will lead people to discover this place."

"Then I'll leave!" Tears of grievance swirled in Qing Yi's eyes, he was genuinely aggrieved, he just wanted to help find that person.

"Stop!" Today's Qing Yi was acting unusual, both Xiao Lin and Shou felt it. "Leave? Where can you go?"

Shou timely stepped forward to protect Qing Yi, taking him to the side. "What happened?"

"Here!" Qing Yi took out a USB from his bag, it contained all the records from last time. Xiao Lin took the drive and plugged it into the computer, after opening a folder, there were several documents inside. "The second last folder." Qing Yi turned his head angrily, yet still told Xiao Lin which file to look at. "These were what I got that night, I think some might be useful to you."

Xiao Lin didn't directly open the file Qing Yi wanted him to see, but instead, rearranged them and found that each document was named by time. He thought he knew what this was, each document was a record from the past years, regardless of whether it was useful, but indeed there might be what he wanted in there.

Xiao Lin let out a heavy sigh, threw down the keyboard, walked in front of Qing Yi, and held him in his arms. "I won't apologize."

"I won't apologize either." Qing Yi still sulked, knowing himself that he was just a hair's breadth away from not getting out of that system, deliberately opening the cage to tempt these people into getting devoured bit by bit. "I found that group was looking for someone named Hong Lian, I had seen this name in an old newspaper before, so instead of finding that person's files, I thought why not obtain all the information from that period. So, while they were tracking another group, I got into their new system, and there were archives saved from twenty years ago, I didn't have time to look through them one by one, so I packed them all."

"Fool, compared to you, what do these archives even count for?" Xiao Lin affectionately patted Qing Yi's head. "Pack up, we can't stay here."

"Why?" Qing Yi widened his eyes, he didn't do anything.

"Shou, seal this place up, leave the Liuli Factory above and that's it." Xiao Lin instructed Shou, then turned to Qing Yi. "Now go destroy all systems here, including the computers and all communication devices on you, leave no electronic item behind, understand?"

Qing Yi nodded, he didn't dare disobey, but he was reluctant to part with those devices, all meticulously modified by him, destroying them meant starting all over again. "Can't I keep even one? Some devices can't be traced by them."

Xiao Lin shook his head, he couldn't take any risks. "I promise you a brand new setup, plus your own independent room and workshop, how about that?"

"Really?" Qing Yi was a little incredulous. All the equipment, that's quite a big expense, though Xiao Lin could afford it, the point was that some things money couldn't buy.

"Quickly, we must leave before dawn."

Qing Yi, after caressing each beloved item, finally resolved to input the last command on the keyboard, and in an instant, all systems crashed with an alarm sounding in the background.

"Move away a bit, there'll be a small explosion." Qing Yi had already hidden in the bathroom, only to hear a loud bang, and the equipment on the tables had turned into scrap metal. Shou leapt down from above and, seeing the flames rising, quickly extinguished them with a fire extinguisher.

"Did you want to burn this place down?"

"This is faster."

"Is everything above taken care of?" Xiao Lin asked Shou, who nodded. "Let's go!" (To be continued. If you like this work, please visit Qidian (qidian.com) to vote for it and support the author, as your support is my greatest motivation.)

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