Chapter 37: A Glitch in the Website?
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[Dog Editor-in-Chief: Where are the long shots? Why are they all close-ups? And why are several of them completely black?]
“It was pitch-dark when I found them, and there was no lighting over there. Those pictures aren’t actually black, either. There’s an image in them—you can see it if you brighten them.”
Yet this earnest explanation did nothing to satisfy the editor-in-chief.
[Why waste electricity on corpses? No one cares about these undocumented stowaways!]
[I don’t care how you do it. Get the scene photos for me immediately, before tomorrow!]
Shi Rang was still too inexperienced. His experiences in Pingyuan City had taught him something about life, but not enough.
He was ultimately no good at navigating human relationships.
If Ying Shang had been there, she would have seen through the reason at a glance: this was never really about the photographs. During that phone call, the editor-in-chief had sensed that Shi Rang was “in urgent need of money,” so he had produced a seemingly reasonable excuse and used it to seize him by the throat. First, to suppress Shi Rang’s pride; second, to tie him down while bargaining over the price.
Someone skilled at dealing with people might have cobbled together a few photographs, then used the opportunity to negotiate—or deliberately stalled in order to reclaim control of the conversation...
But calm, rational analysis usually existed only in hindsight.
And if you did not know how to do something, then you simply did not know.
Shi Rang pressed out his phone screen. The little bit of good cheer he had painstakingly gathered vanished without a trace.
“Damn...”
For one brief moment, he wanted to send a message saying, “I quit,” and walk away. But when he thought of the payment he had earned by risking his life—though that had not been his original reason for going—as well as the money he would need in the future to search for his family, he could only hurry out.
He had made his choice, and he would see it through to the end. As always, he would keep moving forward even if he had to smash his head bloody against the wall.
It was too late to return to Pingyuan City. The train took six hours.
Besides, he would rather die than go back to that dangerous place.
Shi Rang decided to head for the industrial district of Yunling City.
When he found a factory complex that bore some resemblance to the actual site of the incident, his heart began pounding uncontrollably. The shadow it had left behind was too deep; it would probably take a long time to fade. He hesitated at the door, but the blazing sun overhead finally made up his mind.
The industrial district in daylight bore no resemblance to the industrial district of that mad night.
Get this done as quickly as possible, go home before dark, and sleep soundly...
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There was a distinctly rebellious line in Shi Rang’s philosophy of life:
As long as he did not seek to climb higher, and simply did his own work properly, he would not need to understand the intricate, unspoken mechanisms of society disguised beneath the names of “connections” and “favors.”
But after spending two hours taking several photographs that, to his eyes, looked almost exactly like the real site—and even waiting for a thick bank of clouds to cover the sun so he could capture the right interplay of light and shadow—he sent them to the editor-in-chief.
His philosophy began to waver.
[Do you really think this chimney looks like it belongs to an abandoned factory?]
[The trees beside it are so green. Take a look yourself. Do you think that makes sense?]
When Shi Rang had written short columns in the past, he had either searched online for photographs or taken pictures of buildings that looked close enough. No one was going to verify whether the images showed the actual site of an incident for the sake of some insubstantial article...
But this time was different.
No matter how hard Shi Rang tried to frame the shots, the editor-in-chief could always find some reason to criticize them. The demands kept changing as well. One moment he wanted night scenes; the next, daylight shots of the police cordoning off the site; then, a while later, he would change his mind and say that silhouettes of people at dusk would also work.
Shi Rang hurried back and forth between one industrial park and another. He watched the sun sink piece by piece beneath the horizon, yet he could not take a single photograph that satisfied the editor-in-chief.
Gradually, Shi Rang’s thoughts began to drift away from his body.
Why was it always like this?
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“This is society. This is reality. Conscience is just something used to deceive children. Without the connections I gave you, you can’t take a single step!”
The harsh voice burst from his memories again.
“So, your wings have grown strong, have they? You even dare disobey my arrangements now?
“You think you can turn around and threaten me? You want to run away from home, is that it? Then get out! I don’t need a useless son like you!”
Shi Rang’s head grew heavier and heavier. He tried to argue with the person in his memories, but every rebuttal merely crashed around inside his mind before striking his heart.
He dimly understood the core of the problem, but the moment he thought about it, he felt sick.
Did he really have to curry favor with the powerful and imitate those hypocritical words and gestures just to survive in this world?
This was no longer a struggle against the editor-in-chief. He was also struggling against that person in his memories, against those voices.
But how could anyone defeat the voices inside their own head?
After searching all the industrial districts around Yunling City, Shi Rang stopped by the roadside. The pressure made his entire body tremble, and he could barely breathe.
At times like this, Ying Shang would have told him not to overthink things, not to keep lingering in the past. She might even have cried with him, helping him forget it all.
But she was gone.
He missed Ying Shang terribly.
Her name was like a healing medicine. At last, it brought Shi Rang back to himself, and he realized that he had been standing motionless by the roadside until his entire body had gone numb.
He could not go on like this.
He needed to produce something decisive, something that would leave the editor-in-chief speechless. Only then could he set out. Only then could he find her...
He searched online for abandoned industrial parks around Yunling City, but found nothing. Without hesitation, he entered the Central Administration Hub. Sure enough, within that website, which was like a treasure house of everything, he found the answer.
[Area requiring attention: The planned Yunling New District in the western outskirts of Yunling City was abandoned after the construction company went bankrupt. The industrial park, advertised as having received an investment of more than ten billion and intended to attract outside companies to establish factories, never became operational...]
Shi Rang hailed a taxi.
“Driver, take me to the western outskirts. I’ll guide you.
“Please drive as fast as you can. Can we get there before dark? I need to get there early and come back early...”
Curled up in the back seat, Shi Rang stared blankly at his messaging app, desperate for some support from the outside world.
Apart from Mushroom, he had no friends he could talk to. The online friend with whom he had once been able to converse for hours had not contacted him in many years and had become a stranger. But Mushroom had posted an update not long ago, apparently dining with colleagues. Calling her now would probably disturb her.
Shi Rang’s finger moved away from the message box.
Mushroom probably would not mind, but he still did not want to hand her bad news immediately after a pleasant conversation.
He returned to the Central Hub once more and opened the messaging page. His eyes passed over “Agent Kyle,” “Robin, Reserve Intern of the Logistics Department,” and “Harvey, Assistant to the Director of the Intelligence Department,” who had inexplicably contacted him before...
In the end, unsure whom he could confide in, Shi Rang began browsing at random.
He clicked on Harvey’s profile and was surprised to find that he could see the entries Harvey had recently viewed and edited. The latest two were [CVA-B-108-2: “The Stitched Revenant”] and [Online Meeting Minutes]. Shi Rang opened the former in a separate window to read later, then clicked on the second.
[Connection established]
[S4—Zinc: Is it safe to use the Central Hub under these circumstances?]
[S2—Crusher: This is the fastest way to hold a meeting.]
[Proposal created: Continue the transformation program and gradually deactivate all marked facility systems. (S11—Black Lightning)]
[Result: Rejected]
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[S1—Skyhawk: At present, we can only confirm that the “revenant” possesses no plant fibers or similar structures. However, we cannot rule out a connection to B-108.]
[S11—Black Lightning: The transformation project can’t be halted just because you say so. Do you have any idea how many financial problems this will create?!]
[Proposal created: Revert all proposals to the state before the transformation program and proceed with the investigation as normal. (S2—Crusher)]
[S5—Scorpion: Is there any need to vote on this?]
[S2—Crusher: Procedure must be followed. This incident has already shown that the transformation program was too conspicuous, giving outside forces an opportunity to infiltrate the facilities. If we continue, it will trigger a series of security breaches and containment failures. We should cut our losses. As for who the true culprit is, we can investigate that slowly afterward.]
[S11—Black Lightning: Oh, of course. A bunch of people who don’t have to suffer the consequences can say anything.]
[S2—Crusher: I’m sure you can solve the financial problems. Thank you for your hard work.]
[S4—Zinc: I’m more inclined to believe this was an isolated accident...]
[Parliamentary Voting Summary]
[In favor: 4. Against: 2. Abstentions: 6.]
[Result: Passed]
Shi Rang had initially assumed that these chat logs were attached to some file, supplementary material intended to enrich the story. But when he discovered that he could not see any information about the people whose usernames consisted of code names, he gradually sensed something strange.
He switched to the revenant’s profile and clicked [Edit], changing an insignificant period into a comma. After he saved it, the page changed, but the homepage’s [Recently Edited Projects] contained no trace of the “Mud-Head Truck” activity—as though he were a nonexistent ghost.
He entered Robin’s personal page and found that every piece of information about the other person was laid bare before him.
Looking closer, he realized he could even ban Robin’s account directly!
He could also read Robin’s conversations with other people!
[Group Employee Training]
[IOI (Robin, Reserve Intern of the Logistics Department): Is tuna casserole actually meant for human consumption? Why does anyone make a dish like this???]
[LOL (Jane, Intern of the Field Operations Department): Now you know why nobody goes to the cafeteria.]
Shi Rang sat upright in the back seat. His brows furrowed, then rose, and finally his expression turned blank.
Could he have encountered some kind of bug? Had he somehow been placed in the website administrators’ permission group when he registered?!
And Harvey, who had suddenly contacted him to ask who he was—could he actually have been asking, “Which administrator’s alt account are you?”
Besides, weren’t these people taking their roles a little too seriously...?
Just then, the taxi driver suddenly turned around, patted the headrest of the passenger seat, and called out to Shi Rang.
“We’re here, young man. I nearly exceeded the speed limit the whole way. Fast enough for you?”
Shi Rang glanced at the fiery sunset outside the window and returned to reality.
“Thank you, driver!”
He jumped out of the taxi, hugged his camera to his chest, and ran straight toward the industrial district overgrown with weeds. The precarious water tower and crumbling buildings made his heart pound with fear, and he could not help running faster.
He would make it. He would definitely get home before dark!
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