Author: 长洱 / Chang’er

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

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Chapter 55

Probably extremely frightened, Wang Chao quickly came.

Lin Chen waited at the entrance of the school for a while and saw a taxi speeding in the distance. The teenager jumped out of the taxi; his face was extremely pale, his footsteps were floating, and his palms were full of sweat.

After he got out of the car, his first action was to shove the laptop into Xing Conglian’s hand and yell, “Captain, take it away from me.”

For a teen like Wang Chao, who was good at technology, had a cheerful nature, and spent his days dominating the internet, it was rare to encounter such an issue that could make him this frightened.

Given the current state of the teenager, it wasn’t suitable to talk about the case right now. Lin Chen took him to the small café at the school instead.

This was usually a place for professors and lecturers to talk about research ideas. Few students would come here. The environment was quiet and elegant, but the main points were the floor-to-ceiling windows and the large soft sofas, which were warm and relaxing.

Lin Chen ordered a cup of hot cocoa. After he served the boy the hot drink that was sprinkled with chocolate chips on top, the boy’s pale face slightly improved.

The sun was warm, dispelling the spring cold.

Wang Chao held the porcelain cup and took a sip of the hot drink. He felt the sun’s rays falling on him, gradually warming his hands and feet.

On the opposite sofa, Lin Chen and Xing Conglian sat together, quietly waiting for the young man to calm down.

After a while, Wang Chao put down the porcelain cup and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

Seeing his face turning red, Xing Conglian leaned forward slightly, rested his elbows on the coffee table, and gently said, “Tell me, how did you find them?”

“Cause I’m smart!” Wang Chao sniffled and motioned for Xing Conglian to turn on the laptop.

“The privacy of the deep web means I can’t use the usual retrieval methods to search for the videos I want. Even if I write a program, it’ll be an absolute torture to solve the problem, and the Captain didn’t give me that much time to write such a long program. Then, I suddenly had a flash of inspiration. In a place like the dark web, there’s one thing that can do everything!”

“What?”

“Money!”

The teenager rubbed his fingers very slickly. It seemed that his reliance was quite amazing.

“On the deep web, there’s a special reward website. If you have the money, you can commit any kind of crime, including murder and arson, so I gave it a shot. I posted the photos taken by Wang Shishi’s mother and offered a reward of 100 bitcoins. I was looking for the original video and the website it was posted on. Soon, someone sent me a private message saying this was a live broadcast website, and they gave me the entrance to it.” Wang Chao paused and took another sip of hot cocoa. “Captain, you pay this money.”

Xing Conglian couldn’t help smacking Wang Chao on the head. “Don’t keep people in suspense.”

“Oh, let me familiarize the deep web for you. Most websites require a special entrance to enter, and some places can even change locations with a click of a button. Only long-term members can enter. When I saw the entrance, the first thing I felt was that this website was engaged in some shady business.” To prove what he said was true, Wang Chao reentered the website at this time, but there was no webpage displayed. “When I entered, the website had already started a live broadcast. The angle of the video was very high. It seems someone had hacked into the surveillance of the school system. Then I happened to see someone jumping off the roof from the top of one of the buildings.”

“Did you take a recording?” Xing Conglian asked.

“I did.” The teenager’s response was unusually solemn.

He opened another video, which was on a website that was almost all black. At the top of the website were two bright words: “Blood Video”.

The structure of the entire website was extremely simple. It only had a live broadcast screen in the middle, a simple message bar on the left, and a cluster of golden flowers at the bottom.

Lin Chen’s gaze was fixed on the live broadcast.

After all, this was a surveillance video. The pixels weren’t high. The particles in the picture were very large, but the picture was still distinguishable. The location of the video was the No. 3 teaching building of Yongchuan University and the student square below.

Lin Chen recalled the arrangement of the entire school’s teaching buildings. Wang Chao was right. This was recorded by a surveillance camera on the roof of building No. 4.

Wang Chao entered a little late. The first video he recorded was a girl in purple jumping down from the roof. The girl was fluttering, like a butterfly, and had a graceful posture as she fell in the air before heavily smacking into the ground.

That was the scene where Jiang Liu jumped off the roof.

What was even more terrifying was that after Jiang Liu fell, the live video even switched cameras, and the picture became a close-up of the pool of blood. The girl’s head was bleeding as she lied motionless on her back on the cobblestone pavement as blood trickled away.

The expressions of the students on the sidelines were all dumbfounded. Some even squatted on the ground, vigorously covering their ears with their mouths wide open. There was no sound in the picture, but he could clearly tell that those people were screaming at the top of their lungs.

Looking at those horrified expressions, Lin Chen suddenly realized the live broadcast had even switched the surveillance camera screen to make the stream smoother, like a silent movie.

This wasn’t a simple suicide video. This was a carefully planned live broadcast of death.

Outside, the sunlight in the spring was warm, and the heating was on in the café, but all Lin Chen felt was cold in his heart.

He couldn’t help but look at the person next to him.

Xing Conglian was expressionless, but his eyes were moving up and down quickly, as if he were reading something.

Lin Chen moved his gaze to the message bar on the left side of the live broadcast screen and then realized that Xing Conglian had been watching the quickly refreshed messages.

Those dialogues flowed like water, making them dizzying to look at. Not only did it include Chinese and English, but there were also Arabic and even Russian, as well as some statements in a language he couldn’t distinguish.

Lin Chen glanced at Xing Conglian again, somewhat surprised. Looking at his appearance, he seemed to be unhindered reading these statements.

“What are the messages saying?” Lin Chen asked.

Hearing this, Xing Conglian didn’t answer but only pressed his hand, as if to say, “Wait a minute.”

At this moment, Lin Chen’s breathing stagnated. He saw himself appear in the picture.

Xu Haozhen was sitting on the edge of the rooftop; her feet were dangling in the air. When she heard the movement of the iron gate being pushed open, she turned her head.

It was an eerie feeling that made all the hairs on his body stand up. When Lin Chen saw the man who was walking slowly on the rooftop, he almost wanted to shout at himself, “Don’t be slow. Rush over. Rush over. You still have a chance to save her!”

However, this was already an established fact and couldn’t be changed by regret.

He watched himself come to a halt not far behind the girl and watched as the girl turned her head and showed a contented smile.

In his ears, the voice at that time came to him.

He heard her say, “Shixong, you must refuel!”

As if there were a big hand squeezing his heart tightly, causing him extreme pain, Lin Chen couldn’t help but lower his head and cover his face.

At that moment, he suddenly realized that no matter how much he tried to comfort himself, in the end it was just self-deception. He truly regretted it.

He wanted to save her, but there was nothing he could do.

It would be nice if time could be reversed.

Sitting under the warm sunlight, Xing Conglian saw the girl sitting on the edge of the rooftop and jumped down.

Even when the screen was dimmed, the reflection was a little harsh. He saw Lin Chen standing on the roof of the building with one hand half-stretched out as if he were trying to hold something but, in the end, stopped.

At the end of the video, it was fixed on Lin Chen. The young man wearing white seemed transparent under the bright sunshine and blue sky. He seemed to exude a powerful, crushing cold.

Xing Conglian turned his head somewhat stiffly and saw that Lin Chen was no longer looking at the video. He had his hands covering his face and was hunched over silently.

Xing Conglian wanted to reach out and put his arm around Lin Chen’s shoulders, but his hand also stopped half way out, just like Lin Chen… Because he found that Lin Chen’s posture was like a statue. He didn’t even tremble, so he wasn’t crying.

Indeed, this was Lin Chen. The Lin Chen who didn’t even need relief.

Xing Conglian retracted his hand and signaled to the waiter.

After a long time. Lin Chen felt someone patting him on the shoulder.

He raised his head, and his vision was filled with the sharp, handsome face of a young, mixed-race man. Because he was covering his face for so long, his vision became blurred.

A cup of hot coffee was stuffed into his hand.

Perhaps it was due to the heat that diffused from it, but he only felt the sight in his eyes was very beautiful. It had a touch of blue and green, like the mountains and the sea, and was basked in sunlight. It was so captivating and gentle that it made it impossible for him to find the right words to describe it.

Then, he heard Xing Conglian’s low voice.

He said, “It’s said that caffeine can stimulate dopamine secretion. That is to say, it will make you feel happier.”

For an instant, Lin Chen was dumbfounded.

What an asshole. Even the words of comfort were copied word for word.

The coffee in his hand was hot. He took a big sip, and it stung from his throat all the way to his stomach, as if he were downing hard liquor.

It was so hot that it hurt, but it felt real.

“Sorry, I was a little overwhelmed just now,” Lin Chen said.

Xing Conglian stared at him, only to feel that this sentence was too frank without any pretense. It was so sincere that it made it hard for people to respond to it. Xing Conglian felt that he should go to Italy to improve his coaxing ability…

Naturally, Consultant Lin didn’t know what the captain was thinking. He quickly packed up his emotions, and said to Wang Chao, “This website was closed after the suicide was broadcast live?”

Only then did little comrade Wang Chao come back to his senses. He looked at Lin Chen’s slightly pale face and said with concern, “Yeah, this stupid website is closed. A’Chen, are you okay? Do you want a hug?”

“I’m fine.” Lin Chen couldn’t help but rub Wang Chao’s head. He then asked, “What kind of website is this? Is it profitable?”

“It seems to charge people, but I didn’t spend any money to get in. It may be that the person who gave me entrance paid for me, so I just needed to follow a link and click it.”

Hearing this, Xing Conglian nodded, as if he approved of Wang Chao’s speculation.

As Wang Chao spoke, Xing Conglian pointed to the last content of the message board and said, “Someone here asked about the entrance to the next live broadcast and how to purchase it.”

Lin Chen followed along Xing Conglian’s finger and found that the message was in Russian, and underneath there seemed to be two responses in French.

“Did anyone answer?”

“No, they’re calling the Russian guy a fool…”

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Kinky Thoughts:

Hoo boy, don’t get me started on bitcoin. In 2016, when this novel was written, 100 BTC were equivalent to $37,500 USD. At its current value of this translation, it’s worth 1.67 million USD. At the peak of BTC, that was equivalent to 6.5 million USD. Well, I guess $37,500 isn’t so bad, but if that person kept their BTC for just 6 years, they would’ve become a millionaire.

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