Author: 长洱 / Chang’er

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

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Chapter 301

“It is reported that at 12:15 PM yesterday, local Chinese time, 21 flights from 18 different countries and regions were set to repatriate the remains of 113 medical workers who had sacrificed their lives in Dana fighting against the Borna virus,” the newscast sporadically broadcast through an old, battered television.

The audio was somewhat fuzzy due to signal issues, but the picture was still clear.

Under the clear blue sky, an old runway appeared, like a purple-red scar carrying the unique smell of gunpowder from the Dana region.

The anchor continued, “The special plane from China has departed from the Angodo Airport and is expected to land at Yongchuan Airport at 15:00 this afternoon…”

The plane glided swiftly over the cement runway heated by the intense heat wave and took off into the sky.

On the other side of the world, Lin Chen and Xing Conglian stood outside the tarmac at Yongchuan International Airport, waiting for the special plane to return. Unlike the sunny weather in Dana, Yongchuan was experiencing light rain. Just around the Qingming Festival*, the spring rain was as gentle as suet. They shared a black umbrella, not standing with the team welcoming the remains, but gazing at it from a distance through the misty rain curtain.

*A traditional Chinese festival where Chinese families visit the tombs of their ancestors to clean the gravesites and make ritual offerings.

The past year had been tumultuous.

Many events occurred, not influenced by personal will.

The Borna virus continued to spread in the Dana region. Many people died there, with many medical staff brutally attacked by violent patients and losing their lives; most of them died in this way.

Fortunately, vaccine development had entered the preclinical research stage. Zhourui Pharmaceutical, after being acquired, had made a great contribution to vaccine development, seemingly redeeming itself. Lin Chen’s teacher and many victims of adverse reactions to brain health drugs were gradually recovering, but some brain damage was irreversible, including Lin Chen’s.

However, thankfully, the development of the antidote was very timely, and the situation wasn’t severe.

Counterattack operations were quickly launched.

A lot of user information was found on the servers seized in the Mailin area. Through decoding and a series of phishing operations, many participants were arrested.

A mysterious hacker made the names of all those suspected of watching the death livestream public, causing a huge uproar in society. But Wang Chao insisted he wasn’t responsible and continued working overtime to find out who was.

Unfortunately, the person behind Shen Lian hadn’t been brought to justice.

Sometimes, Lin Chen suspected that it would be difficult to attribute this kind of malice to a specific person.

It was a kind of evil far more widespread and harder to eradicate than imagined, deeply rooted since ancient times.

When Lin Chen thought of this, the person beside him squeezed his hand. Xing Conglian raised the edge of the black umbrella. Following his gaze, Lin Chen also looked up.

The plane pierced through the clouds, landing from the sky. The landing gear descended and hit the ground with a thud.

After gliding slowly for a while, the plane stopped, and the hatch opened. The urns covered with the national flag and the flag of the Red Cross were carried out in turn.

The light rain fell gently on the red and white cloth, some seeping into the fabric, some droplets still sparkling on the surface.

On the iron-blue runway, family members stepped forward to complete the final ash handover ceremony.

White-haired elders touched the portraits of their grandchildren, while young children gazed innocently at their father’s picture.

The short ceremony in the rain was solemn and silent. Inside and outside the television, countless people mourned in silence.

The live broadcast ended here. Someone picked up the remote control, turned off the television, and said to the female prisoner sitting in front of the TV, “Time’s up.”

Shen Lian stood up from in front of the familiar LCD TV, straightened her clothes, followed the person in front of her out the door, and walked into a long, dark corridor that would never see light again.

Yongchuan Airport.

A black special car escorted the families and the ashes of the doctors slowly away.

Xing Conglian’s phone vibrated slightly. He checked the message and nodded at Lin Chen.

In the Dana Rainforest, as the live broadcast ended, the doctors at the medical station left the small TV and got busy again.

Duan Yang had the day off today. With his backpack, he began to climb Xazi Mountain.

The jungle was dense. When he reached the peak, a gust of wind blew, creating waves of green as vast as the ocean.

Under the sunlight penetrating the dense leaves, under a towering tree, there was a tombstone. In the wind, Duan Yang stared at the grave for a long time, then he knelt down and kissed the stone deeply.

The drizzle in Yongchuan had stopped.

Xing Conglian folded up the umbrella, and Lin Chen walked side by side with him.

“What do you want to eat tonight?” Xing Conglian asked.

Lin Chen took his hand and said, “I don’t know why, but I have a feeling that we won’t be able to eat tonight.”

Xing Conglian’s umbrella lightly tapped the ground, and Lin Chen’s phone rang in response.

Wang Dynasty’s excited voice burst out of the handset. “A’Chen Gege, we have located his latest hiding place!”

Lin Chen and Xing Conglian exchanged glances and quickly opened the car door. The dust-covered Jeep was once again speeding down the highway.

Scientists have calculated.

The human brain contains more than a hundred billion neurons, each of which has between a thousand and ten thousand synapses with other neurons. This results in the total number of possible combinations of brain activities surpassing the number of fundamental particles in the universe.

Every time we think, a sea of neural nodes is activated. If you can imagine, it is a wondrous neural cloud chart, akin to a nebula, lit up with each breath.

No one knows where humanity will eventually end up.

But the brain is a magical organ that allows us to evolve from savagery to exploring the universe and eventually trying to probe the mysteries of the human heart.

And throughout our lives, we all hope to become better people.

Seeking truth, advocating goodness, yearning for a better future while grappling with our innate human instincts—that is the essence of being human.

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The author has something to say:

I haven’t written much in the “author comment” section previously, but now I can indulge in some chatter.

There are always lovely girls asking me for book recommendations, so I took the opportunity to list a few important ones. There will be a more comprehensive list later (although not too many).

The content on abnormal psychology in the text is a reference to “Abnormal Psychology” edited by Professor Qian Yiming. All relevant definitions and judgment criteria are based on this version.

“One Sand” was written 11 years ago and was my first short story. The main reason I decided to expand it was that there was a bug in the short story, and I couldn’t control myself. I wanted to fix it a bit, so “One Sand” basically retains the original look of the short story.

But because it was written a long time ago, I don’t really remember the reference materials at that time. The memory awakened by the market boss should be a reference to “NLP Rational Emotional Therapy”. The main line is based on “Systematic Desensitization Therapy”. There should also be references to the content of sand table games. Many books have been written about it. I really don’t remember the reference books at that time, so I’m sorry I can’t provide them here. If you’re interested, just look at the keywords.

The cause of “Two-Way” was an observation on the highway during a spring outing many years ago. The thesis mainly referred to “Car Auto SOS System Based on MEMS Accelerometer”. Normal mode is a commonly used concept in psychological measurement. Intelligence tests and personality tests are all research areas of psychological measurement. It’s probably the most boring subject besides psychological statistics. I didn’t find any particularly good popular science books. Professional psychological measurements usually have professional institutions and scoring standards and must refer to normal modes.

“Three Graves” mainly refers to “The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind” and “Fanatics”. Of course, the original intention was to write about an XJ organization, but this is too sensitive, so I wrote a more obscure story. In fact, there is no essential difference between pyramid schemes and XJ’s psychological control methods, but there are also many criticisms from the crowd. I won’t elaborate here. What I said is very superficial; it’s better to read the books. A friend once raised the issue of collective unconsciousness. Sometimes the use of proper nouns in writing is not rigorous enough. Please feel free to point it out.

In “Four Tones”, the method used by Lin Chen during his performance in Li Jingtian’s mall comes from research on the “bystander effect“. We often blame the more people there are, the fewer there are who stand up for justice. This phenomenon comes from this. The best solution is to designate a specific person, such as “Please help me, brother in red”. The request for help must be specific. I always think this is very useful, so I mentioned it again.

Regarding the listening ability of Mr. Zheng Chenggong at the embassy, it was based on a real story of a French agent. The results of the House-Tree-Person test in the gambling game came from “Psychological Painting – A Dictionary of Painting Psychological Analysis”. If there is no professionally trained tester accompanying, self-administration is not recommended. In fact, Lin Chen was able to guess where the item was, mainly because of his analysis of Li Jingtian’s physiological indicators, just pushing him to the limit, and then making guesses based on the results of the House-Tree-Person test. The rest is just for show.

The bug in Song Shengsheng’s teeth comes from a story about Saddam Hussein…

The setting in “Five Floats”, the Dana Rainforest, is based on the Congo Rainforest in Baidu Encyclopedia, and the virus setting comes from the Borna virus. The intention of going so far was to write a type of story I hadn’t tried before, including battles and a new text structure. Some people think it’s long, but in fact, Five Floats is composed of three stories, plus romance interwoven, which consumes more chapters. If you remove this part, “Five Floats” is actually very compact.

I apologize for the slow updates later on, due to health reasons and being too busy at work. There was a time when I slept only four hours a day and lived chaotically due to conditions like pneumonia and cervical spondylosis. Later, I went to CP’s house, and she took care of me for a while before I gradually recovered. Personal issues have delayed the completion of this novel, which should have been finished long ago. I said I would write six or seven, but I really didn’t have the energy to continue, and I’m sorry.

Moral dilemmas are a constant problem.

Mr. Kohlberg used this tool to study children’s morality. I’ve always wanted to write about the three levels and six stages of moral development theory, but it doesn’t fit in. However, this research on child psychology is very interesting. You can read “The Essence and Confirmation of Moral Stages in Moral Development Psychology” by [American] Kohlberg. It’s very comprehensive and detailed.

For moral-related content, “The Origin of Morals” refers to “The Selfish Gene“. The former is truly dry, while the latter’s theory is a bit shaky, but the game theory part is very interesting and worth reading.

But regarding the main line hidden in Five Floats, it comes from the book “The Psychopath Inside“. The author’s self-analysis made me determined to write a section on Teacher Wanshan.

“Who Decides – A Psychological Interpretation of Free Will” is a particularly good book, apart from the translation. It also solved a question I’ve had for a long time. Lin Chen’s design and analysis of the large vote come from this book. If you have time, why not buy a copy and take a look?

Likewise, I hope everyone doesn’t have incorrect expectations of psychopaths after reading this book. My personal view is that we should treat this phenomenon scientifically, not demonize it, and carefully consider how to be vigilant and help these people, who we are certain exist.

Research on the human brain, or, say, the mind, is an eternal theme.

Psychology seems pretty pseudoscientific, but “guess what I’m thinking” is only a small part of the discipline. This discipline itself involves research on human cognition, thinking, emotions, intelligence, logic, personality, social, and many other aspects. Looking at it only from the perspective of mind-reading is somewhat unfair to this discipline.

The title, Crime Psychology, was chosen out of laziness. I wanted to discuss crime and psychology, and felt it was suitable, so I used it. The legal settings in the text are mainly based on the US, combined with a police team that considers China’s national conditions. It’s really a fictional setup. I didn’t spend much time researching this aspect.

The four major families are introduced for two reasons. Firstly, to circumvent censorship—on Jinjiang, one can’t write about officialdom, gangs, or politics, and there will be no military intervention no matter what happens later because Jinjiang doesn’t allow it. Secondly, I hope readers will not have incorrect expectations for this story. It’s a bizarre blend of narrative, and it’s okay if you can’t tolerate it and decide to abandon it—there’s no need to waste your time, so I didn’t change it in the end.

The organization behind Lao Xing is a background setting, signifying a “door system”. Although every country has its own struggles, they all leave a back door for each other. When you need real help, you can knock on the door. But the door needs to be guarded by trustworthy people, and Lao Xing is the gatekeeper. It’s just a naive idea, and I won’t elaborate on this organization. It might appear in the story about Fang Aizi.

The “Three Graves” represented by Su Fengzi is a setup drawn from the phrase “To continue the sage’s uncompleted work for the prosperity of all generations*.” It’s an institution of scholars, and has been around for many years, but the current president is not a serious person. I might write about the story of the Three Tombs if I get a chance.

*The first half refers to the people who made significant contributions to Chinese culture and civilization, and their uncompleted work is usually seen as the pursuit of knowledge and wisdom that the “sages” engage in and each generation carries forth. The latter half is used to describe the ideal state of the world, where everyone lives in peace and harmony (due to the work of the sages and those that pursue it).

Regarding the real criminal, my idea has always been that it’s a collective of evil intentions. I don’t want to write about a specific person. Writing about villains is a waste of time. I prefer to write about those who are hurt and those who continue to resist. That was the original intention.

As I said before, I might write a story about Fang Aizi in the future. The story of the Underground Ring ends here. Honestly, I had planned to link it with the story of the twin drug manufacturing factories, which would’ve fit perfectly. But my friend and mentor, Sha Bao, said that overly refined stories lose their beauty, that not everything needs to be calculated. I think that makes sense, so in the end, I didn’t link it. Let’s leave it as a regret.

In summary, this isn’t really a reliable story, just a bizarre one. Take it as a pastime.

Finally, I want to thank some friends.

My friend Zang Yao was the first to encourage me to write on Jinjiang. I didn’t plan to sign a contract or enter VIP. It was a whim to finish a story, but then I ended up writing 1.2 million words, which I found quite depressing.

The design of Tern’s heterostructure comes from the formidable Lady Cat Pi. All the chemistry details in the text come from her. Such knowledgeable women are really scary.

The organizational structure of Zhourui, the issues with the pharmaceutical company, and the promotional details of Nao Kangning and Nordren all come from a former senior executive of a pharmaceutical giant. According to him, he gave me training worth hundreds of thousands, which I appreciate, but I’m not paying.

Thanks to my editor, Si Yue, who was willing to proofread this story even after so many years since our earliest magazine serialization. The proofread version from One Sand to Three Graves will be replaced soon.

Thank you to my mentor, Sha Bao, for reviewing my writing and giving me pointers every day. There are many parts I couldn’t have written without her encouragement due to my laziness and fear of trouble. If a chapter doesn’t have any typos, that means she helped me proofread it. I really can’t spot typos myself, and it troubles me. The steelmaking system that Lin Chen encountered in the steel plant was also her design. She talked a lot about it, but I didn’t write it very clearly in the end. I think it’s good for everyone to have their own interpretation, but I still want to thank her.

Also, thanks to Jinjiang for publishing this story. I was very surprised when the copyright editor came to talk to me. The contract was also signed very quickly, and I also thank the buyer.

Finally, thank you to each reader who followed the story. I’m really grateful. It was a real challenge for you all!

So, that’s the end of the story.

(Of course, there are still some extras…)

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Kinky Thoughts:

Alright, this marks the end of the main story. It’s been a long journey getting here. What can I say about this novel? I wouldn’t say it’s one of my tops, but it wasn’t bad. After reading the author’s notes, I got a better sense of where the author was coming from and why it ended the way it did.

Nevertheless, I still have my own criticisms. It makes so much more sense now why these five arcs seem so disjointed (as they were originally written as short stories). To be honest, she didn’t need to try hard to connect them all together, as that made the plot quite convoluted. It seems there was more to be written, but due to her poor health, she didn’t continue, which makes more sense why the ending seems so… abrupt?

Usually, when I read a crime novel, I expect a resolution, especially a resolution of the main culprit or the twist of who that culprit is. It seems the author went in a more thematic direction and just assigned the culprit as not necessarily a single person but a collective that basically represents the evil of human nature. Still, it doesn’t give you that satisfying ending of reading 300 chapters and not even having the main culprit captured.

When I first picked this project up, I thought it was interesting, but it didn’t meet my expectations for what I wanted from a crime novel. That’s not to say it was bad, but I don’t think it was necessarily my cup of tea… but as the author said, it’s not meant to be taken as a reliable story and is just more of a pastime novel.

However, don’t let my criticism reflect your own opinion. There are many chapters that I really liked, especially near the end and, of course, the showdown between Lin Chen and Li Jingtian. Overall, the story was interesting and kept me going (hoping to find out who the real mastermind is… only to be let down). At least there was surprisingly some smut. There is one chapter in the extra that has smut, which is 308, for those interested.

Anyway, if you like the novel, please consider supporting the author by buying the raws. You can use Google Chrome with their auto-translate and this guide on how to buy novels on jjwxc. Remember, only with your (financial) support can artists continue to produce more great work.

I would also like to thank everyone for your comments, encouragement, help with my translations, and ko-fi donations. It in part fuels my motivation to release so frequently.

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