Genius Club

Chapter 102: Chapter 99 Arrogance and Hypocrisy (Vote for monthly tickets~)

Ji Lin didn’t look up.

His gaze was fixed intently on the laptop screen, watching various news snippets quickly scrolling past, continuously rolling the mouse wheel with his right hand:

“The list you gave me didn’t capture the main point.”

“If the list is wrong… then go find more clues…”

The old man was quite vexed but did not doubt Ji Lin’s judgment in the slightest.

If Ji Lin said it was wrong, then it must be wrong—there was no need for questioning. This kid never let him down and never missed even once:

“Since you have ruled out all the possibilities on the list, you should go out and look for new clues. Hurry up and find the person who’s disrupting history… What’s the use of staying at home all the time? Will the person causing the historical disturbance just show up on your doorstep?”

Upon hearing the old man’s words.

Ji Lin sighed softly and smiled:

“Arrogance… you really are arrogant. How little you must think of the one disturbing history to say something like that.”

“Why do you say that?” The old man furrowed his brows.

“According to you, the person disrupting history helped Xu Yun by dealing with the Hibernation Pod Filling Liquid. Now that Xu Yun has died in an accident, unless that person is an idiot, they will surely be on guard and not dare to act rashly and expose themselves.”

After listening, the old man turned his head:

“So, you don’t want to startle the snake? You don’t want him to realize we’re searching for him, to let him lower his guard and eventually slip up?”

“That’s not the point.”

Ji Lin replied indifferently. He closed the laptop and raised his head to look at the old man:

“In fact, I’ve been thinking… how do we actually prove someone is truly disrupting history?”

He pondered for a few seconds, then continued:

“How do we define the original history? And how do we define disturbed history?”

“This can’t be explained in just a few words. According to your requirements, we cannot kill the innocent. It’s as if killing any one person wrongly would result in us losing the chance to receive an invitation from the Genius Club.”

“Exactly.” The old man nodded:

“We absolutely cannot kill the wrong person. We must strictly prove that they have indeed disrupted history, obtain the most accurate evidence, and then we can kill them.”

“Do you know the original history?”

Ji Lin looked up, staring at the old man:

“Do you know the original historical trajectory, the direction history was heading?”

“Of course, I don’t.” The old man shook his head:

“If I did, would I need you to investigate? I could compare and find that person directly.”

“So that’s where the problem lies, Arrogance.” Ji Lin spread his hands:

“You don’t know what the original history was, nor do you know the direction it was supposed to go. So how can we judge if someone is disrupting history? On intuition?”

“No way.” The old man responded decisively:

“We must find absolute evidence.”

“You see, that’s exactly the problem,” Ji Lin said with a laugh, looking down as he reopened the laptop screen, focusing on the glow:

“Then don’t complain about me being slow to act… You tell me nothing and give me no hints, so what choice do I have but to search online thoroughly? What if I could find some clues on a forum or something?”

Listening to Ji Lin’s laughter.

The old man frowned.

He finally understood…

The kid was doing this on purpose.

He still didn’t believe what he was told, suspecting he was being kept in the dark about something.

It was a provocation, a way to lure him into revealing more!

“Ji Lin, you’re trying to fish for information from me, aren’t you?”

The old man pulled up a wooden chair and sat down:

“Give it up, Ji Lin. I’ve already told you everything I know.”

“No, no… far from it.”

Web pages on the laptop slid across Ji Lin’s pupils as he blinked and continued to speak:

“There’s still so much you haven’t told me… like the peculiar way you demand murders to be carried out, it has to be a car accident, specifically between 00:42 and 00:43, within that 60-second window, to cause death.”

“This kind of inconceivable method is not only unsafe and not covert enough but also very difficult to implement. Sometimes we stake out for several months and can’t find a suitable opportunity to kill.”

“But that’s at 00:42, Arrogance… For a normal person, they’re already asleep at that time. How do you expect us to stage a car accident to kill someone?”

“Is it that difficult, Ji Lin?” the elder smiled, leaning back in his chair:

“I see you always do well in your tasks, don’t you? It may be a bit troublesome, but in the end, don’t you always succeed? Just like this operation, wasn’t it a success?”

“That’s because you had inside and outside cooperation.” Ji Lin replied indifferently:

“I’m really curious, what did you say to him when you met Xu Yun before the celebration banquet?”

“I said what you told me to say.”

The old man’s smile faded as he stared at Ji Lin:

“Ji Lin, you don’t see yourself as a good person, do you? You talk as if you are unwilling to kill Xu Yun. Your hands have been stained with blood over the years… It’s too late for you to play the good person in Xu Yun’s case.”

“Although I was the one who suggested killing Xu Yun, you were the executor of the plan! You know full well that it breaks my heart to kill Xu Yun, so why do you keep bringing it up in front of me?”

“If you really want to avenge Xu Yun, then hurry up and find the person who disturbed history! And use your brain to think about it! How to prove that he really disturbed history!”

“Then I’d like to ask you, Arrogance.”

Ji Lin said softly:

“How do you prove that Xu Yun disturbed history?”

“Because it’s impossible for him to have developed the Hibernation Pod Filling Liquid; he doesn’t have the skills!” said the old man, frowning:

“Isn’t that obvious?”

“Can such subjective judgment be taken as evidence?” Ji Lin spread his hands:

“Then I could accuse anyone of disturbing history. Since Xu Yun was clearly not worthy of my sister, did you not also disturb history by forcibly bringing them together?”

The old man frowned tightly but said nothing.

It was clear that he was unwilling to talk about Xu Yun and even felt a bit of aversion; it was a wound he did not wish to reopen, yet Ji Lin repeatedly tore it open.

“Speak up, Arrogance, if you don’t tell me the criteria, how can I start working?”

Ji Lin chuckled and looked down:

“You see, you indeed have something important that you are hiding from me. Your understanding of the Genius Club goes far beyond what you claim to know nothing about.”

“Since you’re not talking, let me guess.”

Ji Lin propped himself up from the ground and slowly stood up.

He walked step by step to the old man’s side, circling the chair:

“In the past, for every killing, your reason always revolved around the words ‘disturbing history,’ but when we talk about actual evidence, you really don’t have much to present. It seems more like you shoot the arrow before painting the target, or perhaps… you don’t even know what the evidence is, what ‘disturbing history’ really means. Instead, someone told you—”

“This person has disturbed history, go kill him.”

“Moreover, every time you kill, your requirements are very peculiar and bizarre, even incomprehensible. You demand the death must be by car accident, and the timing of death must be within the 60 seconds between 00:42 and 00:43.”

“Such behavior is really too strange, as if you are afraid others won’t know you’re deliberately killing. So I think… there could be two possibilities for this.”

Dah.

Ji Lin stopped in his tracks.

He placed his left hand on the old man’s shoulder, squinting his eyes and staring into the old man’s dry eyes:

“Either, you’re also an ‘imposter’, imitating someone’s killing method, believing that by doing so, you can join the Genius Club just like him. That is why you blindly use this method of killing without regard for the consequences, because you don’t know why you are supposed to do it.”

“Or, you’re intentionally ‘performing’ for someone, making it clear to them that these people were killed by you, like boasting about an achievement, as if passing a test arranged by the Genius Club.”

…

Listening to Ji Lin’s words, the old man remained silent, closing his eyes.

Ji Lin smiled and straightened up:

“There’s actually a third possibility.”

He wrapped his arms around the old man’s neck from behind, his right hand’s three fingers touching the old man’s carotid artery:

“These people who have disturbed history were the ones that someone from the Genius Club told you to kill.”

“He must have promised you something… given you some assurance. That is why you are so unwavering in doing these inconceivable acts, like a dog that bites on command.”

The old man’s heartbeat quickened, and Ji Lin leaned close to the old man’s ear, whispering:

“Arrogance.”

“Inside the Genius Club… whose dog are you being?”