Genius Club

Chapter 98: Chapter 95: The Safe (Extra for alliance leader SunriseBlaze!)

Buzz, buzz, buzz, buzz…

The surveillance drone in the distance was approaching along its patrol route.

The blank time in the surveillance blind spot was about to end soon.

Before climbing over the wall, Lin Xian had already sensed through the change of scent that the girl wearing the Ultraman mask was not Lee Ningning.

He recalled.

On the way running through the forest, there had been a period when Lee Ningning had fallen behind and then quickly caught up again.

Actually, given Lee Ningning’s agile skills, how could she possibly fall behind?

Or if indeed her shoelace had come undone or there was something she needed to take care of, she would have mentioned it to Big Face Cat and the others in advance. She definitely wouldn’t have fallen behind without saying a word.

She didn’t seem like someone who was so disorganized and undisciplined.

So…

There was only one possibility!

[Lee Ningning was ambushed in the forest, and the woman who ambushed her put on Lee Ningning’s mask to disguise herself as her!]

This familiar tactic was just like the way he had impersonated Big Face Cat in the beginning.

But the woman who ambushed Lee Ningning was obviously well-prepared.

Her figure was already very similar to Lee Ningning’s, slender and lithe, with similar height, and dressed in the same black bodysuit with hair tied up… The disguise was indeed effortless.

Moreover, with the Ultraman mask covering the face, it was impossible to detect the ruse in such a dim environment unless one looked closely.

And that ambusher was very cautious.

She didn’t speak and didn’t run to the front of the group, always sneaking behind.

At that time, Big Face Cat and the others were focused on their watches and the drone’s route, and they didn’t realize at all that Lee Ningning had been replaced without them noticing.

From this series of preparations…

The woman impersonating Lee Ningning had a very simple goal—

[She was using Big Face Cat and the others as a human wall to take the opportunity to climb into the Waste Treatment Plant.]

And this familiar plot, this familiar tactic, Lin Xian had witnessed too many times in “The First Dreamland”.

Linking that with the familiar figure and movements, there was a high chance that the woman who ambushed and impersonated Lee Ningning…

Was likely CC!

Therefore.

Under Big Face Cat’s urging, Lin Xian didn’t hesitate any longer.

He sprinted, climbed, and vaulted over the wall.

It was still very necessary to verify this answer.

The worst that could happen was death.

In his endlessly recurring dream, the least valuable thing was life.

…

But.

The moment he jumped down from the wall, he was immediately met with a gun pressed against the back of his head by the woman behind him.

Obviously, she had heard his shout of doubt while climbing the wall and realized that her identity had been exposed.

Even if she was CC.

In his view, CC was indeed a very familiar acquaintance, a partner he had worked with countless times, even a “friend” he had once chatted with leaning against a safe.

But for CC, it wasn’t the same.

To her, Lin Xian was just a purely strange person, and also an accomplice of Lee Ningning. Now that Lin Xian had discovered her identity, she was in a very dangerous situation.

Perhaps…

She might fire at any moment.

“Don’t be nervous,” Lin Xian said in a friendly manner,

“I—”

Whoosh!

Before he could finish, the person behind him quickly retreated like a rabbit, leaping away. By the time Lin Xian turned his head… she had vanished without a trace, her destination unknown.

Buzz, buzz, buzz, buzz!!

The sound of the drone’s propellers above him grew louder, rapidly approaching.

Big Face Cat had said that all the robots and vehicle equipment inside the Garbage Factory were blind, merely working according to programmed instructions.

But the drones had surveillance and alarm functions. Their patrol range was around 20 meters inside and outside the perimeter wall; they must not be detected by them.

The person behind him was obviously also very familiar with the drone patrols.

Lin Xian also hurriedly ran further into the Waste Treatment Plant, jumping and rolling to take cover under an upturned sofa, successfully evading the patrolling drone’s survey.

He checked his watch.

00:05

There were 12 minutes left until the evacuation time he had agreed with Big Face Cat.

He was indeed curious about whether the “switched-out woman” was CC or not, but right now… there were many other things he cared about more.

[Introduction to the Cosmological Constant]

[Historical materials from MX Company]

[Information about MX Company’s CEO in the newspapers]

Although looking for this information in the Waste Treatment Plant was like searching for a needle in a haystack, as there seemed to be no chance to infiltrate New Donghai City anytime soon, he still had to try it.

Lin Xian checked the position of the drone and ran a few more steps forward.

He successfully escaped the surveillance area within 20 meters of the high wall.

He turned his head toward the control room in the middle of the Waste Treatment Plant…

It was empty, the uniformed supervisor probably having gone for a shift change. The new supervisor would arrive at 00:20, and he had to make the most of this brief window of opportunity.

Even without considering jumping over the wall to leave, and not minding the loss of this life, the time he had to rummage through the garbage was merely a mere 20 minutes at most.

Although the supervisor might not have had a weapon on them, as Big Face Cat had mentioned, the drones were equipped with enough weaponry to kill, not to mention there were specialized security robots on standby at all times.

“Let’s go.”

With no supervisor around and out of the blind spot, he could act unrestrainedly.

Several robots and vehicles passed by Lin Xian as he continued on his way, all busy with their tasks.

Indeed, all blind.

The Garbage Factory was large, but the speed at which it processed garbage was fast, so there wasn’t a lot of accumulated waste. Lin Xian quickly climbed onto the pile of garbage to start searching.

Garbage of all sorts were present…

It was foul-smelling, sticky, and revolting.

But he had no time to care about that now.

He rummaged to the left and right, finding nothing but useless household waste, food, and construction debris.

He saw no newspapers, no books.

“Sigh…”

Lin Xian sighed.

Maybe it was just as he had speculated; the people of New Donghai City no longer read books or bought newspapers. They must have a more advanced way of reading.

He moved on to another pile of garbage to search.

While searching, he glanced towards the direction where the woman in black had disappeared, but saw no signs of movement.

It seems…

Garbage was not her target.

She had entered the garbage factory with another purpose in mind!

What could it be?

Lin Xian felt that since entering New Dreamland, he was in a state of “information overload,” and he would need to sort it out later.

“Found a book.”

Lin Xian was hopeful, despite the filth and stench around him—the thrill of treasure hunting was that simple and unadorned.

He opened it only to find…

It was a cookbook.

He continued to flip through it.

Lin Xian hadn’t considered looking for other valuable things, including the electronic products Big Face Cat had asked him to find. Indeed, he had seen them but didn’t bother with them.

This world, after all, would be destroyed at 00:42; throwing them out to Big Face Cat and the others would be meaningless.

Whoosh————Whoosh————

From outside the wall, a series of hurried bird calls suddenly rang out. Lin Xian heard it clearly—it was the sound of the whistle Big Face Cat had given him.

But… wasn’t it still too early?

Lin Xian looked down at his watch. It was only 00:13.

There were still 4 minutes before the agreed upon time to escape.

He recalled Big Face Cat’s words:

“Remember, whenever you hear this sound, retreat immediately, climb over the wall, don’t worry about anything, just run, run to the hilltop here and regroup. Don’t hesitate!”

It seems…

An unexpected situation had arisen outside.

Perhaps there was danger.

Or perhaps… the real Lee Ningning had come over, and Big Face Cat and the others had discovered the imposture of Lee Ningning, warning Lin Xian of the danger, urging him to retreat quickly!

Lin Xian picked up the whistle and blew a long note in response.

Signifying he had received the message, telling them to retreat first.

He didn’t plan to retreat now; the white light that would destroy the world was about to arrive—better to keep searching here a while longer.

After flipping through a few more piles of garbage, he still came up empty-handed.

As expected.

To hope for luck in finding the information he wanted in a trash heap was just too unrealistic.

It seems…

Only by breaking into New Donghai City and searching in bookstores or other novel devices would he find the information he sought, discover the history of MX Company and the name of its current CEO, and find Big Face Cat’s father’s book, “Introduction to the Cosmological Constant.”

Elsewhere.

A supervisor in uniform yawned as he walked by, sat down in the monitoring room, and started watching the screens expressionlessly, occasionally laughing out loud.

Lin Xian noticed that he was wearing something similar to a Bluetooth earpiece… and his eyes were darting around, as if he was looking at the air about a dozen centimeters in front of him.

It must be some high-tech device, something like holographic projection? Anyway, this guy definitely wasn’t concentrating on his work.

Boom————

On the other side of the steel wall, a giant steel gate rose, the thundering sound deafening. One by one, garbage trucks loaded with trash drove out from the gate, tilting their contents into different areas.

Boom————

The steel gate thundered down again.

Lin Xian looked in that direction.

Those garbage trucks were transporting the trash of New Donghai City from the city’s waste transfer stations to the outside Waste Treatment Plant for disposal.

Lin Xian watched as the garbage trucks dumped their loads, the assorted trash no different from the piles he saw in front of him, containing all sorts of things.

Even—

“Eh?”

Lin Xian saw a pile of remarkably familiar items.

Square, shiny silver, solid and sturdy, looking brand new as if just manufactured…

[They were the safes from The First Dreamland’s bank warehouse, inscribed with names!]

“Why are they appearing on the garbage truck?”

Lin Xian was astonished.

He was all too familiar with these safes.

In The First Dreamland, he had tried numerous times to crack the codes without success; later when he was about to cut through them forcefully due to the uncontrollable Temporal Flux, he caused himself trouble when the safes’ steel turned into an invincible aerospace material—new hafnium alloy.

He sprinted carefully to a new hiding place, continuing to observe.

Unlike other garbage trucks… the one that was dumping a load of hafnium alloy safes had little other trash; it was mostly those safes tumbling out.

Getting closer…

Lin Xian could see even clearer now.

His previous guess was right!

Those hafnium alloy safes each had eight password wheels!

“In vain I have searched far and wide…”

Lin Xian timed it right, and with another swift run, made it to a hiding spot even closer to the garbage truck.

He was curious whether his own name would still be on the safes this time.

If there was still his name…

That could well confirm that the contents were anything but ordinary! Even such massive changes in the future world could not make these safes disappear.

Moving forward.

He moved like a mouse with a motor, using parkour to dodge and hide, unafraid of the filth or stench.

Finally!

He reached the nearest cover behind the garbage truck and the pile of safes—

Click.

A small handgun extended from behind the cover, pressing firmly against Lin Xian’s forehead!

The familiar scent of camellias, the familiar Ultraman mask, the familiar brown coiled hair, the familiar shapely figure under the black bodysuit, and…the familiar voice:

“Don’t move.”

The sweet voice of a sparrow chimed from behind the mask.

A delicate, smooth hand lifted the Rhine Cat Mask from Lin Xian’s chin, flipping it open…

“Huh.”

The woman behind the Ultraman mask chuckled lightly:

“I knew it was you!”