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墨書 Inktalez
Zhong Kui's Diary
When I woke up, I found myself lying next to the photocopier in the office hall. It was eerily quiet, as if nothing had happened. Could it be that I just had a dream?
I sat up and rubbed the back of my head, immediately wincing in pain. I inhaled sharply, feeling a large bump; damn, it turned out I wasn't dreaming.
Shaking my head, I stood up and pulled a golden ball from my spatial bag, gripping it tightly in my hand as I began to check each office cubicle.
After walking around the hall, I discovered that there was no one in the cubicles. It seemed everyone had retreated after I fainted.
What were these people thinking? Did they really ambush me just to knock me out? Confused, I put away the golden ball and walked over to the photocopier. Just as I was about to call Sima Sanguang, I noticed that the USB drive on the photocopier had been removed.
No way, could they have come to steal this USB drive? That makes no sense; it's not some unique secret formula. I have the software in my email; I could easily find another USB drive and download it again. How hard could that be?
Oh right, there's a shared USB drive in our office department. I can just go copy the software from there.
Just as I was about to leave, the photocopier buzzed and spat out a piece of paper.
“Zheng Nan, you have three seconds. If you don't leave now, we will get serious.”
“Tch, get serious? Come on, will you turn into Optimus Prime?” I sneered and pulled out the golden ball again, shouting as I activated the restriction.
The photocopier hummed loudly and spat out three sheets of paper in succession.
One.
Two.
Three.
I tightly gripped the golden sphere, feeling it was still not secure enough, so I took out another golden sphere and activated the Restriction.
The Photocopier made a clicking sound and suddenly shut down, leaving the entire hall in dead silence. I leaned forward, keeping my body in a highly alert state, ready to strike at any sign of abnormality. Damn it, with two Grandmaster Level Restrictions in place, even a master of Ji Wuyuan's caliber would probably have a headache.
Time passed second by second, yet there was no sign of anything unusual in the hall. What on earth was going on?
Silence, dead silence; I could even hear my heartbeat—thump, thump...
Silence!
Thump... thump...
Silence!
Thump thump...
Thump... thump...
My heartbeat quickened and then slowed down again, just as it was about to return to normal...
With a crisp sound, I heard a clear noise. My muscles tensed up, and I positioned my hands holding the golden spheres defensively. Following the sound, I saw that the Photocopier had turned on again, and with a buzzing sound, a sheet of paper was ejected.
Cautiously, I leaned over and used a finger to wipe the paper on the ground. Upon looking at it, I saw a few words written on it.
"Just kidding, don't take it too seriously."
In an instant, I was furious, my anger boiling over. I walked over and directly unplugged the Power Supply from the Photocopier, cursing under my breath, "Damn it, what kind of joke is this? Go to hell!"
Taking a deep breath, I thought about heading to the department office to copy Sima Sanguang's software first. Just as I took a couple of steps, there was another beep—the Photocopier had turned on again. Looking at the faint blue control panel made my scalp tingle because at that moment, the Power Supply plug I had just removed was still sitting on top of the Photocopier.
Amidst the buzzing sound, the Photocopier spat out another sheet of paper, which read: "Why bother?"
I felt a dryness in my throat; I wanted to shout loudly but didn't know what to say, so I could only stare blankly at the paper.
With another buzz, another piece of paper was ejected: "Are you surprised? With your IQ, it's hard for me to explain. You might as well go home and sleep."
"Damn!" I suddenly got angry, put away the golden ball, grabbed both ends of the Photocopier, and shouted loudly as I lifted this large all-in-one machine with sheer force, raising it above my head and throwing it aside.
Bang!
The Photocopier crashed to the side with a loud noise, several panels flying off from its body, and I had no idea which parts they were. At the same time, I noticed that another Power Supply plug was exposed at the bottom of the Photocopier; due to my forceful throw, the Power Supply plug had become somewhat deformed.
Damn, there was actually another Power Supply line. So that's how it is; I thought there was really a ghost. Looking over at the control panel, it was indeed turned off. I sneered a few times and shouted loudly: "Whoever is hiding behind controlling this thing, come out if you dare! What kind of cowardly trick is this?"
The office hall was silent; it seemed that the person did not hear my shouts or perhaps heard them but didn't care about my insults.
After shouting several times without a response, my anger had nowhere to vent. I walked straight to the shrine and grabbed the statue of Guanyu, throwing it forcefully onto the ground: "Damn, not coming out, huh? Playing tricks?"
The statue of Guanyu shattered into several pieces upon impact, revealing a mechanism inside. I exclaimed and crouched down to take a look. Initially, it was just to vent my frustration, but unexpectedly, I found one of the secrets.
A quick glance allowed me to understand the principle behind it. Guanyu's hand was shaped like a cylinder; the palm formed an inner circle while the back of the hand formed an outer circle. The inner and outer circles were separated by a flexible steel plate that could be controlled by a mechanism. As long as you pressed the remote control, the steel plate would rotate. When it rotated, the palm would follow suit while the back of the hand would remain stationary. This explained why in an instant, the blade could turn from outside to inside.
Understanding this principle eased my mind; it turned out that everything was just human-made trickery. I stood up and walked toward the restroom. With each step, my thoughts became clearer. The clattering sound inside should be from a Mini Recorder; once I found this Recorder, all these supernatural events would likely be resolved.
As for the person behind it all, even though I no longer had the USB drive, I could still call Sima Sanguang to come to our company for an investigation to see which computer was controlling the Photocopier. At that point, figuring out who was causing trouble wouldn't be too difficult.
After searching in the restroom for a while but not finding any Recorder, I didn't mind much; that's just how it was. I called Sima Sanguang and asked him to come help us at our company. He readily agreed.
After hanging up, I called Tang Zian as well. It turned out that things were becoming clearer on our side; it wasn't some Demon but rather human-made trickery. We should be able to identify the culprit soon. Tang Zian was delighted upon hearing this and immediately said he would arrange for three top domestic female artists to have dinner with me—of course with all expenses covered.
I laughed and scolded him to hurry up and find someone to guard the photocopier I had broken, to prevent anyone from coming at night to swap it out or erase the evidence. Tang Zian readily agreed.
About half an hour after hanging up the phone, a dozen big men rushed in through the door, all smiling and calling me Ghost Brother. After giving them a few instructions, I left.
The situation was straightforward; as long as Sima Sanguang found the person controlling the photocopier, we could use him to uncover the one who framed Yeh Rong. This photocopier was like a vine; we just needed to follow it down to find the fruit.
Once outside, I called Kong Xuan, who was busy with homework. When he heard it was about late-night snacks, he simply said, "I'm doing homework right now, no time," and hung up.
I called Fatty, who also replied with five words: "Busy, do not disturb."
They were all a bunch of animals. Besides doing homework or work, couldn't they have some other form of entertainment? I couldn't even share the fruits of victory with them. Feeling frustrated, I took a taxi to my usual late-night snack stall, ordered two beers, grilled some food, and drank alone.
Just after taking a couple of sips, I heard a sobbing sound nearby, as if someone was crying.
Looking in the direction of the sound, about seven or eight meters away, a middle-aged man sat alone at a table. There were already five or six beer bottles beside him. Under the streetlight, I could vaguely see that his face was covered in tears.
The sobbing was indeed coming from this man.
I scoffed and rolled my eyes. A grown man crying in public like this was quite embarrassing. Clearly, I conveniently ignored the fact that I had also shed tears at the late-night stall not long ago.
I raised my hand to call over the owner and asked what was going on. The owner smiled wryly and shook his head: "Who knows what's going on? Probably just a lunatic. He’s been here several times before, always drunk out of his mind. After getting drunk, he cries and keeps shouting something about A Hong Teng. It’s probably a love triangle."
"That guy looks like he's in his forties; would someone that age really cry over love? I don't think so," I disagreed with the owner's theory.
"Well, I wouldn't know," the barbecue owner seemed uninterested in debating this with me. He smiled and went back to grilling.
Sometimes, such melancholic emotions can be contagious. As the middle-aged man cried, I felt a light sadness creeping into my heart and found myself feeling somewhat blocked inside.
I picked up my beer and walked over to sit beside him. Clinking my beer bottle against his cup, I said, "Brother, meeting is fate; let’s drink first!"
The middle-aged man looked up at me in surprise, then without saying a word, raised his glass and gulped it down in one go. I also downed half a bottle of liquor in one shot.
"Another round!" the middle-aged man burped.
"Alright, I'll drink with you to my heart's content!" I turned around and shouted to the boss, "Boss, bring me another case of beer!"
The barbecue boss responded from a distance, and soon he brought a case of beer and placed it at our feet, smiling, "Zhong Boss, do you want to bring over what you grilled as well?"
I nodded, "Bring it all over, and add two more squid."
"Uh, how will we settle the bill later?" The boss gestured towards the beer.
"Just put it all on my tab!" I laughed and pointed to the items on the middle-aged man's table, "Everything he consumes will also be charged to me!"
"Alright!" The Fatty Boss nodded and went off.
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