Chapter 194: Little Zhuo, I Want to Ask You Something

Zhuo Shuqing felt he might not be fully awake.

Ever since Chen Ling had punched out half of his teeth in the outer ring, that calm and indifferent face had become his nightmare. Not only did the toothache keep him awake, but almost every time he fell asleep, he would relive the day Chen Ling delivered that "punch of justice." With each recurring nightmare, Chen Ling's face in his subconscious became increasingly filtered through fear, now almost synonymous with "devil."

He had finally managed to get a slightly better night's sleep last night. Yet, today, as soon as he walked into the office and sat down, the face from his nightmares suddenly appeared by his desk, startling him as much as seeing a ghost in broad daylight.

"You two know each other?" Feng Man asked, looking at Chen Ling in surprise.

"We met once, not close," Chen Ling shrugged. "Where's my workstation?"

"That's your workstation. When you're not out on assignment, you'll be writing articles here." She paused, then added, "However, since you'll be running with Wen Shilin, you probably won't have much time to sit still... we'll see how it goes."

Feng Man's finger pointed to the empty desk right next to Zhuo Shuqing's.

Chen Ling glanced at Zhuo Shuqing, a playful smile playing on his lips. "Alright, I understand."

"I've left all your things on the desk. Wen Shilin has the camera, you can just ask him for it later. If you have any other questions, ask Zhuo Shuqing; you two know each other anyway." Feng Man glanced at her watch. "I have a meeting soon, so I'm off."

Feng Man seemed to be a typical strong-willed woman, constantly busy. As soon as she finished showing Chen Ling around, she immediately plunged into other work without any hesitation.

Even after Feng Man left, Zhuo Shuqing still hadn't recovered. He stared blankly at Chen Ling, who was walking towards him, as if in a dream.

Chen Ling leisurely walked up to Zhuo Shuqing, flashing an innocent smile: "Please take good care of me from now on... Zhuo... what was it again?"

"This can't be..." Zhuo Shuqing jolted awake, speaking in disbelief. "You became a reporter?"

"What do you think?"

Chen Ling sat down at the workstation next to him and began to look through the items on the desk, which mostly consisted of procedural manuals, notebooks, and a fountain pen. Chen Ling picked up the fountain pen, intending to shake out some ink. The moment he swung his hand, Zhuo Shuqing beside him paled dramatically, instinctively covering his face.

Seeing this, Chen Ling found it somewhat amusing: "What are you scared of? With so many people here, do you think I'd actually hit you?"

Zhuo Shuqing's expression immediately turned extremely grim. He thought to himself, 'Last time you hit me, there were even more people around...' He didn't dare glare at Chen Ling, merely snorting coldly and turning his head away.

Chen Ling tested the fountain pen, confirmed the ink was fine, and then his gaze began to survey the surroundings. A dozen desks were arranged throughout the office area on this floor, two-thirds of which were empty. Most of the people working on this floor were reporters, and at this hour, many were likely out on assignments.

"Little Zhuo, I need to ask you something," Chen Ling said naturally.

Zhuo Shuqing, not wanting to deal with Chen Ling, was about to stand up to get himself a glass of water when a strong hand pressed down on his shoulder, pushing him back into his seat as if a mountain had descended upon him. Then, those five fingers clamped down on his bone like an iron vise, a sharp pain instantly shooting through Zhuo Shuqing's mind. Simultaneously, a cold voice whispered in his ear: "I need to ask you something... Do you have time?"

Zhuo Shuqing's face was chalk-white. He immediately nodded. "Yes, yes!"

"Do you know A-Cheng? Which one here is his workstation?"

Zhuo Shuqing swallowed hard and stammered, "A-Cheng... The one you're sitting at, that was his old spot."

A flicker of surprise crossed Chen Ling's eyes, and his hand released Zhuo Shuqing's shoulder. Although it only lasted a few seconds, Zhuo Shuqing felt as though his shoulder was about to fall apart. He abruptly stood up from his seat, put on his reporter's badge, and practically fled out of the office.

The reason he was still lingering so leisurely at the newspaper office at this hour was his laziness, combined with the fact that someone outside would pay him, making him naturally unwilling to endure the hardships of field assignments. But now, with Chen Ling sitting next to him, Zhuo Shuqing would rather be exhausted like a dog from daily field work than slack off here.

Chen Ling didn't stop him. Instead, after Zhuo Shuqing left, he began to probe the drawers of the desk with his fingertips. According to A-Cheng, he had transcribed the article about the "Hand of Salvation" and hidden it in a secret compartment of his desk. Chen Ling had expected to search for it after infiltrating the Aurora Newspaper, but to his surprise, he found it effortlessly.

Soon, his fingertips brushed against an almost imperceptible protrusion. As Chen Ling applied slight pressure with his fingertip, a few thin sheets of paper slid out from a crack in the wood above the inner side of the drawer. Chen Ling quickly scanned them, catching a fleeting glimpse of the words "Hand of Salvation?" With many people around, Chen Ling naturally couldn't unfold these documents there. Instead, with a flick of his finger, he made the pages disappear as if by magic, as if they had never existed.

Chen Ling sat in the office for a while longer. After about ten minutes, Wen Shilin returned to the newspaper office and walked over to Chen Ling's workstation. He seemed a little surprised not to see Zhuo Shuqing at the next desk, but then he turned and saw Chen Ling, who was so bored he had started twirling a pen, and he seemed to understand something.

"How do you like it?"

"Not bad," Chen Ling replied. "The atmosphere isn't as bad as I imagined, and my colleagues are unexpectedly interesting..."

"Have you met Feng Man yet?"

"Yes, I have."

"She's my supervisor, a good person... If you have any trouble at the newspaper office later, you can ask her for help."

Chen Ling nodded slightly. "What about the corpse?"

Wen Shilin's expression turned serious. He glanced around and then told Chen Ling, "Follow me."

Chen Ling followed Wen Shilin out of the newspaper office and walked straight along the street. As more pedestrians appeared and the surroundings grew noisier, Wen Shilin lowered his voice and said: "That body came from Frostleaf Hospital."

Chen Ling paused, looking at Wen Shilin with a puzzled expression. "How did you find that out?" In his opinion, Wen Shilin could at most determine the body's age, cause of death, or other physiological details, as those were the only clues left on the corpse. He couldn't understand how Wen Shilin had managed to accurately pinpoint the victim's hospital based on just a body.

"The state of the body was pretty much what I expected: the organs were professionally removed, and my friend found medical anesthetic residue in his system. There's nothing unusual about that..." Wen Shilin paused for a moment, his eyes narrowing slightly. "The key was the sheet wrapped around him."