~ Tasks and Stimuli ~

Regarding Su Mo’s retort, Chu Han didn’t feel upset, rather he actually seemed to enjoy it.

He licked the corner of his mouth as if pleased with himself. Looking at Su Mo with his ‘human-like’ eyes, he gestured as if slicing his neck, then finally disappeared from sight.

“Su my boy, who were you talking to just now? Did you discover anything new?”

Putting down the dressing mirror, Su Mo spoke while he was walking to a specific position, “Yes, it should be right here.”

The area of the wooden floor that he was standing on, was where the female ghost had disappeared. Su Mo jumped on the spot to try and exert force onto the floor. Suddenly a piece of the floorboard lifted up.

“Eh? There was a secret compartment! How unexpected.”

Having discovered something new, Mark, who found himself unable to get along with the others, revealed an expression of happiness and hurriedly gathered around the new discovery.

The hidden compartment was really small. On the inside there was only an old and shabby looking vanity box.

“A make up box, a dressing mirror. This boy was very delicate!”
Xiao Ya said mockingly while taking the make-up box.
How strange, “On the top, is that a letter of the English alphabet? No no, it’s not English…”

“Πανδρα!”^[1]Google translate: Greek; “Pandra!”

The voice came from behind them. Everyone turned at the same time and looked towards Lu Lan Lan.

To their surprise her face was a deathly pale palour as she retreated further and further backwards. Her legs hit against the corner of the two walls, before she cried out, “Don’t, don’t open it!”

Upon seeing her reaction, Xiao Ya didn’t dare to rashly open it. She felt the need to ask, “First of all, don’t panic. Tell us what is the meaning of this?”

“Pandora.”

A calm voice, without a single thread of hesitation, spoke out. Everybody’s attention shifted to Su Mo. With everyone looking at him, their gazes showing their lack of understanding, Su Mo unexpectedly revealed a smiling expression. “This is Pandora’s box.”

“Pan, Pandora’s box?”

A cold shiver passed through them. Xiao Ya suddenly felt that the box in his hand began to burn unbareably. Without pause, he started desperately trying to throw it away.

Xiao Ya continued with her efforts. However, everyone knew the person that ‘Pandora’s box’ represented. At this moment, everyone’s expressions were more or less worse than that of Lu Lan Lan. Except for…

“The key is grasped within Pandora’s hand!”

While everyone was still surprised by ‘Pandora’s box’, Chai Gang suddenly jumped up and excitedly exclaimed, “Excellent! Then the key should definitely be in there!”

Black lines appeared on Su Mo’s forehead^[2]A look of shock often shown in anime. Even Mark who had been beaten up by Chai Gang couldn’t bare to look at him. With a face that showed no effort to hide his disdain, he spoke, “Wow, it really is terrible being uneducated.”

“What did you say you banana?”^[3]An insult for someone who is “white” on the inside, but they are actually asian on the outside (-_ -)

Chai Gang grabbed Mark by the collar and went to hit him.

“Enough. Mr. Gang you stop that right now!”

Without acknowledging these two people, Xiao Ya subconciously looked towards the ever calm Su Mo that was standing within the group of people. “So the markings on the top of the box are Pandora’s name? Then, then…”

‘Pandora’s box’. Except for Chai Gang, everyone knew what it meant. Because they all knew, nobody dared to rashly open it.

“That… cough cough, can someone explain? Who is Pandora?”

Although ‘uneducated’, Chai Gang wasn’t an idiot. How did he not realise that he was making a fool out of himself?
It’s a pity that the grave-looking Xiao Ya and Dai Xingzhang both weren’t in the mood to acknowledge his question.

The self-proclaimed leader, Chai Gang suddenly felt himself unable to keep a calm expression as he felt himself about to explode in anger. However, he couldn’t find a reasonable reason, so he had no other choice but to drag Mark, who had a face full of resistance, to the corner of the room.

“If it really is Pandora’s Box, then we definitely should not open it!” Dai Xingzhang said in an agitated manner while firmly pressing down on the lid of the box.

As everyone knows, Pandora’s Box is filled with the God Zeus’s flames of fury. You only need to open the box, then suffering and calamity will be released to wreak havoc in the human world.

On the box is written, ‘Pandora’. In this world where people are doubtful about deities and supernatural occurances, it would be natural to feel a sense of trepidation looking at it.
However, many people are also unaware that in Pandora’s box, not only are there calamity and suffering, but there are also other things. For example: The Goddess Athena’s hope.

“Athena sealed her seed of hope at the bottom of the box and the panic-stricken Pandora did not find it.” Su Mo continuously spoke in a calm manner, with a look that made people want to beat him.

Xiao Ya stared at him with round eyes and couldn’t help but ask, “I also know about this story, but…does it really need to be opened?”

“Do we have any other choice?” Su Mo asked rhetorically.

In the end, everybody agreed to open the box. At this time, Chai Gang also returned after having finished force-feeding Mark with ‘science’. His facial expression looked as ugly as it could get. Although his expression was like that, he surprisingly didn’t oppose the idea to open the box.

Dai Xing Zhang had no other choice but to release his hold of it and get out of the way. After everybody had gone and hidden a safer distance away. Mark who had lost the game of rock-paper-scissors, with a face of apprehension opened the box…

However, no calamities were released. Absolutely nothing happened. The whole time, all that was in this little box were two things: A pink diary and a photograph.

On the diary there was a nine digit number lock, after Xiao Ya had tried the combinations, 19749516 and 19740517 yet was unsuccessful. They had no other choice but to give up for the time being.

“A man, wife and twins that are a boy and girl, this really is a happy family ey!” Dai Xing Zhang lamented.^[4]Cool side note: In there is a belief in china that if you have a girl, “女“ and a boy, “子” then life will be good and happy, “好“

Right, it was a photo of the family. In the photo the father was wearing a pair of sunglasses and holding the mother who was sitting on a bench chair in his embrace. The daughter was holding a baby doll and was shrinking back into the father’s embrace and lastly, the son was holding a plastic spade, digging at the dirt next to them with a lollipop in his mouth.

Looking right and left, they still couldn’t figure out what they were meant to do. When Xiao Ya was about to put away the diary and photograph, Su Mo abruptly spoke out. “The female ghost.”

“Female ghost? What female ghost?”

Chai Gang scratched at his head, “Bro, did you get scared silly?”

Su Mo didn’t acknowledge his remark, rather his attention had shifted to Lu Lan Lan that was still in the corner of the room. “Give her the photo to look at.”

Su Mo didn’t know whether Lu Lan Lan had come to terms with her reality and finally calmed down yet.

Xiao Ya handed the photo over to her. After a moment, she spoke with an uncertain tone, “Yes, it is this little girl, maybe? At the time I was scared to death, so I didn’t have the guts to look at her properly. I can remember that she wore red clothes, and also her age should be….”

“Just a photograph and nothing else, could it be a clue as to something?”

Dai Xingzhang impatiantly urged, “Hurry it up a little! Up until now we still don’t know what the mission is!”

He motioned towards Xiao Ya to put the diary and photograph in a secure place for safe-keeping. Everyone could no longer stand to delay and immediately opened the door to the room and left the first floor.

Stepping on the creaking staircase, they all arrived in a hall.

“Finally decided to come down?”

A strange voice was heard coming from the corner of the living room. Their gazes followed the sound until it came upon a woman sitting in a chair in the dark.

Everybody quickly realised that they had thought incorrectly. Because the woman was actually sitting in a wheelchair and she gradually pushed herself forward, revealing herself from the darkness.

Xiao Ya’s eyes shifted. She was the first to bring up the courage and asked, “Ma’am, you are…”

“Officers, you were all in my son’s room for so long, did you discover anything?” Exhaustion had starting to seep through into her words and her face looked completely wan and lifeless.

“Huh?”

Someone releaed a surpised noise and Chai Gang hurriedly went and covered their mouth with his hand.

The person in the wheelchair wasn’t a stranger. She was the matured version of the beautiful mother that was in the photograph. —- That’s not right, the woman in front of them had wasted away much more than just what comes with aging.

In the way the woman addressed them, everybody realised what role it is they were playing the part of. However, although they now knew their role, they still had absolutely no idea what type of case they were investigating.

Su Mo looked about the entirety of the room’s layout as quickly as he could, then stepped forward and posed a question. “We have found some things, however…”

“What’s wrong?”

The woman, unsatisfied spoke rhetorically, “The blackmailer already called, is there anything more to it than that?”

[ You have triggered the main task: Rescue Tan Le. ]

[ Honourable Mr. Su, You are M city’s criminal investigator from the Ministry of Public Security, Mr. X. Before dawn, the Ministry of Public security’s Mr. X received Madam Tan Qing’s report of a crime. She claimed that her ten year old son had been kidnapped and that she was being blackmailed to give one hundred thousand Yuan^[5]Chinese currency. You and your colleagues went to investigate and in your investigation you discovered that there was more to it than meets the eye. Please discover the truth of the situation through investigation and save Tan Le ]

Tan Le?

The use of these words is quite ingenious. Su Mo seemed lost in thought.

It’s obvious that everybody had received the same mission information. Xiao Ya took the initiative and spoke, “Don’t worry ma’am, we will definitely rescue Tan Le and return him safe and sound!” Madam Tan Qing, do you know who the people are that kidnapped Tan Le? As well as their contact details and where the location of the transaction is meant to take place?”

Tan Qing regained her expression of cold indifference and handed over a map that was in her hand to Xiao Ya. She then impatiantly said, “I don’t know who kidnapped Le Le.^[6]The duplication of the name to show fondness or familiarity The location and the contact method has been noted on the map. I am merely a crippled person, where would I get my hands on one hundred thousand Yuan? I’m so tired, I’ll hand this over to you to handle…”

Ms. Tan Qing’s voice came to a stop as she turned her wheelchair in the direction of the bedroom. Upon seeing this Lu Lan Lan muttered to herself in a soft voice, “Isn’t she too indifferent? If it was me who got kidnapped, my Daddy…”

At this time, a gentle breeze blew past lifting the woolen blanket that was covering Tan Qing’s legs.

“Aa….Chu!”

Lu Lan Lan just yelled out, when Xiao Ya at the exact moment covered the open side. At that moment, the expression on Xiao Ya’s face was not good. After Dai Xingzhang sent a signal with his eyes to everybody, the six people found that they were unable to open the map, so they hurriedly rushed to the entrance of the doorway…

Until everybody had smoothly left the living area and arrived onto the street, they finally released a slight breath of relief.

“I didn’t imagine it right? That older lady’s legs were actually…”

Mark gulped at Chai Gang’s words, “Unexpectedly, they were just bones!”

Not wrong. In the instant that the breeze blew past, everybody was able to clearly see it. That lady’s deformatiy was not a simple one. Her pair of legs had already turned into a pair of ghastly bones!

However, this place is the ‘Dreamland’s Paradise’. No one would be bothered that it’s unscientific and even less people would believe that the lady was just playing a practical joke.

“This is wrong, very wrong!”

Xiao Ya’s expression became more and more ugly, “Maybe it really is the Supernatural category? Then wouldn’t our mission be…”

“Everybody calm down, let’s first get in the car!”

The older and more mature Dai Xingzhang , hastily beckoned the group. When Dai Xingzhang finished speaking everybody finally realised that there was actually a golden station wagon that had come to a halt not far from the corner of the building.

“I’m driving!”

Chai Gang yelled out and before anybody could argue ran to the driver’s side of the car.

Looking at the sliding doors on this golden station wagon that opened up onto the back seats, Su Mo suddenly thought of idea. To try and quickly get to the front seat before anyone else could.

However, the front passenger seat had already been occupied and you could see in Dai Xing Zhang’s eyes the willingness to defend his position there, flash past. Afterwards, the two girls with their faces full of smiles, co-ordinated that they sat on the innermost seat. So Su Mo and Mark had to sit by the front row, next to the two sliding doors.

After getting in the car, Chai Gang asked for the map from Xiao Ya. However, Lu Lan Lan felt uneasy, “Are we really going right now? Shouldn’t, shouldn’t we wait until the sky gets lighter?”

After Mark heard this suggestion, he showed his approval with both of his hands^[7]Ie. two thumbs up and Xiao Ya, who was about to hand over the map to Chai Gang, also showed a moment of hesitation.

“Missy, you are too delicate!”

Who knows when he pulled it out, but Chai Gang was lighting his cigarette while sneering, “In the Supernatural category, every second is precious! Since the system chose for us to come in the evening, they must have a reason for it. If we were to really delay until the second day, then there will likely be unforeseen consequences, or an accident.”

Su Mo raised his eyebrows. This blonde-haired hooligan is not like what he imagined a hooligan would be like. He thought that he would be the type of person who lacked any sense of a brain. Well, he was wrong, but also right. For a person who already survived two scenarios, how is it possible that he’s such an idiot?

The map that the lady gave them really did have the ‘kidnapper’s’ contact details on it. What could one do when this time period didn’t have cellphones and they also couldn’t dare to return to the police station as the bunch of fakes that they were. They had no other choice but to take a chance and go directly to the indicated location.

On the map there was a distinctly clear, bright red circle. The place that the kidnappers had decided to do the exchange was in the middle of the wilderness in the countryside.

“We should immediately get going with this, we’ll set out right now!”

Chai Gang’s memory wasn’t bad. He only needed to look at the map twice before he handed it over to Su Mo. The station wagon was to make a beeline towards the countryside….

Chai Gang started the car and everyone else were also no longer hesitant. Xiao Ya and Lu Lan Lan were attempting to crack the code on the diary, Su Mo and the three people according to limited resources, could infer the real objective of this mission.

“If we take the guess of this being a Supernatural category mission, then I’m afraid the mission isn’t so simple as just having to rescue the hostage.”

The old and wise Dai Xingzhang took the opportunity to speak first. “We didn’t discover anything. The house only had one person, being Lan Qing. Her husband and daughter were both absent!”

Lan Qing is the mother of the family, however, with such a large incident occuring the sunglasses guy and the girl in his arms had both yet to appear. It’s obvious that something was not right here.

“And also, her son’s surname is Tan.” Su Mo spoke.

Mark suddenly posed a question, “Although it has not been long since I returned to Z country, but I also know that in Z country, their view towards the aspect of changing surnames is open-minded. For the child to take the mother’s surname seems to be quite normal right? Hmm, in this regard, our M country cannot really compare.”

Although Z country had a saying, ‘if you marry a chicken, follow the chicken, if you marry a dog, follow the dog'^[8]‘嫁鸡随鸡，嫁狗随狗’ which means you should follow and obey the man you are married to no matter how he’s like, however, even though this is during a feudalistic time period, the girls that are brought into the husbands house through marriage, really didn’t need to change their surname. As long as the wife and husband discussed it, the child can either take the mother’s surname or the father’s and either option would pose no issues.

This point is a more reliable system in comparison to the majority of other countries traditions. Especially with the protests for ‘freedom to democratic rights’ that have been happening lately in M country.

“Don’t forget, we are currently in the 1970’s”

Dai Xing Zhang who was a senior explained, “The □□ ^[9]That’s how it was in the original. in the 70’s was still very conservative. Moreover, Tan Le is a boy.”

Su Mo nodded his head, he also thought along those lines. For now, he won’t consider the possibility that the sunglasses man was married into the wife’s family.

But on the other hand, there was one last possibility.

“Remarried, or divorced.”

Chai Gang who was incharge of driving suddenly chipped in, “It’s the same as my family…”

Su Mo eyes swept over Chai Gang, he continued, “It’s possible that in this time, divorce wasn’t as common. It was most likely that after the husband died the wife would get remarried and then… I still have three things I’m uncertain about.”

Dai Xing Zhang inquired, “Which three things?”

Su Mo didn’t mince his words and spoke plainly, “First of all, there was something wrong with the setup of the room. On the ground and first floor there was also no girl’s room in sight; Secondly, her son was kidnapped, yet Tan Qing’s reaction… was much too cold; Thirdly, the timeline is also wrong!”

“Yes yes, I also discovered that!”

Since the mission started, the constantly ill at ease Lu Lan Lan suddenly spoke out. “If I was ever to be kidnapped, my Daddy would definitely be worried sick and would rather risk losing everything, in order to save me! That lady clearly has a lot of money, but she doesn’t even want to give up one hundred thousand Yuan!”

The most important point is that, although Tan Qing tried her best to show a worried expression on her face. The expression in her eyes was cold and indifferent, empty of any emotion. This wouldn’t fool anyone.

As for the third point, Su Mo was just contemplating it, when at the corner of his eye he caught a glimpse of the smeared on red…

“Fuck!”

“Careful!”

“Don’t!!”

The two girls and Chai Gang yelled and swore. In a split second, everybody felt as if their hearts had completely risen up into their throat. Everybody looked ahead feeling an incomparable terror over the girl wearing red, who suddenly appeared in front of them…

The golden car turned in the direction of the side of the road that was empty and the car had just hit 140km/h. After all, it was already so late, who would have thought that on a road in the middle of a desolate countryside, there would suddenly appear a fully grown, living person?

Although, seeing the fast approaching golden vehicle, that would charge into her, the girl continued to stand in the middle of the road. The light from the car’s headlights shone on the girl’s face, showing a distinct picture of terror on it…

At that moment of extreme crisis, Chai Gang who was seated in the driver’s seat’s was staring with wide eyes, and subconciously went to slam on the breaks and turn the steering wheel!

However, the steering wheel wasn’t moved in time, as a strong hand extended from the passenger seat and firmly held onto Chai Gangs right arm preventing him from turning it! At the same time, the foot that was about to push at the breaks was kicked away!
Moreover, the foot that kicked at Chai Gang did not withdraw, but rather, it stepped on the accelerator! The speed that was originally slowing down rose back up instantly. The car was heading straight towards the girl and was about to run her over!

The headlights fell on the wide, disbelieving eyes of the girl, as from her mouth an extremely terrifying scream was released!

“Ah!!”

“Thump!”

The horrifying scream suddenly came to a halt. The girl, as if she was a kite that had it’s string snap, suddenly soared up high into the sky.

“Bang… plop…

The station wagon jolted, causing the female’s body to carelessly tumble off.

~ * ~

The author has something to say:

Su Mo: What to do? We’re in trouble… (indifferent face)

Chu Han: Pretend. Continue to play pretend! (lick mouth)

New chapter open now, please like, leave a comment and collect! (henchmen)^[10]don’t ask me, I’m not sure either

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TL: Thank you everybody who read my first chapter! <3 This is my first time translating a novel and I won’t lie and say I didn’t stalk the comments and seeing your support really made my day. Wish you the best in these difficult times. 🙂