Chapter 70 – Interrogation
Novel Title: 龙血 (Dragon Blood)
Author：水千丞 (Shui Qian Cheng)
Translator: K (@kin0monogatari)
Protagonists: 单鸣 (Shan Ming -MC), 沈长泽 (Shen Changze -ML)
*Please read at Novels Space.space, the original site of translation. TQ*
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They rested in the underground base until dark and everyone got a good night’s sleep.
When Shan Ming woke up, he found that House was interrogating Kafar. Kafar looked dejected. He had completely lost the prestige and arrogance of the day before. Tang Tingzhi stood beside them, listening thoughtfully.
Shan Ming walked over and looked at House, “I’ll ask him a few questions.”
House nodded.
Shan Ming squatted down, looking straight at Kafar, “Do you know where Nesis is?”
Kafar froze for a moment before shaking his head. He looked as if he was afraid that Shan Ming would not believe him, “If I knew, I would definitely tell you. We are rivals after all. The situation at that time was too chaotic. I don’t know where he went. But a lot of people are going into Western Sahara seeking refuge from different parties.”
“Why do you seek refuge from the Indepence Party instead of the government?”
“There are many limitations in the way the government handles things. We can’t predict it and we can’t control it. For example, those people and me, we are most afraid that the government will send us back to China through official channels. When the media exposed us, me and my family will be done for. So we spend money to eliminate such disasters, hoping to find a way to return to our own country after entering Western Sahara. Nesis is a Moroccan political figure so he absolutely cannot afford the consequences of being exposed. I believe he also entered Western Sahara. I just don’t know where he is.”
Shan Ming saw that he was very honest and there was no concealment. He nodded in satisfaction and continued to ask: “Then what about Lawrence Rody?”
Kafar showed a hint of disdain, “Rody is just a fool. Nesis played him around and made a lot of money from him. Recently, the candidates of the Rody family will be decided soon and everyone is not optimistic about him. His elder brother Fabin Rody is the one who can control the whole family. So Nesis would probably give up on him after considering making a fortune for himself. Now that this kind of accident happens, I don’t know what Rody’s fate was. He is likely with Nesis or he may be killed for he is useless.”
Shan Ming nodded. He then said to House, “That’s all. But I want to know the result of your interrogation.”
House raised his eyebrows, “Why is that?”
At this time, Shen Changze came over. He is a handsome fifteen-year-old boy with an astonishing aura, “Because he is my father?”
House shook his head and sighed as he looked at him, “Shan, you are so lucky that you make people envious. You just picked up a son in the forest…” He remembered that Kafar was there so he changed his wordings: “The probability of you picking ‘him’ up is similar to someone picking up the powerful ring in ‘The Lord of the Rings’ on the street. They are both unique, powerful, and…-“
“-And they obey the master’s orders.” Tang Tingzhi interjected. He then gave Shen Changze a meaningful look.
Shan Ming didn’t understand the hidden meaning in Tang Tingzhi’s words. He instead felt rather proud to be able to raise a powerful son, “Of course. If not, what would I do to simply raise him?”
Shen Changze pulled Shan Ming to sit down and said as a matter-of-factly, “You ask. We will listen.”
Tang Tingzhi said: “Then, have you decided to help me?”
Shen Changze shook his head, “I have to listen to the content first before making a decision.” He untied the splint on Shan Ming’s arm and began to massage him with some medicated oil.
House ignored them and began to ask Kafar a series of questions. From their conversation, Shan Ming could roughly hear that the cause of the incident was related to a certain ‘academic exchange’ between China and the United States. Of course, their exchanges must be related to dragon blood. As a result, an accident happened during the experiment and the laboratory was burned down. A young Chinese scientist disappeared and the priceless ten millilitres of ‘experimental product’ disappeared.
As Shan Ming listened, he thought to himself that ten millilitres of dragon’s blood can already cause such panic. If someone grabbed Shen Changze to draw his blood out, wouldn’t it be the same as pouring gold into molten iron?
The incident happened last year and is being investigated by both countries. Since the leak happened in the United States, China and the United States started to blame each other for the ten millilitres of dragon blood. China said that the United States should take full responsibility for the poor security measures. At the beginning of this year, they got the news that the contestants in the Moroccan underground fighting arena ‘Genting’ had similar behavioural characteristics to the experimenters after taking dragon blood extracts after using the drugs. So they deployed various methods to catch up with them there.
Since the United States was the first to know the news, in order to maximise the possession of the experimental product, they did not notify China. They instead acted on their own. The Chinese side only recently received the news and was deploying personnel before Tang Tingzhi ran over. Although it is already a serious violation of discipline, it can be regarded as a meritorious service.
Next, House began to conduct a detailed investigation of the channels through which Kafar obtained the drugs. Kafar represented himself as a black market middleman. At that time, the drugs were hyped on the black market and were sold for 500,000 dollars per millilitre. Even though they are so expensive, people still flock to buy them. This was because after injecting these drugs and winning the competition, they can earn hundreds of thousands or even millions dollars back.
Tang Tingzhi said softly: “One millilitre of the extract sells for about 500,000 US dollars. Ten millilitres of pure dragon blood… which can be extracted… How much money should he make…? What does he need so much money for?”
House snorted coldly: “You Chinese have done a good calculation.”
Tang Tingzhi didn’t care about his provocation, “He needs so much money. There must be a hidden purpose.”
House clenched his fist and said, “We’ll know when we catch him.”
Shen Changze asked Tang Tingzhi, “Do you know who that person is?”
Tang Tingzhi said flatly, “From a genetic point of view, he is my younger brother.”
Shan Ming frowned and said, “What do you mean by this? Are you a robot?” He had long suspected that a freak like Tang Tingzhi who had no human emotions was an abnormal human being.
Tang Tingzhi seemed to be talking about other people’s affairs instead of about himself. He said lightly, “It’s not that complicated. I’m a normal human being. It’s just that I was a product of a genius project. You should have heard of it. The men and women with the highest IQ records were selected from the national reserve gene bank for test-tube pregnancy. After they found out that my IQ reached 220 when I was four years old, they felt that this method was very successful. So Tang Jingzhi came into being. At present, besides him, I may have three other younger siblings. They should have conceived a lot of babies. But only one-eighth of those who have truly inherited their parents’ IQ and reached the genius level. So far, only Tang Jingzhi has entered the field of biology like me.”
Shen Changze narrowed his eyes and said coldly, “Do you always do these experiments that violate human rights?”
House said: “He is not to be blamed for this. A country can do a lot of shady things in order to seek development and prosperity. The ‘Genius Project’ has been proposed since Hitler’s era. If he hadn’t been defeated, today’s Germany may have a large number of products from this project which would have made great contributions to the future of the country. Many other countries are also following suit. This is indeed an effective means to ensure that there are enough talents in the development of the country.”
Shen Changze was quite disgusted by such things. This was probably because he himself was a product of a test subject that everyone coveted.
Shan Ming asked: “Since it’s your younger brother, don’t you usually see any unscrupulous intentions in him?”
Tang Tingzhi shook his head and said calmly: “We rarely contact each other except for work. He hated me since he was a child. He is competitive and enjoys getting better research results than me. So, I never know what he is thinking about.”
Shan Ming snorted coldly: “I can only imagine this. With your robot-like dead appearance, anyone who stays with you will hate you.”
Tang Tingzhi nodded and wondered softly, “Is that so…?”
House planned to keep on interrogating Kafar and at this time, Ayer came over, “What are you guys talking about?”
Shan Ming turned around, “They are interrogating him. It has something to do with some spy leaking secrets.”
Ayer frowned and said, “Then what are you doing here? You are already familiar enough to listen to his state secrets.”
Shan Ming said: “Of course not. I just inquired about Nesis and Rody along the way. But it seems that he doesn’t know about them either.”
Ayer gave him a suspicious look. He then pulled him up, “Pack up your things. It’s time for us to head back to ‘Genting’.”
The group returned to ‘Genting’ through the same route. After crossing the cordon of the Moroccan government and Western Sahara, they were still eight to nine hours away from ‘Genting’. House took Kafar and separated from them. They did not plan to return to the United States immediately but decided to stay in the country to continue the investigation. There was no longer a need for them to go with the ‘Peregrine Falcon’.
Tang Tingzhi wanted to investigate with House but House didn’t want him tagging along. So he decided to follow ‘Peregrine Falcon’. Ayer felt that Tang Tingzhi was useless and there was no point in him following them. Besides, he didn’t know what was hidden under his expressionless face so he wanted to drive him away. But Tang Tingzhi got into the car naturally and sat next to Falcon, inspecting his wounds. He refused to obey Ayer’s order to get out using silent treatment.
Tiger Shark said: “Let him come. At least bring him back to ‘Genting’ as thanks for saving Falcon.”
Ayer whispered: “I always feel that he has some hidden purpose for approaching us. It makes me feel very uncomfortable.”
“Then just keep an eye on him.” Tiger Shark pushed him into the car where Tang Ting was sitting.
Ayer sat next to Tang Tingzhi. He stared at him with squinted eyes, trying to see a tiny hint of hidden conspiracy from his face. But that face looked so calm. It was so calm that one would feel sleepy just looking at it.
They were all full of thoughts as they returned to ‘Genting’.
They thought that the mission was a definite success and the journey would be over. But they didn’t expect that when they got to ‘Genting’, they found that Job and Pell were missing.
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Next update: 2023.06.24
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