Chapter 36: She Was a Parasitic Host

by cnwebnovels

Gu Qiutang said nothing about Zhu Zhaojie.

Gu Kunling must have told him. But Gu Qiutang had said he wouldn’t interfere in the new company unless something major happened. He wanted me to make my own calls.

So no warning came.

I still hadn’t figured out why Zhu Zhaojie had appeared. I just felt that abnormal events hid sinister causes. But where? I didn’t have Fiery Eyes and Golden Pupils to see through it.

Gu Kunling resisted Zhu Zhaojie, but all I could do was protect her carefully.

To wake her sooner, I called Zhu Shiqing over anyway.

The day they met, I arranged a family dinner at my place. I cooked personally.

I had an apartment near the company. It was company property.

I invited Zhu Zhaojie first, then timed it and sent a driver for Zhu Shiqing.

The moment Zhu Shiqing walked in and saw his daughter, he was overcome. First time seeing her since she’d disappeared.

Just as I’d expected.

Zhu Zhaojie was extremely resistant to Zhu Shiqing’s appearance, her expression saying that strangers should not come close.

I’d warned Zhu Shiqing that she’d lost her memory and didn’t remember anything. But he ignored that, eyes wet, pouring his heart out to her.

She thought I’d set up a Hongmen Banquet and turned to leave.

I stopped her. I told her to hear him out, as a favor to me—help a deranged old man.

I also had to stop Zhu Shiqing. Things were more complicated than he thought. If he wanted answers, we had to go slow.

I explained Zhu Shiqing’s situation to her, hoping she’d understand what it felt like for him to lose his daughter. Even if she wasn’t Zhu Zhaojie, she could give him a little sympathy and comfort.

To Zhu Shiqing, I stressed repeatedly: don’t disturb her day to day.

Zhu Jie’s coldness deepened Zhu Shiqing’s pain. She said it several times—she was Zhu Jie, not Zhu Zhaojie. If we kept this up, she would stop dealing with us.

I said it was my fault for being rash. I apologized.

The family-recognition dinner ended badly.

But I knew she wouldn’t leave in anger. She probably had a mission.

So Zhu Shiqing could see her often, I rented him a room in the same residential compound as Zhu Zhaojie. He said he wouldn’t bother her, but being able to see his daughter satisfied him completely.

Two months later, something happened.

Zhu Shiqing was in a car accident.

Hit by a car.

The gate guard reacted fast, yanked him back. Saved his life. But his leg was injured. Hospitalized.

I deliberately brought Zhu Zhaojie to visit him.

The accident made me alert and filled me with self-blame.

This wasn’t an accident. Someone wanted those eyes gone from her side.

I checked the surveillance footage at the entrance of the residential compound. It was clearly a deliberate collision.

I met the driver. He said the car had seemed to go out of control on its own, just rammed forward.

I sensed his brain. He wasn’t lying.

Someone had remotely controlled the car.

I could control devices remotely too, but only switches. I couldn’t manage something this mechanically complex. The controller’s ability exceeded mine.

I didn’t regret calling Zhu Shiqing over. Since losing his daughter, he’d been in unbearable pain. This period had been his happiest.

I’d only underestimated how vicious my opponent was—willing to hurt ordinary people by any means, without humanity.

After Zhu Shiqing was discharged from the hospital, I brought him to live with me.

My place was 140 square meters, three bedrooms, two living rooms. Usually it was just me living there, empty. Zhu Shiqing’s arrival actually helped me keep the place in order.

I told him again and again: Zhu Zhaojie was under someone’s control. He shouldn’t be impatient. I’d find a way.

By then Zhu Shiqing had lost all judgment, placed all hope in me. Thanked me over and over, like a child.

Just as I was watching for anything unusual about Zhu Zhaojie, Gu Kunling told me someone had tampered with her secret room’s electromagnetic wall.

Fortunately I had electromagnetic sensing. I inspected the perimeter and found it—an inconspicuous black dot on the upper corner of the wall facing the door.

I took it apart. It was a micro sensor. Obviously used for detection.

I put it back.

That place could no longer be used.

Gu Kunling opened a new secret room. Only the two of us knew about it. I handled the renovation myself.

We passed through the company’s start-up period that way, in peace.

Early summer. Everything lush, flowers in full bloom.

Zhu Zhaojie and I had grown familiar. At least, she thought so.

One weekend, she invited me to dinner at Jishuitan.

I accepted gladly.

I even thought she might be showing signs of improvement.

At dinner we drank a little wine. Then strolled to Shichahai like a couple. Looking across the lake at the faint neon glow on the far shore, I felt almost intoxicated.

As we walked, she asked casually, “I heard when you were abbot at Tansong Temple, you encountered many invisible people in the temple. What kind of people were they?”

Half my buzz evaporated.

I’d only told Senior Brother Guanghuai and a few core people about investigating invisible people at Tansong. Never outsiders—mainly because I did not want to cause unnecessary panic among the monks. How did she know?

I feigned indifference. “Nothing much. Couldn’t see them at all. No idea what they were. Only heard them call themselves elite people.”

She asked, “Elite people? What’s that? I’ve never heard of them.”

I said, “I don’t know. That’s what they called themselves. I don’t know what they are either.”

I suspected she was probing, so I used same-frequency sensing to observe her thoughts covertly.

The moment I did, something went wrong.

A co-frequency oscillation.

First time I’d encountered it.

I steadied myself immediately. While making small talk, I thought it through.

Micro-electromagnetic waves spread outward from a source like ripples. Same-frequency sensing works by matching the target’s frequency, layering over it, resonating to extract thought information.

So what was that oscillation?

Only one possibility: she was also using same-frequency sensing to probe my thoughts. Our signals overlapped, producing a same-frequency overlay that triggered electromagnetic oscillation waves.

Like two transparent grids overlaid—you’d see a moiré pattern. Or a swing: repeated pushes at the right rhythm make it rise higher. Co-frequency oscillation was exactly that.

Had the Sweepers’ research into same-frequency sensing already matured? When I was at the base, they knew about it but couldn’t do it.

I couldn’t help asking, “So you can do same-frequency sensing too?”

No point pretending. I asked bluntly, “The Sweepers shouldn’t have complete same-frequency sensing. Otherwise Bi Deyuan of the Tianshu Department would not have needed my help observing. But I know elite people seem able to do it.”

Her heart jolted. I sensed it.

But she still wouldn’t admit it. She looked at me, innocent. “What? You still don’t trust me?”

I pressed one hand on her shoulder. “You say you’re Zhu Jie, but I know you’re Zhu Zhaojie. We grew up together, we were classmates. How could I not trust you? You’re just not the same person anymore. Zhaojie, look me in the eye. Do you dare shout it out loud several times: Zhu Shiqing is not my dad? Do you dare?”

Her expression went unstable, cycling rapidly through joy, anger, sorrow, delight. Uncanny.

She walked abruptly to the lakeside and shouted at the water:

“Zhu Shiqing is not my dad!”

“Zhu Shiqing is not—no, no, he is my dad!”

I’d finally broken her.

She screamed, rushed toward the lake, threw herself into the water without hesitation, crying out, “Zhu Shiqing is my dad!”

“Dad—!”

Then plunged beneath the surface. Didn’t come up.

I panicked. Jumped into the cold water, searching everywhere for her.

I hadn’t expected this.

I blamed myself. Had I pushed too hard?

Suddenly water splashed behind me. I twisted around. Zhu Zhaojie burst from the lake, face glacial, one hand had become extremely sharp. She stabbed toward me viciously.

Her mouth kept shouting, “You really are extraordinary. I’m done waiting. Die!”

I’d never imagined she could become so utterly deranged, her movements shockingly fast.

I used everything I had—parrying, pushing, striking, and dodging. I didn’t want to hurt her. But every strike she made was meant to kill.

After dozens of exchanges, I was losing ground. Blood ran freely from several wounds.

But I kept resisting.

Her strength seemed limitless. Mine was draining.

If this continued, I was finished. So I fought toward areas with more people.

She saw what I was doing. Suddenly drew a black flexible whip from her back, glimmering with dark-blue microglow. Lashed it toward me fiercely.

Crack—

Sharp snap. I dodged. A section of lakeside stone post struck by the whip shattered.

Barely escaped the first strike.

The second came terrifyingly fast.

I flipped over a park bench, lifted it, hurled it.

Crack—

The bench exploded into fragments.

Then the third lash, high speed.

The instant that whip danced through the air, I felt death closing in.

That powerful?

What the hell was that thing?

“Soul Hunter Whip!”

Someone called out softly, grabbed it mid-air, yanked hard, flung Zhu Zhaojie to the ground.

I didn’t see who grabbed it. Just felt a human-shaped mist sweep overhead, carrying the Soul Hunter Whip away.

The invisible person.

My invisible protector had appeared.

“You finally showed yourself. I’ve been waiting for you.”

Zhu Zhaojie’s voice changed completely. She shouted, sounded excited. Flipped, leapt into the air, flung countless flying nails toward the mist.

I sprang forward, flung open my trench coat, and tried to catch them.

Wrong.

Not nails—a net made of countless flying nails.

It covered me instantly, tightened rapidly.

Caught by the sudden restraint, I was trapped, bound into a ball, couldn’t move. Thudded to the ground.

What the @#¥%…

I shouted, “Zhu Zhaojie! Wake up! I’m your classmate, Gu Beichen! Let me go!”

The mist-shaped person laughed. “Silly kid, she’s not Zhu Zhaojie. She’s nothing but a Soul Hunter’s parasitic host. You expect this parasitic host to save you?”

Parasitic host?

What the hell was that?

How had I never heard of this before?