Qiming Chapter 99

Chapter 99

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It’s impossible for you to control everything, including me.

These words carried great weight as he spoke them, his voice full of energy and authority.

The light from the east brightened the entire hospital. Xu Chengyue looked through the window and saw Jiang Hai, still unconscious in his hospital bed. He lay there, motionless, his fragile life sustained only by an intravenous drip. Lin Xiangrong had once told him that her original intention for joining the AI detective team was the hope that, one day, Jiang Hai would wake from his coma, open his eyes, and see the world years later, witnessing her efforts.

But time was too long, and people's hearts changed too quickly. In the daily grind of experiments and inescapable violence, she had almost forgotten her original purpose. If it weren't for the critical condition notice, she would have nearly forgotten her former lover, forgotten the promises she once made, thinking only of grasping the power and the temptations beckoning her, plunging into an abyss she could no longer see clearly.

Lin Xiangrong's face gradually twisted into something grotesque as she stared at Xu Chengyue in shock, as if witnessing something unbelievable.

But there was nothing unbelievable about it. Xu Chengyue avoided her gaze and lowered his head, smiling slightly. He was no object, no mere machine, he wouldn't be endlessly manipulated. He had feelings, thoughts, and the heart of a rebel.

"If one day the past Xu Chengyue wakes up, you'll become a meaningless chip, installed by Lu Yong into a cold machine." Lin Xiangrong's voice trembled as she spoke. For the first time, she appeared so out of control, as though she had been severely struck. Her voice gradually quieted, and her face darkened.

"Is that so?" He blinked. "Perhaps that's not such a bad place to end up."

Who knew when that day might come? Maybe the old Xu Chengyue would never wake up, or maybe by tomorrow morning, he'd return. Would he coexist with him, or remain silent forever?

But no matter what, he shouldn’t kill his former self.

The sunlight fell on him, and in that moment, he felt as though he had merged with the past Xu Chengyue, standing there without hesitation, more like a true warrior than ever before.

Wasn't it ironic that those who created him would never have imagined that the AI detective they had tried to control and manipulate would ultimately develop his own personality, defying them all and choosing his own path?

"And what about the person you love?" Lin Xiangrong pressed her half-smoked cigarette into the trash can nearby and pulled out a new one, elegantly holding it between her fingers, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't light it.

"Gu Yunfeng has long known about all of this, hasn't he? I see that he hasn't really given Zhiyin Biotech a hard time." She frowned, bending down to pick up something she had kicked aside.

"He pretends not to know anything at the Public Security Bureau, all because he's afraid you'll lose hope, afraid you'll rush off to die. If you disappeared, he'd be heartbroken. Wouldn't you be heartbroken too?"

"That kind of pain, it's unpleasant."

Xu Chengyue hesitated for a moment, looking at her trembling hands, and handed her a lighter.

What does it feel like to lose something you once had? When he lost his body, with only a chip keeping his soul alive, would he still feel despair or pain?

Perhaps he wouldn’t feel anything at all. Or perhaps he'd remain forever immersed in his own memories, unknowingly standing in a vacuum.

"There will always be moments of sadness," he said, gazing out the window.

Outside the hospital, a large crowd had gathered, protesting Ruihe Hospital for providing Zhiyin Biotech with experimental facilities and personnel.

Large-letter posters were plastered on the windows, and red banners were hung at the hospital entrance. A few medical staff quietly slipped through the crowd and entered the hospital, starting their work as if no one else existed.

This sort of thing had been happening every day recently, as if the entire city, the entire world, was discussing it. Yet, they had no idea what Zhiyin Biotech had actually done, no understanding of the victims' experiences, nor any awareness that the world had quietly undergone a monumental change.

Lin Xiangrong tossed a small hard drive into the air and caught it with one hand. Her expression gradually calmed as she made a phone call and said to the person on the other end, "I’ve got the prototype data for the AI detective, let Dean Dai's family go home."

She ended the call with a light chuckle, then turned to Xu Chengyue in a teasing tone. "You were a cop at one point, weren't you? Stealing classified files, breaking the law knowingly."

"Yes, breaking the law knowingly," he admitted readily, standing straight against the wall.

"And haven't you been imprisoning and threatening others to get the lab passwords and access?"

"Yes, it’s that simple," Lin Xiangrong said as she flexed her wrist and shrugged into the coat draped over her shoulders. "I'm not like you, I've done this kind of thing more often. Here’s a bit of advice for old times' sake, stay out of sight for a while. Soon, you'll be a target for a manhunt, I don’t want to see you die, and neither does our Boss Wan."

"But we can't watch over you every day, so let your boyfriend protect you," she added, sweeping her hair back from her face. With a wink, she said, "Lu Yong is terrified that you’ll regain your old memories. Before your fall, you must have discovered his deadly secret."

"I really do wonder, what exactly is that secret?"

Xu Chengyue opened his hands and gazed at the lines in his palms, clenching his fists slightly, as though trying to grasp something. All his memories had been artificially altered, blurry and indistinguishable between truth and falsehood. It was as if only his dreams were real. For the past few months, he had been trying to piece together the events of that day through fragmented dreams. The truth was on the verge of revealing itself, yet always seemed to slip away.

At this pace, in less than a month, Ying Han would be released, Zhiyin Biotech would only suffer public condemnation and moral outrage, while Lu Yong wouldn’t even appear in court, as there were no charges against him.

Xu Chengyue could already imagine the day when Lu Yong and others, facing the cameras and the public, would smile and refute all criticisms and accusations.

They would stand tall, without a hint of shame, heads held high with contempt, speaking about righteousness, morality, and scientific progress, all while their minds were filled with personal ambition and power, clamouring about how they were breaking through ethical boundaries to change the world.

"Each of these lives was a great contribution to the development of medicine and technological advancement. I only regret the fragility of life and the backwardness of medical technology."

"We’re just developing AI chips with human brain functions, this doesn’t violate any laws, it’s a technological breakthrough, heralding a new era of intelligence."

With the gentlest faces and the most grotesque hearts, they spoke of their boundless vision for the future.

On an individual level, it seemed as though none of them had crossed the legal line. Their arguments were rational and flawless, without any loopholes.

But only Xu Chengyue, only his existence, his voice, could proclaim to the world that they were attempting illegal human modification, violating ethics and morality, trampling on human rights and lives.

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“Why is it switched off all day today?” Gu Yunfeng had been calling every ten minutes. From the moment Lu Yong reported the case this morning, seven or eight hours had passed, yet Xu Chengyue’s phone remained off.

If he didn’t switch it on soon, Gu Yunfeng was really going to start suspecting that Xu Chengyue had snuck out last night to steal something. When he woke up this morning, Xu Chengyue had already disappeared. Gu Yunfeng assumed he had just left early for work, but after asking around at the university, everyone said Professor Xu hadn’t shown up today.

Where had he gone?

Gu Yunfeng drove along the highway, which was unusually clear today. He barely had to touch the brakes, driving straight to Ruihe Hospital without any obstacles.

“Captain Gu... are you sure we’ll find Lin Xiangrong here?” Shu Pan pointed to the eerily quiet street.

“Yes. Isn’t Jiang Hai’s condition critical? They managed to save him, so someone must be looking after him,” Gu Yunfeng replied casually as he opened the car door and headed toward the inpatient department.

After only a few steps, he stopped in his tracks, staring silently at the banner hung overhead.

“Shit, seeing how deserted it is out here, I thought maybe they weren’t working today,” Shu Pan said as he plucked a fallen leaf from his head and tossed it into the flowerbed.

"Do you think they can still work like this?" Shu Pan nudged Gu Yunfeng.

“Of course, hospitals aren’t like us, they work three-hundred sixty-five days a year, every hour of every day.”

With that, he approached a security guard and entered the inpatient department through a side door.

Jiang Hai was still in the ICU. His attending physician said that two days ago, he had suffered a brain haemorrhage due to a ruptured blood vessel. After an emergency surgery, his life was considered saved, though his family wanted him to stay in the ICU for a while longer for observation before being transferred to a regular ward. He had been in a coma for a long time, and the new complications made it impossible to predict what further damage might have occurred, so there was little to observe anyway.

The quiet hospital room was filled with a faint smell of cigarette smoke. Gu Yunfeng pinched his nose and frowned. Although he no longer hated the smell of smoke, this was distinctly a woman’s cigarette, so one could only deduce that Lin Xiangrong had just left.

"Hi there, we’re friends of Mr. Jiang," Shu Pan was chatting with a young nurse at the ICU nurse's station. He started with small talk about her age and whether she had a boyfriend before finally circling back to Jiang Hai’s family.

“His friend, or should I say family member, are you guys familiar with her?”

“No, she never says hello to us,” the young short-haired nurse shook her head, laughing at Shu Pan’s flattery and responding quite openly to his questions.

"Did she come today?"

“She came, but she wasn’t alone.”

Shu Pan slapped the desk, looking excited. “Then, when did Mr. Jiang’s family leave?”

“About an hour ago.”

Shu Pan was about to ask more when he was interrupted by Gu Yunfeng, who had been quietly listening nearby.

He had caught something in the nurse's words and leaned forward against the counter.

“You said she wasn’t alone?”

“Yes, there was a man with her.”

“Was there? I saw her leave alone,” said a slightly older nurse who had walked over.

“Aiya, they left one after the other, the man left two hours before her. I saw them exchange a few words, they seemed to know each other.”

“How old was the man? How tall? What was his build?”

“About one metre seven... He didn’t seem very old, he was wearing a mask and looked pretty thin.”

“Did he look like this?” Gu Yunfeng asked as he pulled up a photo of Xu Chengyue on his phone, a full-body shot he had secretly taken of him walking ahead one day.

‿︵‿︵ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ・❉・ ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ‿︵‿︵

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Translator Notes

Please feel free to comment any mistakes I made so I can improve and do better as I go through the book.

Translated: September 25, 2024 by Angel

Edited: January 7, 2025 by Angel