Life Game In Other World
Chapter 427: The Disappeared Daughter (Long - for Monthly Tickets)

Chapter 427: Chapter 427: The Disappeared Daughter (Long Chapter for Monthly Tickets)

The shrill blare of horns sounded on the bustling highway.

Traffic was crawling along this stretch of road, with a large number of vehicles jammed in this small section.

"What on earth is happening on Wes Avenue?"

The driver was chatting with a colleague using the vehicle’s built-in display.

"Heard some lunatic is up ahead hitting people at random, it’s blocked, and the traffic police are clearing it up."

The colleague replied casually.

"F**k, there’s been all sorts of incidents these past two years."

The driver placed both hands on the steering wheel and turned back to glance at He Ao, who was sitting in the back seat, "Sir, we might be a bit delayed."

"No problem."

He Ao nodded with a smile.

PM is the usual time off work, Pete often didn’t find jobs until 11 PM before.

His daughter was used to it.

He Ao leaned back in the soft seat of the rear row, his body slowly relaxing, recovering energy.

He casually brought up his personal attribute panel.

[He Ao (Pete)]

[Access Level: Advanced Player]

[Physical Condition: 782 (4)]

[Skills: Talent Sequences 272: Super Memory (C-level), Basic Firearms Mastery (Soul part), Talent Sequences 40: Magician (D-level) (unusable)]

[Mechanical Modification: None]

[Martial Arts: Qi Refinement and Spirit Transformation (C-level) (partly usable)]

Physical condition 4...

This was the lowest physical condition He Ao had ever seen, even worse than Roy who’d been a vagrant for years, indulging in alcohol and pleasures.

But it made sense, when you think about it — 44 years old, years of overworking, business trips, staying up late, irregular life patterns, the psychological stress of a huge loan, the successive deaths of spouse and wife, and being laid off with no job prospects.

Under such conditions, it was indeed hard to maintain a good physique.

No wonder he was so easily exhausted.

He Ao tried to absorb the energy in the air through breathing exercises but found that the energy channels in Pete’s body were nearly completely blocked and could not absorb energy normally.

Clearly, Pete was not one with Martial Arts talent either.

But that was to be expected; if he had Martial Arts talent, even normal breathing would convert some energy, and his physical condition wouldn’t be so poor.

It seemed he still needed to find a way to obtain some Talent Sequences.

He Ao closed the personal attributes page and opened the character card interface.

Within the character card interface, there were still only those three character cards.

After He Ao exchanged for [King of Nightfall], the card was covered with a faint purple hue, while the other two cards were a murky gray.

He Ao’s gaze gathered on [King of Nightfall].

The card slowly floated out from among the three cards and moved in front of He Ao, and at the same time, a new pop-up appeared.

[Would you like to exchange one Exchange Star for one day’s use of ’King of Nightfall’? (Current exchange stars available for use: 1)]

....

So, after exchanging for a card, there’s a continuing cost for using it?

He Ao fell silent for a moment.

His gaze shifted to the words ’Exchange Star’.

If he remembered correctly, the system upgrade explained the origin of this ’Exchange Star’.

His only Exchange Star came from the extra S-level rating he earned from doing the upgrade task.

It seems that the Exchange Star is directly related to the comprehensive evaluation.

Furthermore, the current evaluation system has shifted from an S grade evaluation to a star-level evaluation.

Does this imply that, moving forward, the evaluation stars from task evaluations can be directly converted into Exchange Stars?

After the task evaluation system was upgraded, it also hinted that the evaluations had other clever uses and encouraged self-exploration.

Is the ’clever use’ here referring to the ability to exchange for character card usage time?

No, that might not be the only use for it.

He Ao turned his attention to the card on the left, symbolizing Joey, the [Primeval Flame].

A pop-up window swiftly appeared,

[Would you like to spend 3 Exchange Stars to exchange for "Primeval Flame"? (Current available Exchange Stars: 1)]

As expected, the character card exchange is also calculated with Exchange Stars.

However, different character cards may have different requirements.

He Ao shifted his gaze to the character card of Nell, named [Usurper], where this time the system did not produce any pop-up.

It seemed that certain conditions were not met, and the [Usurper] remained unexchangeable.

I have no idea what those requirements are.

The problem with the system is that it’s too rudimentary—no hints, all self-exploration.

It looks as though a programmer simply threw together a framework and presented it as if it were fully functional.

He Ao withdrew his gaze and looked at the [King of Nightfall] card before him, ultimately deciding not to directly exchange for usage time of this card.

If the effects of this card were as he expected, then with only one opportunity available, he would need to use it at the most critical moment.

After exiting the character card interface, He Ao looked ahead.

The once-congested traffic had begun to loosen up, and the taxi was moving forwards without rush.

They passed by a spot where the guardrail was damaged, which seemed to be the site of the recent accident.

A trail of blood not yet cleaned away ran along the road to the damaged guardrail, looking somewhat terrifying under the not-so-bright streetlights.

"Alas," muttered the driver, glancing at the blood and quickly averting his eyes, "the world is getting tougher and tougher."

He Ao turned his head to look out the window, where homeless wanderers sat numbly and blankly staring at the passing vehicles from tents along the roadside.

"I might be joining them before long,"

The driver glimpsed He Ao in the rearview mirror, sighed, and continued to drive quietly.

But He Ao’s attention was not on the driver’s words at that moment.

Just now, he had felt a flutter in his soul, a ’tremor’ from his Super Memory.

It seemed that one of the people he had ’marked’ was doing something.

This was his first use of the marking ability, and he hadn’t expected it to have such an effect.

Without activating Super Memory, he was unable to use its ’Listen’ and ’Ease Thought’ functions, and since the duration of Super Memory activation was very brief, the continuous listening capability of ’Listen’ was not very effective.

Just when He Ao thought ’Listen’ might not be very useful, he unexpectedly felt this tremor.

He calmed himself and activated Super Memory.

He had only marked two people at this time: the doctor who had tried to perform ’surgery’ on him, and Reid, the head of the research institute.

——

Inside a finely decorated office.

"Mr. Reid, this is all the information that can be openly found on ’Pete’,"

The officer handed a paper book tablet to Reid, "Pete, forty-four years old, widowed, both parents deceased, graduated from Dawn University, has a daughter attending high school at Eland private high school, unemployed for half a year, and still has a mortgage."

"Let me see."

Reid took the paper book tablet and began scrolling through it rapidly.

"Just looking at the documents, he seems like an ordinary corporate employee,"

the officer said slowly, "The Jellic Consulting Services Company where he was employed specializes in consultation services for small businesses, and he doesn’t have any work history related to the medical industry,"

"Not finding something doesn’t mean it’s not there,"

Reid put the tablet PC on the table and fell into a brief contemplation, "How could a regular forty-something worker, who also lost his job, easily kill someone like Mano, a C-level strongman?"

"Yes."

The officer nodded lightly, "It really doesn’t add up when you think about it."

Reid leaned back in his chair, his fingers tapping gently on the desk,

"Perhaps this identity of an ordinary employee is just a cover, and secretly he’s a member of some kind of underground organization. His unemployment isn’t really unemployment, but rather leaving behind a disguise to devote himself fully to executing some kind of mission."

He pondered, "So, what could this mission be?"

Right then, the tightly closed door of the meeting room was silently pushed open little by little, and a figure shrouded in a pitch-black hooded cloak slowly walked in.

This figure was both tall and thin, as if a gust of wind could knock him over.

But his steps were very light, making no sound at all.

Not until he walked up beside the officer did Reid and the officer notice his presence.

"Is the stuff ready?"

A hoarse voice sounded in the ears of Reid, who was lost in thought.

Reid jolted in realization, somewhat frightened, he sat up and looked up at the figure shrouded in the black hood, his face immediately breaking into a smile.

"Of course it’s ready."

He reached under his desk and pulled out a square-shaped small briefcase, placing it in front of the hooded figure.

"Good."

A ghastly, thin hand that looked like it was all skin and bone reached out from under the hood, grasping the handle of the briefcase.

"Wait a moment,"

Reid, as if afraid that the figure might disappear in the next second, quickly took out another identical briefcase from under the desk and placed it on the table, "Help me kill another person, this is the deposit. There will be another payment after the job is done."

"That person," a hoarse voice came from under the hood, "Strong?"

"He killed Mano in two moves,"

Reid spoke slowly.

"Interesting, I like killing the strong," a smile seemed to appear from under the pitch-black hood, "It sounds enticing."

Reid’s face lit up with pleasure.

But then, the black shadow sharply changed his tone, "However, this is not enough."

Reid was taken aback, "But didn’t you say you like killing strong people?"

"That’s a hobby, a hobby is a hobby, work is work,"

the shadow under the hood spoke calmly, "I keep business and pleasure separate. If you don’t pay enough, I won’t lift a finger."

······

Reid’s expression darkened, "Then I’ll add another payment."

"Deal."

As the hoarse voice of the shadow sounded, his other hand picked up the remaining briefcase, "Send his information to my email."

Then, his figure slowly disappeared from Reid’s line of sight, as if he had never been there.

Once certain that there was no longer the presence of the black shadow around, the officer turned to Reid,

"Mr. Reid, can Shadow handle it?"

"There’s no one Shadow can’t kill," Reid looked at the officer, "You ask that as if you have something in mind?"

"Doesn’t Pete have a daughter?"

The officer spoke slowly, "Shall I send someone to capture her before Pete returns so if Shadow fails, we’ll have a hostage to use against Pete?"

Reid looked at the officer, clearly touched by his suggestion, but he still hesitated.

He needed to make a decision.

In the end, he shook his head,

"No need, recklessly apprehending people can easily lead to complications. If someone were to capture it on video and upload it to the internet, we would have to expend even more energy to settle the matter. Now is a critical moment, and everything should be stable as the main priority. Shadow can complete this task covertly on his own; there’s no need for us to go to unnecessary lengths."

He slowly stood up and praised the officer, "Your suggestion was good, I’ve taken note of it."

"Yes, Mr. Reid’s insight is profound,"

the officer also nodded hurriedly.

——

Sitting in the taxi, He Ao came back to his senses. His previously dull gaze gathered in his eyes.

He had disabled his Super Memory, feeling a severe sense of weakness emanating from his body, and let out a slow sigh of relief.

Although ’Listen’ couldn’t be normally used when Super Memory was turned off, it still monitored the thoughts of the marked person in a sense. Whenever the marked person had thoughts disadvantageous to He Ao, he would receive a reminder from it.

This ability was quite good, serving a certain monitoring function.

Narrowing his eyes slightly, He Ao carefully felt the tiredness in his body.

He had just altered Reid’s choices, steering him away from the option to capture his daughter.

This was not the first time he had used the ’Ease Thought’ ability to change someone else’s decision. Previously, in the main world before Super Memory was perfectly promoted, he had used the incomplete ’Ease Thought’ to change the ’Boss’s decision.

But there was a difference between using abilities as his main body and using them now in Pete’s body.

For his main body, with a physical quality as high as 782, Super Memory was virtually burdenless, so he felt almost nothing when using his abilities.

But for Pete’s body, which only had a physical quality of 4, even this one instance of use drained away the little energy he had just managed to recover, making him even more tired.

He took a couple of deep breaths and leaned on the back seat of the taxi, falling into a deep sleep.

······

When the taxi arrived at Pete’s apartment building, it was already half-past ten at night.

Many lights in the apartment complex were still on, and even the elevator was a bit crowded.

Many people were only now getting off work and returning home.

Pete’s apartment was on the 27th floor, close to the top, where standing by the window offered a glittering view of the city nightscape.

He Ao stood in front of the door, verified his face and fingerprint, and opened the door.

Although there were many verification steps, the entire process actually completed in the instant He Ao gripped the doorknob.

Therefore, his overall experience of opening the door was seamless; he grasped the handle, gave it a twist, and the door opened.

The lights inside the apartment were off, but his daughter’s room light was still on.

Public high schools in Limen City dismissed students at either two-thirty or three in the afternoon, while private high schools at five in the evening, but no matter how you looked at it, it was well past his daughter’s dismissal time by now.

He Ao, treading softly, pulled the apartment door closed, opened the fridge, which contained a vegetable salad and roasted beef, prepared by his daughter.

It had been a long time since Pete and his daughter had a proper conversation.

He was afraid to see her, afraid she would realize he was a powerless father, afraid he couldn’t face his deceased wife.

But in reality, the family’s savings had run out last week, and soon, Pete wouldn’t be able to pay the apartment’s electricity bill or his daughter’s school meal fees.

He Ao sighed, closed the refrigerator, and walked to his daughter’s room door, where she should be either playing on the computer or doing homework at this time.

He knocked gently on the door, "Ennie, are you asleep?"

There was no answer from inside.

He knocked again.

Still no response.

He turned the doorknob and slowly pushed the door open.

Bright light filled the pink and white decorated room.

The desk lamp was on, textbooks were spread out on the desk, but the computer chair, where his daughter Ennie should have been sitting, was empty.