Trickster Hunter.

Chapter 242 Negative Image
"I have a feeling." Yang Lian looked at Sun Hang and said, "If you keep messing around like this, you'll get into big trouble sooner or later."

"Tsk, what are you saying..." Sun Hang glanced at the ruins not far away, "The world of human civilization is now full of big and small problems. If we do nothing because we are afraid of causing bigger problems, what is the difference between that and waiting to die?"

"You fellow, why are you talking about big principles so eloquently now?" Ye Jiu praised from the side, "Look at Comrade Yang Lian, he wants to refute but can't find the words... Hahaha, I am dying of laughter."

During the time when Sun Hang was away, Ye Jiu was often criticized by Yang Lian's sharp words - although according to her position, Ye Jiu could be considered half of her superior, but Yang Lian would not care about this when he was criticized.

No wonder she had been doing errands for so many years before she met Sun Hang, but never got a chance to be promoted.

"Keep laughing, I'm going to work." Yang Lian rolled his eyes at Ye Jiu and left with a stack of files.

"Ling Xiao!" Sun Hang waved at the boy standing beside him in a daze, "The place where you met that woman should not be far from here, right?"

"It's right next to the resettlement camp." Ling Xiao replied.

"Take me over there and have a look."

……

The ruins are right next to the No. 6 refugee resettlement camp. Ling Xiao used to live here. His family of six squeezed into a low-rent apartment of less than 50 square meters... They were not the worst off in the community. The family next door to them had a total of eleven people, including the elderly and children. The room was as crowded as a can of sardines, and even a folding bed had to be placed on the three-square-meter balcony to relieve the pressure in the room.

For them, the conditions in the refugee resettlement camps are actually not much worse than their original living conditions... At least in the resettlement camps, everyone can be allocated a clean sleeping bag, and the space in the tents is much more spacious than the previous cramped and moldy cubicles.

Sun Hang and Ling Xiao were walking among the ruins. Although he had never been to this place, because he had read Ling Xiao's memory, many things here gave him a sense of déjà vu.

This location used to be a half-collapsed dangerous building. Most of the residents had moved out, but at least a few who could not afford to move were still living inside. There were many homeless people sleeping on the floor in the corridor, and the dirty bedding was full of holes, through which you could see the cotton inside had turned yellowish-brown.

This is the activity area in the community, but the sports equipment has long been in disrepair. Many of the equipment even have only a bare base left. There is a several-meter-long hemp rope between the horizontal bar and the parallel bars. This is a public clothesline for residents of the community. Ling Xiao's mother often quarrels with the housewives downstairs because of the right to use the clothesline.

Walk another fifteen meters forward and turn right, and the ruins are Ling Xiao’s former "home" - calling it a "home" is actually not entirely accurate, because the house is rented, and the rent has been in arrears for two months. If Ling Xiao's parents still cannot pay the rent by the end of this month, the landlord will kick them out.

Thanks to Longyanlei, they no longer have to worry about this problem.

Ling Xiao's family originally had decent living conditions, and they lived closer to the center of Tianfu City. However, because his father was addicted to stock trading and believed in the advice of some mysterious Internet masters, he not only lost half his life savings, but also mortgaged his house and car.

In Ling Xiao's memory, his father didn't look like a stock investor at all, but more like a gambler who had lost all his money.

Ling Xiao's mother picked up a gold ring on the way back from burning incense in the temple. From then on, she became an extremely devout believer. She even borrowed money from relatives and friends to go to the temple to bring back the "blessed" statue of Guanyin Bodhisattva.

Although his mother never told her children how much the statue cost, during one of their parents' arguments, he heard his father yelling at his mother, "Why did you spend 88,800 yuan on this thing? I could have used the money to buy the two stocks I liked before! If I had the money then, I would have made a fortune now!"

Ling Xiao didn't know why a 20-centimeter-tall bronze statue was so expensive, but his mother valued it more than her own life...and what made Sun Hang speechless the most was that after Ling Xiao's father was dragged by his wife to worship the Buddha, the stocks he held went up the next day. This made his attitude change 180 degrees, and he worshipped the Buddha more diligently every day than his wife.

Although such things never happened again, the couple did not think it was the Bodhisattva's fault. Instead, they felt that it was because they were not pious enough, or that their children were not pious enough.

At this time, Ling Xiao, who was the least interested in worshiping the Buddha, naturally became the couple's outlet... For this, he had been beaten and scolded since he was a child.

Sun Hang suddenly understood why Ling Xiao had such an inexplicable hatred towards gods and Buddhas.

The two of them continued walking forward for a distance. This time, Sun Hang knew that they had arrived without Ling Xiao taking the initiative to speak.

In front of us is a pile of ruins nearly ten meters high. The ruins are in the shape of an irregular cone. This is because the department responsible for disaster relief used a bulldozer to flatten the remains of the entire building and piled them up in order to prevent a secondary collapse of the ruins. From a distance, it looks like a mini pyramid.

In Ling Xiao's memory, the woman emitting bright moonlight was sitting so gracefully on the top of the ruins - there was no moon in the sky shrouded in eternal night, but the moment Ling Xiao saw her, she was like the moon of this world.

"It makes the heaven and earth pale in comparison." This sentence is the most appropriate description.

"I do feel that a little bit." Sun Hang nodded silently.

Fortunately, Ling Xiao himself has no good feelings towards gods. If it were another boy who had just entered puberty, he would be completely fascinated by this guy...

On the Internet, men often call the women they admire "goddesses", but if they were to see this scene, they would definitely think that the word "goddess" refers to only one individual... and that is Anna, who is sitting on top of the ruins, overlooking all living beings.

Sun Hang walked up the slope of the ruins, stood where Anna had sat, and looked around.

He didn't detect any scent belonging to Anna, not even the scent of other strange creatures.

It's very clean here.

"Could it be... that what appeared in front of Ling Xiao was just a projection?" Sun Hang muttered in his heart, "But, if it was just a projection, how did she devour Ling Xiao's emotions? If she could achieve this level with just a projection, it's really a bit against the will of heaven..."

Sun Hang turned around, looked down at Ling Xiao who was standing under the ruins, and asked, "Do you think I am a god?"

Ling Xiao shook his head. The next second, a circle of blue flames ignited on Sun Hang's body, and the flickering flames licked the waste residue under his feet. The tangled steel bars quickly turned into molten iron and seeped into the cracks of the ruins. The broken concrete blocks cracked and turned into gray-white powder.

"what about now?"

"It still doesn't look like..." Ling Xiao thought for a few seconds, then said, "It doesn't look like a high and mighty god. Instead, it looks like a demon crawling out of hell."

"Huh?" Sun Hang put away the flames and jumped down from the top of the ruins. "Why do you think so?"

“I don’t know, it’s just a feeling.”

"Demons are not bad either. Demons are naturally hostile to gods." Sun Hang said, "Since you think gods are not good, then we should be on the same front, don't you think?"

"Can I gain such ability?" Ling Xiao looked at Sun Hang and asked calmly.

"Then you have to become an infected person. You just heard what the flat-chested big sister said. It's against the rules to do so." Sun Hang said, "But I have a way to allow you to gain the power of a monster as an ordinary person."

"any solution?"

"Have you heard of strange equipment and qualified persons?" Sun Hang asked.

Ling Xiao shook his head.

"The armor worn by the guy named Ye Jiu just now, as well as the wolf-tooth spear and long sword on his back, are his strange equipment." Sun Hang said, "The essence of strange equipment is strange objects, but they can be manipulated by humans. Those who have the ability to manipulate them are called qualified ones."

"Can everyone become qualified?" Ling Xiao asked.

"If everyone could do this... the federal government would have already started a major counterattack." Sun Hang said, "But I have a plan. If it works, maybe it can be done... But this plan requires your cooperation. You need to trust me unconditionally and without reason."

"I will cooperate." Ling Xiao nodded, "It doesn't matter even if you turn me into an infected person."

"That's against the rules." Sun Hang patted his shoulder. "You will be my first experimental subject... But don't be nervous. This experiment does not require dissection or medication, and even blood drawing is not required. As for what you need to do specifically, you will know when the time comes."

"Blood draw? Doesn't a physical examination require blood draw?"

"A physical examination is a physical examination, and an experiment is an experiment. These are two different things." Sun Hang looked at Ling Xiao helplessly. This guy is good in everything except that he is a bit stubborn. "Okay, let's go back. It's almost noon. It's time to look for food."

"Foraging...are you going to catch someone to eat?"

Ling Xiao's question made Sun Hang dumbfounded. Although Sun Hang had indeed devoured other infected people, how could this little brat equate the words "foraging" and "eating people"?

"Uh... do you have any misunderstandings about me?" Sun Hang scratched his head. "You can't think that I was a devil just because I acted like a devil, do you think I really am a devil?"

"My classmates at school told me that in order to maintain their lives, the infected need to eat a living person every once in a while, otherwise their bodies will be quickly dragged down by the strange virus." Ling Xiao answered seriously, "My father and mother occasionally talk about the infected eating people, and ask us to stay away from the infected as much as possible - even if the infected person is a registered hunter with a legal license."

"Oh my goodness, this is just a rumor..." Sun Hang rubbed his brows helplessly, "The image of this monster hunter among the people is so negative that it can't be more negative... We have to think of a way to change the current situation..."

"This is not a rumor, it is a real thing that happened in Tianfu City." Wang Xiyi suddenly flashed out from the side. She had taken off her heavy powered exoskeleton and put on a light sportswear.

There was a bowl-sized hole at the back of her pants, and the scaly tail stretched out from the hole, swaying behind her.

"Did it really happen?" Sun Hang was stunned. "Didn't they say that I was the first human confirmed to be infected by Taotie?"

"That guy wasn't infected by Taotie, but a meme similar to a vampire. His code name is 'Dracula', and his physical characteristics, abilities, and weaknesses are similar to those of vampires described in various legends, such as pale skin, fear of natural light, amazing strength and recovery ability, etc. At the same time, he also has to drink human blood regularly, otherwise his body will age rapidly..."

"Is there really such a meme?" Sun Hang was a little surprised.

"He is also a registered hunter in Tianfu City. In order to meet his needs, the blood bank in Tianfu City will regularly provide him with blood pulp... But in the three years since he joined the company, his 'appetite' has gradually increased, and his taste has become more and more picky. The blood bank in Tianfu City has gradually been unable to satisfy his appetite..."

"And then he started hunting humans?"

"Yes, human blood has an incomparable attraction to him, especially the blood of young and beautiful virgins... The situation at that time was somewhat similar to the Bloody Mary case before, both of which involved young women going missing... However, this guy's ability to hide his whereabouts was much worse than those cultists, and he was caught by the investigation bureau in less than half a month."

"What happened next? How did this guy handle it?"

"I was in charge of capturing him. My order was to kill him on the spot if he resisted." Wang Xiyi shrugged. "He certainly won't sit there and wait for death. I can only help the federal government save the cremation fee."

"You are worthy of it." Sun Hang gave Wang Xiyi a thumbs up.

"This matter should have been kept strictly confidential. After all, it would have a very bad impact on both the federal government and the monster hunters... But there happened to be reformists among the investigators and sheriffs involved in the case. Although they all signed a confidentiality agreement, the matter still spread among the people, and the rumor that the infected people eat people spread. The research institute and the investigation bureau publicly refuted the rumor several times, but it was useless."

(End of this chapter)