Am I really hallucinating?

Chapter 479 Good people are rewarded

……

"Are you asking about Shanren Village?"

"Why are people still asking this at this hour? I thought you guys in the firm had already lost interest. You're probably just fantasizing about finding some clue to solve a cold case and become famous overnight."

"Chu Xiuping? That restless kid who's been acting strangely ever since he came here. It's good to be young, he even managed to find a golden flower in the mountains, haha. Then after the entire Shanren Village was wiped out, he almost went insane. He can't do his job properly and only thinks about investigating that matter. Even though the higher-ups have already made a final judgment, he still insists on demanding an explanation."

"Where did he go? I heard he was going to be transferred to Jiangwen Street. It was a sudden transfer order, so he's lucky. That kid doesn't know what's good for him. When he first came, he said he wanted to leave, but now that he's finally going to the main street, he says he's not going to leave."

"In the end? In the end, of course, he was just saying one thing and meaning another. He didn't even say goodbye to us colleagues who had worked together for several years. One day after get off work, we never saw him again. I think he was actually quite anxious."

"If you want to go to Shanren Village, the only way now is to find a guide in town to drive you up the shortcut. There's no one there anymore. When the incident happened, a bus going up the mountain crashed into the valley. Now buses don't go up the mountain anymore. Around the same time Chu Xiuping left, the road was blocked by a landslide. If you don't have someone familiar with the mountain roads to guide you, be careful not to get lost on the mountain."

"Oh, right, actually, not long after that incident, I occasionally heard people in town say that a ghost bus sometimes runs on that bus route, carrying the vengeful spirit of the bus that crashed off the cliff. Maybe if you're lucky, it can take you to the mountain village, hahaha."

……

Lin Yilin recalled the information she had gleaned from the on-duty police officer while inquiring at the police station, and then strolled around the deserted mountain village.

There weren't many clues, and after looking at the suspected source of the poisoning, they left.

However, Lin Yilin is not here to investigate any clues; she is simply here for sightseeing.

Before the next rain came, Lin Yilin walked down the mountain.

She saw a road swallowed up by a landslide along the way, but it was no obstacle for her. After crossing it, she continued along the road.

Finally, she returned to the station where she boarded the train.

The police station not far away was lit up. Lin Yilin glanced at it a few times and then left.

Back at her temporary lodging in town, she dialed Zheng Fan's cell phone.

“Mr. Illusion, I’m about to return. I’m heading straight to Jiangwen Street… no, maybe somewhere else.”

"You're coming over? Did you find out something?"

"Mr. Illusion said before that Lu Chongming's side had grasped the key clues, so what's the situation now?"

"A man named Wang Shizhong was operating undercover within the Bureau. However, he fled as soon as he realized he had been exposed. He's currently planning something with a very dangerous fingertip nuclear bomb by the end of February," Zheng Fan relayed directly.

Having internet access is great. Lin Yilin's fingers tapped on the keyboard, and she quickly dug up information about Wang Shizhong.

"A white world citizen, with excellent grades from childhood to adulthood, always ranking first in everything he did in his early upbringing. Oh, he's actually my classmate, a graduate of the University of Sanzio. He entered the Xinjiang News Processing Bureau's affairs group with outstanding grades, but his work experience over the next ten years was unremarkable. Judging from his resume alone, he seems like a good person."

“Yes, he’s a good person on his resume, he’s done a lot of good deeds.” Zheng Fan echoed, “In fact, according to the locals, he’s the kind of person who would help an old lady cross the street.”

"He has publicly and privately sponsored numerous charitable causes, mostly to reputable organizations, and he has even personally supervised the construction of many of them. Shanren Village is one of them." "Does he do so many good deeds simply to do good?"

"Of course not. He was essentially using charity as a pretext to plant seeds of corruption in countless places that received his help. For example, the charity project in Shanren Village was one of his early investments. At that time, he even took advantage of his holidays to personally come to the village to teach..."

"No, can he really do that? I suspect he has a split personality," Zheng Fan joked.

"Mr. Illusion, how do you feel?"

Zheng Fan said, "It is impossible to know when he first came into contact with the Mothman illusion, but at least his behavior is probably related to the Mothman illusion."

"Then it probably wasn't a change of heart that happened midway, but rather something he had prepared from the beginning. The poisoning in the mountain village was done with a remote-controlled device, deep underwater. I had Toast go down to check and find it. You can tell that the methods used in the early years were quite crude and clumsy. If the locals had investigated more thoroughly, they might have been able to find it."

"That's probably why he chose to take action in a remote area," Zheng Fan said.

"To cover up his earlier oversight, he secretly monitored the investigation in this area, and even took the time to kill a police officer who was persistent in investigating the matter, and sabotaged the normal road leading up the mountain."

"He did good deeds in the first place just to destroy them later? That would make him a purely perverse person. But I don't think so. I've had contact with that Mothman, and I could sense that he had a strong sense of purpose. He wasn't just acting for his own pleasure. These actions actually brought him some real benefits," Zheng Fan said, expressing his opinion.

After a moment of silence, Lin Yilin asked, "Mr. Illusion, what did the teacher say to you before?"

"Oh, I forgot to tell you the details. Oh right, your teacher said that the other party is not manipulating fate, but rather a manifestation of idealism."

“That’s right,” Lin Yilin affirmed.

"You have your opinion?"

"Mr. Illusion, you should know the saying 'good deeds are rewarded,' right?"

"This is a very common value. Although people often refute it with satirical real-life examples, most people are still willing to believe it deep down. At least they hope that when they help others, they can receive the same help when they encounter difficulties themselves. I think it's a kind of self-comfort in an orderly society," Zheng Fan said after thinking for a moment.

“That’s it. I think Wang Shizhong’s ‘good luck’ is a concrete manifestation of this kind of ‘self-comfort’,” Lin Yilin said. “As long as he does good deeds, he can get just the right amount of good luck. This good luck can help him turn danger into safety, overcome difficulties, and even make his wishes come true and have a smooth journey to a certain extent.”

Zheng Fan nodded after listening: "It sounds like the merit system of some online novel protagonists... No, he started laying the groundwork a long time ago, but the earliest system was after the earthquake impact."

"That might not be the case. If he had taken his time, by March he could have even become the director of the Jiangwen Street Affairs Bureau. There was no need for him to be in such a hurry. But according to Mr. Illusion, he became somewhat impatient and active after the earthquake, and even pursued the highly efficient weapon of mass destruction, the fingertip nuclear bomb."

"He's clearly a capable person who's been lying low for so long. Even if the situation after the earthquake is indeed a good opportunity, there's no need for him to be in such a hurry. Or is there some huge benefit that could motivate him to accelerate his plans?"

Zheng Fan was silent for a moment, then thought of something and asked, "Then what do you think about the idea that 'evil people will be punished' for him?"

Wang Shizhong is now undoubtedly destroying the "good things" he did in the past.

There is clearly a deeper meaning behind this behavior.

“If good fortune is the hand that lifts him up,” Lin Yilin thought for a moment, “then misfortune is probably the iron fist he hurls at all those who threaten him. Good fortune and misfortune can be one and the same.”

(End of this chapter)