So… did he trick me?
After hearing the old investigator’s summary, the young female investigator couldn’t help but stand frozen in place. After a long while, she snapped back to reality and angrily pulled out the survey form, ripping it into countless pieces right there!
“Don’t rush.”
A hand, its skin dark yellow and loose, covered with age spots, gently waved. Miraculously, the shredded papers flew back together, reassembling into a perfectly intact survey form, seamless and as good as new, showing no trace of ever being torn.
Taking the survey form from the female investigator, the old investigator smiled warmly with his crescent-shaped eyes and teased, “Aisha, weren’t you just praising him highly earlier? What’s going on now? Are you planning to rewrite the survey form?”
“I… thank you for your guidance!”
The female investigator, her face somewhat troubled, took a deep breath before respectfully bowing deeply to the old investigator.
“This time, I underestimated the situation. Without your reminder, I might have been deceived by him. I’m still too inexperienced; there’s much more I need to learn from you.”
“Ho ho, these things can’t be learned.”
The old investigator shook his head, smiling kindly with his curved eyebrows.
“To be precise, all the judgments I made earlier had no evidence at all—just hollow guesses. The way I judged that there was something wrong with him wasn’t based on solid logic but rather a subconscious feeling.
If we want to do our job well, we must be like bank tellers who handle a lot of ‘real money.’ If someone handles real money their whole life, when they occasionally come across counterfeit money, they don’t necessarily need to find anything specific—they’ll instinctively feel that the money in their hands is different.
Our investigation work follows the same principle. This subconscious sense of disharmony cannot be taught; only after encountering enough people will you gradually grasp it through accumulation.”
“I’ve understood, Senior Camus!”
“Hehe, good to hear it. I’ll keep this survey form here. After finishing writing the investigation results later, I’ll attach it behind my own form and submit it together.”
“???”
Hearing that he actually planned to submit her survey form too, the female investigator couldn’t help but protest anxiously:
“But my investigation was wrong! How can it be submitted?”
“There indeed are errors, but if even an experienced investigator like you could make mistakes, it serves as excellent proof.”
The old investigator smiled upon hearing this, waving toward a nearby steam carriage while explaining:
“Just as you said earlier, not everything can be reflected in documents.
My investigation produced a gut feeling of ‘something’s off’ after interacting with this person, without any concrete evidence. However, your investigation was entirely logical, every judgment supported by evidence, making it more credible than mine.
Only by submitting your erroneous investigation alongside my results for comparison can the reviewers truly understand where the problem lies with this newcomer from the Virgo Subdivision… Aisha, you won’t hold it against me for embarrassing you, right?”
“Not at all… since I made the mistake, it’s proper for you to report it.”
“Hehe, good that you don’t blame me… Um… Since the investigation has concluded and our opinions align, let’s walk together. Your carriage has arrived.”
Huh? My carriage? The female investigator blinked slightly in confusion:
“Aren’t you coming back to the General Bureau with me?”
“Not yet.”
After helping her onto a luxurious two-seater steam carriage, the old investigator bid farewell with a smile: “I have an old friend around here. It’s rare to see him, so I arranged to meet up before this mission. I plan to spend some time with him. I won’t return with you this time.”
“Alright, then please stay safe.”
Waving goodbye to the female investigator, once her carriage had driven far away, the old investigator didn’t wait for his supposed old friend but instead signaled another vacant steam carriage over.
Noticing the fine tailoring of the old investigator’s clothes, sensing a potential big customer, the driver couldn’t help but grin widely. After the old investigator boarded, the driver eagerly asked, “Where to, sir?”
“Undecided. Let’s just drive forward for a bit.”
“Uh… okay…”
Listening to the chilling voice as cold as ice chips, the driver shivered involuntarily and couldn’t help but sneak a glance at the passenger through the rearview mirror.
His eyes were narrow and long, eyebrows and corners of his mouth slightly tilted downward. Even without making any expression, he looked like he was about to burst into tears.
This old man looks so gloomy… oh well, doesn’t matter as long as he pays…
“Director, that old investigator seems pretty nice.”
After recounting the recent interrogation process and the two survey forms seen with the help of the puppy, Leon curiously asked,
“He barely asked any difficult questions and showed no ill intentions towards either me or you in his soul. Why did you warn me to be cautious of him?”
“If I must say why… it should be a kind of intuition.”
The red-haired bureau director rubbed his temples, blinking his fox-like eyes, looking puzzled and saying, “It’s hard to describe this feeling, but it’s like having a case of twelve bottles of Margaux wine, with one bottle of second label Margaux secretly mixed in.
Even though the taste may not differ much, and the grapes used for winemaking are only separated by a river, after drinking a lot, you would instinctively feel that the acidity is a bit off, and the alcohol content feels stronger.
And he is like that bottle of wine that was sneaked in. No matter how you taste him, something feels off. Especially when you called for help, and he leaned in to wake me up, in that instant, I almost instinctively felt that this person shouldn’t get too close to me.”
After sharing his feelings, the red-haired bureau director asked somewhat discontentedly,
“Leon, after checking his soul, did you really not find any abnormalities?”
“Really nothing. His soul is completely normal.”
“Ah… I see…”
The red-haired bureau director frowned,
“The soul is the most essential part of a person. There should be no way to fake it. Perhaps there’s something about him that poses a threat to me, which is why I instinctively resist his proximity…
Hmm… But you should still be careful. There’s a subtle sense of disharmony about him. It’s best not to have any contact with him.”
“Understood.”
Nodding slightly and earnestly committing the red-haired bureau director’s advice to memory, Leon said,
“Director, tomorrow is the ennoblement ceremony, but I still have some official duties unfinished. If there’s nothing else here, I’ll go back to the office first.”
“Go ahead, go ahead. And stop calling me ‘you’ so formally—it’s tiring to hear… Oh, by the way.”
At this point, the red-haired bureau director seemed to remember something, rummaged through a drawer, and handed over a photo tied with hair.
“Here, it’s yours.”
