"This is just ridiculous."
Gu Jianlin rubbed his forehead in resignation, sighed, and walked out of the lounge.
Su Youzhu was already sitting outside waiting for him. She seemed to have rushed out the door, hastily tying her hair into a messy bun, with a few stray hairs sticking up. She was wearing a white short-sleeve shirt and pink pajama pants.
A pair of pink pig slippers revealed her delicate, petite toes painted with black nail polish.
She fiddled with her keys and phone, and despite wearing a face mask, her displeasure was evident.
When Gu Jianlin appeared, she turned her head, and their eyes met.
It was awkward. He was well aware of his current sorry state—his body covered in blood and dust.
He looked utterly miserable.
Su Youzhu glanced at him and asked, "What day is it today?"
Gu Jianlin was puzzled. "April 6th."
Su Youzhu's face remained blank as she replied, "I feel like I've traveled back four months."
Back then, during winter, their mother had received a sudden call saying her son had been in a near-fatal car accident. She was so shocked that she ran out barefoot, flagged down a cab, and rushed to the hospital.
Su Youzhu and her father had to follow suit, and at the hospital, they saw the young man being wheeled into the operating room.
At that time, the young man looked just —an absolute wreck.
After four months of recovery, he'd finally seemed to get better.
But within just one morning, he had managed to end up looking again.
Gu Jianlin had no idea how to explain himself. Although this girl was nominally his stepsister, he couldn't shake the feeling that she was like a second mother to him—especially when she fixed him with that cold, unyielding stare.
"It was an accident," he said stiffly, offering a clumsy explanation.
Su Youzhu's gaze turned colder. "An accident?"
In her mind, she thought, "You look like you've just crawled out of a trench."
Gu Jianlin insisted, "It really was an accident."
At that moment, an agent responsible for filing records happened to pass by and offered a brief explanation of the events leading up to this mess.
To be fair, what Lu Zicheng said was actually true. After drinking Mind-bending Tea, the agents at the East Sea Road Police Station were all hypnotized, and their investigation of the incident under the overpass produced an utterly absurd conclusion.
According to them, it was a deliberate act of revenge orchestrated by accomplices of the criminal suspect.
Driving a car, they had taken a public servant's family member hostage, intending to harm them, but things spiraled out of control during the struggle, resulting in a crash.
In the end, they were rescued by two international agents.
Perfectly reasonable.
With absolutely no supernatural factors involved.
Because Professor Gu had cracked the case, the criminals' associates held a grudge and sought revenge against his family.
Su Youzhu listened quietly for a moment before nodding. "Thank you, I understand now."
She then turned to the young man again. "Does your wound still hurt?"
Gu Jianlin shook his head. "Not really. It's already bandaged, no big deal."
The Ether Association's external wound medicine worked surprisingly well. Whether it could heal him so quickly was another matter, but at the very least, its pain-relieving effects were immediate, far superior to standard anesthetics.
"Next time, just call me to come with you."
Her expression betrayed no emotion. Picking up her phone, she stood and calmly said, "Do you still need to finish the report or anything? I'll go outside and call a car. We'll talk when we get home."
Gu Jianlin watched her back as she walked away and felt lucky he hadn't dragged her into this today.
Otherwise, this innocent girl would have been caught up in the mess.
However, hearing the word "home" once again stirred his emotions.
He wasn't sure if he should return to that "new home."
It was the house their mother and Uncle Su had poured all their savings into. It represented the new family that two people with broken marriage histories had carefully rebuilt—a happy, flourishing household with two beautiful daughters.
Gu Jianlin had always felt that home didn't belong to him.
Staying there temporarily—it was already a stretch. He couldn't bring himself to cause them any more trouble.
The most nerve-wracking thing was that even the Fallen had now found their way to his doorstep!
God knows what might happen in the future.
Just then, Lu Zicheng walked up beside him, patted him on the shoulder, and said unhurriedly, "Don't worry. Once you become a member of the Ether Association, your family's safety will be guaranteed. Under Deep Space's protective net, someone like Li Changzhi wouldn't even get within five kilometers of your house before we'd already caught them."
Gu Jianlin hesitated for a second. "Deep Space?"
"Mm. Fifteen years ago, a new technology unearthed from an ancient tomb in Egypt. Have you heard of the 'Jade Record'? Within the domain of alchemy, the world is composed of the four fundamental elements—Earth, Wind, Water, and Fire—as well as a fifth element: Ether. Ether represents the human spirit and consciousness, and we've applied it to the realm of supercomputers."
Lu Zicheng elaborated, "Once you join the Ether Association, you'll gain access to the Deep Web. The Deep Web will also use satellite technology to monitor a ten-kilometer radius around your home. It has an independent algorithm that automatically identifies regular residents, transient visitors, newcomers, and so on."
"It then marks each person's identity, pulls up their records, and analyzes their threat levels based on various factors such as gender, personality, age, occupation, and past experiences."
He spread his hands. "Doesn't that sound reassuring?"
Gu Jianlin couldn't help but admit, "This sounds like you're selling me a pipe dream."