Chapter 242: The Nine Military Bureaus
Translator: Exodus Tales Editor: Exodus Tales
Edited by Aelryinth
The next morning, Zhang Che and Huang Juyun took the latter’s custom-made, full metal-bodied super luxurious car alloyed with purple-gold crystal, heading to central Bei Du City.
Zhang Che found it a little strange. Shouldn’t the relevant departments be located in some secluded area? Why would they be heading towards the city center?
Huang Juyun dispelled his doubts with a smile. “It’s not a combat unit. Of course it’d be more convenient to locate it in the center of the city.”
Seeing Zhang Che still acting a little nervous, Huang Juyun chuckled, “No need to be nervous. Your experience is important to the Nine Military Bureaus for their study of this series of incidents. They won’t make things hard for you.”
Zhang Che smiled, embarra.s.sed. “It’s exactly because I thought this is the highest intelligence department. I’m afraid they’ll even find out the age I stopped wetting the bed.”
Truthfully speaking, Zhang Che was indeed very nervous at the start. His predecessor had heard many things about intelligence departments. Thinking that he was about to become the target of investigation, how could he stay calm?
After hearing Zhang Che’s words, Huang Juyun pointed at him, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. It was only when his future father-in-law gave him his word that he finally settled down.
The car drove on for close to an hour through the intersecting roads, before turning into an una.s.suming little courtyard.
Zhang Che wasn’t curious about the ordinary exterior of this place. Instead, he was bemoaning silently, -This driver really sucks, taking so long to reach here. If it was Miss Tienan driving, I’m sure we would have been here in half an hour!-
——————-
After alighting from the car, Zhang Che followed Huang Juyun and pa.s.sed through several strict security checks, before finally arriving at the inner area of the Nine Military Bureaus.
The person who received them was a middle-aged major general, as well as a few record-takers sitting at his side.
What Zhang Che found strange was that other than these people, there was also a middle-aged woman with rather high cheekbones sitting at the side calmly, exuding the dignified aura of someone with high status.
Huang Juyun’s complexion changed slightly the moment he entered the room and saw this woman. There were hints of awkwardness, and hints of restraining fear, leaving Zhang Che’s heart thumping. -s.h.i.+t, did future father-in-law run into his old flame? This is not good.- This kind of situation was something he really wanted to avoid.
The department head of the Nine Military Bureaus, Xu Lingkong, probably felt the awkward atmosphere in the air. He couldn’t help but stood up and greet Huang Juyun, “General Huang, this must be your daughter’s little boyfriend, Zhang Che?”
The face of the middle-aged woman sitting at the side suddenly turned cold. She humphed, “Department Head Xu, this isn’t the place for small talk. Please start your questioning. I still have to hand the results of the questioning to our higher-ups.”
After saying that, the middle-aged woman turned to look at Huang Juyun, whose face was constantly changing. She said coldly, “General Huang Juyun, please sit at the side quietly. Don’t interfere with our questioning process. Thank you!”
Huang Juyun’s complexion turned even uglier. He didn’t utter a word, only sitting down at the side pa.s.sively.
Zhang Che was crying about his bad luck inwardly. -Looks like this won’t be an easy process. Does this count as getting implicated?-
Afterwards, the questioning officially began.
Zhang Che repeated what he talked about this to his future father-in-law, starting from the demonic flower that could blur one’s rationality.
When he was onto the part when the demonic flower’s soul trying to consume him, but was killed instead, the middle-aged woman suddenly interjected, “Stop! You just said that that demonic flower could cloud your consciousness from the start. It goes to show that its soul should be far stronger than yours. How could you reverse kill it at the last moment? I think your story is very suspicious!”
-Freaking h.e.l.l… you old virgin must have gotten dumped by my future father-in-law in the past!-
Zhang Che was very annoyed. However, looking at another perspective, this woman was indeed faithfully discharging her duty, and her senses were keen, discovering the loophole in his story immediately.
However, with his future father-in-law going through the story with him previously, Zhang Che wasn’t afraid of her. He met her suspicious gaze, saying calmly, “How would I know? Maybe that demonic flower is only good at clouding senses, and its soul wasn’t actually that strong? Moreover, that was only a strange plant in the end, how could it match up to us humans?”
There was no way to refute his words.
The middle-aged woman focused her cold gaze on Zhang Che, suddenly changing the topic, asking, “Since that demonic flower’s soul was consumed by you, then your spiritual sea must be larger than ordinary beastmasters. Can you talk about your beastmaster tier and the number of beasts you can employ?”
-This woman is incredible!-
“My beastmaster tier is already at Tier Five.” Zhang Che had no intentions of hiding his beastmaster tier. Not only that, he even planned on revealing a little about the secret of his large spiritual sea. “Also, I can employ one subdued beast more than other beastmasters.”
This was the first time Huang Juyun had heard Zhang Che talking about this. A trace of surprise flashed across his eyes, a surge of joy in his heart.
“Since that was the case, why wasn’t your spiritual sea measured to be that of a Tier Five beastmaster’s when you partic.i.p.ated in the joint university enrollment test? What other secrets are there-”
That woman kept pressing on.
“Enough! Zhen Manting, this is unrelated to the questioning this time.” Huang Juyun couldn’t hold it in any longer and interrupted her with a cold humph.
“How is it unrelated?” Zhen Manting turned to look at Huang Juyun coldly, her gaze unyielding, “This is related to our study on the series of disappearing incidents. We have to get things clear!”
Huang Juyun’s expression turned even uglier. Just as he was about to speak, he saw Zhang Che smiling faintly, saying, “It’s fine, Uncle Huang.”
Then, he turned to look at Zhen Manting with a calm expression, explaining, “Originally, this is considered to be my private matter, and I didn’t wish to talk about it. But since this old auntie insists on me revealing it, I’ll cooperate with your investigation and talk about it.”
Stopping there, he intentionally paused for a moment. The words “old auntie” immediately agitated Zhen Manting, her chest rising and falling quickly.
“But speaking about it, actually it’s not any secret now. After I consumed that demonic flower’s soul energy, I obtained the ability to control the fluctuations of my spiritual strength. It can be considered a profit from a disaster, I guess.”
There was no mistake; he’d just push everything onto that demonic flower. Zhang Che didn’t believe they could find another strange demonic flower like that.
So what if they found another one? Without the help of the mysterious rainbow crystal, there shouldn’t be many people who could win against the demonic flower’s soul, right?
Zhen Manting had no comebacks, either, and could only nod with a sunken face, keeping silent.
Afterwards, the near-invisible department head of the Nine Military Bureaus, Xu Lingkong, finally took back control, and started asking Zhang Che about what happened after that.
Just like that, Zhang Che spoke about him bribing a city administration official in the Ou Lu region and took the sky shuttle back to Hua Xia. At this moment, Zhen Manting interrupted him again.
“Which city in the Ou Lu region? What is the name of that city administration official? Which sky shuttle flight did you take?”
Zhang Che rolled his eyes back, “Please pardon me, for I can’t speak about this. I won’t say anything that concerns the future of that official. Mhm, my character is like that. Since I spent money to get others to do things for me, I won’t let them get implicated-”
Zhen Manting could no longer endure any more. She directly stood up, yelling, “Insolence! Mind your att.i.tude when speaking!”
Zhang Che didn’t make a sound. He looked at her calmly.
“Uh hrm!” Xu Lingkong, who hadn’t expressed much opinion all this while, suddenly let out a cough. He said, “I feel that this is indeed a small matter. It’s unrelated to our investigation. There’s no need to continue asking about it.”
After a short pause, he turned to Zhang Che with a faint smile and said, “Alright, Zhang Che boy, that’ll be all for today. However, I hope that you won’t go out casually for the next few days. If we have any other doubts, we’ll need you back here for your a.s.sistance.”
“Alright, no problem. Thank you, Department Head Xu!”
As the saying goes, never hit one with a good att.i.tude. Although Zhang Che felt that Xu Lingkong was no simple man, either, since he was acting so amiable, he couldn’t possibly show him a cold face, right?
——
On their way back, Huang Juyun suddenly said, “Xiaoche, you did pretty well today. However, you really made Zhen Manting lose face today. You have to be more mindful when dealing with matters in the future. Don’t give her the opportunity to find trouble with you.”
Zhang Che was depressed! -Isn’t it because I got implicated by you? This woman picked on me so much, it’s obvious she’s got something against you!-
“Uncle Huang, that Zhen Manting is..?”
“Oh, she’s one of the people in charge of Hua Xia’s government affairs inst.i.tution, directly under the intelligence bureau… Mmm, her family is even more powerful, holding great political powers and network within the government.”
Zhang Che’s complexion instantly darkened. -This time I really got freaking thrown into a pit by my father-in-law!-