Chapter 99
Lin Ke could never have imagined that one day, he would be deemed suitable for the role of “bait.”
What he least expected was that after learning what kind of bait this mission required, he really had to admit that he was exceptionally suited to be bait.
Speaking of fear toward the bizarre, who had more than him?
Before Luo Shizhen and the others contacted him, Lin Ke had been shrinking inside the Awakener school, not daring to take a single step out the main gate.
He was deeply afraid that the moment he left Eternal Day’s supervision range, he would immediately be hunted down by that bizarre—whether it was real or fake.
“I do really like watching horror movies, that’s true, but making me watch them alone, I’m seriously terrified!”
Lin Ke knew that in the entire team, the easiest one to talk to was Luo Shizhen. He directly slumped on the floor, hugging Luo Shizhen’s shin and fake-crying.
Luo Shizhen had a good temper, letting him hug him while trying his best to comfort him:
“Don’t worry, we’ll all be guarding nearby. We won’t let that bizarre do anything to you.”
“The point isn’t the safety issue, it’s the fact that a female ghost appearing in a horror movie itself is terrifying, alright?!”
Especially when knowing it in advance, the fear level instantly doubled.
Luo Shizhen scratched his head. Seeing that Lin Ke really seemed terrified, he mirrored the teachers, reaching out his hand to gently stroke Lin Ke’s head over and over to soothe him:
“We really can’t accompany you to watch it. Last time we watched a horror movie, we attacked it, so we aren’t sure if it remembers us. If we stay with you, we might alert the enemy. But we will absolutely be watching nearby, and we won’t let that bizarre hurt you even a single bit!”
The young Purifier’s hand landed on his head. Lin Ke instinctively froze, then was dazed by the other’s rhythmic, gentle stroking—just like petting a puppy or a kitten.
Perhaps because Luo Shizhen had just taken a shower, Lin Ke could smell a fresh soap scent on him. It wasn’t strong, just faint, making one involuntarily want to lean a bit closer.
Lin Ke, whose mind had been full of lines to refuse, suddenly forgot what to say, instinctively blurring out:
“You smell so good.”
Luo Shizhen lifted his arm in confusion to sniff it, then came to a sudden realization:
“It’s the soap brand I’ve used since childhood. I use it for my laundry too. It’s very good. If you like it, I can give you a box.”
Lin Ke felt it wasn’t because of the soap. That scent was very faint, almost imperceptible, but once smelled, it inexplicably brought peace of mind.
Could it be because Luo Shizhen was a Purifier?
He threw his dignity to the wind, as if his brain had short-circuited, hugging Luo Shizhen’s shin, burying his face, and taking a deep breath:
“Ah! Fragrant!”
Luo Shizhen instinctively moved his leg, laughing: “It tickles, stop messing around.”
Only then did Lin Ke realize he was acting like a total pervert.
He instantly grew vigilant, springing up and looking left, right, up, and down. After confirming that Chu Xiao, Xiao Shan, and the others weren’t around, he let out a massive sigh of relief.
But…
Lin Ke looked back at Luo Shizhen, who was completely oblivious and still smiling cheerfully at him, his eyes full of pure clarity.
“You’re way too defenseless, aren’t you?”
If he had done that to anyone else, they would have considered him a freak—at worst getting beaten up, at best getting cursed out.
But Luo Shizhen didn’t feel anything was wrong at all; trust was practically written all over his face.
Lin Ke couldn’t help but feel relieved that he wasn’t actually a pervert.
He looked at the young man before him again.
Back when he was still at No. 3 High School, because his grades had been poor for a long time and he felt he was bad at speaking, Luo Shizhen’s social circle was average, and he always kept his head down gloomily.
When he was a child, his reactions were slow and his speech was slow. Few peers had the patience to wait for him, so Luo Shizhen also developed the habit of avoiding speech whenever possible.
But Lin Ke had never seen him back then. The Luo Shizhen he knew had always been the young Purifier nourished by the school to be healthy and fair-skinned, surrounded by a group of friends, smiling cheerfully every day.
Luo Shizhen’s features were very clean and delicate—not the strikingly exquisite type, nor the deep, brooding type, but clean and pure, like the morning sun or a white poplar at the foot of a mountain.
Facing someone with this kind of appearance who was entirely defenseless and yielded to every demand, Lin Ke felt that if he weren’t a pervert, he was on the verge of becoming one.
“Ahem!” Lin Ke cleared his throat quickly, inwardly marveling at what a moral and good person he was.
“Shizhen, you can’t be like this, you know? You need to maintain a sense of distance. You can’t just let outsiders get this close to you so easily.”
Luo Shizhen didn’t understand: “I haven’t let outsiders get too close to me either.”
Lin Ke: “You haven’t? I just hugged your leg, why did you let me hug it?”
The young Purifier looked blank, then smiled sheepishly. His smile made people soften up inside.
“You’re not an outsider.”
Lin Ke’s entire body shuddered. He, who was usually eloquent and adaptable, actually started to stutter: “W-what?”
“I said, you’re not an outsider.”
Luo Shizhen looked at him in confusion instead, their eyes meeting, his gaze completely sincere:
“Didn’t we form a team together before?”
“This time too, we’re teaming up again. The moment we called you, you came immediately. You didn’t even care about the danger just to help us act as bait. You’re a teammate, so how could you be called an outsider?”
Lin Ke, despite his thick skin, felt his face instantly flush red under Luo Shizhen’s incredibly earnest words.
He hadn’t expected Luo Shizhen to think this way.
After all, he had always prided himself on having self-awareness.
He, Lin Ke, had a low awakening sequence, lacked offensive capabilities, lacked defensive capabilities, and only possessed the single skill of makeup.
When Guardians fought bizarres, they usually faced them head-on, making his disguise ability look exceptionally useless.
Even when Luo Shizhen and the others were doing Zou Tangzheng’s mission, it was only by relying on his thick skin that he managed to mix into the team.
But all along, Lin Ke himself hadn’t truly felt like he was a part of the team.
Yet Luo Shizhen had always thought of him this way?
Even though he knew Luo Shizhen never lied, Lin Ke still instinctively stammered:
“D-don’t think that just because you’re saying these sweet words, you can coax me into being bait…”
Luo Shizhen was confused: “I didn’t coax you, it’s just the truth.”
Seeing Lin Ke suddenly start talking gibberish and his face turning red with excitement, he figured Lin Ke must be too terrified of being bait.
“If you really don’t want to be bait, let’s forget it. We can just find someone else.”
The number of times Luo Shizhen had visited Eternal Day was absolutely several times that of his peers. As a mutant Purifier, he had to go to Eternal Day for physical exams almost every half-month.
He had gradually grown familiar with Eternal Day’s staff, and he recalled there were a few low-level ones who were suitable to be bait.
Thinking this way, Luo Shizhen reached out his hand and clumsily stroked Lin Ke’s head again to comfort him, pulling out his phone to call Eternal Day.
Before he could dial, his phone screen was blocked by Lin Ke’s hand.
Luo Shizhen: ?
He was confused again, but remained patient: “What’s wrong?”
Lin Ke looked at Luo Shizhen with a complicated expression: “I suddenly realized that I don’t need to worry about you at all. You’re a natural black archetype; you can even use reverse psychology by instinct.”
Luo Shizhen: “Ah? What reverse psychology?”
Lin Ke slipped the phone back into Luo Shizhen’s pocket: “No need to look for anyone else. Let me be the bait.”
“Oh, alright.”
Luo Shizhen smiled happily: “Then let me add you to the group chat.”
Lin Ke: “What group chat?”
“The mission group,” Luo Shizhen said matter-of-factly. “Usually, having a group makes it more convenient to communicate.”
This group had been created when they were clearing bizarres in the South Ward. Originally, they had posted everything in the classmate group chat.
But Chu Xiao mentioned that Ying He and Ying Liu weren’t participating in the missions, so if they posted mission details in the classmate group every time, it would disturb them too much.
Luo Shizhen thought that made a lot of sense, so he created a new mission group chat.
Now that Lin Ke was joining, he naturally had to pull him in.
Lin Ke looked at his phone, seeing Chu Xiao and the others all present without exception. The flush that had just receded from his face surged right back up.
He actually pulled me into the mission group.
He really does view me as one of his own.
I, Lin Ke, am actually a member of a Guardian team now.
A mere bait duty—what is there to fear!
After finishing his chat with Lin Ke, Luo Shizhen went to pour a glass of water. Just as he was about to carry it back to his room, he spotted Cheng Yunshao in the corridor.
“Cheng Yunshao, good evening. Where are you going so late?”
The moment Cheng Yunshao saw Luo Shizhen in his pajamas, he couldn’t help but look twice, pausing for a few seconds before answering:
“Isn’t Lin Ke scared? I wanted to go persuade him.”
In terms of familiarity and suitability, he believed Lin Ke was the most appropriate candidate. Cheng Yunshao still wanted to avoid changing people if possible.
Luo Shizhen let out an “oh” and said naturally:
“No need to persuade him anymore, Lin Ke isn’t scared anymore. Just now, he even said he wanted to find some bulletproof vests or something to wear, so it would be easier to resist attacks while watching the horror movie.”
Cheng Yunshao froze: “Not scared anymore?”
How could that be?
He had seen very clearly that ever since Lin Ke arrived, he had been in a state of anxiety over being bait. Once he learned he had to watch a horror movie, that anxiety worsened.
Cheng Yunshao didn’t want the mission to fail, so he had specially cleared two hours tonight to give Lin Ke a good talking-to.
He knew Lin Ke’s character well; this guy was typically hard to persuade.
How could he stop being afraid before anyone even persuaded him?
His gaze instantly landed on Luo Shizhen: “You persuaded him?”
Luo Shizhen: “I bumped into him when I went downstairs, so I chatted with him for a bit. Then, for some reason, he suddenly agreed.”
Cheng Yunshao: “…How long did you chat?”
Luo Shizhen recalled: “About five minutes?”
Cheng Yunshao: “…”
His silence lasted a bit too long, making Luo Shizhen confused:
“Why aren’t you speaking?”
Cheng Yunshao: “Nothing, I just wanted to say…”
“Goodnight.”
Luo Shizhen didn’t think much of it, immediately smiling and responding: “Goodnight.”
Cheng Yunshao watched his retreating back. Wearing bear pajamas, he looked a bit youthful.
But he suddenly felt that Luo Shizhen was very suited to be a captain.
Even more suited than himself.
Recommended Reads
