Chapter 65: Chapter Sixty-Five
Lin Ke had originally thought that because Luo Shizhen and the others were young, they would impulsively decide to do something without thinking it through.
In fact, the two accompanying teachers thought so too, but they were relatively calm.
Although the mission was real, in the end, it was an opportunity to train the students and give them some real combat experience.
If the students did well, then naturally all would be well.
If they didn’t do well, it would be a chance for them to learn from the experience, and the teachers were there to back them up anyway.
Lin Qi hadn’t managed to draw the lot for Luo Shizhenâs group, but that didn’t stop him from obtaining information remotely from a distance.
When he heard that Luo Shizhen had decided to play a scammer to lure the fish onto the hook, he nearly laughed out loud.
“Of the six of them, the one who looks least like a scammer is Luo Shizhen. And they actually chose him to be the scammer? Are they afraid the mission will be too easy?”
The person Lin Qi was talking to was, naturally, his captain, Sui An.
As Luo Shizhenâs Watchman, Sui An didn’t need to draw lots and was directly responsible for protecting their squad.
However, Sui An wasn’t with the two teachers. Instead, he had randomly chosen a tree and was ‘standing’ on a thin branch.
If one looked closely, they would see that he wasn’t relying on the branch to support his body. Mental energy threads intersected, literally supporting a “high platform” for him.
The originally transparent color of his mental energy shifted slightly in the sunlight. Using the reflection of light and shadow, he achieved a cloaking effect. Below, passersby walked past, and not a single soul discovered that a person was standing atop this tall tree.
Sui An appeared to be leaning lazily against the tree trunk, but his mental energy hid his presence while threading through various critical points.
“You’ve trained him plenty; how are you still not clear on what kind of person he is?”
Lin Qi: “? How could I not be clear? This child is the most innocent of all the students.”
That was exactly why he was so surprised when he heard they decided to have Luo Shizhen play the scammer.
“He is indeed pure-hearted, but he is also a serious, good student.”
Sui An said slowly, “When Luo Shizhen sets out to do something, he does it more seriously than anyone else.”
“So, I actually have quite a bit of confidence in him playing a scammer.”
Inside the room, Lin Ke was trying to stop them: “Isn’t this going a bit too far? Aren’t you supposed to be imitating this scammer called Zou Tangzheng?”
“A scammer’s thought process would surely be to want to swindle money, but they wouldn’t dare play it too large. Otherwise, if it blows up, won’t they be discovered immediately?”
Luo Shizhen pulled a thick stack titled Zou Tangzheng Research Manual from his bag, flipped to a certain page, and pointed it out to him:
“No, that’s not right. Zou Tangzheng isn’t like that. His way of doing things is that whatever disease is hard to treat, he claims he can treat it. And he’s not afraid of being discovered at all. Every time, he makes as much noise as possible and even spends money to buy press for himself.”
“Look here. Zou Tangzheng will claim he can treat cancer and blatantly advertise his status as a doctorate of medicine in commercials. During this period, he appeared on TV in March, May, June, and August respectively. The identities he used were a doctor of medicine, an heir to a TCM family, an heir to Hmong medicine, and a ninth-generation heir to acupuncture.”
Lin Ke looked over. The page he had flipped to was indeed filled with dense details of which TV shows Zou Tangzheng had appeared on, how he had boasted about himself, and what kind of things he had said.
They were even all handwritten.
Looking at the thick stack in Luo Shizhenâs hand, he was stunned. “You wrote all of these?”
Luo Shizhen nodded. “Yes. Since Iâm going to play a scammer based on what kind of person he is, I definitely have to research him well first.”
“Handwritten?”
“Yes. Handwriting makes it a bit clearer to remember.”
Lin Ke gestured at the thickness of the stack of papers and was suddenly filled with respect. “Can I see it?”
“Go ahead.” Luo Shizhen very generously handed him the thick stack of papers.
Lin Ke began flipping through it.
Inside were detailed records of Zou Tangzhengâs birthplace, family environment, educational background, personality traits, psychological state, social relationships, personal behaviors and habits, and so on.
Even Zou Tangzhengâs various catchphrases on TV were recorded in detail, with notes on how many times he used these phrases and what tone he said them in.
What Zou Tangzheng was like in front of outsiders, what he was like on TV, and what he was like in front of his relatives were all written clearly.
Even what he liked to eat, what he liked to drink, and which hand he used to stroke his beardâLuo Shizhen had actually recorded them all clearly.
This truly could be called the Zou Tangzheng Research Manual.
Lin Ke felt that even if Zou Tangzheng himself were here, he probably wouldn’t know himself as well as Luo Shizhen did.
“How much time did you spend on this? With this much, your hand must have nearly broken from writing, right?”
Luo Shizhen blinked. “It was okay. It wasn’t that much. I’m used to writing; my hand wasn’t tired at all.”
Compared to the test papers and homework he did every day during his senior year of high school, this truly wasn’t much.
In the past, to improve his grades, Luo Shizhen would add extra test papers for himself in addition to the homework assigned by his teachers.
Lin Ke had graduated a long time ago, so the way he looked at Luo Shizhen was practically as if he were looking at a god among men:
“With this kind of perseverance, you will succeed in anything you do.”
Luo Shizhenâs face turned red from the praise. “This is just a clumsy method. If I were to just pretend to be a scammer on my own, I was afraid I wouldn’t be convincing, so I could only record everything Zou Tangzheng did and then learn to do it step-by-step just like him.”
Lin Ke looked down at the neat and organized handwriting on the pages and mused:
“No matter the method, as long as it works.”
This method did seem a bit clumsy and troublesome, but the key point was that once it was done, it would work very well.
When every word and action has an example right in front to copy, how could it not work?
Luo Shizhen smiled at him and then looked back down at his phone.
Before, Lin Ke had thought he was scrolling through entertainment videos because Luo Shizhen had been wearing headphones the whole time and Lin Ke had been busy doing makeup and hadn’t paid attention.
Now, looking at the detailed report in his hand, Lin Ke had a vague inkling of what Luo Shizhen was watching.
Sure enough, as he looked closer, he saw Luo Shizhen with a serious face, watching one of Zou Tangzhengâs medicine-selling videos.
Lin Ke: “…”
Heavens, was this the difference between a high-talent Awakener and himself?
Were it him, he could never, under any circumstances, manage to watch and study a video of a scammer selling fake medicine as seriously and carefully as Luo Shizhen was.
Once the clothes were changed, Lin Ke watched with his own eyes as Luo Shizhen compared himself to Zou Tangzhengâs walking posture and speaking tone in the video, adjusting himself before the mirror over and over.
His learning speed wasn’t considered fast, but the boy was incredibly diligent. Even if he couldn’t learn it at first, after practicing dozens of times and stopping to adjust again and again, by the final time, his expression and demeanor truly carried that air of confidence that Zou Tangzheng had.
Lin Ke watched, dumbfounded. “You have to learn this, too? I thought youâd just apply some makeup, memorize some lines, and call it a day.”
Luo Shizhen turned around. Having exited his study state, even with the old-age makeup, his expression still carried some of his own natural innocence. He said quietly and bashfully:
“Iâm afraid I won’t play the part well. It’s better to be safe.”
After his quick reply, Luo Shizhen returned to the mirror and continued adjusting his expressions, posture, and tone over and over.
This was truly a tedious and boring taskâto constantly imitate a certain sentence or do the same action. If it were Lin Ke, after ten times, he would want to throw in the towel.
But Luo Shizhen seemed completely unable to feel the boredom. He just seriously continued to adjust again and again, even recording videos to repeatedly check if the expression on his face was correct.
Sometimes, when he discovered a “knack” for a certain expression or a “better small trick for imitation,” he would stop, purse his lips, and seriously record it in his Zou Tangzheng Research Manual.
Originally, Lin Ke had only wanted to be an external associate to hide from potential anomaly attacks. Logically, after finishing the makeup, he had nothing else to do and could perfectly well sit on the sofa, scroll through short videos, or watch some TV.
But with Luo Shizhen beside him practicing his demeanor so diligently, Lin Ke played on his phone for a bit before finding that his heart simply couldn’t settle down.
He simply put down his phone and began researching makeup techniques; only then did his heart feel at ease.
Halfway through, the others in the squad had come in. Seeing that Luo Shizhen was immersed in the world of learning and couldn’t pull himself out, they didn’t disturb him.
Cheng Yunshao was the last one to enter.
For this mission, it was naturally impossible for Luo Shizhen to be the only one needing to play a role; a scammer also had a team.
A scammer at Zou Tangzhengâs level couldn’t do everything personally.
His team included a marketing promoter responsible for publicity, a health consultant responsible for contacting patients and their families to sell the medicine, an accountant to manage the books, an assistant, and bodyguards.
This was the full roster of a small fraud gang.
There were also some external people, such as shills posing as patients. These usually weren’t permanent actors, but different shills hired as the situation required to pretend that their diseases had vanished after taking the fake medicine.
Truth be told, the role Cheng Yunshao originally wanted Luo Shizhen to play was the assistant.
But now that Luo Shizhen was the “scammer,” Cheng Yunshao became the assistant and concurrently the health consultant.
Chu Xiao was the marketing promoter, Rong Nian was the accountant, and Wen Hu and Xiao Shan were, naturally, the bodyguards.
Originally, Cheng Yunshao thought of having either Wen Hu or Xiao Shan be the health consultant, but as soon as those two heard that the bodyguards would follow Luo Shizhen 24 hours a day, neither was willing to be any kind of consultant.
Helpless, Cheng Yunshao could only take on the role of the consultant himself.
Although everyone had been assigned a role to play, at the beginning, they had just glanced at the “script” and hadn’t taken it to heart.
None of them were actors; they were just temporarily playing a character. There was nothing that really needed advance preparation.
This included Cheng Yunshao.
The arrogance in an Awakenerâs bones was not just talk.
But seeing Luo Shizhen trying so seriously to play another person, making a thick stack of materials, and trying over and over to be more convincing…
The other members of the squad who hadn’t taken this roleplay too seriously were all a bit moved.
This included Cheng Yunshao.
Before this, he had always felt that having Luo Shizhen play the scammer wasn’t a good idea; after all, everyone knew what kind of personality Luo Shizhen had.
But now, looking at the peer who was seriously practicing again and again, trying to play the role of a scammer better, Cheng Yunshao discovered his own arrogance for the first time.
He had always thought he understood everyone, including Luo Shizhen.
But now, he realized that his understanding of Luo Shizhen was far from enough.
Cheng Yunshao didn’t disturb the boy. After a single look, he silently withdrew.
The group was currently in another villa. They had rented this villa directly; renting a villa and pretending to be successful pharmaceutical people also fit the setting of a fraud gang.
Everyone had their own rooms. Normally, Awakeners would rather return to their own rooms and wouldn’t be willing to stay in a public space for long.
But now was an exception. Everyone, including Cheng Yunshao, chose to stay in the living room, which was a public space.
However, they were also clearly divided, keeping a great distance between one another.
Everyone was busy with the task at hand.
Chu Xiao was looking into promotion-related matters, Rong Nian was gritting his teeth while doing the accounts, and Xiao Shan and Wen Hu stood on either side like real bodyguards, guarding the door to Luo Shizhenâs room.
At this moment, they all looked as if they were diligently completing the mission.
And these shifts of theirs all began after they entered the room and saw Luo Shizhen.
Cheng Yunshao couldn’t quite describe the feeling in his heart.
Perhaps Luo Shizhen wasn’t the most suitable candidate to play a scammer, but he proved through his actions that he was the most serious about it.
Clearly, as a Purifier and the center of the squad, he didn’t need to work this hard.
Cheng Yunshao was very certain nowâeven if the role he were playing wasn’t the scammer himself but any other member of the scammer team, Luo Shizhen would seriously and conscientiously do a good job with that character.
Cheng Yunshao had always felt that he was the most clear-headed person in this squad, the one most determined to complete the mission.
But now… Cheng Yunshao gave a self-mocking laugh.
He had thought about this and that, considering a great deal and harboring a secret pride, thinking that with his ability and a group of highly offensive teammates, completing this mission wouldn’t require any effort.
But Luo Shizhen had always been steadfast. From the beginning until now, Luo Shizhen hadn’t thought about anything else. He didn’t try to predict whether the mission would succeed, nor did he think about who would be the leader of the squad. Every action he took was simply done for the sake of completing the mission.
As for whether it would be completed or if something would go wrong, Luo Shizhen hadn’t thought about it at all. He was just purely doing the things he could do now.
Cheng Yunshao believed that when Luo Shizhen fought for the role of the scammer, he had already decided to use the “clumsy method” and research Zou Tangzheng inside and out.
As long as one saw that thick stack of handwritten Observation Notes, no one would feel ill will toward Luo Shizhen.
And after doing so many things, the way Luo Shizhen looked at his companions was still calm, just as it was before.
Cheng Yunshao also vaguely knew why so many people liked Luo Shizhen.
He seemed like a very clumsy person, but in his heart, he was more steadfast and solid than anyone.
For Awakeners who appeared powerful on the outside after awakening but were actually always being influenced by Qi, producing all sorts of negative energy in their hearts, such a pure and steadfast person was practically like a lighthouse in the dark.
Cheng Yunshao also chose a spot to sit down, opened his laptop, and began to quickly learn the knowledge a health consultant needed to understand.
From that point on, every member of the squad completely settled down. They no longer made snide remarks to each other; instead, they were unified in their goal, setting their sights on completing the mission.
Recommended Reads
