Chapter 26: Complete Withdrawal

A child’s naive voice came through.

Du Qiu looked in the direction of the voice and saw a five- or six-year-old girl at the next table staring at him, her small hand pointing at him.

The middle-aged man sitting opposite her grabbed the girl’s hand and offered Du Qiu an apologetic smile.

【Did I bully her? It was clearly her throwing a tantrum and bullying me!】

“Little sister, that auntie has a bad temper, the uncle didn’t bully her!”

“Not true, my sister is so pretty. She was smiling so beautifully just now; you are the one who bullied her, and that’s why she ran away. You’re a bad uncle for not apologizing to her!”

The middle-aged man said embarrassingly: “Buddy, don’t take my daughter’s words to heart.”

Du Qiu scratched his head, looking at the girl who had turned her head away from him, feeling somewhat amused.

This little girl deliberately called him uncle and called Zhang Mingliu sister, clearly expressing her severe dissatisfaction; yet it was laughable he even tried to explain himself to her.

“It’s okay, children speak their minds!”

Du Qiu said, then paused, suddenly wondering — could it be that Zhang Mingliu still considered him her boyfriend, and that’s why she was so angry?

The belatedly aware Du Qiu sorted through the events and felt that this possibility was significant.

It seems that his recent interactions with her were frequent enough to give her a certain illusion.

No, he must stop this illusion!

Well, tonight’s quarrel was a good thing — he had an excuse to distance himself.

Du Qiu swiftly dumped a table full of dishes into the hot pot, cooked them through, and ate them all.

Only then did he belch satisfactorily on his way to his home.

Walking on the street, the night wind blew over.

Du Qiu couldn’t help sneezing several times, wondering if it was the cold or if someone was speaking ill of him behind his back.

“In an instant, a million possibilities…”

His phone ringtone went off; Du Qiu thought it was Zhang Mingliu and picked up, but it turned out to be Ning Shuangshuang instead.

“Officer Ning, is there something you need?”

She said, “I’m just letting you know that from tonight on, you don’t need to report to me every day. However, if you encounter any strange people or events, you can still notify me immediately!”

“Ah? Is the case over?” Du Qiu asked, puzzled.

“Sorry to have disturbed your life these past few days!”

“Officer Ning, you’re too polite; we are friends after all. Don’t hesitate to ask if you need anything. Uh… Are you really sure it’s over?”

Although Du Qiu was reluctant to be watched by security personnel, he felt that the crystal pillow incident was not over; if they really withdrew, wouldn’t he have to face it alone?

Officer Ning’s calm voice came through, “You don’t have to worry, I will confirm it.”

Then the phone call was disconnected.

Du Qiu pondered Ning Shuangshuang’s words and felt something was amiss. What did “I will confirm it” mean?

Doesn’t it imply she hasn’t confirmed yet? Withdrawing without confirmation, what’s that about?

Unable to figure it out, Du Qiu hurriedly walked back home.

Downstairs, he noticed the absence of the security personnel responsible for surveillance.

By now, the night was thick, and few people were walking on the roads of the community.

Du Qiu made a swift decision, went home, and took down the cardboard box containing the parts of the alarm network, and began to install each component at the positions he had determined.

The spots he chose for the nodes all avoided the community cameras, and his agility was such that climbing trees or lamp posts was not a problem at all, almost matching the talent of a pole dancer.

Avoiding the occasional passerby, after getting everything installed, Du Qiu returned home.

He turned on the high-performance server he had already prepared and ran the software he had written; soon, the interface displayed the images from around each sensing node.

This alarm network integrated video, audio, infrared and more — Du Qiu had even added thermal imaging sensors in a few spots.

If someone really intended to sneak near Du Qiu’s home, an alarm would be triggered immediately.

If the same incident of the impostor woman breaking into his home occurred again, he could immediately capture her image, and the patrolling officers and security personnel would not miss her this time.

Even if someone tried to place a location tracker or listening device in Du Qiu’s home or car, they would be unable to hide.

Du Qiu quickly set the alarm conditions to avoid false alarms from passersby and the community’s own cameras.

At this moment, no red dots appeared in the networked images.

Damn, did they really withdraw completely?

No wonder when he sent Ning Shuangshuang the crystal pillow picture last night, she had no particular reaction; it seems that something had already changed by then.

What exactly had happened?

Could it be that Ning Shuangshuang and her team had already apprehended everyone involved with “Wolf’s Kiss”?

That’s impossible; “Wolf’s Kiss,” as a mercenary organization and not operating domestically, couldn’t have possibly been wiped out by Ning Shuangshuang and her team in just a few days — could it?

If it wasn’t a complete round-up, then “Wolf’s Kiss” must have known their situation and retreated, which was a bit possible.

Du Qiu was unclear about “Wolf’s Kiss”‘s circumstances and didn’t know what kind of organization they were in terms of their modus operandi.

Since he couldn’t depend on the safety officers now, he would have to rely on himself.

To know both yourself and your enemy is to be safe in a hundred battles; he needed to learn more about “Wolf’s Kiss.”

Du Qiu quickly went online, using some special search engines to search for information about “Wolf’s Kiss.”

The results were disappointing.

The information found only indicated that “Wolf’s Kiss” was once a somewhat renowned mercenary group that later suffered a heavy blow in conflict areas, with the remaining personnel withdrawing from hot zones.

Since then, there was very little information about them; the most notable operation was intercepting a whaling ship from the State of Dongying in the South Pacific.

From this action, it seemed that “Wolf’s Kiss” had been hired by some extreme environmentalist.

But this also showed that “Wolf’s Kiss” was really down on their luck, accepting such low-risk jobs.

Du Qiu pondered for a while and decided not to think about it anymore.

However, with the security personnel gone, Du Qiu was indeed worried about Zhang Mingliu, her sister-in-law Qin Yun, and Xiao Yu.

Despite having just decided to distance himself from Zhang Mingliu, Du Qiu couldn’t ignore them in case of a real emergency.

So, he sent a message anyway, advising Zhang Mingliu to stay with her sister-in-law Qin Yun for safety and to inform him and call the police immediately if there were any abnormalities.

After sending the message, he got no reply.

After some thought, he also messaged Li Qiang to help order some electronic components and a certain type of digital watch.

Du Qiu planned to make an alarm device that looked like a digital watch; so long as Zhang Mingliu and the others wore them, they could send out an alarm during an emergency.

At the same time, Du Qiu would be able to detect their locations.

Upon sending the list, Li Qiang immediately replied, “Got it, will deliver to you tomorrow.”

At this point, the alarm set for ten o’clock at night went off.

Looking out the window, he saw the city’s night sky was a blurry red, devoid of stars.

“The third night!” Du Qiu murmured.

It had been three days since the dreamscape had vanished, and Du Qiu didn’t know if he would re-enter the dream world tonight.

Regardless, he’d gained something from the dreamscape.

The contract he signed with Tianqi Company today would provide an income stream for his company right from the start.

Although Xue Ningmei trusted him, she was very meticulous about the business contract.

It was stipulated that the software system provided by Du Qiu had to be inspected by Tianqi Company; once it passed inspection, the contract would officially take effect.

With Tianqi Company’s monthly sales exceeding 200 million, the processing centers requiring Du Qiu’s control system could account for about 80 to 100 million of that.

By that calculation, Du Qiu’s monthly income from Tianqi would be between 3 to 5 million.

With this contract, Du Qiu’s company didn’t have to worry about going bankrupt for the time being.

Du Qiu knew, however, that Tianqi Company really got a great deal, as his price was not only lower than imported systems but even some from Central Data.

In fact, through this deal, he kind of returned some of the favors.

As for why Huading Tianqi insisted on marketing their system as independently developed, and what kind of scheme was behind that, Du Qiu couldn’t care less.