Dimensional Hotel

Chapter 748 - 747: Subtle Abnormalities

To be honest, Yu Sheng wasn't surprised by Baili Qing's request, because after learning about the sightings of that knight, he was already on the same page as Baili Qing.The target appears randomly in the various Exotic Realms of the Boundary Land, disappears suddenly in mysterious ways, and is seen briefly without interacting with others—trying to "catch" him through normal means is obviously no easy task. It's much simpler to let Erin's puppet army handle it.

After all, those mass-produced puppets of hers could crawl everywhere like cockroaches...

The little puppet instantly turned its head, its scarlet eyes staring intently at Yu Sheng.

"Let me tell you, my intuition is very sharp. Are you secretly talking bad about me in your heart?"

How should I put it, as expected from the Omen Goddess. Good things are uncertain, but she picks up on bad things even better than Hu Li's nose.

Yu Sheng answered frankly, "No, I was actually marveling at how badass your puppet army is."

Erin perked up, "That's alright then."

It's true that the Omen Goddess's spiritual intuition is extremely strong, but fortunately, Erin's silly side in the form of her puppets balances it out well.

"Manpower is not a problem," the little puppet turned its head, generously waving at Baili Qing, "Let me tell you, I currently have eight divisions, at least four can be loaned to you guys—if you wait another two days, I can whip up two more divisions..."

"That's enough, that's enough," Baili Qing quickly interjected. Upon hearing that Erin had already produced eight puppet divisions, she seemed to display a fleeting look of shock on her face, though she kept it well under control, but Yu Sheng still noticed a twitch in the brows of the lady director.

Then, Baili Qing composed herself and continued speaking:

"We do not plan to set up defenses in all the Exotic Realms—on one hand, the vast number of realms in the Boundary Land makes comprehensive monitoring too difficult, on the other hand, many realms have unique entry conditions or are too dangerous internally, making them unsuitable for 'monitoring'.

"We plan to establish 200 monitoring points first, because based on current data, the 'knight' seems to favor appearing in Exotic Realms with 'artificial' features, like subways, districts, or buildings...

"With at least two puppets per monitoring point, 400 mass-produced puppets should be sufficient."

"Oh…" Erin sat cross-legged on the office desk, looking a bit disappointed, "You only need that few people. Well, okay... By the way, you're going to pay, right?"

The little thing said, her eyes sparkling as she stared at the lady director in front of her.

Lately, she's been obsessed with buying all sorts of trendy small trinkets online, and spending on game skins, clearly corrupted through and through by money.

"Of course," Baili Qing seemed to smile slightly, "The Special Service Bureau will pay your mass-produced puppets based on the standard daily rates for hiring freelance Spirit Realm detectives...payment settled per puppet."

"What if any puppet gets broken?" Erin quickly asked, "Will compensation be given for fatalities?"

Baili Qing was tactically stunned, for the first time, this solid and reliable director was rendered a bit speechless by this 66.6 cm tall little creature.

"...That might be a problem," she finally, slowly began to speak after a moment, "I think for you, losing one or two mass-produced puppets can't really be called...'fatalities.' But we can compensate you for equipment depreciation; it depends on your puppet's cost."

Yu Sheng started calculating, rubbing his chin—Erin's mass-produced puppets' main materials are actually quite simple, mainly soil from the valley, which is free; then his blood, using less than a drop for each puppet; also, there's Spiritual Fox Mysterious Iron, now reduced to mere grams of thin wire per puppet, and some 'worker bee' type puppets incapable of laser emission don't even have those grams of iron, using repurposed wires from Sun's construction site as frameworks...

What's left is some ritual candles, alchemy essential oils, and the like, mostly acquired through various methods from the Special Service Bureau, as well as from Qianfeng Ling Mountain, and after the battle with the cultists at the Hidden Monastery, he hauled back a large stash from their old lair, mostly still unopened.

After calculating all this, Yu Sheng, with a serious expression, stated while pinching his chin: "The main materials of the puppets consist of enchanted active clay, Spiritual Fox Mysterious Iron framework, copious amounts of spiritual blood, and various other alchemical materials needed for making living dolls. The cost is quite high, at least several hundred thousand per puppet..."

Baili Qing silently looked at him.

He silently looked back at Baili Qing.

Finally, Baili Qing said she believed it—convinced by Yu Sheng's forthright attitude.

After that, they discussed some details, and also talked about collaboration matters between the officers of the Special Service Bureau and Erin's mass-produced puppets.

The setup for monitoring will be jointly completed by the Special Service Bureau officer team and the mass-produced puppets. The former will primarily handle potential negotiations while the latter will be in charge of communications with other teams, and pulling people out in emergencies.

For obvious and well-known reasons, it's necessary to let normal humans handle the "negotiation" tasks.

Erin felt as if the sky was falling upon hearing this news—she originally planned to self-destruct some mass-produced puppets during missions in the Exotic Realms to claim compensation from the Special Service Bureau, only to find out someone would be supervising nearby...

Once everything was arranged, Yu Sheng bid farewell to Baili Qing and, with Erin and the fox girl munching on a roasted sweet potato, opened the door to return to the valley.

The long-haired princess had already gone back to rest, and the fairy tales members who came earlier for the excitement had all left the castle hall. Only a few mass-produced Erins remained, scurrying with tiny mops to clean the place, while Luna stood at the door "on guard" waiting for Yu Sheng.

"How's the situation?" Luna came over and asked curiously.

"Erin has turned mercenary." Yu Sheng said casually.

Luna: "…?"

It was Yu Sheng's first time seeing such an obvious look of confusion on the face of this Mechanical Girl.

Then he briefly recounted his meeting with Baili Qing.

After he finished speaking, the scene was quiet for a few seconds, then a voice came from the doorway: "Is this matter attracting so much attention?"

Yu Sheng looked up and saw a familiar flash of red appear in his field of vision.

Little Red Riding Hood walked in.

"Big Golden Hair said she was still a bit dizzy, so I accompanied her for a bit, then came back to check the situation," she said, her furry wolf ear poking out from under her hair and twitching, "Just in time to hear you talking about the Special Service Bureau."

Little Red Riding Hood was now very skilled at controlling her partial wolf transformation, even turning it into some sort of active skill—back in the day, she wouldn't dare casually transform any part of her body into a wolf.

"From Baili Qing's attitude, the Special Service Bureau seems to take this matter quite seriously," Yu Sheng nodded, "But I always feel... the level of attention is a bit unexpected."

Erin blinked, looked at Little Red Riding Hood, then at Yu Sheng, and couldn't help but speak: "No, how did you see that? What's unexpected?"

"It's obvious," Hu Li said offhandedly, handing Yu Sheng a roasted sweet potato that was no longer too hot to touch, "Savior, eat this, it's sweet—the Special Service Bureau is such a big organization, in the Boundary Land with hundreds or thousands of Exotic Realms, how many strange entities and talented people emerge every day? A knight wandering between various Exotic Realms is a bit suspicious, but it shouldn't warrant such a large-scale operation... yet such a big Special Service Bureau even borrowed a few hundred puppets from you."

Erin stared wide-eyed: "…silly fox, haven't you been busy roasting sweet potatoes all this time?! So you were listening in on the side?"

"We foxes have sharp senses," Hu Li also twitched her ears, "Besides, Baili Qing's expression did change when she talked; if you observe closely after a lot of interaction, you can see she was hesitating to speak several times..."

Erin was half-believing: "Really? Why didn't I see it... I just noticed she didn't seem as tired today."

Yu Sheng: "Not being tired is quite normal, it's spring now, so her hibernation phase is probably over."

"In any case, this 'knight' who suddenly appeared definitely has more issues than we imagine, involving other matters behind the scenes," the fox girl said seriously, "And I suspect it's related to the Special Service Bureau or the Boundary Land; otherwise Baili Qing wouldn't have had that attitude, she usually speaks very frankly with us."

Yu Sheng frowned slightly, with a thoughtful expression on his face.

And just then, the faint sounds of conversation from outside suddenly interrupted his thoughts—

"Boss, I don't think it's the mint sticks' fault, meow!"

"In my opinion, that's at least thirty percent of the reason. You've practically been soaking in catnip the past two days. If you don't get sick, who will?"

"The symptoms are very mild, meow; I've taken medicine and had shots. Boss, please just give me one more stick, meow..."

"Not a chance, abstain for three days first."

"Ahh, woo—"

"Then six days with no sneezing."

"Meow~"

Yu Sheng and the others exchanged glances and stepped out of the castle hall, only to see two familiar figures, one tall and one short, walking down the path outside.

One was a burly man nearly two meters tall, and the other was a petite Jipro girl wearing a white dress and sporting cat ears.

Yu Sheng raised his hand to greet them both: "Hey, Old Xu! Lingdang!"

When Xu Jiali and her companion saw Yu Sheng, they quickly walked over.

"What's the situation? Is Lingdang sick?" Yu Sheng asked as he curiously looked at the cat-eared girl standing beside him, only to find that her complexion looked good, and she had walked over lightly, showing no signs of being ill.

"Old World Nightmare Syndrome, also known as Old World Syndrome," Xu Jiali said casually, "I don't know what happened, but she was fine during the battle over at the Hidden Monastery, yet she suddenly got sick when she returned to the Boundary Land for vacation... But it's not serious, and this illness is easily treatable now. We've stabilized it with medication, and with the good environment in this valley, she should recover faster here."

Yu Sheng listened with a bewildered look: "...What on earth?"