How joyful is it to earn money while lying down?
Zhang Yuan truly understands this now.
His current position is a technical advisor director at Xianren Dreaming Group. In addition to holding some shares, he receives a weekly salary just like other employees because of his role as a technical advisor.
His weekly salary is 200,000 credit points.
It's worth noting that previously, as a low-level undercover agent, he received no additional subsidies and had to rely solely on his salary from the security department, which amounted to only 8,000 points per month.
Now, his pay has increased by a factor of 100!
Although he hasn't received the money yet and wouldn't dare to spend it lavishly even when he does, it feels fantastic!
Moreover, according to his boss's personality, which tends to avoid work, he has already found his direction: to put in maximum effort when his boss has tasks, and to enjoy life when there are none!
Zhang Yuan has lived in Xigu Valley City for so many years, born into an ordinary government employee family. To raise money for his family's medical expenses, he joined Xianren Dreaming Company, working under intense pressure, ultimately suffering from data epilepsy and becoming a zombie-like undercover agent.
However, everything changed after Qin Xuezhong took office.
The previously challenging tasks were effortlessly resolved by her; the usual oppression vanished without a trace. Even when Xigu Valley City faced a huge crisis, she single-handedly tackled it.
To his surprise, simply by being closer to the team leader, he ended up with a director position?
For the first time in his life, Zhang Yuan felt ease and reassurance.
According to the regulations of the undercover group, if he obtains a higher position within the company, he can directly apply to stop being an undercover agent and return to work.
Of course, Zhang Yuan wouldn't go back.
Who would be foolish enough to return?
For the entire day, he wore a peculiar smile that puzzled his colleagues.
"Hey, Xiao Zhang, are you in love or something?" joked the deputy director of the technical department, approaching him with a laugh.
Zhang Yuan quickly waved his hand. "No, no, just in a good mood."
"As long as you're in a good mood," the deputy director said, placing a storage device in front of him. "Can you help me analyze the data for this case and see if there are any anomalies?"
"A case?" Zhang Yuan asked, puzzled.
As the core area of Xigu Valley City, the Bay Area's Public Security Bureau's technical department handles hundreds of data files every day, directly assigned by the main brain and office systems.
Even for significant criminal cases, supervisors only highlight important tasks in the assigned work and require special checks. It was unprecedented for the deputy director to bring a storage device himself.
Not only was Zhang Yuan taken aback, but the surrounding colleagues were also curious.
The deputy director shrugged and explained, "This case is from Jincheng District. The victim… has some strange circumstances. The body was found in a virtual dream club owned by a friend of mine, and he wanted me to help take a look."
Zhang Yuan understood.
Since a death occurred in the establishment, regulations dictate that the club must be temporarily closed until the perpetrator and cause are determined.
In general, for ordinary cases, the main brain can directly check the surveillance and chip records to pinpoint locations and potential suspects in less than a second.
What follows is for the homicide team to assess the suspects and make arrests.
If a case requires preliminary analysis from the technical department, it indicates that it got stuck at the first step—the main brain analysis.
"I initially wanted to refuse, but after understanding the situation, I found it a bit strange," the deputy director explained. "You'll see for yourselves."
Zhang Yuan took the storage device and connected it to the screen in front of him.
The deputy director continued, "I roughly understood the case. The issue started with a new puppet that came to the club."
Hearing this, Zhang Yuan and his colleagues frowned.
—This could be difficult to investigate.
In Xigu Valley City, the term "puppet" generally has two meanings.
One refers to the bodies of women used by Qin Xuezhong at concerts and those of Yu Zhezhong, existing to conceal the user's identity.
The other refers to the puppets within the clubs.
hese puppets typically possess exceptional looks and physiques, and for various reasons, they find themselves in certain virtual dream clubs.
In these semi-realistic high-end virtual dreams, having someone like them by your side enhances the realism of the experience. While serving guests, they are completely unaware that someone can enter their consciousness and control their bodies to cater to customers. This provides more options for guests with particular preferences.
A customer can choose their desired body, then select their favorite personality, mixing and matching as they please. The technical requirements and equipment needed for such services are high, and only very upscale clubs typically offer them.
Such exclusivity often makes tracing information—especially customer details—quite difficult.
"The one who died was a puppet?" Zhang Yuan asked.
"No," the deputy director shook his head. "It wasn't a customer either; it was a killer."
The mention of "killer" made everyone pause for a moment.
—What kind of plot is unfolding here?
"Don't tell me this killer was out to kill a puppet and ended up getting killed instead?" Zhang Yuan asked in shock.
The deputy director nodded slowly. "At least from the scene, it looks that way. However, the puppet itself was also seriously injured."
He clicked on the screen to enlarge a picture.
—It depicted a lounge, presumably that of the puppet. However, it was hard to tell it was a lounge—blood splatters, broken furniture, and remnants of clothing were everywhere.
In the corner of the room lay a corpse, nearly unrecognizable and mangled.
"This is the killer. According to chip data, he's high-end merchandise from the black market, making him hard to trace."
At this point, Zhang Yuan couldn't help but smile inwardly—though hard to trace for the public security bureau, finding someone like him in the black market was incredibly easy. Including Kess's mercenary club, there were several seasoned intermediaries in the black market.
While the deputy director continued speaking, he quickly sent the identification number into the system for his ghost organization comrades to review.
"A killer, taken down by a puppet?" A nearby colleague's tone was laced with disbelief as he pointed to the bodily data beside them. "Dynamic capture ocular implants, cut-resistant skin, bioware muscles that can exert ten times normal strength, embedded weapons... and this humanoid weapon was killed by a puppet? How did that happen?"
The deputy director shook his head gravely. "We haven't confirmed the result yet, but it's likely to be an accident."
He opened another image—a small knife smeared with blood.
"The homicide team speculates that the puppet accidentally stabbed the killer in the eye with this knife, damaging the brain."
Zhang Yuan nodded slowly.
"The key point is this," the deputy director moved the image aside and opened a batch of biological data from the scene.
Investigators scanned various forms of evidence—blood, tissues, objects, etc.—creating a complete record. The deputy director clicked on one item.
—It was a small piece of skin, divided into two layers.
The upper layer was artificial skin, smooth and pale. The lower layer was real skin, marked with a thin, scar-like line.
The forensic department had written a complex analysis:
[Influence of female hormones and abdominal skin expansion leads to skin fiber rupture, resulting in cracks on the abdominal surface. After skin expansion and contraction, similar marks are left. According to earlier data, this type of line is likely a "stretch mark" left by a woman after pregnancy and childbirth.]
The technical department fell into dead silence.
A woman being pregnant?
This was something they hadn't heard of in years.
Around 200 years ago, artificial wombs had become completely popular in the Eastern Federation, and roughly 60 years after that, the entire world adopted them.
Artificial wombs had become as essential as household appliances; even amidst the constant warfare and chaos of the New Continent, two people aiming to start a family required an artificial womb as a prerequisite.
Today's citizens of the federation viewed natural childbirth as a relic of the past—a sign of barbarism, suffering, and permanent harm.
Even Zhang Yuan knew that by the time he was born, his mother was busy working outside while his father took care of him.
Now, there was a woman who had actually been pregnant and given birth?
The two female colleagues in the technical department seemed to empathize with the pain, their breathing becoming heavier.
The deputy director noticed their reaction and said, "When I first saw it, I had the same response. The killer is male, so this piece of skin is naturally not his; it most likely belongs to the escaped puppet."
He swiped the screen to reveal several photos of the same woman—beautiful, with an excellent figure and posture.
"This is her. The boss said she seemed weak at first, her resume and health checks were excellent, and we didn't think to investigate further, not expecting such a huge incident to occur."
"Has the homicide team investigated her?" Zhang Yuan asked.
The deputy director nodded. "They've looked into it; she was a manager at the Jincheng Grand Hotel, who suddenly resigned two years ago and hasn't been contacted since. Only now has she reappeared. The homicide team is currently struggling, so we're trying to conduct more analyses of the data from the scene. If you're busy, Xiao Zhang, let others help out."
Since Zhang Yuan had been commended for his actions during the virus outbreak, his work rating had been significantly elevated. Additionally, due to the internal purge of the anti-intrusion team, he had once been listed as a suspect but safely escaped under Qin Xuezhong's protection. After undergoing rigorous investigation and questioning, Zhang Yuan now firmly held the identity of a law-abiding citizen.
Thus, the main brain and superiors would assign him more complex tasks, and if opportunities arose, they might promote him.
The deputy director understood this well, which is why he made that remark.
Zhang Yuan initially thought that obtaining the killer's information from the black market would be sufficient and that his colleagues could handle the more specific technical analyses. After all, this was a case from Jincheng District and not closely related to the Bay Area.
However, he casually glanced at the work system to check the progress of the case.
[Due to a system failure in Jincheng District, the body has been transferred to the Bay Area Public Security Bureau for preliminary processing, with the initial assigned officer: Qin Xuezhong.]
"It's fine, I'll take it!" Zhang Yuan volunteered eagerly. "Since the body has been transferred to us, I'll coordinate with the analysis department."
Seeing Qin Xuezhong's name made Zhang Yuan anxious about someone else getting the opportunity.
Such a rare chance to connect with his boss and boost his rapport—he couldn't let it slip away.
His enthusiasm raised some eyebrows among his colleagues.
The analysis department? That was the same department he had sheltered with during the virus outbreak.
Could it be that this Yuan Ge… has developed feelings for someone in there?