Chapter 138: As Expected of Real Brothers

Bai Qingchu finally turned around to face the man directly. Raising an eyebrow, he said softly, "I must admit, you are an extremely imaginative man, and quite clever as well. But what you've just said... what does it have to do with me? Your conjectures are entirely wrong."

Looking at Bai Qingchu, whose expression was one of absolute certainty, Cao Fusheng hesitated. This scientist didn't seem like he was just bluffing.

"You won't understand the gravity of the stakes involved, and I wouldn't tell you anyway. There is one thing I can tell you: I do harbor the thought of using you for experiments, but I have absolutely no intention of intentionally killing you. I simply don't know whether or not you will survive being experimented on," Bai Qingchu said candidly, completely unconcerned that his words might hurt or upset Cao Fusheng.

This remark was utterly devoid of human warmth and spoken with shocking lightness.

"Of course, I won't be performing any experiments on you right now, because there is an upcoming meeting scheduled regarding you, which you will also have to attend. I certainly can't render you half-dead with an experiment and make it impossible for you to go."

Driven to fury, Cao Fusheng laughed in anger and retorted, "So, if I'm getting this right, I'm supposed to f***ing thank you for your present clemency in not killing me? Where on earth do you get such confidence? You want to use me as a guinea pig?"

"Don't misunderstand. The primary reason I'm interested in you is your blood, and the means you use to replenish the Tianzhu energy comes second. If I can figure out the mystery of your blood today, then whether we conduct subsequent experiments or not won't really matter. As I said before, I hope you'll cooperate with me." Bai Qingchu walked up to Cao Fusheng and gave a solemn bow.

His behavior was somewhat incomprehensible, at least to Cao Fusheng.

Cao Fusheng let out a deep breath and said softly, "Director Bai, I mentioned earlier that you resemble someone. Do you know who I am talking about?"

"Who?"

"Do you know Bai Ye?"

"Who did you say?!"

"Bai Ye, the one with 'fire' in his name."

Bai Qingchu's lips trembled slightly, his eyes widened, and the muscles in his face twitched unnaturally. He suddenly grabbed Cao Fusheng by both hands and cried out in a hoarse, desperate voice, "Where is he?! Where is he?! You know him, don't you? You know him."

Cao Fusheng pressed down on his hands and said, "Calm down first, or I won't tell you anything."

"Alright... I'm calming down... Calm... Ah...!" Bai Qingchu's chest heaved violently. It took him quite a while to catch his breath, though the excitement on his face had not faded in the slightest.

However, Cao Fusheng's next sentence caused his face to darken completely.

"Well, about that... your son, I actually met him before..."

"Wait! Whose son?"

"Your son, of course. Isn't Bai Ye your son?"

"Who said he's my son?"

"Look at how old you are, and Bai Ye looks so young. Aren't you his father?"

Speechless with indignation, Bai Qingchu roared, "I am your son! Your entire family are sons!"

Cao Fusheng: "..."

"Hold on a second, let me go get something for you. Take a look and see if that's the person!" With that, Bai Qingchu trotted back into his office.

A short while later, he returned holding a photograph, exquisitely framed in a goldennanmu wooden picture frame.

"Here, take a look and see if this is him."

He pointed to the person on the far left of the photograph for Cao Fusheng to see.

Good grief, all three of them were acquaintances.

On the far left was a younger version of Bai Ye, in the middle was Han Xiang, and on the right was Bai Qingchu.

Judging by the background and the appearance of the individuals in the photo, at least ten years had passed, if not more.

"I recognize them. This is Bai Ye. If I'm not mistaken, the white-haired old man in the middle is Teacher Han, and the one on the right is you," Cao Fusheng named them one by one.

Bai Qingchu said in surprise, "Yes, yes, yes. Bai Ye, Teacher, me... wait a minute, Teacher Han? Did you mistake the person?"

"How could that be? I can recognize both you and Bai Ye, so how could I fail to recognize Old Master Han? By seniority, that makes you my senior martial brother," Cao Fusheng bluffed with a straight face.

He had once tried bluffing Bai Ye like this, but had been seen through immediately.

"Alright, alright, alright, you're my senior martial brother. Let's put that aside for a moment—tell me where you ran into my younger brother."

"Uh... actually, he's already dead..."

"!!!"

Letting out a mournful cry, Bai Qingchu gripped Cao Fusheng's collar tightly and said, "You're lying to me!"

"I'm not lying to you. He really is dead... but he didn't die completely. How exactly that came about, I don't know either. You'll have to ask him yourself when you get the chance," Cao Fusheng said, looking quite aggrieved.

"If he's dead, how am I supposed to ask him? You need to explain this clearly to me, what on earth is going on? Even with my high intelligence, I can't make sense of a word of this!"

Bai Qingchu released his hands and sat down, panting heavily.

Judging by his state, that fit of roaring had almost tired him out. Just how poor must his physical constitution be?

And as for your intelligence—it wasn't just that you couldn't understand; you couldn't even string a coherent sentence together. Just listen to what kind of gibberish you've been spouting.

One second he's my son, the next he's my junior martial brother.

This generation gap has even got me all confused.

Cao Fusheng silently cursed twice. And this guy was supposed to be a scientist? When things were calm, his IQ was 251, but the moment trouble hit, it dropped by 1.

Still, he had no intention of lowering himself to the level of this middle-aged and elderly man with half-white hair, so he simply began to recount the story of Bai Ye from the very beginning.

Sure enough, after hearing the whole story, Bai Qingchu was completely beside himself, laughing and crying all at once, exhibiting some kind of bizarre behavior.

"Everything you said is true? He really turned into one of those anomalies, half-human and half-corpse? And he even evolved some special abilities? That's wonderful... that's wonderful... But I'm not very interested in that side of things. My main focus is researching space-time issues; I believe that is the fundamental key to saving the Wasteland Era. Anyway, since my younger brother has already become a corpse seed, he can't possibly deteriorate any further. Let it be. I trust he'll find a way to sort himself out."

Cao Fusheng felt a vein throbbing on his forehead, and he almost burst out swearing. Are you out of your mind? And severely ill at that!

Neither of these two brothers was normal; each one was quirkier than the other. It seemed he truly lacked the aptitude to become a scientist.

Just in terms of personality alone, he couldn't hold a candle to either of them.

"By the way, you just called Old Man Han your teacher, what's that all about? I don't remember him having a student like you. Back in the Old Era, if I had free time, I would also help him mentor students, but I've never heard of someone like you." Recovering his composure, Bai Qingchu stared fixedly at Cao Fusheng, suspicion continually welling up in his eyes.

Yet he didn't immediately refute it; after all, some of the facts Cao Fusheng mentioned were known to him—Bai Ye had indeed stayed at that company, though only in the capacity of a consultant.

Feigning an action, Cao Fusheng reached inside his jacket and felt around. After a long moment, he pulled out a journal and held it up, shaking it slightly.