Chapter 369: Cooperation

Alright, now Zheng Tan finally knows the origin of Liuba's name.

After finishing writing, Liuba looked at Zheng Tan and said, "You really can't speak?"

In Liuba's view, legendary monsters are all able to speak; although he had never encountered this before, he had encountered other scientific phenomena that are hard to explain. Since he accepted this reality, his thoughts went towards the cat demon direction Benz. But this cat indeed never spoke, not usually, not even on the phone; otherwise it would be impossible to use the more complex Morse code to communicate and convey information.

Sure enough, after Liuba finished asking, Zheng Tan gave him a look saying "You're talking nonsense."

Being unable to speak is one of Zheng Tan's sore points; Liuba now obviously stabbed him in that spot. Since becoming a cat, it's been over five years; the experience of over five years being unable to speak human words, not even able to meow properly, really makes Zheng Tan feel awful.

"Can't speak, then can't speak," he paused, then Liuba again said, "You really aren't a monster?"

When he first discovered the truth, that was when Liuba was most shocked; now, the time of greatest shock has passed, after buffering, it's no longer as strong as the initial feeling. Last night he agonized all night, just thinking about how to have a good talk with this cat.

He's confident negotiating with people, but with a cat he has no experience; during this time Liuba has recalled everything from the first time he saw this cat up to now, recalling that he once sprayed the cat with a water gun.

Now thinking back, that was really... courting death.

Zheng Tan decided to ignore Liuba's nonsense.

Seeing Zheng Tan's impatient look, Liuba shifted the topic to what Zheng Tan was interested in. He said when he found Zheng Tan's phone, and also changed the phone's ringtone, and had been monitoring the phone.

Strictly speaking, this behavior is illegal, but since Liuba can say it openly like that, he must have already erased the "traces"; without evidence, even if one wanted to sue, they couldn't sue this guy. Of course, Liuba and his ilk are people who exploit legal loopholes; domestically private investigators are not allowed, so they put on a legal facade—consulting agencies, introduction offices, and the like. They do this kind of thing a lot.

The reason for his occupational habit. Once Liuba makes a determination, he will try every way to investigate desperately. Before the earthquake incident, Liuba had not made up his mind to dig deep, after all nobody wants their ** to be uncovered. At that time Liuba didn't want to offend the other party. But after the earthquake incident, Liuba went all in. If he can't find answers, he can't sleep; closing his eyes makes him think of that earthquake period and those several phone calls and text messages. Anyone who has experienced that disaster can't be the same as before. So he took action.

Of course, what Liuba said wasn't told to others, but Zheng Tan still believed it. Likewise, it can be said to be due to their profession; they keep tight lips, and if they weren't strict about confidentiality, they wouldn't have so many upper-class people entrusting them with tasks. This makes Zheng Tan feel a bit better.

The initial unstable emotions quickly passed; making a start, the rest became much easier. Liuba is not like Long Qi—he has strong acceptance ability; he doesn't care whether the cat before him is a god or a monster, as long as it doesn't harm his interests it's fine, forming a good affinity is also good. Liuba has few taboos about this, unlike Long Qi, who still avoids Zheng Tan whenever possible when he sees him.

Liuba talked for a long while, but Zheng Tan remained sitting there in the same way, silent and unresponsive to Liuba's words, until Liuba brought up phone security.

Liuba had said all that, but he had actually been observing Zheng Tan all along; seeing that Zheng Tan seemed a bit interested in this topic, he planned to elaborate further. Of course, technical details would not actually be disclosed.

"Phones aren't as safe as people imagine; if you really want to locate or monitor a phone, even turning it off can't stop that. As for the usual methods, they're nothing more than viruses: before 2004, the SMS virus stage, a single message with 'material' could monitor a phone; then came the deceptive virus stage, and future vulnerability virus stage...' These are techniques commonly mastered in their line of work; other higher-tech skills rely on personal ability, and no one will reveal what they've mastered—the know-how for making money is never passed on."

"'Especially now, with smartphones on the rise, they're easy to get hold of. Actually, many spy technologies were developed long ago, they just take a few years to become public knowledge, and some remain classified forever.'"

Signal interception, interface security, SMS and email, jailbreaking, etc., can all be tackled from here; the arrival of the smartphone era also excites Liuba and his ilk, because then they can take on jobs, monitor phone locations and targets, etc., more easily.

"'Your phone isn't a smartphone, but its security is also poorly done; I think monitoring it would be just as easy. However, we can't monitor your cat father's phone—even if we could, it would pose great risk.' Liuba said."

Zheng Tan glanced at Liuba; this guy, to investigate him, even checked Jiao Ba? Thinking it over, Jiao Ba's phone now seems to be issued by the institute or the school; back then Zheng Tan only thought it was a bonus attached to the year-end award, but hearing Liuba's words, that phone is still something that protects researchers' private information?

"'Moreover, we usually don't readily act against people around here,' Liuba pointed around, meaning the Chu Hua Da Xue area, 'Even if we take a job, we'd consider more: one, there are many experts in this school, plus several well-equipped labs with capable people; if they caught us, it wouldn't be good, and fortunately they hadn't noticed you before, otherwise you'd have been unable to hide. Another is that this school has many people I don't want to provoke and can't afford to provoke.'"

Initially, when Liuba tracked to this area of Chu Hua Da Xue, he had hesitated; after consideration, he then decided again to continue searching.

"'Do you know? Just your building alone has at least three people I don't want to provoke, I don't even want to investigate them.'"

Zheng Tan's heart jolted—at least three?

Seeing Zheng Tan looking at him, Liuba continued: "Two on the third floor, one on the first floor—that's just what I've seen. As for those I haven't seen, I don't know."

Two on the third floor?

Lan Old Head couple?

No! There's still one on the third floor; Er Mao's family, although they have a house outside, occasionally come stay a few days; I heard that next year, when his daughter Er Yuan gets older, they'll come to live here regularly.

Could the other one be Er Mao?

As for the first floor, it's probably Da Pang's old lady.

"'In our line of work, often we don't need to dig deep; a single glance can give preliminary info from many seemingly trivial details. Otherwise, if you offend the wrong people, you wouldn't know how you died; without that mind and eyesight, you wouldn't last long in this business.' Liuba said."

Liuba has always thought he belongs to the group with decent eyesight, but he hit a wall with this cat. However, swapping in others might not be better than Liuba. Who among ordinary people would put their suspicion on a cat that looks utterly ordinary?

"'The phone used by that old lady on the first floor isn't something just anyone can use. One look and I know whether this person is easy to provoke; even if I got a related job, I'd think twice.' Liuba didn't want to go up against the state apparatus."

Zheng Tan recalled the old lady's phone; he remembered it seemed brandless, and he had always thought Da Pang's old lady used just a regular senior phone. He didn't expect her phone to be superior to Jiao Ba's. But thinking about the old lady's son's status also makes sense; maybe her son got promoted again, who knows.

Seeing Zheng Tan looking doubtful at him, Liuba waved his hand: "We won't leak client information, nor bother unrelated people. This time is an exception. Besides this incident, I really haven't randomly investigated people; we also have professional ethics."

"'Ethics... is this thing worth money?' Zheng Tan thought. But soon he thought, 'Damn, this world is too unsafe; can't get hold of those high-end phones, better to avoid being discovered by more people—this cat might as well not use a phone.' Just thinking about what Liuba just said about the many capable people on campus in this regard makes his scalp tingle."

While Zheng Tan hung his head considering whether to throw that phone into the lake to destroy the corpse and erase traces, Liuba stretched out a stick and poked Zheng Tan.

"'Hey, uh, are you interested in joining our line of work?' Liuba looked expectantly at Zheng Tan."

Elders, children, women are types of people who easily make us let down our guard; animals, even more so.

Seeing Zheng Tan unmoved, Liuba continued: "This makes money fast. If we cooperate, a fifty-fifty split—how about that? Rest assured, we won't take very dangerous jobs."

Do this line of work? Be a detective? This kind of thing seems to have been done before.

Around the school, walking has gotten a bit tiresome; going farther isn't convenient either. Zheng Tan doesn't know if it's because he became a cat, also inheriting those cat traits—if not curious, they'll defecate; if immobile for a while, their paws itch—so he always finds something to amuse himself. But if it were truly partnering with Liuba, Zheng Tan would still hesitate.

Liuba said he'd help Zheng Tan keep the secret; Zheng Tan believed him, but regarding cooperation, Zheng Tan doesn't want to for now. One, he isn't that close to Liuba; two, he just returned, and even until New Year he doesn't want to run around; besides, his fee for this movie shoot is not small, so he's not short on money; also, during the New Year period he could go to Xiao Guo's place to work overtime, earn some cash for the New Year to give red envelopes; other matters, Zheng Tan doesn't want to handle.

Liuba still had something to do later, and Zheng Tan didn't want to keep listening to Liuba's nagging; so the person and the cat each went their separate ways. Liuba let Zheng Tan think it over, and if he had a decision he could just call him.

Zheng Tan pondered all night—not about cooperation, but about whether to toss his phone into the lake. As for exposure, as long as Liuba keeps it secret, it's temporarily fine.

Actually, just like that old lady in the Lakeside Villa Area said, there's more than one person pretending to be clueless around Zheng Tan; even if they know he's different, they won't say it outright, but instead openly and covertly offer much help. If things really head in a bad direction, go find help.

The next day, Zheng Tan wandered over to the Old Tile House Area, where he hid his phone.

As soon as he entered the house, Zheng Tan smelled that someone had been there.

It was Liuba.

On a table near the wall lay a flip phone that looked about seventy percent new, with no particular highlights, and a new SIM card.

Zheng Tan had never seen the phone's brand before; its buttons were a bit larger than the ones on his previous phone, and they felt good to press.

Beside the phone and SIM card lay a note:

"'If you want to cooperate, callme~' after which was drawn a smiling cat face."

Not turned on and without the SIM card inserted, Zheng Tan put the phone and card into the drawer for hiding old phones, closed it. He turned and left the tile house. (To be continued...)