Enforcer Manual
Chapter 617: The Impostor_1

Chapter 617: Chapter 617: The Impostor_1

Song Lan witnessed a murder scene.

However, the nature of the murder was somewhat unusual.

For example, one of the victims at the scene was himself, and one of the murderers was his future wife, which easily reminded him of some family dramas that happened in the year 2167.

Yes, in this age of simple customs, the way people resolved family conflicts was also much more brutal than in the past. For instance, Captain Doug had told him that when they arrived at the scene of a domestic dispute, the victim had already had a hole blasted through his chest by the pellets of a shotgun.

And now, one of the murderers at the scene was carefully cradling his palm, looking at the scar across it with concern, and meticulously dabbing the wound with a cotton swab soaked in disinfectant.

"How did you get such a big cut? Doesn’t it hurt?"

While talking, she exhaled a breath of warm air towards the wound.

"Engle is too suspicious, I’ve already sprayed on healing spray."

"Ordinary healing sprays might leave a scar; you need to disinfect it carefully."

At that moment, Song Lan felt the double standard in Lu Xiang’s differential treatment. If she was injured herself, she would usually just hurriedly spray on some healing spray and never bother to consider the possibility of infection or scarring. This put his mind at ease a lot, at least Old Lu hadn’t yet grown impatient with him.

"How is he now? Do you need me to go over and help you process the scene?"

"No need, for safety’s sake, I’ve taken Yeying over there... no, wait! He collaborated very willingly and shared what he knew; we can now pretty much call each other friends."

"Then it seems he’s quite sensible. Alright, I’ll use medical gauze to wrap up your wound; don’t let it get wet for the next few days."

After completing the disinfection and dressing, Lu Xiang glanced at the pamphlet "A Love Tip Every Day" hidden under the documents without a hint of expression. The process of treating wounds was specifically mentioned in the manual, but this was the first time she had encountered a significant wound on Song Lan after having been with him for so long.

The manual said that when a person is injured, they feel the most insecure inside; at this time, warm care from a lover can more easily reach into their heart.

Yet, after much hesitation, she still couldn’t bring herself to do what the manual suggested and lick the wound with her tongue, mainly because they were both at the bureau where everyone was busy with the Southeast Bank robbery case, and any department head might walk in at any moment.

It might be possible to try it under the pretext of changing the dressing when they got home in the evening.

"What was with those people just now?"

"They probably wanted to inquire about the case’s progress and then set a trap to replace me, so that they could have the whole case under their control."

On the way, Lu Xiang had deliberately provided false information, such as claiming that the person Song Lan was meeting today was not Guan Lili but Engle. Yet from the reaction of the impostor, they seemed to have no knowledge of these details.

Moreover, he just couldn’t hide his agitation. In a journey that took only ten minutes, he revealed his intentions without any reservation, which might be because they believed the trap they had set was flawless.

"They seem to be very interested in the family members of the Southeast Bank’s cyber security staff; they might want to silence them."

This contact had provided her with a lot of implied information. "The fake that impersonated you was full of flaws, and besides looking like you, he had almost nothing in common with you, or rather, his behavior seemed more like how others perceive you to be."

Obviously, they knew nothing about the real Song Lan.

Encountering a criminal offense while walking side by side, the impostor had daringly rushed into the alley and engaged in physical combat with the criminals.

To put it in Song Lan’s words, it was like a doubt that refused to be rated.

The real Song Lan, if faced with such a situation, would only scream at her like a scared "Dumb Bird," yelling, "Help! Murder!"

But it was this same fake who had deceived the person closest to the Southeast Bank cyber security engineer, to the extent that his wife still firmly believed that her husband was coerced.

"I speculate that these Worms need to extract a host’s knowledge, memories, and lifestyle through the Parasitic process to completely replace someone. However, since they had no chance to Parasite onto you, they could only ensure to look the same."

For the knowledge and memories they couldn’t extract, they had to imitate them like everyone else, based on the evaluations from those around and on the internet.

This made them no different from ordinary criminals.

Lu Xiang summed up the clues she had deduced.

"And they seem to know nothing about Old Sa, what does that tell us?"

"It means they do not share the Bug Swarm consciousness."

Song Lan tacitly answered.

The Bug Swarm consciousness is not unique to them; it’s a feature all devourers possess. Individuals under the influence of devourer consciousness will share memories to a certain extent, similar to how a Horn Bug scout in District 17 finding a criminal is essentially like all members of the Bug Swarm witnessing the criminal’s characteristics.

But the toll collector who was attacked yesterday didn’t bring any information about Old Sa and the others to their companions.

Following Song Lan’s answer, Lu Xiang said, "So, these Worms are just independent living entities?"

"Not necessarily, I think they are currently engaged in some organized and disciplined actions. On the way back, I asked Dr. Bai Zhu to help look up the crime records in all cities of the United Government recently, and found that there have been a total of 23 bank robberies in various cities recently."

Of course, more than half of these bank robberies failed, with reports from law enforcement departments in some core cities stating all robbers were killed.

"It seems that they are not targeting District 17 or Southeast Bank specifically; it looks more like they are amassing wealth in this way. Moreover, the combat abilities of individual Worms are not strong, and a well-equipped security team can suppress them."

Importantly, one must know about their healing abilities in advance and be wary of Worms that may emerge from corpses at any time.

"According to Old Sa’s guess, when the Parasitic Worms realize they can’t escape unscathed, they will wait for an opportunity to escape from the corpse or Parasite into a new host."

And now, these self-conceited robbers had come to their door, allowing them to capture several Worm prototypes at once.

Medea had already begun the corresponding research.

"But there’s one thing I still don’t understand."

Song Lan said, "If they wanted to rob banks, why impersonate me?"

He was just an honest and ordinary citizen; who had he managed to provoke?

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