Chapter 250
Chapter 250: Come Here, I’ll Feed You!
Jiang Tea Tea listened to his demands. While she showed open disdain for him, she tilted her head and asked the Interrogation Officer beside her: “Hey, I’m curious, for a strange flower like him, on average how many of these do you meet in a year in your career?”
The Interrogation Officer snorted and answered: “A shameless oddball like him is the first one I’ve met in my entire career. I was so shocked I was staring with my mouth open, I couldn’t believe it. I was like some country bumpkin, thinking he was the rarest thing ever!”
Jiang Tea Tea let out a long, meaningful “oh” and spoke with hidden barbs, scolding him while pretending to talk about something else: “Looks like the cases you handle still involve too few criminals. Later, I’ll use this tender face of mine. Since your Commander in Chief likes me and trusts me, I’ll ask your Commander in Chief to assign you more cases and more suspects.”
“You handle more cases, see more suspects, and when you meet another freak like him, it won’t feel so rare.”
The Interrogation Officer gave her the highest respect and spoke as narcissistically as she did: “Thanks for the reminder. I think the Commander in Chief likes me quite a bit too and trusts me a lot. Later I’ll go show my face and talk to him myself. I believe he’ll ignore the Empire’s laws for my sake, give me special treatment, and promote me to be the Empire’s second-in-command.”
Jiang Tea Tea burst out laughing: “Great, that’s perfect. Next time call your whole department along. The more people, the stronger the power. Maybe once Commander in Chief Chong Ming gets in a good mood, he’ll just throw out the Empire’s Law Code, hand over his Commander in Chief of the Three Armies position to us, and let all of us grow freely, sweet and happy, joyful and carefree!”
The Interrogation Officer played along very well: “Okay. I won’t just call our Interrogation Department. I’ll also call the Intelligence Department next door, the Security Department, and even the Logistics Personnel Department.”
“Ah, just thinking about all of us going to show our faces and the Commander in Chief ignoring the law just for us makes me so happy my hands and feet want to dance. I feel like smoke is rising from my ancestors’ graves.”
Chong Xing Qi was too shameless. What did he take the Empire’s laws for?
Did he really think he was some very important character, a key figure, treating everyone else like fools while taking himself so seriously?
He stood here as if he was above the Empire’s laws, bargaining, thinking that the things he held in his hands could make the law give way, could make Commander in Chief Chong Ming grant him special privileges.
With that childish brain of his, he actually wanted to kill the two dragons of the Golden Dragon Clan, overthrow the imperial power, and put himself on top.
On top with what? With who? With just Reboot and those countless battalions of living dead he had infected?
Naive. He was really naive to the point of being almost cute.
In the face of absolute firepower and high technology, even a demon like Jiang Tea Tea, who only had three or four layers of spiritual power, did not dare stick her head out, did not dare loudly say she had five cubs. Yet he treated himself like the boss and started daydreaming.
Chong Xing Qi’s face turned green and white from the insults. He could not even feel the pain of his fingernails digging into his own flesh. Blood gushed from the palms of his hands.
Unwilling to give up, he continued to threaten her: “Jiang Tea Tea, you think my demands are wishful thinking, and you don’t want to pass them on to Commander in Chief Chong Ming. Can you take responsibility if a dozen or even dozens of laboratories all break out with a large scale super virus at the same time?”
“No, you can’t, and not just you. Even Commander in Chief Chong Ming cannot bear the consequences. So I advise you, you had better pass on my demands to Commander in Chief Chong Ming word for word.”
“I can die. I can go to the Yellow Springs with my family. But the hundreds of thousands of dragons of my Yellow Dragon Lineage absolutely cannot be exiled to the Border Stars, and absolutely cannot suffer any accidents.”
Jiang Tea Tea could not help laughing out loud: “You’re threatening me?”
People laugh when they are speechless. Demons laugh when they are speechless too.
With an IQ like his, with how speechless he made even a demon feel, he was not even good enough to be used as her fertilizer. She was afraid that if she absorbed him, she would also become so ridiculous that people would laugh in disbelief.
Chong Xing Qi said viciously: “I am not threatening you. I am informing you!”
Jiang Tea Tea pointed at the surveillance system in the room, then pointed at the Interrogation Officers sitting on her left, right, front, and back: “You’re in this room. Every word we say is being recorded by the surveillance system, 360 degrees without any blind spots.”
“Those words you just used to threaten me and threaten Commander in Chief Chong Ming, as long as Commander in Chief Chong Ming moves a finger, in the next second every common citizen in the M31 Star System will know that you threatened him.”
“You tell me, based on the Empire’s common citizens and their sense of belonging and recognition toward their nation, will they choose to personally kill their own infected family members for the sake of righteousness, or will they want Commander in Chief Chong Ming to compromise with you, to protect your Yellow Dragon Clan, and let your Yellow Dragon Clan keep being nobles with fiefs?”
“You…”
Jiang Tea Tea cut him off: “Don’t think your threat is really a threat. Don’t think your laboratory is really that big a deal. And don’t take yourself so seriously.”
“Chong Xing Qi, you and your grandparents, your dad and your mother are a shame to the Yellow Dragon Clan, not an honor.”
“You were the ones who wanted to overthrow the imperial power. You were the ones who wanted to wipe out the Golden Dragon Clan. It was not the people of the Yellow Dragon Clan who wanted to kill the Golden Dragon Clan and overthrow the throne.”
“In the end, it is you who dragged other people into your own mess. With death right in front of you, you still think you can offer yourself up as a sacrifice and help the Yellow Dragon Clan find a last way out. You’re simply daydreaming.”
“You yourselves created this trouble for the Yellow Dragon Clan, and now you want to turn yourselves into the Yellow Dragon Clan’s saviors. You’re disgust piled on disgust, disgusting all the way to the end.”
Chong Xing Qi felt the words stab right into his heart. The last tiny bit of self-righteous cover he had was ripped away clean, not a scrap left.
Jiang Tea Tea looked at him, then turned to ask the Interrogation Officer beside her: “He already admits he knows about dozens of underground laboratories and where the virus samples are. Do you have ways to make him wish he were dead and spit it all out?”
The Interrogation Officer answered at once: “Of course. We have plenty of methods and strength to turn a man who is like steel into a little lamb.”
Jiang Tea Tea raised her hand and made a courteous gesture: “His mouth is so hard, and his attitude is so arrogant. Go on, give him some real intensity. Let him learn how vicious people’s hearts can be.”
The Interrogation Officer shot a look at the people on Chong Xing Qi’s left and right.
They stood up at once, tied Chong Xing Qi’s body to a stool, then tilted the stool up so his body hung half in the air. A strong light was shone straight into his eyes. They forced his legs and feet to turn into a dragon body and dragon tail…
They used all kinds of methods on Chong Xing Qi. In the end, he was only a 19-year-old genius researcher who had always been held in people’s palms and on the tips of their tongues, growing up proud and confident.
He had never experienced this kind of interrogation, whipping, and cursing. Meanwhile, the people interrogating him were all experienced experts, both in interrogation skills and in hitting people.
In less than three hours, he could not hold on anymore. He stopped bargaining, stopped being self-righteous, stopped being naive.
He told them everything he knew that Commander in Chief Chong Ming did not know. Some of it was lists that could be checked. Some lists could not be checked. Laboratories, partners, local sponsors, he told them all.
A long string of names, places, and actions took up a full 80 pages of A4 paper to record all of his confession.
Jiang Tea Tea ate the last bite of flesh from the fruit in her hand, then took the stack of 80 pages and weighed it in her hand: “Heavy enough.”
Chong Xing Qi was now a complete mess. His body was half human, half dragon, with a dragon tail. The scales on his dragon body had fallen off. His dragon tail was split apart. His hair looked like it had been burned by fire. His chest rose and fell with barely any breath coming out, as if he could die at any moment.
The Interrogation Officer nodded: “It really is heavy, heavier than we ever imagined.”
Jiang Tea Tea handed the 80 pages back to the Interrogation Officer: “You were the ones who interrogated him. Take it and give it to your Commander in Chief.”
The Interrogation Officer was slick and clever: “The Commander in Chief told us to interrogate together. So we’ll give it to the Commander in Chief together. Let’s go…”
“Wait, wait.” Chong Xing Qi’s voice was urgent but weak as he called out to Jiang Tea Tea: “Jiang Tea Tea, wait, I have something to say.”
Jiang Tea Tea did not hand the 80 pages back. Holding the stack in her hand, she turned to look at Chong Xing Qi: “Say it.”
Chong Xing Qi’s wrists had been squeezed by the handcuffs all the way down to the bone. On both wrists it was basically only bone connected to bone. The flesh and tendons had been cut and torn. He said: “Reboot is only an 11-year-old child. I created her together with some other researchers.”
“From the time she had memories and started to learn to talk, I appeared in front of her and stayed with her, watched her grow up. Everything she did was because of my orders. All the sins are mine. They have nothing to do with her.”
“I know you have three level S supernatural abilities. The variant plant-type ability is just a small skill to you, not even worth mentioning. Your hypnosis is what is really strong. Please hypnotize her for me and let her become an ordinary person, okay?”
Jiang Tea Tea walked up to him and slapped the stack of papers against his face: “I said you keep pushing and overestimating yourself, and you still don’t admit it. You’re already at death’s door, and you’re still daydreaming.”
“Reboot has three kinds of super virus inside her. Three. Her saliva, her sweat, her blood, her flesh, even the breath she exhales is poisonous.”
“Right now there is no cure for these three viruses. As a researcher, you know what ‘no cure’ means. Yet you are here begging me to seal her memories, return her freedom, and raise her like an ordinary person.”
“I might be willing. Will Commander in Chief Chong Ming be willing? Will the hundreds of billions of people in the Empire agree?”
“You people in your family really are experts at betraying the country, splitting the nation, and hurting your own people without shame.”
Chong Xing Qi trembled all over. He opened his mouth, wanting to say something, but could not force out even a single word.
Thousands of years ago, the Yellow Dragon Clan did not have the surname Chong. Because they firmly supported the Golden Dragon Clan, the Golden Dragon Clan granted them the surname Chong. Later, after they committed crimes, they went back to their original surname, were exiled, and wasted away.
In the past little more than one hundred years, they had sacrificed thousands of dragons on the battlefield. They fought bravely and charged ahead. Once again, they earned the Golden Dragon Imperial Clan’s gift of the surname.
Around a hundred years is not very long, but not very short either. It is long enough for a clan to forget many things and for people in that clan to start coveting the power of the Golden Dragon Imperial Clan again.
Reboot. Reboot. That was the name he gave her. He hoped she would be as strong as Commander in Chief Chong Ming, become his best weapon, and open up a new era.
Now it was gone. All gone. The Yellow Dragon Clan, which had betrayed the Golden Dragon Imperial Clan twice over thousands of years, had once again fallen back to its original place, becoming the target of scorn and a joke for the other dragon clans.
Jiang Tea Tea took the thick stack of 80 pages of testimony and, together with the Interrogation Officer, went to Chong Ming’s office to report to him.
“Commander in Chief, this is the testimony confessed by Chong Xing Qi. It is all personnel lists and laboratory coordinates that are not in his parents’ and grandparents’ memories.”
“This result from the interrogation is all thanks to the Interrogation Department. I was only here to watch the show. Don’t count the credit for me, thanks.”
Schoolmate Jiang Tea Tea wanted to give all the credit to them?
No way. She was the soul of this interrogation.
The Interrogation Officer at once snapped to attention and saluted Chong Ming: “Reporting to the Commander in Chief, the main credit for interrogating Chong Xing Qi belongs to Schoolmate Jiang Tea Tea.”
“If she had not smashed Chong Xing Qi’s mental defenses to pieces, we would not have gotten this so easily. We needed less than three hours to ask all this out of him. We don’t dare claim the credit. Please see clearly, Commander in Chief.”
Chong Ming put his hand on top of the 80 pages of testimony and looked at them: “I watched your whole interrogation process from start to finish. There’s no need to push the credit around. After the case is closed, I will reward everyone based on their merits.”
The Interrogation Officer answered respectfully: “Yes, Commander in Chief!”
Chong Ming nodded: “Go back to work. Jiang Tea Tea, stay.”
The Interrogation Officer saluted again, took three steps back, kept his back straight, and then strode out of Chong Ming’s office.
The moment the office door closed, Chong Ming took out a space knob storage device and tossed it to Jiang Tea Tea, who was standing in front of his desk: “The thirteen kinds of medicinal herbs you wanted.”
Jiang Tea Tea reached out and caught it: “Chong Ming, I suddenly feel that being your subordinate is really pitiful. We spin like wheels twenty-four hours a day and can’t even get food into our mouths.”
[Starving. I’m about to starve to death.]
[Does he not know I’m pregnant with cubs?]
[Or does he really just see me as a draft animal?]
[I really don’t get it. A dragon whose eyes only see work, and so many people still worship him?]
Chong Ming had loosened two buttons on his shirt, revealing his neck and Adam’s apple: “I think what you need is dragon blood, not food.”
Jiang Tea Tea looked at his neck, his Adam’s apple, and the blood vessels there and could not help swallowing: “No, my stomach is hungry. I want food, not dragon blood.”
The corner of Chong Ming’s mouth curved slightly: “Actually, for a mother body carrying a youngling, drinking more dragon blood lets the youngling only take the nutrients it needs. The rest is even better for the mother body’s health.”
“Jiang Tea Tea, you have awakened many high level supernatural abilities, and sometimes they clash with each other. Drinking some dragon blood is better for your body.”
Ever since he confessed to her and started to pursue her, he had not seen her, held her, or touched her for several days. He was so busy his feet barely touched the ground, and she was busy too. Now that they finally had a bit of free time, his desire for her was being held back to the extreme.
Jiang Tea Tea flipped her hand, took out a cup, put it on his desk, and pushed it toward him: “Come on, bleed.”
Chong Ming reached out to stop the cup. His eyes were full of both doting and helplessness as he looked at Jiang Tea Tea: “Pouring it into a cup wastes water. You also have to wash the cup. It also won’t be fresh, and the nutrition will be lost. So…”
Jiang Tea Tea finished the words he was clearly holding back on purpose: “So I should hold you and bite you?”
Chong Ming slowly smiled: “Yes. Hold me and bite me. Hold me and take a drink. It will be fresh, the nutrition won’t be lost, and you won’t waste water resources. Come here, drink as much as you want. I’ll feed you full.”