茶杯狐 -CUPFOX

Chapter 124: Who is More Eager?

Xiang Kun sent a message back: “You’re not the owner of this account, are you?”

The immediate reply came: “What does it matter? Didn’t you create a fake account just to send a private message?” It seems like she has completely given up on deceiving Xiang Kun by pretending to be a cute vampire girl.

Xiang Kun didn’t respond to her somewhat “ultimatum” style reply, nor was he concerned about her threats of blocking him. From his earlier communication, he already knew that the person behind the screen was much more anxious than him.

“Tomorrow at 2 pm, come meet me at the ‘Long Time No See Cafe’ on ** Street in ** City. Tell me what you’re wearing or what your distinctive features are, I will look for you.”

Although Xiang Kun wanted to see what other “vampires” looked like, to find more mutation examples for his “Vampire Mutation Model,” to gather more data, to find out more about mutation so as to discover the root cause of these transformations.

But he had no genuine need to meet this “vampire”. If she really did block him, then so be it. He never intended to use this account a second time anyway. Even if he lost contact with this “vampire,” he was okay with that.

Xiang Kun let go of his mouse and with chopsticks gently stirred a bowl of dumplings placed next to him.

The place he suggested to meet was in the neighboring city where he had spent the entire day. Initially, he just made it as a contingency plan, preparing for a possible offline meeting, choosing spaces where he could easily observe and familiarize himself with the route. Now that she had suggested meeting up, the meeting should naturally take place in an environment he was already familiar with.

The reason he didn’t choose a location in his own city was simply that he didn’t want her to think he lived there.

He now basically concluded that similar mutants could sense each other’s presence from a certain distance, much like the time he inexplicably noticed the Giant Owl’s scent in the hills.

He didn’t want her to randomly move around in his city and bump into him by chance.

This was like encrypting a file with the salted PBKDF2 algorithm, planning to prevent brute force cracking or rainbow codes, but then the other party knowing the password length and randomly guessing one correctly…

So Xiang Kun had to reduce this probability. The meeting place had to be in another city.

AS tor scneaullng sucn snort notice, Xiang Kun wanted to make sure tne otner party wouldn’t have enough time to prepare or set up an ambush.

Could she make it on time? With modern transportation, it shouldn’t be a problem within the country. If she was already in * *city where the meeting was proposed, she would certainly make it on time. After all, this was for her to consider, not him.

After sending the message, Xiang Kun started a mental countdown.

When he reached 157 seconds, she finally replied:

“I will be wearing a blue top and there will be two drinks on the table in front me. But tomorrow afternoon is too rushed, let’s do the day after tomorrow at 2 pm. And you also need to tell me what you’ll be wearing and what you look like so I can recognize you!”

Xiang Kun ignored her bargaining, responding simply with: “Then it’s settled. Tomorrow, 2 pm. See you then.”

He then closed his browser, deleted the virtual machine, turned off his computer, stood up, asked the waiter to pack his dumplings, and left.

From this brief private chat, it seemed that Xiang Kun’s hypothetical position towards “Kasumi of August” held up. This “vampire” clearly had malicious intentions and wanted to “fish”, she was also quite eager.

At first, she tried to fool Xiang Kun by pretending to be the character behind the “Kasumi of August” ID, but after realizing that Xiang Kun was alert and wouldn’t let his guard down, she still persistently sought to know his identity or meet him offline, disregarding his displayed abnormalities and relentless probing.

“She must be starving…” murmured Xiang Kun, just like the “Giant Owl.” Even when wounded, instead of leaving to recover, it had given Xiang Kun, a ground-dwelling creature incapable of flight, the opportunity to corner it.

At this thought, he suddenly stopped. Frowning, he reflected on his own mental trajectory and actions after learning about the existence of other “vampires.”

Was he also being influenced by the instinct to devour the blood of other mutants?

If it were another mutant transformed from a non-human animal like the “Giant Owl” , he had no doubt that he would actively go hunting.

Was this instinct, possibly ingrained in his genes, driving him to “hunt” this “vampire”? Like her insistent desire to meet him?

Xiang Kun scrutinized and reflected upon the psychological journey he had been on and the motives behind each decision he made over the past few days. He basically concluded that none of the decisions he made was directly influenced by physical impulses or desires, though his subconscious might have such tendencies.

Xiang Kun didn’t stop to dwell. He walked over to a beggar crouching at the foot of an overpass staircase and placed the packed dumplings beside him without making a sound, then silently climbed up the overpass.

Before making a decision, Xiang Kun would hesitate and weigh his options, but once he had made a decision, he would follow through according to the plan, otherwise he would become more troubled.

After returning home, Xiang Kun first refined and sorted the chat records he had with “Kasumi of August.”

Generally speaking, both of them spoke more falsehoods than truths, mostly probes, and the rest was hard to tell if it’s true or false. But comparatively, their conversation had fished out some information from her:

1, she likely relies on human blood as a main source of food, and might have killed people in the process;

2, a “cure” for the violent hunger pangs—releasing blood;

3, she suggested to meet in **Town in * *City, which might be one of her “bases” or at least a familiar place for her.

1 and 3 can’t be fully confirmed, but 2 can be tested at any time to see if releasing blood can truly suppress the violent behavior caused by hunger.

Besides this information, there was some “bait” from her like the QQnumber, the website, the company name. Xiang Kun wouldn’t immediately check these as they likely wouldn’t reveal much useful information based on her behavior.

He also reviewed his own responses, reassuring himself that he didn’t reveal any information that could expose his identity.

Throughout the chat, he was constantly monitoring the ports and data in real time and didn’t notice any abnormalities.

At 2 a.m., after preparing food and water for the canary and the remaining rabbits, Xiang Kun put on a pre-prepared wig, changed his clothes, took a carving knife, and set off overnight to the neighboring city..