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Chapter 38: 38

When Gu Jun heard Professor Qin, he was already mentally prepared . The question was what did the state know?

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He knew that amongst the judges, Professor Qin was the one who valued him the most . He was about to ask further, but before he could, Professor Qin sternly said, “I can’t say anything more . You can go in now . ” After saying that, Professor Qin and several other judges left . Gu Jun sighed softly and walked back inside .

Everyone shot him envious gazes and thought that Professor Qin had given him some pointers .

“Did something happen?” Wang Ruoxiang’s thoughts differed from the rest, and she delicately thought to herself . Recently, she had developed some understanding of him, and she saw how Gu Jun’s complexion had changed slightly after being called out .

“It’s nothing . ” Gu Jun merely shook his head in response .

Next, the staff immediately brought the nine of them into the elevator . Arriving at a corridor on the second floor, there was a small sign, “appraisal room”, hanging outside the office door at the end of the passage . Before they could even sit down on the waiting chairs, the staff told Gu Jun that he was the first to be evaluated .

Gu Jun didn’t have much time to think . He could only walk up and push open the office door, and enter the office . The other students watched as he closed the door behind him .

This room was cramped with no windows at all . As soon as Gu Jun walked in, he saw a chair in front of him, and three judges were sitting behind a table . There were two men and a woman . All of whom were middle-aged . They were expressionless and giving off a cold aura that sharply differed from those of the corpse guides . Their sharp eyes seem to be able to pierce right into one’s soul .

A camera was placed in the corner, and a TV screen hung on an adjacent wall . Above the chair, an unlit fluorescent lamp hung from the ceiling .

“Hello, professors,” Gu Jun greeted the three people . There was no plaque placed at their desk, hence he didn’t know how to address them .

“Student Gu, please take a seat,” said the man sitting in the middle . His face seemed to have lost all its collagen, with extremely deep grooves and wrinkle lines were carved into it . The woman on the right wore glasses . She had an angular facial shape and small beaded eyes . On the other hand, the man on the left has the typical features of an ordinary Chinese face, indistinguishable from the masses on the streets .

They were all holding a pen with a folder of documents placed in front of them . Those should be his personal details and a questionnaire for his evaluation .

Gu Jun sat down on the chair . The camera lens and the lamp were facing to his side, giving off an invisible sense of pressure .

The lines on the face of the man in the middle twitched, and he sternly asked, “What can you tell us about your parents?”

“…” Gu Jun swore inwardly . The state should have known fully about his background, but now he decided to throw all caution to the wind and could not help but uneasily let out a sigh of relief . He was tired of hiding the truth . Gu Jun started speaking, “My parents were scientific researchers and died in a shipwreck accident, but I always suspected that their deaths were not so simple . Their employer, Lai Sheng Research Co . , Ltd, had some eccentricities . Therefore, I decided to conduct my own personal investigations into them, but my search yielded no results . ”

He had already imagined such a situation in his mind . Since he decided to confess, then he should not hide anything . Else, he would appear to have ulterior motives if he was exposed . He repeated himself, “A man had been following me recently . I suspect that he is from Lai Sheng, but I don’t know what his purpose is . I hope you can help me solve these doubts . ”

The three reviewers were all staring at him, their eyes not moving away from him at all . At the same time, their pens were scribbling something in the folder .

“What do you know about Lai Sheng?” the man asked again .

“Practically nothing, but now, I feel that they are… some sort of secret organization . ” Gu Jun answered truthfully .

“What makes you think so?”

“A hunch, I guess,” said Gu Jun .

They didn’t say anything else and continued to write inside the folder . The angular-faced woman then asked, “You have a brain stem tumour at the advanced stages, so why did you decide to participate in the competition?”

“I wanted to enter the inner circle of this business . ” As Gu Jun spoke, he grew more and more composed . They know everything, that’s good . “I think the affairs that my parents were dealing in are related to this circle . ”

“Why?” the woman asked again .

“During the deep-diving project to Longkan, I heard what Li Yuerui and the rest talked about some sort of news and inner circles, as well as strange rumours about Longkan . Afterwards, mysterious whirlpools really appeared on the seabed . My parents vanished there . A few days ago, I was convinced that there was indeed a mysterious circle in the world when I witnessed the malformed remains of those suffering from the Malformed Banyan disease . This contest was the best way for me to enter . ”

Gu Jun’s explanation was mostly true . Only that the sequence of events was somewhat adjusted, hence he spoke very naturally .

“What did you see at the bottom of Longkan?” the man in the middle asked again .

Gu Jun knew that he would definitely be asked this question, and gave a rehearsed answer . “It was extremely chaotic at that time . Outside the window was very dark, and the seawater was extremely turbulent . Afterwards, there were even many frightened fishes trying to escape, which cut off my vision outside . ” He then voluntarily fished out Li Yuerui’s mobile phone out of his pocket and said, “This is Li Yuerui’s cell phone . A while back, I received a package from Maldives . I wasn’t sure what was going on, but I had a feeling that they had been captured by the secret internal department of the state after the competition yesterday . They should have sent out this phone right before they were taken away . ”

“Hold on to the phone first . After the review, someone will find you for it,” said the man .

Gu Jun nodded and put the broken phone back in his pocket . As expected .

“Did you think we would hire you after learning about your physical condition?” asked the woman asked .

“Yes, because my condition is still stable . Perhaps I can still live for a few years . ” Gu Jun self-deprecatingly laughed at himself . “Can the department guarantee that we can still live for another two or three years?”

Of course, the three did not answer . There was no trace of emotional fluctuation in their faces, but they continued taking records .

“Why are you so familiar with that chest specimen?” the man in the middle asked again .

1

Gu Jun froze slightly . This problem was something he hadn’t expected . Gu Jun immediately realized that since he had shown an apparent loss of composure, he should follow up with this reaction . He puzzledly gave an “Ah” in exclamation . “Familiar? What are you referring to? I studied medicine . When I touched its surface, I found that the surface was all dead skin . The chest wall was blocked by the lamellar bone and was even connected to ribs . My thought was to remove that bone first before I can enter the thoracic wall . ”

The logic he gave seemed completely reasonable . Even without the incomplete anatomical reference, it was entirely plausible to happen .

As the man recorded down his response, the woman took over the conversation again . “What are your thoughts towards the Malformed Banyan Disease and the Malformed Banyan? Please use a few words to describe your thoughts . ”

Gu Jun remembered that he felt that the Malformed Banyan was strangely beautiful . Perhaps it was better to give the conventional response of saying it was “disgusting”? Or maybe not . He already had many suspicious points regarding the other party . If he gave an ambiguous reply to this question, then all the words he spoke so far might lose their credibility .

After this thought flashed through his mind, he decided to speak the truth . “Horrifying and twisted, but exquisite and gorgeous . ”

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The three interviewers still remained expressionless . At that time, the woman picked up a remote control and pressed it a few times . The lamp above the chair lit up, and an overwhelmingly blinding light shone . Gu Jun could only narrow his eyes, feeling intense discomfort…

“Student Gu, please look at the screen,” said the woman .

Gu Jun narrowed his eyes and saw some eerie images playing quietly on the screen . Severed human fingers, swarms of worms, a lighthouse by the sea at night, dry swathes of forests in the mountains… The more he looked, the stronger the sense of oppression in his heart grew .

In the next ten minutes, Gu Jun didn’t know how many different images he saw, and the sense of oppression gradually morphed into depression and restlessness .

He suddenly heard an unfamiliar voice . It was the man on the left who had not yet spoken . There was no trace of emotions in his voice .

“Classmate Gu, I will ask you some questions next . You only need to answer with one of the three answers: A for yes . B is between yes and no . C for no . You can only answer within 5 seconds . Regardless of whether you have answered or not, I will ask you the next question after 5 seconds . ”

Gu Jun heard this and immediately understood the purpose behind this: psychological assessment, it was a personality test .

In order to woo girls in the past, he had picked up some knowledge of medical psychology . The choice of A, B, and C should be following the model of . He would be graded on his response, and his score would be tabulated to determine his personality type .

Gu Jun suddenly felt that this was the real purpose behind the interview . His life experience and illness were not the focus . The state was more concerned if he was “safe” to be used . If his psychology and personality were deemed unsuitable for this kind of work, it will definitely not work out .

“Do demons exist on earth?” the man on the left asked the first question .

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5 seconds, 4 seconds, 3 seconds, Gu Jun still remained silent…