Chapter 80: The Bomber

Faced with Old Master Liu's words, Yan Jing did not respond for a moment, still a bit dazed.

Seeing Yan Jing's expression, Old Master Liu coughed twice and said, "Let me state this right up front: I followed your advice to the letter! The moment I saw that bald guy in a robe surrounded by his entourage, I immediately stayed far away!"

"But who would have thought it would actually blow up!"

"I just didn't get far enough away, so my arm took a bit of damage. I'll reflect on that. Next time, I'll definitely run even further!"

"But! Just listen!"

Perhaps feeling that Yan Jing didn't believe him, Old Master Liu held up his slightly scraped right arm. "I swear, I really did take cover!"

"Mm."

Finally recovering his wits, Yan Jing nodded. "You did well," he said calmly.

He pointed to the Walkie-talkie at Old Master Liu's waist, a gentle smile on his face.

"But why didn't you answer the Walkie-talkie, sir?"

Hearing Yan Jing's words, Old Master Liu finally realized what had happened. He hastily pulled the Walkie-talkie from his waist. Its green light was flashing rapidly—the voice messages had obviously piled up.

"This, well, this... there's a reason for this."

Old Master Liu lowered his voice.

"Didn't I just say? I saw the person who planted the bomb!"

"Where?"

Yan Jing asked, his expression turning serious.

"Already dead."

Old Master Liu kept his voice down. "It was the little girl diagonally across from my stall."

"Right before the bomb went off, that bald guy walked past her. I saw with my own eyes as she reached into her pocket for something, and I felt a surge of weird energy!"

"And then, it blew up!"

Yan Jing frowned.

"That little girl across from you—where was she from?"

"She's from right here."

Old Master Liu recalled, "I chatted with her before. She's been in this Tower ever since she was born."

Yan Jing's frown deepened.

In other words, the girl was a tower inhabitant.

But that hardly made any sense.

A tower inhabitant was born with only one purpose: to eat. Why would she suddenly decide to plant a bomb?

Let alone bomb the very building she was born in.

Furthermore, how could an ordinary waitress manage to run up to the eighth floor and drop off an Advance Notice?

If what Old Master Liu saw was true, then it was highly likely that someone else was pulling the strings behind this girl.

While Yan Jing was deep in thought, Chen Nian and Mantou also arrived, one after the other.

A moment later, having grasped the situation, Chen Nian dragged Old Master Liu off to the side, and the two immediately started bickering over the core issue of "why didn't you answer the Walkie-talkie?"

Mantou stood by and listened, treating it as a lesson to strengthen her safety awareness.

Yan Jing, meanwhile, watched Tiger and the others arrive late to the scene. He walked over to Rose and asked, "Xiao Mei, if someone asked you to plant a bomb in the Tower right now, and it would likely cost you your life, would you agree to do it?"

"That's impossible."

Rose answered blankly.

"What if they offered to treat you to a luxurious meal?"

"Still impossible."

"What about ten luxurious meals?"

"Absolutely impossible."

"A hundred free premium meals?"

"Impossible. Absolutely impossible."

Rose wiped a line of drool from the corner of her mouth and shook her head repeatedly. "It's impossible."

Yan Jing nodded.

It seemed it really was impossible.

"What if it were a different situation? Say, your superior threatened you and put pressure on you?"

Rose looked a little confused.

"That's impossible too. That counts as blatant workplace oppression. You can report it to the disciplinary inspection team. As long as they're caught, not only will that person be punished, but you'll even get a food reward."

"Besides, why bomb the building? Every boss I've had seems to genuinely love the Tower."

"Without the Tower, we would starve to death."

"I see." Yan Jing nodded.

He hadn't expected the Tower to have a workplace disciplinary inspection team—and one that actually did its job, making it much better than some companies in the Surface World.

Putting it that way, the chances of the Tower itself being behind that girl were rather slim.

So, what could drive a young girl whose sole purpose in life was eating down the path of no return as a suicide bomber...

Yan Jing furrowed his brows tightly. While he hadn't wanted to get involved in this bombing case before, his mindset had shifted somewhat now.

There were many reasons he hadn't wanted to participate initially. First, this wasn't their home turf. Second, they didn't have a suitable identity to meddle in this matter. Third, the opponent's strength, identity, and motives were all unknown, and there were zero leads. The difficulty level was simply far too high.

Now, however, his reason for wanting to get involved was simple and cliché: the bomb had hit his own people.

Although catching the culprit directly would be difficult, they now held a small clue. If they just assisted in solving the case—like they had back in Rotten Vegetable Village—it might actually be doable.

Only, it clearly wouldn't be an easy task, either.

That 'Kindness' elder had only just begun investigating the culprit and was already blown beyond recognition. Now, he was surrounded by a bunch of people from Virtue Bridge, all crying their eyes out.

At this thought, Yan Jing walked over to a corner on the other side.

A glassy-eyed man and a kind-faced man stood together there. There were simply too many people crowded around the elder ahead of them; they couldn't squeeze in. Even now, they hadn't been able to see what state their elder was in.

They could only hear the sobbing of the crowd.

"How is the situation, gentlemen?"

Yan Jing asked, his expression full of regret.

"To be honest, sir, I'm not too sure. We arrived too late," the glassy-eyed man said. "But judging from the weeping of those guys from the 'Kindness' Pathway, I'm guessing the situation isn't terribly bad."

"Excuse me, but do you mean... it isn't terribly good?"

Yan Jing said, listening to the rising and falling sobs around them.

"No, you haven't seen what it looks like when things are truly bad, sir."

The glassy-eyed man shrugged. "That kind of scene could only be described as a river of tears."

"But honestly, I never expected the 'Kindness' elder to fall here."

Yan Jing took the opportunity to ask, "What tier of existence is the 'Kindness' elder?"

"Almost at the Second Tier."

The man said slowly, "The Great Elder once said that the 'Kindness' elder's advancement would be this year."

"Now, it looks like it might not be at the beginning or middle of the year, but probably pushed to the end of the year."

Yan Jing nodded. Now that he knew the elder's strength, he just needed to look at the 'Kindness' elder's injuries to figure out the exact destructive power of the bomb.

Before long, a group of people dressed in white robes rushed over from the distance.

Regardless of gender, every one of them was exceptionally beautiful. They wore extremely loose robes, leaving not a single inch of skin exposed other than their faces.

The person leading them was a woman who looked to be pushing forty. Even though faint wrinkles had already appeared on her face, they didn't hide her beauty in the slightest; instead, they added a unique, mature charm. She had an excellent figure that even the loose robe struggled to conceal.

"Make way, make way."

The white-robed group began to clear the area, but the effect wasn't great. Those 'Kindness' people still sat clustered around the elder.

A moment later, some of the white robes were actually affected. They inexplicably began to feel that their actions were wrong and wanted to join in weeping for the injured person in the center.

That was, until someone spoke up:

"These people from Dandelion Manor are here to save them. Don't get in the way."

"Whoosh—"

The crowd gathered around the old man instantly scattered.

It was then that Yan Jing finally saw the injured state of the 'Kindness' elder.

Right now, his eyes were shut tight, his lips trembling. One half of his body was a mangled mess of blood and flesh, making it impossible to make out his actual appearance. The other half looked utterly miserable as well, his skin densely covered in black veins where weird energy flowed.

'To be able to heavily injure an old man near the Second Tier...'

Yan Jing came to a conclusion.