Chapter 249: Root: Chuck is Your Sister's Lover, and We're About to Have Our Second Date... Let Me Process This!
"When do we start?"
Root looked at the oil painting beauty for a while before asking.
"You're agreeing to come with me just like that?"
the oil painting beauty teased. "Aren't you afraid I'm a con artist?"
"I trust my eyes."
Root smiled slightly. "And even if I am fooled, since you're the liar... I promise I won't make you suffer."
"Why?"
The oil painting beauty didn't seem to mind Root's implied threat at all, looking at her with interest.
"Because you're beautiful."
Root looked at the woman's stunningly beautiful face. "Like a beauty who stepped out of an oil painting—a face like that should remain beautiful from birth to death, not distorted by anything. So even if you commit any grave mistake, you can just die peacefully and beautifully, without suffering any torture."
"Then I'll thank you in advance."
The oil painting beauty smiled, reaching out to smooth Root's hair behind her ear, studying Root's face. "Actually, you're beautiful too, and you'll be even more beautiful in the future, I believe."
Root fell silent.
At this moment, she was no match for the global crime queen.
"Do you want to go back to see your mother first, or deal with this matter first?"
The oil painting beauty stopped abruptly, turning to point to the missing person flyer for Root's best friend, Hannah, on the wall.
"Let's go see my mom first,"
Root said, glancing at her best friend Hannah's photo on the wall. "We'll talk after my mom is taken care of."
"Alright,"
the oil painting beauty nodded and smiled. "To truly become root on the internet, the first step is to erase as many traces of yourself as possible in real life, so that no one can trace you offline and physically harm you."
Root suddenly asked, "Is your sister that kind of person?"
"You're really smart,"
the oil painting beauty praised. "But you can discover this surprise later; I won't spoil it now. Trust me, you'll be very surprised."
"I'm already looking forward to it,"
Root said, a glint in her eyes.
Led by the oil painting beauty, the two returned to Root's home, where Root said goodbye to her mother.
Root's mother had been ill for many years and suffered greatly from her condition.
Now, even though most people would call the police over the sudden appearance of a stunningly beautiful stranger offering to take her daughter for treatment, saying she wouldn't have to worry and would take good care of her—a situation that would leave most people helpless—she could only watch as Root, with her exceptionally high IQ and a headstrong personality that had always set her apart from her peers, made the decision.
"Mom, go and get treatment. I'll visit you regularly,"
Root reassured her anxious mother with a smile.
"Okay, you must come see me,"
Root's mother glanced at the oil painting beauty, reluctantly said goodbye to Root, and then, with the woman's help, got into a moving van and left this small town—a place where she'd lived for many years but had few friends left, and which probably wasn't really her hometown anymore.
"Can I go see her?"
Root watched her mother leave, then looked at the oil painting beauty.
"Of course,"
the oil painting beauty smiled. "What do you take me for? Do you think I'm the head of some evil organization that imprisons your mother to control you?"
"You're not?"
Root looked at the oil painting beauty, a hint of disappointment in her eyes.
"Of course not."
The oil painting beauty ignored Root's disappointment and smiled, "Do you know about the invisible hand?"
"Adam Smith's concept from The Wealth of Nations."
Root has a very high IQ and extensive knowledge, possessing insights far beyond what one would expect for her age.
"Yes."
The oil painting beauty smiled, "There's an invisible hand controlling everything in the market, and in the criminal world, I am that invisible hand.
To ordinary people, I might seem like some kind of evil criminal mastress.
But those with real insight wouldn't think that way.
Because what I'm doing is simply repeating the history of organized crime's rise to power, only not as powerful as they've become, having formed syndicates and grown strong for hundreds of years.
When I was relatively weak, I was an evil organization in their eyes!
But when I became stronger, I became an indispensable element for a stable underworld.
So do you still think I need to control you by controlling your mother?"
"No."
Root nodded, "If you really had that kind of power, then killing anyone would be easy for you, without even needing to care where they are."
"Not everyone..."
The oil painting beauty nodded and then shook her head. Seeing Root looking at her curiously, she smiled and said, "You'll know these things later. Now, how do you want to avenge your friend Hannah?"
"Can I take revenge myself?"
Root suppressed her curiosity, her eyes narrowing as she thought of her only friend, Hannah.
"Of course you can."
The oil painting beauty naturally wouldn't refuse.
Night.
The Bishop librarians, a married couple, sipped their red wine, enjoying the rare quiet evening. Suddenly, they felt incredibly dizzy.
"Honey, did you!"
"Did you!"
The couple, dizzy and barely managing to stay upright, stared at each other in horror and fear.
"What do you want?"
"Not you?"
"What's going on?"
Clap clap clap.
With the sound of applause, the oil painting beauty emerged from the darkness, smiling, "Looks like you both know what kind of people you are. You're quite a match."
"One preyed on a high school girl, and the other, knowing what her fiancé had done, refused to accept it and instead blamed the one who told her the truth. After the high school girl disappeared, you actually got married."
Root also emerged from the darkness, coldly saying, "Indeed, a very good match. No wonder you'd rather let an innocent friend die tragically than give him up."
"It's a shame—it seems he wasn't your true love either, was he?
Otherwise, you wouldn't both be so afraid, suspecting the other of drugging you to do something to you."
"Samantha!"
The female librarian recognized Root, looking at her with fear and pleading. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said those things to you, I really didn't mean it..."
"What did you say?"
Root looked at her, gesturing for her to repeat.
"Please."
The female librarian was almost scared to death, and didn't dare repeat what she had said.
"Let me help you remember."
Root smiled and raised the gun, pressing the muzzle against the forehead of the female librarian's husband, who had murdered her friend Hannah. "Do you remember now? I'll count to three, 3, 2..."
"I remember, I remember!"
the female librarian screamed. "Back then, when you told me the truth, to protect him, I attacked you with the most vicious words, calling you a little bitch who only knew how to spread rumors for attention..."
A string of vicious words came from the seemingly kind female librarian.
Root listened with a smile, and after the librarian finished speaking, she calmly pulled the trigger.
This was her first time handling a firearm, and her first time killing someone, yet she was as calm as a seasoned professional assassin.
Then, looking at the librarian who was so stunned she couldn't even scream, she smiled and said, "Sorry, it seems I misunderstood you. I really am a little bitch who would do anything for attention, so are you paying attention to me now?"
The librarian wanted to faint, but didn't dare, and could only look up in terror at the girl she had previously looked down upon and insulted, her eyes full of pleading.
"Please, let me go, I really didn't want to. I'm overweight and too old, and unlike my sister in New York who's a high school librarian, I'd never do anything like hooking up with high school boys. I finally met him. If you were me, what would you do?"
"Sure enough, it's all bad code."
Root looked at the librarian who was crying, confessing, and begging for mercy, and shook her head coldly.
She loved computers; those lines of efficient code were so elegant and beautiful. She had long felt that humans were too cruel, full of malice—all bad code.
"I can tell you where Hannah is!"
The female librarian, sensing something, made a last-ditch effort to survive.
"I know without you telling me,"
Root sneered. "You got married, and he renovated the northeast corner of your house. Hannah is there, isn't she?"
The female librarian was desperate; her last bargaining chip was useless.
"Bad code should be eliminated sooner rather than later."
Root gave the female librarian a swift end, then looked at the oil painting beauty sitting beside her, watching her performance with amusement. She stared at her for a moment, then a smirk appeared on her lips: "You're good code!"
"No, I'm not,"
the oil painting beauty shook her head with a smile. "You're not either. You're root, aren't you?"
"Yes, I'm root!"
Root looked at the dead couple of predators, completely letting go of herself: "From now on, there's no more Samantha, only root!"
The oil painting beauty instructed Root to clean up and arrange the scene, then left clues to guide the police to find the poor high school girl Hannah buried in the corner, before leaving the town with Root, who had completely bid farewell to the past.
"What's this?"
Root's eyes lit up as she followed the oil painting beauty into a car, only to find the spacious trunk transformed into a server room.
The oil painting beauty didn't speak, simply gesturing for Root to go check it out herself.
"Such high-end specs, this could hack into the Pentagon!"
Root excitedly touched the high-performance computer.
"If it were just hacking into the Pentagon, I wouldn't need to recruit you,"
the oil painting beauty chuckled. "What you're about to do is far, far more difficult than that."
"Is your sister really that capable?"
Root touched the top-of-the-line equipment she'd never owned before, her eyes filled with fighting spirit.
"Far beyond your current imagination,"
the oil painting beauty glanced at her. "But you can greet her first."
"How?"
Root sat down at the computer desk, booting up the machine to familiarize herself with its capabilities, and asked.
"It's simple,"
the oil painting beauty's expression was somewhat complicated. "Chuck Wolfe—you just need to keep an eye on this man, try hacking into his phone, and that's how you greet her."
"Okay."
Without another word, Root began typing furiously.
"Huh!"
She quickly realized something was wrong, her expression changing. "His defenses are so strong! Someone tracked me down through my attack. That's incredible."
"Go on, say hello to her."
The oil painting beauty, unfazed, smiled and told Root to greet Anna, who had already tracked her down via the internet, while driving.
Root nodded, quickly left her signature, and then promptly unplugged the ethernet cable to stop being tracked further.
"Sigh."
Root suddenly sighed after unplugging the cable.
"Don't be discouraged."
The oil painting beauty glanced at her in the rearview mirror. "You're still young, and you had limited access to resources before. It's normal that you can't compete with her yet. After training with me for a while, you can continuously improve and push your limits. Then you won't be as helpless as you are now."
"I'm not lamenting that."
Root shook her head, then looked up at the rearview mirror, meeting the oil painting beauty's gaze. A smirk appeared on her lips. "What I'm lamenting is why you didn't come find me sooner!"
"It seems you've finally experienced the wonders of this world."
The oil painting beauty's eyes were knowing, but she couldn't help thinking of Chuck.
Because in her memory, there was an amateur assassin skilled in killing. After her people contacted him and revealed that although he appeared to be an ordinary architecture professor, he was actually a serial killer, he said something similar.
Unfortunately, this person followed her orders to target private detectives and was arrested when he tried to assassinate Chuck.
She didn't know about tempting fate, but even if she did, she wouldn't stop or interrupt it, because she didn't care!
"Since the key is this man, it's simple,"
Root's eyes flashed. "Why don't we just go find him?"
"I tried, it didn't work,"
the oil painting beauty shook her head. "His abilities are far superior to ordinary people; he's not so easy to capture."
"Capturing him won't work, then let's approach him undercover,"
Root smiled confidently. "There's always a way."
"It won't work,"
the oil painting beauty glanced at Root, who was brimming with confidence and an "I can do it" attitude, in the rearview mirror. "Approaching him undercover—before, we were sitting ducks, but now we don't even have that chance."
Seeing Root's disbelief, she told the story of Amazing Amy, saying, "I could let you try before, but now, with a hacker prodigy as talented as you, I can't bear to lose you."
"Can't we even send an assassin?"
Root frowned.
"No,"
the oil painting beauty shook her head.
"Why?"
Root laughed. "Are you afraid your sister will be heartbroken? That's even better. A heartbroken sister will definitely come looking for you, turning the tables."
"I don't want my sister to be heartbroken,"
the oil painting beauty laughed. "But that's not why I'm not trying to kill him anymore. Do you know what other reason there is?"
Seeing Root looking at her curiously, the oil painting beauty smiled playfully. "There's another important reason: he's my blind date, and we're about to have our second date. So I won't send any more assassins to kill him, and I won't even allow anyone else to kill him. Do you understand?"
"..."
Root was completely dumbfounded.
Blind date?
What the hell?
And about to have our second date?
Don't underestimate her because she's young and sheltered. She's a precocious girl with a high IQ, and she's been immersed in the online world for a long time, making her far more mature than her peers.
She clearly knows what the first, second, and third dates in American dating culture represent.
But isn't this man named Chuck Wolfe the oil painting beauty's sister's lover?
(End of Chapter)
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