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Chapter 256: Unable to Get into the Secret Room

The Heaven Execution Training Camp had full amenities, with reserves of any technologically advanced equipment anyone could find in the Alliance. These pieces of equipment would usually be stored in a storage warehouse, where cadets and instructors alike could borrow them using their ID cards.

Of course, borrowing equipment from the training camp required an appropriate payment, the more expensive the equipment was and the longer it was to be used for, the higher its cost would be. Xia Fei had not stayed in the training camp for the last half of the year, so in accordance to the rules that internal division cadets could earn ten points a day to be used for procuring the equipment and medicinal ingredients they needed, he had more or less two thousand points saved in his card. He first went to the storage warehouse to borrow a YS-8 depth scanner before proceeding to the medicinal dispensary.

He handed his card to the quartermaster, and the bestacled young man inserted it into a data reader. Glanced at the screen, he addressed Xia Fei, “You have a total of 1705 points. Because you’re a cadet from the internal division, you get to enjoy a five percent discount on all your purchases. May I ask what ingredients do you need today?”

Xia Fei nodded and scrolled through the screen with his finger for some time before replying, “A thousand White Dews and Snake Eye Berries.”

“The Snake Eye Berries are priced at 0.5 points, while White Dews cost 0.2 points. This will come up to a total of seven hundred points, leaving you with 1050 points,” the staff rattled off with ease.

These were two ingredients that Xia Fei used most daily. Not only were they able to reinvigorate his physical strength, they even had certain detoxification and perking effects. Since there was no reason for him to leave any of his points unused, Xia Fei figured that he might as well exchange them for the ingredients that he needed.

“Get ten bottles of Scarlet Flower Essence as well. This sort of ointment is most effective in healing superficial wounds. If you find yourself accidentally getting cut, applying it over the wound directly will staunch the blood, and its effect works very well in conjunction with Snake Eye Berries,” Phantom advised from the sidelines.

The Scarlet Flower Essence cost 10 points each, and getting a bunch of it left Xia Fei with nine hundred points. That was more or less the common medical ingredients he would expect to use; unfortunately, he did not find any ingredients that he could use to rank up in the medicinal dispensary, and even if they existed, nine hundred points was hardly enough to acquire them.

Xia Fei and Phantom had a short discussion and ended up using their remaining points to exchange for ten Yufeng Pills. This was a pill that would form an invisible protective film around the body of the user upon administration, not only able to defend the person from attacks but also capable of reducing the effect of resistance on speed ability users. Normally, a speed ability user could double their speed for an hour after taking one of such pills, making it the best drug for speed ability users that was hard to come by.

Because Xia Fei had his five percent discount for being an internal division cadet, this pill only cost him eighty points each, far cheaper than him acquiring the ingredients for it, as well as the time and effort he needed to put into making them, which was why Xia Fei had directly used his points to exchange for ten of them.

Xia Fei used the remaining 105 points in his possession on a set of electronic tools from Shimacorp. The greatest unique characteristic was its use for fine repair, known to be a set of professional repair tools for microelectronic devices. They were a lot more sophisticated than the Probability Company’s general-purpose toolkit that Xia Fei was presently using, making it more suitable for dismantling the nether bell.

After retrieving all that he could redeem and fitting them into his spatial ring, Xia Fei carried the YS-8 depth scanner toward the library.

Having no one to tidy up the place over the last few months, the interior had become covered in a layer of dust. Old man Qin Mang was a very traditional man, and he was not used to using the automatic electrostatic dust removal appliance, completely relying on manual labor to keep the place clean and neat. Thus, it came as to no one’s surprise that the place had devolved into something beyond recognition now that no one was taking care of it.

With how desolate the library had become, Xia Fei could really not stand it.

Xia Fei was quick, so he breezed through the interior and exterior of the library like a bolt of lightning. In around thirty minutes, the entire library had been restored to its past cleanliness. Xia Fei tossed the rag into the washroom and washed his face before going down into the basement.

The depth scanner was like a video camera, supported on a tripod as it used its detection laser to scan and analyze the surroundings.

Xia Fei had the scanner adjusted to the maximum. Because he was trying to check if a secret room existed in the basement, he did not require too high of a precision. It was fine as long as it was at a medium level, limiting the detection range to within one kilometer.

With such a setting, the machine would be able to devote all its power toward a deep scan of the surroundings, not wasting any time with getting bogged down by tedious details.

With a light tap of his finger on the machine, countless red lasers shot forth like innumerable probing dots, forming a composite image when all the dots were linked together.

The depth scanner needed some time to do its work, so Xia Fei carried a chair and sat by the corridor as he read a book. After about a dozen or so minutes passed, the depth scanner completed its third composite image sweep and emitted out a low *beep* before turning itself off.

Xia Fei got up and made his way to the machine, tapping on the display screen to see the results.

All he saw was the entire library depicted, be it the bookshelves of every size or the insect on the wall. Everything was laid out in plain sight, even its foundation.

Xia Fei knitted his eyebrows together. According to the image shown, there was no secret room to speak of aside from the utility room and that room where the Introduction to Robot Coding tome was placed.

It should be stated that this was the most powerful depth scanner in the training camp, able to even do a complete sweep of the entire planet if tasked. A higher-powered scanner at the galactic level would be huge, not even possible to be carried down into the basement; needless to say, there was no need to mention the omni-directional array.

“Could it be not powerful enough?” Phantom asked.

“Maybe. This is already the most powerful portable scanner, though. I can’t possibly go and commandeer an exploration spacecraft to do the scan, can I? That’ll be far too ridiculous.” Xia Fei scoffed.

Phantom pursed his lips, not saying a word.

There were obviously two possibilities: One, there was really a secret room in this basement, but it was shielded with a composite that insulated it from appearing on a scanner, so there was no way for Xia Fei to find out through the portable scanner.

Two, there was actually no so-called secret room. Judging from how the corridor was distributed however, this possibility was not large, unless the designer had gone insane while doing his job and insisted on extending a big portion of the corridor for nothing.

There was nothing Xia Fei could do right now. He could not go find a sledgehammer and just begin breaking his way through the walls, could he? Old man Qin Mang would most definitely get very mad if he learned what Xia Fei had done to his beloved library. What he would be doing would simply be a huge sin in his eyes.

Collecting the YS-8 scanner, Xia Fei dialed Qin Mang’s number.

“Old man, just what is the thing you want me to help get? I’m already at the library,” Xia Fei said.

Qin Mang was basking lazily by the sea at this moment, with two pretty ladies helping him massage his feet. It was a very luxuriant and enviable scene behold.

Nodding, the old man asked, “No one has been taking care of the library during this time; it ought to be in quite a mess, right?”

Xia Fei replied, “Yes, it’s in quite a bad state, but I just finished cleaning up the place.”

Qin Mang nodded. “That’s great. How is Old Black? Did you go see him?”

Xia Fei reported, “I was just planning to. I have his favorite five-spiced peanuts ready.”

All of a sudden, the expression on Qin Mang’s face turned a bit strange as he pointed his finger onto the screen, right at Xia Fei’s head. “Did you do something you shouldn’t have while I was away?”

Xia Fei could feel his heart sinking, wondering to himself, ‘Could it be that Qin Mang discovered me scanning the basement? That’s impossible. I’ve been working here in the library for so long, and I know every part of the place like the back of my hand. The library is structured quite primitively, and there’s no monitoring system installed anywhere.”

Xia Fei smiled faintly. “Old man, what are you saying? I don’t know what you’re trying to get at.”

Qin Mang’s gaze suddenly turned sharp, his aura suddenly changing. The two ladies beside him skittered away as he berated in a severe tone, “Xia Fei, oh Xia Fei, your cleverness will be the death of you one of these days. I learned a saying that suits you very well while I’m here on Earth: ‘Curiosity kills the cat.’”

Xia Fei abruptly froze. Needless to say, Qin Mang must have discovered his attempt to scan the basement, which was why he was so infuriated right now.

Qin Mang suddenly started laughing after that. “Actually, I didn’t send you to the library to help me retrieve anything and just wanted to see if you had discovered the secret in the basement and would take any action to solve the riddle.

“How long have you known?” Qin Mang asked.

“A long time,” Xia Fei honestly admitted.

“And you haven’t found any way to get in?”

“Nope.”

“That’s great,” Qin Mang happily said. “It’s great that you’d discovered its existence, but being unable to find it is very normal. If even someone like you could easily find the secret room I constructed, then my entire life would’ve been for naught. Don’t do it again. It’s good for you to have a healthy curiosity, but if you have too much of it, you just might be misled, instead.”

Xia Fei nodded. With how things had panned out, there was nothing else he could say. After all, this had all been the result of his actions.

“I know that you just wish to look and see just what is it, and it isn’t out of a deliberate attempt to steal anything. You’ve had that chance in the library before, yet you did no such thing, which is proof that you’re trustworthy, or else I wouldn’t have accepted you into the library.”

“I only wish to teach you a principle through this incident: There are some secrets that you should not get too near, otherwise you might get burnt. You already know about The Brotherhood, so if you wish to join the strongest organization within the Alliance and still live long after joining it, you’d best remember what I just said,” advised Qin Mang with severity. Xia Fei could tell that he was being sincere when telling this to him instead of reprimanding him for his actions.

Xia Fei furrowed his brows. It was not too hard for him to read into the meaning of Qin Mang’s words here. Superficially speaking, he was telling him that there indeed was a secret room in the basement, but it was not time for him to learn just what exactly was hidden inside it yet.

The deeper meaning behind this was Qin Mang’s intention to make Xia Fei join The Brotherhood. Xia Fei had always felt that Qin Mang seemed to be intentionally yet unintentionally providing pointers to aid him as if the latter was guiding him down a very foreign path. Hearing the old man’s words now only proved his speculation about this—that this was indeed what Qin Mang was thinking and subsequently doing.

Turning off the screen, Xia Fei muttered to himself, ‘The Brotherhood? Why does Qin Mang wish for me to join it?’