I Am Your Natural Enemy

Chapter 1229: Chapter 423: Requesting Access, Sealed Case (5k)

The interrogation room at the Scorching Sun Headquarters is actually seldom used. When it is, it’s mostly for interrogating living people. After all, both Professionals and Different Races can be quite dangerous, and the restrictive measures primarily focus on restricting their physical form, which makes it difficult to completely restrain them.

It’s even rarer for Ghosts to be brought to the headquarters for interrogation, because those who commit major offenses and qualify to be brought here have generally already been emptied with a clip on the spot, so there’s no need to bring them in.

But today, a few Ghosts are squatting in the interrogation room. The internal staff are even more nervous than these Ghosts. Inside the interrogation room, three cameras and four types of sensors are all on, and someone is constantly monitoring the cameras, with emergency devices at the ready.

Moreover, today’s emergency devices are all required to be turned off from automatic, and everyone who knows understands why this is done—to prevent the blame from being shifted to the machines.

Everyone involved knows that these Ghosts absolutely cannot have any incidents, at the very least not while in their hands.

The betrayal incident in Nanwu County, where there was collusion among the interrogated personnel, only just happened recently.

Besides a few who know the inside story, the rest of the Scorching Sun Department’s people only know that such an incident occurred, and that the consequences are severe.

And this is enough to make others double their caution.

Dawn breaks, the night shift people begin to clock off, and for the day shift, as long as there are no urgent tasks, those not on the front line, such as interrogation experts, are basically working.

Old Li is quite stubborn, sitting outside and passing the time by fiddling with his phone. As dawn arrives, a familiar internal staff member brings him buns and soy milk. He sits on a bench, nibbling on a bun and drinking soy milk, much like a family member of a patient who came to the Capital for treatment.

The General Director lives right at the headquarters, and when he spotted this scene from afar upon entering this level, he felt somewhat helpless, yet there was really nothing he could say.

He’s not saying he doesn’t trust the Scorching Sun Department, he’s just idle and can’t sleep. Who could say anything against that?

The General Director chose not to go over, just took a glance without a word. Trust is hard to build but easy to break.

The Scorching Sun Department people are spread all over the Divine Land—there are too many people. In such a situation, it’s absolutely impossible to guarantee that everyone in the department is without problems, nor can it be guaranteed that they won’t make mistakes in the future.

They can only enforce strict rules and take proactive measures on a daily basis.

This is also why, despite the shortage of manpower, the General Director has consistently been against rapid recruitment expansion.

Recruiting people is indeed not difficult.

But as everyone knows, a larger staff doesn’t necessarily equate to higher efficiency.

The challenge is controlling the surge in numbers and ensuring these people increase efficiency rather than reduce it.

Maintaining the basic quality of personnel, or even improving the original average level, rather than increasing the proportion and number of parasites.

These issues can’t be solved with a simple recruitment expansion; at least for now, maintaining a controlled annual increase is better than impulsive expansion.

Previously, Guanzhong commandery started recruiting Ghosts. Besides the unique circumstances there, recruiting Ghosts is already the best solution currently and a trend for the future. Another reason was to serve as a trial run.

The General Director enters his office, routinely pours a cup of tea to the side, and begins dealing with the day’s official business.

He didn’t involve himself or give any directives on last night’s matter. At least on the surface, he’s unaware of this incident. It’s not good to intervene in everything or to have a stance on every issue; sticking to the rules is enough.

In a typical process, Ghosts would certainly not be brought here, but a Ghost attacked Wen Yan along the Nether Path, just outside the suburbs of the Capital, which indeed falls under the jurisdiction of the Capital City’s Scorching Sun Department.

The General Director glances at the schedule and starts reviewing today’s documents when someone knocks on the door.

“Come in.”

The door is pushed open, and Wen Yan peeks his head in to take a look. Upon seeing the General Director, he grins.

“You didn’t sleep through the night and went out for a stroll, and now you’re up so early?”

“Young people have energy to spare and need less sleep.” Wen Yan enters, holding soy milk and buns: “You haven’t had breakfast yet, have you? I went to the cafeteria specially to get these. The buns there are really good, thin-skinned with abundant filling, and once steamed, the chives are so green and vibrant, just looking at them whets your appetite.”

“…” It’s rare for the General Director to feel so speechless. He starts to miss Cai Qidong. If Cai Qidong were still around, Wen Yan wouldn’t have run here.

“Have some first. I asked Big Secretary Brother; you haven’t eaten yet. When you don’t have outings or meetings, you prefer these vegetarian chive buns. Big Secretary Brother was woken in the middle of the night and is still busy, so I brought these for you.”

Wen Yan’s chatter came so fast that it sent all the words the General Director wanted to say back into his throat.

Seeing that Wen Yan was so at ease, he sat down, started munching on the buns, and drank the soy milk. Even made a slurping sound, as if it was a bit too hot.

The General Director, having no choice, stood up, came over to the small coffee table, and ate along with him. He indeed hadn’t had breakfast yet.

While eating a simple breakfast, Wen Yan recounted the events of last night.

“Last night, I initially went to meet an informant, who provided a lot of very valuable information.

Coincidentally, Old Li asked me for help, so I tried it out in passing.

Incidentally, I followed up a new lead and didn’t expect the opposing side to have targeted defenses.

Later, as I followed the lead further, I discovered that for the subsequent developments, I didn’t have access to the Scorching Sun Department’s records.”