A Guide for Background Characters to Survive in a Manga - Chapter 321 : Chapter 321

Translator: AkazaTL

Proofreader/Editor: JWyck

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Chapter 321

With only a camera in hand, to collect the maximum amount of evidence, he had to appear at key moments. Following the main character group was undoubtedly a good method, but what he needed to do was create his own plot, not follow someone else’s.

Besides, if he just followed the main character group and appeared at the end as usual, what method could he use to showcase his newly designed ability? This ability could only be demonstrated when a battle broke out.

Walking out of the room, the ground had changed drastically compared to just a moment ago. Several small teams were patrolling the surroundings with flashlights, clearly searching for something.

Among them, the most eye-catching was probably Li Shu. He was wearing a set of black silk pajamas that looked to be of high quality, standing in the middle of an open area with a cold expression, directing the patrol team’s search. Clothes make the man, just as a saddle fits a horse. At this moment, he somewhat had the air of a noble young master like Si Zhaohua.

“Lord Li Shu, the Family Head hopes you can resolve the trouble as soon as possible and not disturb everyone’s rest,” a subordinate dressed more lavishly than the other patrol members said in a respectful tone, though the content of his words held little respect.

Li Shu seemed completely oblivious to the disrespect beneath his subordinate’s respectful facade, smiling as gently as a good student, “Is that so? I understand.”

Su Bei stood at the side and could see Li Shu’s eyes faintly glimmering. Immediately after, the light in that subordinate’s eyes disappeared, and he lifted his foot and walked straight toward the edge of the small island.

Because the scene was chaotic, most people didn’t notice his abnormality at first. A few people noticed, but since they weren’t sure what was happening, they didn’t stop him either. It wasn’t until the subordinate fell into the lake with a “plop” that everyone looked over in shock.

While the others were rescuing the man, another subordinate who had been paying attention and witnessed the entire process cautiously asked this boy with a seemingly moody temper, “Lord Li Shu, what was that?”

Li Shu revealed his usual gentle smile, “That person was so careless, how did he fall into the river? Don’t you think so?”

Looking at those smile-less eyes, the subordinate only felt a strong threat. He immediately broke out in a cold sweat and replied with repeated agreement, “…Yes, yes, so careless!”

“Xiao Shu has really changed a lot. How can you treat a subordinate like this?” A man in a suit walked over and said to Li Shu with a smile in his voice. However, his eyes held no smile either. On this point, the two were surprisingly similar.

The invisible Su Bei raised an eyebrow, guessing the relationship between these two. Judging by age, it shouldn’t be his father, so it must be his older brother.

Sure enough, a hint of annoyance appeared in Li Shu’s eyes, “No matter how little Father favors me, my status on the island isn’t something a mere subordinate can question, right? Big brother.”

“I didn’t stop you from punishing him, did I?” ‘Big brother’ still maintained that sanctimonious appearance. “I was just wondering, are you not worried about Father’s displeasure now?”

“Hasn’t Father always disliked me? Since he dislikes me anyway, it doesn’t matter if I’m a bit more excessive, right?” Li Shu lowered his eyes and laughed neurotically.

‘Big brother’ gave him a deep look and changed the subject, “Do you know who the intruders are this time?”

Without hiding anything, Li Shu nodded magnanimously, “It should be that group of idiot classmates of mine.”

This kind of thing couldn’t be hidden. The island was invaded as soon as he returned; it didn’t take a genius to know it was related to him. Plus, the intruders didn’t seem to have any intention of causing destruction or stealing things. With a little thought, Li Shu guessed who had come.

This answer made Big brother’s expression tighten, “What do you mean? You’ve attracted the attention of your school?”

But Li Shu didn’t seem nervous at all, just shaking his head impatiently, “No, they probably just came to check on me because I suddenly dropped out.”

‘Big brother’ didn’t quite believe this answer, looking at him suspiciously, “Then why not ask you directly, or pay a formal visit, instead of using such a sneaky method? Xiao Shu, you’re not deliberately hiding a mistake, are you? Or perhaps you’ve developed feelings for those idiot classmates of yours?”

“Heh, I’ve already blocked them all. Can they still use the two methods you mentioned?” Li Shu sneered, then feigned obedience, “Big brother, if you suspect me, you can have Father come and judge me personally. As for these baseless suspicions of yours, I won’t waste my time answering them.”

This attitude reassured ‘Big brother’ somewhat. In fact, if the other party had explained nicely, it would have only deepened his suspicion. “You…”

Just as he uttered a single word, someone suddenly shouted, “Over there!”

In an instant, everyone swarmed in the direction the person was pointing, striving to catch the intruder on the island. ‘Big brother’ also looked in that direction, “It seems the little mouse is about to be caught. For the sake of them being your classmates, perhaps we’ll grant them a chance to live.”

Li Shu’s hand, hanging by his side, clenched slightly. He said calmly, “They are the treasures of this year’s ‘Endless Ability Academy.’ If you have the guts to kill them, then I’ll admire you.”

“Xiao Shu is so cute, but unfortunately, your big brother doesn’t fall for reverse psychology.” Hearing his words, Big brother finally remembered that Li Shu was previously a student of Class S at the “Endless Ability Academy,” so his classmates were also from Class S.

Those were indeed not people they could kill easily. After all, the Li Family didn’t have the ability to leave no trace under a full-scale investigation by the “Endless Ability Academy.” His face darkened slightly. He could only hope that these uninvited students hadn’t discovered any secrets. Otherwise, even at the risk of offending the “Endless Ability Academy,” they would have to kill them. After all, the Li Family’s secret could not be leaked.

Watching them leave, Su Bei showed a thoughtful expression. It was clear that Li Shu was not favored by the Family Head in the Li Family, so others tended to look down on him. From Big brother’s words, it could be seen that the original Li Shu would have chosen to endure this situation for his father’s affection, but the current him would act without any scruples.

Although the explanation he gave was fine, Su Bei still saw the crux of the problem. With Li Shu’s paranoid personality of caring deeply for one person, for him to change his attitude towards the Li Family’s subordinates, besides a shift in mentality, a more important point was probably that he didn’t care as much about this so-called father anymore.

Because now there was another person he cared about. Perhaps Jiang Tianming’s importance to him was not yet comparable to his father’s, but he could certainly divert a portion of his attention. It was precisely because there was a substitute that Li Shu would no longer value his father’s thoughts as much.

However, this wasn’t useful information for Su Bei. He just analyzed it briefly before filtering out this piece of intelligence and focusing on more important matters.

Even if ‘Big brother’ hadn’t said it, Su Bei was very clear that the Li Family had an ulterior secret, so this also wasn’t the main point.

The real point was—the place ‘Big brother’ came out from.

It was obvious that Big brother’s status in the Li Family was quite high, and he was more favored by his father. Therefore, the place he lived would be closer to his father. Either he and the Family Head lived in the same villa, or it was the villa closest to it.

Su Bei’s goal was to find the Family Head. While Jiang Tianming and the others were attracting the enemy’s attention for the first two days, he would sneak into this person’s room to see if he could find anything useful.

After some thought, he maxed out his luck value. Taking advantage of the fact that their attention was diverted, Su Bei walked straight into the villa next to that one.

Although it was nighttime, the villa was brightly lit, possibly because of the trouble outside. Two pink-haired individuals who looked like maids stood guard in the first-floor hall, doing some cleaning on the side.

Seeing them, Su Bei suddenly realized that everyone on Li Family Island seemed to be a member of the Li Family. The signature pink hair was the best proof. Not counting the children, he had seen forty to fifty adults along the way, which was enough to show how large the Li Family was.

There was a problem. The number of rooms on the island was not enough.

Su Bei quickly realized the problem. The female doctor had said before that she had been giving birth continuously. It wasn’t just her; everyone in the Li Family, regardless of gender, was frantically having children, and each person had multiple babies per birth.

Under these circumstances, the number of children that could be born just from the adults he had seen would far exceed the island’s room capacity. Not to mention there must be many other adults on the island he hadn’t seen; the number of children would only be more, not less.

Even if all the children slept in extremely crowded dormitories, given the time the Li Family had been developing, the number of rooms was far from sufficient.

According to Qi Huang’s investigation, the Li Family had only started to rise with the current Family Head. Undoubtedly, the other party’s ability played a huge role. If he didn’t know there was something wrong with the other party, Su Bei would probably admire this self-made rich man.

Back to the main point, speculating from the number of beds, either not everyone in the Li Family needed to constantly have children, or the vast majority of the children born would not stay on the island, so not that many beds were needed. And if it was the latter, there were two possibilities for not staying on the island. One was death, the other was being given away.

While thinking, Su Bei walked into the villa and headed straight upstairs. He didn’t know if this was the villa where the Family Head was, nor which room was occupied. But since he had already set his luck to the maximum, he would just act on instinct.

Arriving at the innermost room on the third floor, he first used his Mental Energy to sense if there was anyone inside. After confirming it was empty, Su Bei pushed the door open. The first thing he saw was the family portrait on the bedside table.

There were only three people in the family portrait: a couple and the ‘Big brother’ he had just seen. Su Bei raised an eyebrow; it seemed he had come to the right place. Even if this wasn’t the Family Head’s room, it must be Big brother’s room.

Su Bei walked over and picked up the photo frame, carefully observing the three people inside. Among the three people in the photo, the only one he had seen was Big brother. The Big brother in the photo was much younger than he was now, looking to be only fourteen or fifteen. Thanks to him not having changed much since he was young, Su Bei was able to recognize him at first glance.

The other couple seemed to have a decent relationship, just an ordinary couple, looking to be in their thirties. However, what was more noteworthy was that if Su Bei remembered correctly, the Li Family had also risen at this time.

If his previous speculation was correct, and those people were able to have so many children because of the Family Head’s ability, then as their first child, and a child unrelated to the ability, it was reasonable that ‘Big brother’ was most favored by the Family Head.

After searching the various facilities in the room, Su Bei quickly confirmed the identity of the room’s owner. Different from what he had just thought, this was Big brother’s room. Big brother’s room certainly wouldn’t have as much information as the Family Head’s room, but its advantage was that it was definitely very safe.

After a simple search through the drawers and finding nothing useful, Su Bei decisively turned on the computer. Not everyone in this world sets a password for their computer, and it was the same in the manga world.

This lovely Big brother had not set any password. He hadn’t even turned off the computer before leaving the room. Su Bei easily opened the computer, skillfully clicked into the chat software that was still running, and checked the other party’s chat history.

This was clearly a work account, with many chat partners labeled as Client 1, Client 2, and so on, up to Client 73. But the chat histories had all been cleared, with only the one at the very top remaining. It was a conversation with Client 34, with only two sentences—”I’m coming today, are the goods ready? The people I brought have been ready for a long time, they can’t be delayed either.”

“Of course, we won’t disappoint you.”

Seeing this conversation, Su Bei immediately thought of the ship they encountered when they arrived. Although the scene was chaotic at the time, Su Bei still noticed a few people getting off the ship.

He couldn’t help it; that group of people were all dressed in black and were clearly deliberately hiding their appearance. It was hard for him not to pay attention to people who were obviously problematic at a glance.

However, since they entered the island, the transaction hadn’t started yet. What he needed to do was find the transacting parties. As long as he followed them, Su Bei would definitely see what they were trading.

Wait, there was an even more convenient method: guarding the operating room. According to what the two doctors said before, some pervert would watch the surgery from a luxurious sofa. Su Bei guessed the perverts here were these clients, and as for the people undergoing surgery, it should be those children, as expected.

At first, Su Bei suspected they were going to send the children away. After all, many slightly wealthy families didn’t want to have their own children, and children who could be adopted at birth were very popular. The physical examination was precisely to get the healthiest child.

This guess couldn’t be considered wrong; Su Bei estimated that a portion of the children were definitely sent away. But what about the rest? For one thing, there were many children on the Li Family Island who had already grown up.

These children certainly wouldn’t be adopted anymore. It was possible they were used for human trafficking, but if it was human trafficking, then such a detailed physical examination would be unnecessary. A simple health certificate would suffice, why list all the data so clearly?

Recalling that health certificate again, the data on it looked very normal, aside from being overly detailed. Since there was an abnormality, the problem must lie in that abnormality.

Thanks to his memory, Su Bei could clearly recall what items were on the list. Unlike a normal full-body check-up, this one had a lot more data about the heart, liver, spleen, stomach, and kidneys.

Although these were also relatively routine examination items, they were too extravagant for these consumables that the Li Family didn’t care about at all. It didn’t seem like a benevolent examination, but rather like it had another purpose.

Until he saw this chat content.

It was organ transplantation, Su Bei realized with a start.

That made sense. The Li Family was having so many children to serve as an organ reserve for those willing to pay. No matter what age group’s organs were needed, they could be found on Li Family Island.

The reason they had to undergo physical examinations every so often was also for this reason. The Li Family had to confirm their organ condition at all times to ensure that there would be no problems at critical moments.

No wonder the Li Family could get rich quickly; this kind of business was inherently a huge profit for a small investment. With the premise of being able to have many children at once, they only needed to pay low nurturing costs to sell the children for a high price.

Suitable organs were hard to find these days, but there were always many sick people. To allow the patients to live, there would certainly be people willing to spend a lot of money to contact the Li Family to buy organs.

Because the children themselves belonged to the Li Family, as long as the Li family members didn’t talk, and the transacting parties didn’t talk, this business could be hidden very well.

To expose them, two things were needed: one was a video of the surgery, and the other was the transaction ledger.

From the chat history, it could be seen that the buyer this time couldn’t wait long. Even though it was obvious someone had broken into Li Family Island, the other party would definitely perform the surgery today or tomorrow.

Since they came in the middle of the night, they certainly didn’t want others to know about this matter. In that case, the surgery would also be done at night, so he could get the recording soon.

As for the ledger, that thing might only be found in the Family Head’s room. As for where the Family Head’s room was, Su Bei estimated it was probably not in this villa.

If the other party had the ledger, then his room must be a top-secret of top-secrets. A place hiding such a secret couldn’t possibly be guarded by only a few people. Su Bei had used his Mental Energy to probe before entering this villa; there were no hidden guards here.

While walking out, he took out his phone to check the time. It was now 10pm, still plenty of time. He needed to go back to the operating room first and place the hidden camera in a good position.

Arriving at the operating room, Su Bei couldn’t help but sigh silently. He was a step too late. The operating room was no longer empty as before. Several Li family members were guarding it, debugging equipment, sterilizing supplies, setting up defensive measures…

In short, a large group of people were crowded here, making it impossible for him to install the hidden camera.

Right now, the best method was certainly for him to just hold the camera and record here. Anyway, with the Invisibility Charm, these people wouldn’t be able to discover him at all.

But the problem was that compared to the video, the ledger was definitely the more important thing. If he stayed here recording, he wouldn’t have time to get the ledger. Su Bei didn’t know much about organ transplant surgery, but he imagined it wouldn’t end quickly.

Moreover, there was no guarantee that the main character group wouldn’t cause trouble in the middle of it. After all, the main character group was all here; it was impossible for them to let such an evil surgery proceed smoothly. If he stayed here the whole time, his path would overlap with the main character group’s.

After thinking about it, Su Bei still walked into the operating room thanks to them not closing the door, otherwise it would have been very troublesome for him to get in. Speaking of which, he seemed to often get trapped by doors when he was invisible. Once they closed the door, if he didn’t want to attract others’ attention, it would be very difficult to open it.

Maybe I should get an item that can pass through walls? Su Bei mused thoughtfully.

He had been to the operating room before and was very familiar with its layout. He had also already considered where to place the camera on his way here. So, as soon as he entered, he walked straight to the wall opposite the main door, stuck an Invisibility Charm on the micro-camera, and then placed it on the flower vase on the windowsill.

This position was blocked by leaves, and ordinary people wouldn’t be idle enough to reach out and touch it. Of course, if he was really that unlucky and the camera was discovered in the end, then there was nothing he could do.

Again, the ledger was the top priority. The recording was just the icing on the cake; he had to make a choice.

However, despite saying so, Su Bei still adjusted the camera’s luck. A lucky camera should mean it won’t be discovered, right? After all, once discovered, it would likely be destroyed.

He had done what he needed to do. Su Bei didn’t delay any longer and turned to leave the operating room. He had to hurry and find the ledger, otherwise, once the Family Head realized they were exploring the Li Family’s secret, he would likely hide the all-important ledger in a different place, and it would be difficult to find it then.

Returning to the ground level, there was another burst of fighting sounds, followed by a sky-high blaze. Qi Huang sat on the Flame Phoenix, spreading its wings, and flew high in the air. Mu Tieren sat in front of her like a dependent bird, strafing the people below with a machine gun.

The machine gun in his hand was a special version that wouldn’t kill people; it was only loaded with tranquilizers. Li Shu was talking to them from below, “I don’t think Teacher Meng agreed to you all coming, right? I’ve already called the teacher. I advise you to surrender immediately, otherwise, you’ll be in trouble when the teacher arrives.”

It was a very threatening statement, seemingly to stop the Class S members from continuing to investigate the secrets of Li Family Island. But Su Bei heard something amiss.

No matter what, Li Shu shouldn’t be tricking everyone to come down, right?

First, it was certain that he had not become a villain. Playing the same trick too many times would be boring; the main character group couldn’t always encounter bad guys. And from Li Shu’s previous reaction, it could be seen that he no longer admired his father that much and cared a little for Jiang Tianming, so he probably wouldn’t betray them.

Thinking of the worst-case scenario, even if he only wanted to save Jiang Tianming’s life, he wouldn’t ask Qi Huang and the others to come down at this time. The Li Family definitely had methods to interrogate prisoners. Once Qi Huang and Mu Tieren were caught, it would be difficult for Jiang Tianming and the other two to hide, and they might even reveal themselves to save them.

With this realization, it could be analyzed that he wouldn’t call them down for any reason. Qi Huang, flying in the sky right now, even if not invincible, could hold on for a while. The Li Family didn’t seem to have any flying ability users and couldn’t do anything to them for the time being.

But once they came down, they would be fish on a chopping block, at the mercy of others.

The Li Family’s attitude towards Qi Huang and the others was that if they didn’t know the Li Family’s secret, they might be spared. But if they knew, they would undoubtedly die. Li Shu, uncertain whether Qi Huang and the others had discovered anything, couldn’t possibly ask them to come down.

Conversely, it could be inferred that even if Qi Huang and Mu Tieren came down, he should have a way to ensure their safety.

And his guarantee could only be—Teacher Meng Huai!