Chapter 70: The Adventures of Xue Xiaohai p1
Zhou Siyan was almost light-headed. He walked a circle in the corridor but could not see Xue Xiaohai or the cardboard box.
He held onto a glimmer of hope. Maybe Feng Qizhou or Meng Wu had passed by and taken the child.
His fingertips trembling, he unfolded the screen of his Cloud Sound Box and pulled Meng Wu into their family group chat.
Then he sent a message: @Feng Qizhou @Meng Wu, have you seen my child?
Both of them replied quickly.
Meng Wu: No.
Feng Qizhou: No. I was just about to remind you to hide your big fatty better. A lot of investigation soldiers are saying they’re looking for Abominations, but I don’t know what they’re really looking for.
Zhou Siyan had no time to reply to them.
He quickly returned to his office, pulled up the surveillance footage of the corridor, and saw that after Xue Xiaohai had slipped out with the cardboard box, she had climbed into a nearby trash can with the box. Then, the trash can was pushed away by a cleaner.
He kept zooming in on the screen, taking a screenshot of the number K188 on the trash can and the cleaner’s face.
He sent the picture to the group chat, took a deep breath, and briefly explained the situation.
He then said, @Meng Wu, help me find the child. @Feng Qizhou, you hide Xiaobei and Xiaonan.
Meng Wu: Okay.
Feng Qizhou: No problem on my end. I’ll hide the children in the operating room. The investigation soldiers can’t get in.
Zhou Siyan left the office again, locked the door, and hung up a [On Leave] sign.
He used the account of his Cloud Sound Box to connect to the surveillance cloud and kept tracking the cleaner, all the way to the garbage disposal area on the 12th floor of the building.
He saw from the video that the cleaner had left the trash can there and left.
Zhou Siyan successfully found the trash can with the number K188, opened the lid to search, but did not find the child or the cardboard box.
He continued to check the surveillance, fast-forwarding the video.
About fifteen minutes after the cleaner had left the trash can, Xue Xiaohai had climbed out of the trash can by herself. The trash can was too tall for her, and she couldn’t get down from the rim.
Her little seahorse was hanging on the rim of the can. Xue Xiaohai climbed down the trash can by holding onto the little seahorse’s tail and even brought the cardboard box down with her.
She put the cardboard box on her head as a cover and left through another passage with the little seahorse in her arms, disappearing from the surveillance footage.
After that was a surveillance blind spot, and Zhou Siyan could no longer find her.
Meng Wu also came down at this time and asked, “How is it?”
Zhou Siyan showed him the last surveillance footage of Xue Xiaohai.
The two of them went to look in the direction where Xue Xiaohai had left.
As they walked, Meng Wu said, “The footage is so clear. The investigation department probably saw it too. I’m afraid this matter can’t be hidden anymore.”
Zhou Siyan: “If it can’t be hidden, I’ll take the child and leave the White Tower. The most important thing now is to find her first.”
The two of them kept checking the surveillance and searching in every corner.
In the end, Zhou Siyan was so anxious that he didn’t even pretend anymore and shouted loudly, “Xiaohai! Xue Xiaohai! If you hear me, answer me!”
They searched all morning but couldn’t find her.
Zhou Siyan’s face was pale, and cold sweat kept breaking out. He was trembling as he walked.
He had never been so panicked. Xue Xiaohai was his child, the child he had carried for two years, the gift that Xue Yu had planted in his body.
Such a small and soft life, growing little by little in his belly, moving in his belly, talking in his belly.
At first, Xue Yu had called her a half-breed, then a little thing, then a baby. Finally, this child had a nickname, Xue Xiaohai, and later a proper name, Xue Lanshan.
Each change in her name was the growth of him, Xue Yu, and the child.
He remembered the cry when the child came out of his belly in the South Continent, her bright eyes when she first drank milk, and her mischievousness when she stayed up all night playing.
Every time Xue Yu went out to sea, she would be gone for a long time. He would always hold the child and stand by the floor-to-ceiling window, looking south. Xue Xiaohai would also stare into the distance with him, waiting for her mother to come back.
He couldn’t imagine how he would accept it if something happened to Xue Xiaohai, how he would face Xue Yu.
He summoned Heimei and had it track the child by smell.
He and Meng Wu followed Heimei’s scent all the way, through the corridor of the garbage disposal area, to the elevator, and then out of the Manster Building, to the artificial scenic pool in front.
Heimei stood in front of the pool and sniffed, telling Zhou Siyan that it could no longer smell Xue Xiaohai.
This artificial scenic pool was very deep, about twenty meters, and was connected to the naval combat team’s training ocean pool by a sewer.
Zhou Siyan and Meng Wu jumped into the pool together, searched the entire pool, and then swam through the sewer to the naval combat team’s training ocean pool.
From the artificial scenic pool to the training ocean pool, Zhou Siyan had held his breath underwater for nearly forty minutes.
He was a land-type spirit body, and holding his breath underwater was entirely supported by his physical fitness. Forty minutes was already his limit. When he reached the ocean pool, he had to surface for air.
Meng Wu also came out of the water and said, “Xiaohai’s spirit body is also water-type. She can naturally breathe in the water. Don’t be too nervous. Go ashore and wait. I’ll look for her.”
With that, Meng Wu swam towards the deep water area.
Zhou Siyan took a breath, held his breath, and went back into the water.
The two of them had searched almost the entire training pool. Meng Wu had also pulled up the sky-eye scan data of the ocean pool, but they had not detected any living creature of Xue Xiaohai’s size in the ocean pool.
It was not until four in the afternoon that they still hadn’t found Xue Xiaohai.
Xue Xiaohai’s existence was also completely exposed. The investigation department had seen the surveillance footage of Xue Xiaohai climbing out of the trash can and had immediately taken a screenshot and issued a notice, asking everyone to search together.
One after another, news and wanted posters were issued.
[Today, a child appeared in the White Tower’s Manster Building, which is shocking. All major departments are doing their best to search for this child. Anyone with clues should actively report them. There is a reward for reporting.]
Under this news, there were several pictures of Xue Xiaohai from the surveillance footage.
There were pictures of her climbing out of the trash can, entering the elevator with a cardboard box on her head, and climbing into the artificial scenic pool.
Her face was not very clear. Xue Xiaohai had been holding a cardboard box on her head and would only occasionally stick her head out to look at the road.
She had been in the safe for too long and mistakenly thought that as long as she covered herself with a box, no one would see her.
The moment he saw the news, Zhou Siyan was actually not so nervous anymore.
The system of the White Tower was strict and deformed, and the people of the White Tower collectively disliked children. But the White Tower as a whole had almost no criminal elements. At least, there would be no evil acts of child abuse and child murder.
When the soldiers of the White Tower encountered stray children outside the safe zone on their field missions, they would not like them on the surface, but they would not harm them. Instead, they would directly send them to the orphanages of other safe zones.
Now that the child’s wanted poster was out and everyone was helping to search, this would help to find the child quickly.
Zhou Siyan had made a plan. Since it had come to this, when the investigation department found Xue Xiaohai, he would come out to claim her and then completely leave the White Tower with the child.
Until now, Xue Yu and Mo Li had not sent any messages in the group chat.
Zhou Siyan tried to contact the two of them, wanting Xue Yu to come back and find the child.
Xue Yu and the child had a certain degree of telepathic connection and could sense the child’s location.
Even if she couldn’t sense the specific location, she could see the child’s activities in the reproduction tree, how many meters she had crawled, how much taller she had grown, and how much weight she had gained.
At least, Xue Yu could clearly know if the child was still alive.
Zhou Siyan had tried to contact them all, but all the communication tools showed that they could not be reached.
The two of them were probably in a contaminated zone, which had caused the signal to be interrupted. This was a common situation for snipers. Every time Mo Li went out on a mission, he would basically be out of contact.
Now, all the attention of the investigation department was on searching for Xue Xiaohai, which had relieved a lot of pressure on Feng Qizhou.
He put his two children in a large medical kit and brought them to find Zhou Siyan.
“Haven’t you found her yet? Not a single clue?” Feng Qizhou asked.
Zhou Siyan was silent.
Meng Wu said, “We’ve looked at a lot of surveillance. The child climbed into the scenic pool outside the Manster building and then disappeared.”
Feng Qizhou took his two children out of the medical kit, one in each arm.
He really wanted to scold Zhou Siyan: Your wife is out working hard to earn money, and you can’t even take good care of a child at home. I’ve never lost two, and you’ve managed to do this with just one!
The words were on the tip of his tongue, but when he saw Zhou Siyan’s bloodless face, he could only swallow them back.
He said softly, “Now that the wanted poster is out, she should be found soon. And the big fatty still has her spirit body. That little seahorse will also protect her. Don’t be too anxious.”
Zhou Siyan nodded slightly.
Xiaobei and Xiaonan’s heads turned at the same frequency. They were very curious. Where was Xue Xiaohai playing hide-and-seek again?
Xue Xiaonan grabbed her father’s face. “Hai.”
They now spoke in the same way as Xue Xiaohai had before, one word at a time, using the word “hai” to represent Xue Xiaohai.
Feng Qizhou kissed them. “Big fatty Hai has gone out to play. This glutton is so naughty. It’s fine. She’ll come back to eat when she’s hungry.”
Hearing this, Zhou Siyan felt even worse.
Xue Xiaohai was a child who would get hungry if she missed a meal. It had been a whole day. She must be starving.
Meng Wu stood in front of Feng Qizhou and bent down to touch the two children’s hands. “They look so much like Xue Yu.”
Feng Qizhou was very proud. “Of course they do. The more a couple loves each other, the more the child will look like the mother.”
Meng Wu: “Actually, the one who looks the most like Xue Yu is Xue Xiaohai.”
Feng Qizhou had his own reasoning. “I had two at once, which means my sexual attraction to Xue Yu is twice that of others. This is scientifically proven.”
Zhou Siyan had been looking down at the screen from beginning to end, not missing any new clues about the child.
***