What It's Like Being a Vampire

Chapter 191: How Could it be You?

The application scenario that occurred to Xiang Kun was that if a gang leader brought a bunch of henchmen to attack him, he would use “Mental Deterrence” on the gang leader, causing him to fall into a suppressed, rigid state, while the other henchmen would be affected by “Emotional Assimilation”. As a result, they would beat up their own leader…

But right now, with such good social order and him being not a troublemaker, this scenario is basically impossible to encounter. It is still best suited for the use in warfare during the cold weapon era.

However, after some careful consideration, Xiang Kun thought that his assessment might be wrong.

At the very beginning, he noticed one of the key differences between “Mental Deterrence” and “Emotional Assimilation” was that the former focused on the target, while the latter focused entirely on his own emotions. Because of this, he thought that the two abilities couldn’t be used at the same time.

But after experiencing “Emotional Assimilation” on the express train targeting a seat occupier, and on the subway towards bickering passengers, he began to think that the two abilities might be able to work together under certain circumstances.

However, upon further consideration, even though the target of his “Emotional Assimilation” on the train was the seat occupier, he did not directly affect him. The latter was completely unaware of Xiang Kun’s anger. In the subway carriage earlier, he was still merely observing the arguing passengers from a distance, imagining their arguments as comedy. Even though these two people were the target of his emotions, they were not aware of it, and that made a fundamental difference from “Mental Deterrence”.

If the seat occupier and the arguing passengers were directly affected or deterred by Xiang Kun’s emotions, it’s very likely that “Emotional Assimilation” would not occur, and it would directly become “Mental Deterrence”.

Actually, both abilities have a range of influence. “Mental Deterrence” makes the target bear his emotions, and then mildly affects creatures of the same species as the target, making them have the same feelings as the target; “Emotional Assimilation” directly affects humans around him, making them feel the same way as Xiang Kun.

So fundamentally, the “data type” interpreted by the surrounding people through these two abilities are different.

Based on this, simultaneous use doesn’t seem as simple as it seemed.

Xiang Kun’s current exploration, research and training of his abilities are mainly oriented towards the brain, consciousness, mental, emotional, and cognitive related aspects, because he believes that this direction is the true path to mastering his mutation and finding the cause of his mutation.

When he returned home, it was almost seven in the evening. On his way home, Xiang Kun received a voice message over WeChat from “Xiao Pingguo” mentioning that she had a dream the night before where the minions were doing stand-up comedy.

She hadn’t had a dream in a very long time, and even when she used to dream occasionally, the dreams were just simple things like sounds or falling sensations, and she would forget them all once she woke up.

For the first time, like last night, she heard a stand-up performance in her dream, laughed so hard she couldn’t take it, and could still remember the content of the dream roughly after waking up.

Xiang Kun could hear from Xiao Pingguo’s voice that she was truly very happy and excited. It seems that the dream she had last night had obviously had a positive effect on her mood.

In that case, he could occasionally use the minion to influence Xiao Pingguo’s emotions in the future, allowing her to dream, and then during her dreams, experience those ways of understanding that are completely different from ordinary people in her dreamland, and “learn” those methods.

Today, after waking up, Xiang Kun found that he is still able to perceive things in the unique way he discovered in Xiao Pingguo’s dreams when he looked at the minion wood carvings or searched for the call of the “gold flash” in his memory. But when he listened to the calls of other birds or looked at other items, it’s hard for him to sense that way of understanding things anymore, as if there are some movements he knows how to do, but just can’t do it.

Xiang Kun believes that’s because Xiao Pingguo has touched and sensed the minion wood carving in detail and has heard the call of the “gold flash”, while

he, in essence, is still relying on Xiao Pingguo’s thought process to establish this unique perspective of understanding things.

So when he encounters something that Xiao Pingguo has not sensed before, he simply couldn’t use her way of understanding things to establish his understanding.

After returning home, he checked QQagain and saw the message from his old forum buddy.

Before he left this morning, Xiang Kun had left a message for him on QQ saying he didn’t see his message before. He also mentioned that he wouldn’t be making plans to meet in Pengcheng, and there was no chance he would go to Pengcheng to lead a team or participate in a project for them. At most, he would accept outsourced assignments, but whether he would accept or not depends on their demands.

Actually, this was a very polite refusal. Xiang Kun believed that his old forum buddy with his wealth of experience would understand.

And indeed, not long after he sent out the message and just as he got on the subway, he received a reply from his old forum buddy. He said he’d communicate with the other party and they’d look for opportunities to work together in the future, perhaps on other outsourced projects.

But to his surprise, his old forum buddy was now saying on QQthat the technology director who had always wanted to meet Xiang Kun was currently on a business trip in the city where Xiang Kun was, asking if Xiang Kun could meet him for a chat?

Xiang Kun was slightly taken aback. The guy couldn’t have just come to this city specifically for him, could he?

Although Xiang Kun and his old forum buddy used QQfor communication and directly called each other by their old forum IDs, after their last collaboration, they both know each other’s real-world identities including their real names and the companies they used to work for.

After all, their collaboration was entirely legal and it’s not like they were involved in anything clandestine.

Therefore, it was perfectly normal for the people on the financier’s side to know which city he was in.

“I don’t think he specifically came over here, especially since there was no prior contact. I heard him say that it seems he is on a business trip with his boss. His boss had a whim about starting another project so he came along to provide technical support. Oh, and his current boss is not the same financier that funded us. He parachuted in and took that financier’s place.”

From the way the old guy talked, it seemed that he regretted losing this former financier with whom they seemed to have had quite a successful cooperation.

Xiang Kun pondered for a while. Since the other party had already come to this city, it wouldn’t hurt to meet. Although the chance of a successful cooperation was low, because the other side had made the effort to come, he had no reason to refuse a meeting.

Besides, he was slightly curious about why the other party had such trust in him, continuously reaching out for collaboration. He didn’t believe it was simply because of the codes he had written for their last outsourced project, as if his codes had the ability for “Emotional Assimilation” – which was evidently impossible.

Therefore, Xiang Kun agreed to let the old companion give his WeChat handle to the director so that the latter could contact him.

A few minutes later, Xiang Kun received a friend request, and immediately after his acceptance, the other party sent him a message:

“Are you Brother Qiankun?”

“Yes, it’s me. Hello, Mr. Lin.” Xiang Kun responded.

The other party called him by his online nickname in the forum, likely because when the old friend had mentioned him to the other party, he mainly used his online handle. Of course, Xiang Kun’s current online nickname was no longer the somewhat juvenile “Emperor Qiankun” , but rather “Reverse Qiankun” , which he had chosen for various technical forums after starting his professional career.

After exchanging a few pleasantries and self-introductions, Director Lin went straight to the point and asked, “Have you had dinner, Mr. Xiang? Would you like to have some more?

“No, thank you, I just ate. Can we talk later if you are still having dinner?”

Director Lin then arranged to meet with Xiang Kun at half past eight that evening, with the meeting place being a coffee shop in a five-star hotel.

Xiang Kun looked at the time, calculated the potential travel duration, and set off right then.

On the subway, Xiang Kun looked up the company of Director Lin based on his self-introduction, investigated the possible identities of the “financier”, “boss” behind him and the direction they might want to develop, based on his initial self-investigation. While he felt that a cooperation was unlikely, he was used to conducting this kind of preliminary research before any meetings.

Xiang Kun arrived at the hotel’s coffee shop at 8:13. After giving Director Lin’s name, the waiter told him Mr. Lin and others were waiting in a private room.

Now every time he goes into an area, Xiang Kun’s first reaction is always to scan the place quickly with infrared imaging vision. This way he can detect the presence of mutants like himself, while also collecting various kinds of information through his hearing and sense of smell.

While following the waiter towards the private room, Xiang Kun had already confirmed there were three people inside, one man and two women.

But standing at the entrance to the private room, Xiang Kun detected a familiar scent from one of the women inside who he believed he had met before.

By the time the waiter knocked on the door, Xiang Kun had already matched the smell with the person in his memory – it was one of two girls he and Zi Cheng had flirted with at the bar on the night of September 9th.

One of the girls, Yang Jie, was a graduate student studying at a nearby university. Xiang Kun and Chang Bin had accidentally run into her and her brother again at the same bar while on an outing. The other girl was Zhang Qian, who had returned from studying in the United Kingdom.

The woman in the private room was Zhang Qian.

After hearing a man’s voice inviting them in, evidently from Director Lin, the private room door opened. Inside sat a man in his forty’s, bespectacled and wearing a shirt, along with two women dressed in dark suits. The older of the two had a somewhat sterner face, and looked like an assistant or secretary. The other one was a young beauty with a bob and healthy complexion – this was Zhang Qian whom Xiang Kun and Zi Cheng had met on the night of September 9th at the bar but didn’t manage to exchange any contact information with.

Back then, Zhang Qian had dressed quite casually, like a girl who exercises regularly. Now, she cut a professional figure in a business suit and earrings, instantly emitting a strong, executive aura.

Standing up and ready to meet Director Lin, Zhang Qian was taken aback when she saw Xiang Kun entering the room with the waiter. Unconsciously she blurted out “It’s you?”

Normally, Xiang Kun was supposed to react to her surprise, mirroring her shock, and reply, “How come it’s you?”

However, as he had no expectations for this meeting, he deemed it unnecessary to put up an act and instead nodded and said with a smile, “Yes, it’s me actually..”