Lu Mingfei: What? They're all real!

Chapter 132 The Dragon with a Green Head

Despite all the preparations, Lu Mingfei finally understood the meaning behind the sneer that Xia Mi had always worn on her face when he actually stood on the streets of Shinjuku.

Finding a specific person in Shinjuku, where over 3.6 million people pass through every day, is like finding a needle in a haystack. For Lu Mingfei, it might be easier to find a needle in a haystack, at least the tides obey his commands, but the crowds on the street do not.

His gaze swept over the people who resembled a flock of sheep, and he recalled the movie "Modern Times" that the literary society had seen before. Chen Wenwen pointed to a flock of sheep running and suddenly switched to a scene of a crowd of people. She elegantly described it as a great montage technique in human history, depicting the workers as powerless as a flock of sheep being driven away.

But Lu Mingfei just felt even more powerless looking at the flock of sheep.

He stood on tiptoe, trying to peer through the crowd, but forget about finding anyone; he couldn't even make out each person's face. The crowd was dense and chaotic, and this was just one intersection; Shinjuku Ward had at least a hundred or so such intersections…

At this rate, where is he going to find a girl?

Lu Mingfei even felt he needed to thank Fingel. Luckily, he knew he only needed to use it in Shinjuku. If he had expanded it to the whole of Tokyo, he probably wouldn't have been able to find anyone in his lifetime.

"Sigh..." Lu Mingfei sighed as if he wanted to cry but had no tears.

But while some are sad, others are happy.

"Hum~"

Xia Mi took a small bite of the creamy crepe she had been longing for, and secretly glanced at the person next to her who was at a loss, feeling even happier.

She knew this would be the outcome.

Don't be fooled by her constant chatter and seemingly jealous demeanor; it's just her playful banter with him. She has no worries about her position right now. She never even considered that he could find some legendary girl with just a burst of enthusiasm. Of course, even if he did, she wasn't afraid of any woman emerging from some obscure corner posing a threat.

That day at Su Xiaoqiang's house, Xia Mi overheard him talking to Su Xiaoqiang and realized that the mysterious woman he kept mentioning was actually "Frigga". She almost burst out laughing, her smile was harder to suppress than an AK rifle.

"Brave man!" She couldn't help but pat Lu Mingfei on the shoulder and say, "I have faith in you. You'll be in charge of taking care of Odin, and I'll be in charge of kidnapping his wife for you to do with as you please!"

Of course, that's just empty talk. Odin can be taken down, but his wife—if he really has a wife in the traditional sense—cannot be disposed of by Lu Mingfei. Otherwise, if Lu Mingfei were to lose his beastly nature, there would be two more heartbroken dragons in the world that night, dragons with green heads.

She took another bite of the crepe, wiped the cream off her lips, and then adjusted her expression.

“I said, how about we try a different approach?” She pretended to be very concerned about Lu Mingfei. “Just standing here like this isn’t going to work. Maybe we should take the initiative.”

“Take the initiative… but this…” Lu Mingfei wanted to say something, but he felt that it would be futile to say anything. On his second day in Tokyo, he felt somewhat desperate.

It's impossible to find a hidden girl by luck alone—

No, no...

After several days, Lu Mingfei's mind finally started working again. He suddenly realized that if, as he knew before, all of the girl's information on the internet had been deleted... then there were only two possibilities: either she herself did not want to be exposed to the public eye, or someone did not want her to appear.

If it's the latter, Lu Mingfei thinks... this girl probably wouldn't be on the street; she should be in some secluded place.

Thinking about it this way, the scope seemed to shrink considerably. Lu Mingfei suddenly felt enlightened, and even his head lifted high. But then, he suddenly realized that it didn't seem to have shrunk the scope at all; it had only made his journey more difficult.

He can't exactly go to someone else's house, can he?

The more Lu Mingfei thought about it, the more difficult it seemed. He sighed heavily, his head drooping like a little dog.

Zero was captivated by his appearance. She genuinely enjoyed seeing him looking dejected or giving a cowardly laugh. Her heart pounded wildly. She even secretly thanked the mysterious woman who never appeared, and prayed that he would never show up again.

Zero's appearance came into Xia Mi's view, and she sneered silently... Lu Mingfei was definitely going to come up empty-handed this time. Two of the three people had ulterior motives, and it was good enough if they didn't trip him up.

But even if you think that way, you should still be a little more "generous" in life.

"Alright, stop making that face, it's heartbreaking to see." Xia Mi acted like a kind and gentle older sister, which was an important piece of information she had observed; she knew this guy was susceptible to this.

She patted Lu Mingfei on the shoulder and advised, "Just standing there won't do. We have to take the initiative. Who knows what the outcome will be... By the way! You keep saying she looks just like Chen Motong. How about we get a picture of Chen Motong and then take it to the shop owners on the street to ask them?"

Xia Mi was a clever girl after all. Even if her advice was just insincere, it sounded quite feasible... However, she wasn't afraid that she might actually stumble upon this girl by accident. This clumsy method only sounded reliable.

Lu Mingfei grasped the hand on his shoulder, pouted into an "O" shape, and nodded like a chick pecking at rice, "Smart, smart, you're really smart."

"Of course! Don't you know who I am? Standing in front of you is the incredibly intelligent Lady Xia Mi!" Xia Mi raised her head and straightened her chest, arching her back. At this moment, she also looked like a girl with plenty of assets.

……

So at noon that day, two guys with strange accents appeared on the streets of Shinjuku. The man, speaking in Japanese with the fervor of someone about to become the Pirate King, asked in broken sentences if anyone had seen a red-haired girl. Beside him, a pretty girl was holding a printed photo of a red-haired girl with striking beauty, smiling at the camera with red lips and white teeth.

The shop owners all said they had never seen it before, so the boy then expressed his gratitude politely in an extremely enthusiastic tone, and then led the girls behind him out, and then went to find a new shop to ask in the same way.

Even though he still hadn't received any useful information by nightfall, he remained confident. At this rate, he calculated that it would take about fifteen days to inquire throughout Shinjuku... The future looked bright!

"By the way," Lu Mingfei turned to the girl next to him and asked, "Where did you get these photos? I have a feeling they were taken on the spot. Did you ask Finger for them? If so, he'll start spreading rumors again."

"No, I spoke directly to Chen Motong." The question Xia Mi had been waiting for all afternoon finally came to her. She revealed her tiger teeth, her mischievous smile impossible to hide.

She said, "I told Chen Motong, 'Lu Mingfei wants your photo, send one when you have time,' and then she took a selfie, and that was it."

Lu Mingfei felt his heart skip a beat.

Xia Mi's smile widened. "Don't worry! I'm not that cheap. I got this from Guderian. Dream on, do you think I'd be your matchmaker?"

Lu Mingfei's face twitched slightly.

……

"You mean people on the street have been asking about red-haired girls all day?" The nonchalant man had a toothpick in his mouth, with his usual tonkotsu ramen in front of him.

"Yes, Boss Saeki, that's it! Everyone finds it strange that the boy seems to be Chinese, and he's with two girls." The ramen shop owner, with a rope tied around his head, bowed and scraped as he shared his street experiences with the righteous yakuza boss he'd known for years.

"That's quite interesting." The man chuckled coldly, then spat out the toothpick and bared his fangs at the ramen.

Chapter 133 The talkative girl deserves a slap

Sixteen days have passed, one day longer than the fifteen days Lu Mingfei had expected. His heart went from burning with passion to cooling down, to feeling lost, and then gradually becoming numb, like a child with unrealistic dreams gradually recognizing reality.

He didn't get any information. He asked almost every corner and every person, from the shop owners, the girls standing on the street soliciting customers, and the old man pushing a cart selling ramen. From the west exit of Omoide Yokocho to the east exit of Kabukicho, from the south exit of the floating garden to the Central Park where they were staying.

But no news about the "red-haired girl" has emerged, as if the girls in this area are taboo about red hair, and not even a "suspected" target has appeared.

With only three days left before leaving Japan, Lu Mingfei now had to consider his next move.

Emotionally, he would rather delay or even give up returning to school altogether, since, according to Angers, the academy was unlikely to provide any more valuable information; however, practically speaking, there was no point in continuing to stay like this. He had already inquired throughout the streets and alleys of Shinjuku and was already quite well-known in the area.

Now, whenever he goes out on the street, people will be watching him from the shadows. Lu Mingfei doesn't know if they are just onlookers or something else, but he always feels that these guys are not ordinary people...

Lu Mingfei turned to look at the man hiding in the corner who had been watching them. He had spotted this guy in black after leaving the hotel earlier that day.

"What should we eat today? Eel rice? Or taiyaki?"

Xia Mi tugged at his sleeve, yawning and still sleepy. She had thoroughly enjoyed herself these past few days, following Lu Mingfei around like a trance. At first, she was quite attentive, but later she became increasingly indifferent, and after that, the only things she asked him to ask each day were "What should we eat today?" and "Where should we go shopping today?"

During the day, they wandered through the streets and alleys, and when most shops closed at night, she would take him to places with dazzling neon lights. Except for Kabukicho, which she would get angry at the mere mention of and would never allow anyone to go up to the second floor for a closer look, she took him to almost all the tourist attractions in Shinjuku.

Her trip was all fun, and if you exclude a certain tagalong, it was like a honeymoon.

"Eat, eat, eat! You've almost eaten up all the funds." Lu Mingfei said listlessly, turning to look at the girl. "I'll be asking for the money when we get back. Don't think you can get away with it."

"Mhm!" The girl nodded nonchalantly, grinning. She seemed to have no intention of settling the score at all. She said, "I've written it all down in my little notebook. It's just money. I can pay it back in a thousand years. At worst, I'll just find another way to settle the debt."

“I won’t accept paying off my debts with my body. I don’t need a parasite who only knows how to eat and play.” Lu Mingfei said with a look of disgust.

"Hmph~" The girl closed her eyes, tilted her head back, and happily accepted the nickname.

She seemed determined to be a freeloader.

Lu Mingfei sighed helplessly.

"Don't sigh, there are only a few days left anyway, why don't we have some fun?" Xia Mi started discussing "dividing luggage" as usual. "Let's go have fun, let's go have fun! We agreed to go to Akihabara, aren't you going on your pilgrimage?"

"Patrolling my ass! Do I look like I'm in the mood for that?" Lu Mingfei could only lament that human joys and sorrows are not shared.

“But we’ve searched almost the entire place, and there’s still no news. There’s nothing we can do.” Xia Mi hid the smile that had been playing on her face. She said, “The street that Zero searched for is the last place. I don’t think there will be any news there.”

“I don’t really think there will be any news…” Lu Mingfei hung his head, trying to think of another place that could give him a glimmer of hope.

As they were talking, Zero quietly walked back. She tugged at Lu Mingfei's shoulder, then gently shook her head, declaring that the massive search had ended in failure.

……

"So this is what eels look like. They don't taste good at all." Xia Mi commented on the creature in the bowl. "And it looks so ugly. It always reminds me of some slippery, disgusting creature."

“Me too.” Lu Mingfei also thought of a certain guy, but he never thought that guy was ugly or annoying. At least that guy was more lovable than Jormungandr, who only knew how to be a freeloader.

They're all long and thin, so who looks down on whom?

“Me too,” Zero chimed in.

She felt that she and Lu Mingfei might be thinking of the same guy, and she actually missed him quite a bit.

Lu Mingfei pushed away the bowl in front of him. He only ate two bites; he really had no appetite. All the way there, he had been thinking about where else he could try to look, but after thinking it over, he realized that he had already searched almost every available space on the ground. If there was really any place he hadn't looked, then it would be the sky...

But if it involves this kind of scope, and really requires going upstairs and searching door-to-door... then he might as well just turn Tokyo upside down, I mean physically...

"Boss!" he called out, raising his hand.

"Hello, sir." The owner peeked out from behind the opposite fence; he looked every bit the part of a Japanese chef. "Is there a problem with the food?"

"No, I want to ask you about something." Lu Mingfei's Japanese has improved a lot in recent combat. Although his accent is still a bit strange, his communication is much smoother now.

"A red-haired girl?" The shopkeeper grinned. "I've really never seen a girl like that before."

"I'm asking about the buildings over there, what are they?"

Lu Mingfei pointed out the window, where a tall building stood, with an elevated road running through it—a truly spectacular sight.

“That’s the Genji Heavy Industries building,” the shopkeeper said. “It looks magnificent and is always bustling with people, but nobody knows what kind of business they’re doing. Some people say it’s related to the underworld… You’d better stay away, sir.”

"The underworld?" Lu Mingfei chuckled. "That sounds like something quite rare."

"It's not uncommon at all; it's a legitimate profession in Japan."

After exchanging pleasantries for a while, the boss left, leaving Lu Mingfei staring blankly at the building...

"What are you looking at?" Xia Mi, who was being disingenuous, had already taken the opportunity to sneak a half-bowl of rice from Lu Mingfei's bowl, and now she couldn't help but feel a little guilty. She said, "You don't actually think your little princess is hiding in that building, do you? Don't get too carried away and develop delusions; I can't be a doctor."

“It’s not that…” Lu Mingfei wasn’t in the mood for playful banter with her. He frowned. “I always felt that place was a bit strange. It felt… it felt like there were a lot of…”

"There are a lot of hybrids, right?" Xia Mi quietly picked up the second-to-last piece of eel and continued his conversation.

"Yes, yes, yes." Lu Mingfei suddenly understood, and the strange feeling in his heart finally had an answer. He nodded repeatedly, "That's it... Wait, how did you know?"

"I tried testing it on the sixth day," Xia Mi said. "It's the Word of Power: Bloodline Binding, right? Although it's a Word of Power directly under the old man's control, what can I do when I'm smart? This kind of thing is easy~"

Lu Mingfei didn't reply. Xia Mi's words had awakened him, as if he had unlocked a new skill. He immediately and naturally recited a string of words, and then invisible red threads appeared before his eyes, flowing and changing, flowing out from the doorway and meandering in all directions.

He blinked, then suddenly became delighted—

Across from him, after smugly taking the last piece of eel, Xia Mi immediately realized that she had spoken out of turn.

She really wanted to slap herself.

Chapter 134: Harmful, harming others and yourself!

"Yes! Yes!" Lu Mingfei slapped his thigh hard. "That's it. We were wrong from the start. Why were we looking around in the general population? She's definitely not a normal person."

In an instant, he suddenly understood. Thanks to Xia Mi's teachings, he now had two new straws to grasp.

First, he confirmed a new direction. He needed to search among hybrids or possibly pure-blooded dragons, which narrowed the scope considerably, much like the difference between "the whole Earth" and "Shilan High School." The absolute number of hybrids among humans is not small, but the proportion is quite low.

Secondly, he has mastered a new spiritual power. He has been able to sense the strange connection with the hybrid race for a long time, and now, after being reminded by Xia Mi, he finally remembered how to amplify this connection.

An amorphous, flowing red thread connects these links, extending outwards from him in all directions, flowing to every creature with dragon blood that he can reach. This red thread varies in size, representing the concentration of bloodline—thus making the range easier to define; Lu Mingfei believes he can search from the largest to the smallest.

"You guys take your time eating, I'm leaving now." Lu Mingfei said impatiently, and was about to stand up.

"No, no, no, no, no—" Xia Mi was really panicked now. She grabbed Lu Mingfei's arms to stop him from running away. "Don't be impulsive, don't be impulsive... Let me analyze it for you."

"Analyze what?" Lu Mingfei asked anxiously, as if ants were crawling all over him.

Are you planning to head straight for Genji Heavy Industries?

“Hmm…” Lu Mingfei paused for a moment, then analyzed the direction of these red lines… He felt there was a considerable probability that it was worth trying.

He nodded: "Probably. There are a lot of mixed races there, so many that it's a bit... exaggerated, like an academy."

“Then you need to be careful. Angers told you before that the situation here is complicated and involves mixed-race people, so you can’t act impulsively,” Xia Mi said. “Besides, you’re already in a dangerous period right now. If a conflict breaks out and things get out of control, will you still be able to go back to the academy?”

"I'm not going back. Why would I go back if I could find someone?" Lu Mingfei said matter-of-factly.

Xia Mi felt like crying but had no tears. She wanted to raise her hand and slap herself. She always brought trouble upon herself.

"Don't be so impulsive..." she hurriedly advised, "Think about it, you're looking for a girl because you want to live a good life, right? But if something goes wrong and you end up fighting with someone, what kind of good life will you have? Even if you don't plan to go back, you can't just run around the world with a girl, can you? That's a life of facing the edge of a knife. Do you think everyone is like me?"

She didn't forget to slip in her own agenda.

“Hmm…” Lu Mingfei thought it made sense.