Part 1
"Live Broadcast of a Murder Case"
Author: Tui Ge
Chapter 1: The Vault
"Beep... beep—"
"Hello."
"Hello, Dr. Quinn Foster."
Quinn Foster: "Speaking."
Julian Grant: "Hello. This is the Trident headquarters, I am the person in charge of [Crime Analysis]."
"You’re late." Quinn Foster's voice sounded flat, as if he had been expecting this call for a while. "The scheduled live broadcast was at 9:30 a.m., and it’s already 9:45. The Vault's psychological test has lasted nearly half an hour, which I find unreasonable."
"We received some new feedback at the last minute and are working to verify it. As you know, [Crime Analysis] is a rather unique full-immersion simulation game, with a wide impact and consistently high standards. We don’t want any uncontrollable developments in the scenario." Julian Grant pulled up The Vault's relevant information and adjusted the interface size. "You are her psychological evaluator, so we need to confirm her situation with you again."
Quinn Foster let out a barely audible sigh, then took a breath and said, "Go ahead."
Julian Grant's gaze lingered a moment longer on the photo in the upper right corner, his index finger tapping as he enlarged the image.
The person in the photo was actually quite beautiful, but what caught the eye first was not her features. Rather, her unapproachable, cold demeanor made it easy to overlook her looks.
Her skin had a slightly sickly pallor, and in the high-definition image, faint blue veins could be seen around her eyes. Her half-lidded eyes made her seem listless, yet she exuded an inexplicable, hard-to-ignore sense of danger.
Of course, it might just be his imagination.
This was a person without a surname, with a strange name.
The "former name" field read "Warren Quinn", which didn’t sound much better.
"The Vault, female, 26 years old." Julian Grant read from the file. "Unemployed."
Quinn Foster added, "She was still teaching at A University a month ago, just resigned."
Julian Grant continued, "No criminal record, but the police evaluation is that she should be further observed."
"That’s an unreasonable and baseless assessment. As far as I can see, she’s just very smart, with no antisocial tendencies." Quinn Foster said. "Statistically, there’s no correlation between intelligence and psychopathy. They shouldn’t judge her character based on the people around The Vault. They don’t really know her at all."
"She’s been evaluated by three psychologists. Two said she passed, but couldn’t guarantee the validity of the results. Only you—" Julian Grant raised his eyes to look into the air, the gesture making his already sharp features even more striking. "Your assessment was: passed, healthy and normal, fit to participate in the game."
Quinn Foster: "Is there a problem? She completed the test exactly as Trident required. They set the questions, and now they say it’s useless—doesn’t that seem unfair? She followed the rules they set, and now you want to add extra notes? That’s pointless. I’m not that kind of person."
Julian Grant: "Did she display any unusual behavior during the test?"
Quinn Foster paused, then answered truthfully, "She was very calm."
"Hmm?"
"Too calm. No matter what topic I brought up, she showed little psychological fluctuation. She would discuss things from the perspective of maximizing interests, rarely showing personal emotion," Quinn Foster added. "Even when talking about herself."
Julian Grant: "So, can you guarantee your assessment is accurate?"
Quinn Foster: "What I can guarantee is that The Vault is psychologically sound, highly intelligent, self-aware, and good at controlling her emotions. The only possible criticism is that she doesn’t like socializing much, but that’s not a big deal—many highly intelligent people are like that. Her test results show she’s very well-suited for [Crime Analysis]."
Julian Grant glanced again at the photo in the file, feeling that her gaze had a peculiar penetrating quality. He was momentarily distracted, then suddenly asked a question he himself didn’t quite understand: "What if she’s pretending?"
Quinn Foster’s voice rose: "Sir, you can’t say that. If you want to discuss the selfish and dark sides of human nature, then yes, most people, under extreme conditions, might do things that don’t align with mainstream values. But if such situations really arise, trust me, she would be even calmer and more reliable than most. You can’t judge her from the worst possible angle and conclude she’s a bad person. Without evidence, she’s a law-abiding ‘good person’!"
"I know, ahem." Julian Grant lowered his head. "I didn’t mean anything else, I’m just relaying others’ concerns."
Quinn Foster’s tone softened a bit, and he continued, "Actually, you don’t need to be so nervous. She just sees things that ordinary people can’t, that’s all."
Julian Grant was caught off guard by this and froze for a moment. "What do you mean?"
"Don’t misunderstand, I mean, the human brain is amazing—it shapes the world you see." Quinn Foster realized his words were ambiguous and explained, "For example, some people have exceptional dynamic vision and can track fast-moving objects, allowing an untrained person to easily hit a ball traveling over 200 km/h. Their world is like it has a slow-motion function. Others are naturally sensitive to geometric shapes, like having an auto-drawing cheat—without any tools, they can analyze figures with perfect accuracy."
Julian Grant asked, "So what is The Vault’s world like?"
"Who knows?" Quinn Foster smiled. "She’s extremely sensitive to any subtle change—position, shape, distance, expression, even color. She’s never told me what her world looks like. Maybe, as people online say, in a top student’s world, all the answers are already written."
Julian Grant laughed too. "In that case, she really is a perfect fit for [Crime Analysis]."
"Honestly, it’s rare for her to be interested in this game. She’s an irreplaceable talent—you can use her without worry. And you don’t need to be concerned about her acting out," said Dr. Foster. "Unless..."
Julian Grant raised an eyebrow. "Unless?"
"Hitting her on the head?" Dr. Foster said. "She really hates people hitting her head."
Julian Grant: "Huh?"
Dr. Foster smiled and tapped his own forehead. "She’s had a brain injury, so she thinks getting hit will make her dumber. Like how some people hate cilantro—she especially hates anyone hitting her head. If someone tries, I can’t guarantee their safety."
Julian Grant laughed. "What a childish habit."
"Don’t think she’s childish—a lot of habits really do form in childhood," said Dr. Foster. "So, any other questions?"
Julian Grant: "No more."
Dr. Foster said, "I’m looking forward to this live broadcast."
"Sorry to have kept you waiting. Sorry for the disturbance. Goodbye."
"Goodbye."
Julian Grant closed all the windows, picked up his things, and left the room.
The crisp sound of leather boots echoed rhythmically in the quiet hallway—not too fast, not too slow, not too light, not too heavy. He paused briefly in front of "Live Room 603," opened the door, and walked in.
"Boss!" The people working inside looked up, and seeing it was him, immediately asked, "Is the broadcast still going to start? She’s been waiting inside for a long time."
A young man jogged over and handed him a file, which contained the system-generated player evaluation.
"She picked this scenario herself. The character match rate is less than 40%, but her player score is 92," the young man said excitedly. "Amazing, I’ve never seen such talent before!"
You have to know, the entry threshold for [Crime Analysis] is already insanely high. Those who pass the test are one in a million. Most official players score around 60, and very few ever reach 90—those are usually industry professionals.
"Start it." Julian Grant glanced at it, handed it back, and walked deeper into the office, saying at the same time, "Add one more account. I’m going in too."
·
The Vault maintained her usual posture, patiently waiting for the system to finish loading. Even though the supposedly never-late Trident had kept her waiting for nearly half an hour, her expression showed no impatience at all.
The pre-game test questions had already refreshed three times, and when the fourth set appeared, she finally ignored them. Her gaze shifted upward, focusing on a red light above.
Her face was expressionless, her eyes calm, yet she seemed to radiate a chilling aura that was almost tangible, piercing through the opaque simulation pod and stabbing into the technicians behind the screen.
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