An Italian man traveled all the way to China, not for a fancy Italian restaurant proposal, nor for a diamond ring, but to stage such a performance in a royal garden for a Chinese girl.
What a heartfelt effort! If Lu Mingfei were a girl, he’d agree too!
So how could he blame anyone else for agreeing?
“What’s this?” Finger watched as Chu Zihang cut open a plastic bag, revealing two sealed laptops.
“Professor Schneider sent them over. These belonged to the two missing agents. There might be some valuable information in them,” Chu Zihang said.
“Whoa, Detective Chu, you sound like a tough guy!” Finger praised.
“Too bad we can’t ask Nono for help this time. Her profiling skills would be especially useful now,” Chu Zihang said indifferently. “The competition between our two teams represents the competition between the School Board and the Principal, doesn’t it?”
Chu Zihang opened the laptops, launched Internet Explorer, and began to check the bookmarks and history. Over 80% of the girl’s browsing history was on Taobao. It seemed she shopped on Taobao every day, buying everything from electronics to cute coasters. Her comments were always like “Dear, the delivery was prompt, giving a positive review” or “I recommend this new store to everyone; buying from them gets you free white chocolate, I’m not a shill or anything.” The boy, on the other hand, was a military enthusiast who browsed various nationalist forums every day and occasionally visited image galleries. At first, Finger watched curiously, but soon lost interest. The urge to peek faded, and the task of scrolling through someone else’s browsing history quickly became unbearably tedious, like chewing on someone else’s time, which left an unpleasant feeling.
But Chu Zihang showed no signs of impatience, silently browsing until Finger’s snores filled the room once again.
It was already four in the morning, and the night wind howled outside. Fatigue slowly crept in, yet still, there was no valuable information. Chu Zihang rubbed his tense forehead and entered a URL. An old news page loaded: July 4, six years ago, “Dandelion” Typhoon, an unknown accident. The accompanying picture showed a battered Maybach in the mud, its windshield shattered, the body seemingly burned with acid.
This was probably the hundredth time he’d looked at this news. He could practically recite every word. He still kept a newspaper clipping from July 4, six years ago, and even recorded news footage. He had collected all the information he could about the incident, but still couldn’t find a reasonable explanation. Even considering dragons, it couldn’t be explained. The event defied all rules; to explain it, one would have to believe in gods and demons. The details of that event were all too surreal, and the only real thing was… he had lost that man.
What happened afterward was eerie, as if the man had been completely erased from the world. No one cared about his disappearance, no one grieved, and no one was curious. The boss of Black Prince Group didn’t even express condolences or compensate the family, simply replacing the car and driver shortly afterward. The only thing that remembered that man was the last thing he had left in the world.
And that thing was Chu Zihang.
There were many reasons why Chu Zihang had asked to join this mission, but there was one reason he would never say out loud. In this string of events, he had once again sensed the presence of that man. When the Maybach reappeared in the rain, he knew that mysterious rainy night had returned. In fact, all these years, he had never truly left that stormy night.
An inescapable cage of pouring rain.
And he didn’t want to escape. Only by finding that rainy night and uncovering everything hidden behind that event could he truly learn that man’s fate. This was too important to him.
He closed the webpage and walked into the bathroom, intending to boil some water to make coffee. After closing the door, he removed his T-shirt, silently turning around. The mirror reflected the dark red mark on his scapula, like a birthmark. He was sure he didn’t have it when he was young. This mark had slowly appeared after that rainy night; it didn’t hurt or itch, resembling a half-decayed tree.
A half-decayed World Tree—the emblem of Cassell College. It was precisely through this mark that Chu Zihang had found Cassell College. For years, he was the first student to actively seek it out.
He drew out the folding knife Anjou had lent him from the leather strap on his wrist and lightly pierced his wrist, then clenched his fist, letting the blood flow into the sink. The blood carried a distinct darkness—a deep greenish color. His hematopoietic system had begun to replace his blood, and the enhanced blood from the “Blood Rage” skill was rapidly overtaking the transfused blood Anjou had given him. Recently, his veins always felt searingly hot, but luckily this intense reaction was contained within his body, unlike when it burned in the open air.
The restoration of his blood also meant his power was growing, but Chu Zihang didn’t know how much longer he would live.
He had never told Anjou one thing: the “Blood Rage” skill couldn’t be deactivated, just like he couldn’t extinguish the golden pupils.
This blood was like a demon; once you got used to relying on its power, it would take over your body. Even if you didn’t actively trigger it, it would make you uncontrollably excited. It was both poison and the fruit of wisdom, and those who had tasted its allure could not resist it. Chu Zihang finally understood why the author of Deuteronomy fearfully called this technology “The Devil’s Revelation” and never dared to make a copy of it.
It was best for this technology to end with him, but he only hoped he had a bit more time since he still had unfinished business.
He knew Susie liked him, and he understood Xia Mi’s intentions. But what could he do? He was already in the clutches of the devil. Chu Zihang took out the card Xia Mi had given him, silently reading the address, “Building 31, Unit 15, Apartment 201,” an old factory compound. Xia Mi’s parents were probably veteran cadres of some state-owned enterprise. If they met, they’d surely ask about his background with scrutiny and expectation. But how would he answer? He shouldn’t have agreed to Xia Mi’s invitation; he just couldn’t bear to refuse. As someone who didn’t know how much longer he had, he wasn’t in a position to make promises…
But why had he agreed, then?
He turned on the tap, washing the tainted and powerful dark blood down the drain, then made himself a cup of instant coffee and returned to the table.
He opened a new history entry. In a nationalist forum, some people were discussing “Hidden Legends of the Beijing Subway.” He slowly scrolled down the page.
“Legend: Back when there were only Line 1 and the loop line, after the last train each night, there would always be an empty train making one last full trip to take the disturbed ghosts, upset by the construction and operations, back to their resting places. Otherwise, there would be no peace. True or false?”