Shi Lei had no habit of taking noon naps, so he spent the afternoon playing video games with Exusiai and the others. Since the limit was two players, they mostly rotated in and out, with wins and losses about even.
Croissant left after finishing her pizza without saying what she was going to do. Maybe she was setting up a stall, or perhaps handling some private business. Since she did not bring it up, no one asked.
They played until one in the afternoon, then the three of them took the elevator to the top floor and continued slacking off in the office area.
Less than half an hour later, Texas, enjoying her free time, scratched her nose and pulled out a pack of cigarettes. Seeing that, Exusiai quickly ran over and snatched them away.
"Didn't you say you were quitting? Why are you smoking again today? Confiscated! Confiscated!"
Exusiai opened the drawer at Texas's workstation and took out a box of chocolate sticks. After unwrapping one in front of her, she shoved it toward Texas's mouth.
"Ah, open up. Whenever you want to smoke from now on, smoke this instead. I'm confiscating your cigarettes, so don't get mad, okay?"
Texas gave a bitter grin and obediently opened her mouth to bite down on the chocolate stick, offering no rebuttal.
Exusiai walked over to the water dispenser, filled a paper cup with water, and soaked all the cigarettes in it. Shi Lei had no smoking habit, and he nodded approvingly at what she did.
Only true friends dared to snatch away someone's cigarettes so forcefully.
"Ding."
The elevator's arrival chime made him crane his neck and turn around. The boss only arrived at the company at this hour—what a comfortable life. Not long after Emperor entered the office, he came back out carrying something. Walking up to them, he instructed:
"Texas, take Shi Lei on some regular orders this afternoon so he can familiarize himself with the business. Consider it training."
"Okay, Boss."
Exusiai poked her head out from her workstation, raised her right hand with a grin, and asked Emperor:
"Boss, can I run regular orders with him?"
Emperor rolled his eyes at her and refused bluntly.
"How much loss have you caused the company this month? Do I need to help you remember? You are not going anywhere today. Stay in the company and reflect properly."
With that, he turned and left. It seemed Croissant had been right—Emperor and Kong had been very busy lately.
At those words, Exusiai immediately became somewhat dejected. She sank limply into her chair and sighed.
"Ah, you're all going out to run deliveries, and I'm the only one left in the company. It's really so boring~"
If he had not known she was lively and restless by nature, he might have thought that was something a lonely housewife would say. Holding back a laugh, Shi Lei comforted her.
"Don't worry. We're all coworkers. Sooner or later, we'll have chances to work together. Just think of it as paid leave."
"Well, I guess that's all I can do."
Texas logged into the employee system and used her phone to photograph the regular order information. Then she rose with her sword in hand and tilted her head at him.
"Let's go."
Shi Lei nodded and followed her downstairs to the car.
Texas remained rather quiet throughout the drive. Perhaps, as she herself had said, she usually did not have many thoughts, so she simply did not speak.
Texas like this was like an emotionless delivery machine. She did not teach Shi Lei what to do, merely repeated the process in the most straightforward way possible: pick up goods → deliver them → get a signature → collect payment → leave.
It had to be said that Texas was far more efficient than Croissant. If the delivery was cash on delivery, she collected the shipping fee upon arrival; if it had already been paid, she got the signature. No unnecessary steps.
The two of them set out at one and, by four thirty in the afternoon, had completed nineteen regular orders. Their efficiency was truly astonishing.
Most people paid the shipping fees normally. The few who wanted to dodge payment were physically persuaded by Texas's iron fists.
Lungmen differed from the world Shi Lei had come from. There were no courier stations or sorting points spread throughout every residential neighborhood.
The common practice was one-to-one direct delivery, much like ancient escort agencies.
At four thirty in the afternoon, Texas drove to Fengchi Logistics and picked up a shipment sent from out of town. It was a medicine vial packed in a glass tube.
The box used shockproof materials, and the note specified that it was fragile. The delivery address was not far away, in District 12, north of Lungmen's urban area.
"The last order."
"Mm."
Shi Lei had already grown accustomed to her few words and nodded in understanding. Perhaps because the medicine was meant to save lives, Texas did not drive very fast.
After driving for a little over ten minutes, the car rounded a bend in the road, and a burning building suddenly came into view. Billowing black smoke surged into the azure sky like an enraged beast roaring at the heavens. Passersby stopped one after another, taking pictures, looking on, and gathering to watch.
Shi Lei lowered his head and looked through the car window.
"Tsk, that fire's pretty serious. Texas, how far are we from the delivery address? How about I get out and take a look first, then we'll meet up afterward?"
Fires were merciless, but people were not. If he had not come across this, that would have been one thing. But since he had, there was no reason for him to stand by and do nothing. Even Zhongli would have made the same choice.
Texas raised a brow and glanced over before replying:
"The delivery address is that building."
"..."
Shi Lei drew back his neck, revealing a strange, complicated expression. Then he unfastened his seat belt and asked:
"I'll go in and take a look first. Which floor?"
"Eleventh floor, left side."
Many onlookers had gathered at the entrance of the residential complex. They were not helping put out the fire, merely standing downstairs and staring. The traffic had stalled as a result, causing a jam.
He squeezed through the crowd and rushed beneath the burning building.
A middle-aged woman with cat ears tried to charge into the fire, only to be held back by several people. Her body went limp as she collapsed to her knees, looking upward as she cried out:
"Move! All of you, move! My child is still inside! Someone, please save her!"
Shi Lei thought that since he had to go up anyway, saving one person was still saving a person. He walked up to the middle-aged woman and asked:
"Ma'am, what floor is your child on? Give me the key. I'll go up and take a look."
The light in the woman's eyes widened slightly as she stared blankly at the unfamiliar man before her. After a brief moment of thought, she tried to seize this last shred of hope. She suddenly took off her thick coat in front of everyone and handed it, along with the keys, to Shi Lei.
"I live on the left side of the eleventh floor. There's a child locked in the bedroom. When you get her out, could you cover her with these clothes? Please, I'm begging you."
Damn, she was the recipient?
And why had she locked her child at home?
Shi Lei looked up at the increasingly fierce flames, and an inexplicable thought arose in his heart.
Killing with a Borrowed Knife
Time waited for no one. Although Shi Lei did not want to take the thing, he still accepted the thick coat with both hands.
The main reason was that the temperature at a fire scene was extremely high. Bringing this inside would only turn it into a flammable object.
It would be no help at all during the rescue.
He had just stepped onto the stone stairs to rush inside when a short girl dressed like a firefighter stopped him.
She was around 1.3 to 1.4 meters tall and wore an oversized firefighter helmet that did not match her build. Whenever the short girl tilted her head up to meet Shi Lei's gaze, the helmet's center of gravity tipped backward, exposing her fair forehead.
"Sir you can't go in for safety reasons please wait outside the building for the fire truck rescue if you refuse to listen and insist on barging in you will create a great burden for us and affect our ability to save more people from the fire."
Though the short firefighter was tiny, she rattled off words without pausing for breath.
Shi Lei had no time to argue. He only wanted to rush into the fire and rescue the child as soon as possible. The Jade Shield attached by summoning a Rock Spine was an all-purpose shield capable of blocking any damage. As long as the damage did not exceed the shield's limit in an instant, it could block anything.
But the tiny firefighter was extremely stubborn and spread her arms to stop him.
"You can't do this sir going in at a time like this is extremely dangerous if you inhale too much carbon monoxide it will cause great harm to your bod—"
Before she could finish, Texas ran over and knocked on the firefighter helmet with the back of her hand.
"Ow, what are you doing~"
Shi Lei turned around and discovered that the woman receiving the delivery was holding the medicine case from this shipment.
"Go."
Texas was concise as ever. After saying that, she charged straight upstairs. The firefighter tried to stop her, but could not handle both of them at once. Shi Lei seized the opportunity and sprinted up the stairs.
The elevator could not be used during a fire, so the only way up was by climbing the stairs. Shi Lei climbed all the way to the seventh floor in one breath before he began panting, his pace slowing. Texas did not wait for him and ran upward ahead of him. Like a tireless wolf, she moved with extraordinary agility.
When Shi Lei reached the eleventh floor, he found Texas carrying an unconscious adult downstairs on her back.
"The door is locked. I can't open it. Go quickly."
Standing at the stairwell entrance, he could already see the bursting flames. The fire was entirely on the left side. The rooms on the right had not yet been affected because of the corridor separating them.
Shi Lei tossed the coat at the stairwell between the tenth and eleventh floors, then quickly pulled out the keys and opened the door. Many clear sword marks covered the security door, likely left by Texas.
"Click."
As he grabbed the handle and pulled the door, he felt an unusual weight. The security door was extremely sturdy, four fingers thick. It had probably been specially reinforced.
It was much thicker than an ordinary home security door. No wonder Texas could not cut through it with her sword.
The moment the door opened halfway, a wave of scorching heat rushed at his face. Shi Lei was nearly unable to open his eyes from the heat, so he hurriedly summoned a Rock Spine nearby and applied a shield to himself.
The room was ablaze, with crackling sounds like burning firewood ringing out from time to time. The ceiling had been blackened by smoke, while the burning sofa in the living room gave off blinding flames.
Most of the doors were either completely open or half ajar, making them easy to identify. Shi Lei immediately spotted a bedroom door tightly shut at the very end. That had to be it.
He picked up the ring of keys, but did not know which one opened the door, so he had to try them one by one based on their shapes. To determine what was inside, he knocked as he tried the keys and called out:
"Hey, is anyone in there?"
No one answered.
The fire was strongest near the windowsill. He had no idea why so many flammable objects had been piled there. With a click, Shi Lei found the right key, twisted the handle, and pushed open the bedroom door.
In the northwest corner of the bedroom lay an unconscious little girl. Her hands and feet were bound by chains. It seemed her mother had kept her imprisoned at home for a long time.
Shi Lei's eyelids twitched when he saw the black stones on the girl's arm. No wonder that woman had insisted on stuffing the coat into his hands and asking him to cover her. She really was an infected child!
Although the infected could find some space to survive in Lungmen, their social status was low. This was mainly because the Originium Particles created when their corpses exploded after death could infect ordinary people. Like walking human disease bombs, they inspired both fear and dread.
If word got out that the child was infected, the other residents of the complex would definitely drive them out together. Then they could only live in an unregulated place like the Slums.
The goods delivered today were probably medicine to treat or ease her Originium-related illness. The woman was still willing to spend money on the child, which showed that she had not completely abandoned her. Shi Lei understood why she had imprisoned the girl, but he still felt it was too extreme.
Damn it, picking locks again. I hate this!
He cursed inwardly, but his hands did not slow in the slightest. After trying several keys, he unlocked the girl's shackles from her hands and feet one after another with a series of clicks. From time to time, he summoned a Rock Spine at a distance to refresh the shield around himself.
After everything he had experienced these past few days, Shi Lei had already identified the true culprit behind the Originium resonance.
It was neither the shield nor the Rock Spine, but the Rock Element it regularly emitted. That energy could trigger violent activation within Originium, quickly causing an explosion.
Shi Lei had vaguely guessed downstairs that the trapped child might be infected, so when he summoned the Rock Spine, he did not place it along the path they would have to take. Otherwise, if the Originium exploded while he was escaping with her, that would truly be a sin.
After refreshing his shield, he used its twenty-second protection window to scoop up the girl and run outside. Just as he reached the stairwell, he heard an old man calling for help from upstairs.
Damn it, there was someone else?
Shi Lei glanced toward the sound and felt that it came from the apartment directly above the girl's. As before, if he did not know, that was one thing. But now that he knew, there was no way he could leave the person behind.
Shi Lei carried the girl down to the tenth floor, covered the Originium on her arm with the thick coat, and quickly ran toward the twelfth floor. He did not see Texas along the way, so she had probably gone downstairs.
"Hey, is anyone there? Say something!"
A moment later, a hoarse voice came from inside.
"Help... cough cough... hel... cough..."
Shi Lei confirmed someone was inside, but unfortunately, he did not have this family's key. He could only activate his shield and kick the door hard.
With the Jade Shield protecting him, he would not suffer any recoil damage, yet several heavy kicks in a row still failed to break it open.
Even a Genshin Impact body had its limits.
Suddenly, Texas's voice came from behind him.
"Let me."
Shi Lei stepped aside at her words and watched her swing her sword.
"Swish swish swish!"
Dense sword shadows fell like raindrops, instantly piercing the household security door full of holes!
If he had not known this was Originium Arts, Shi Lei might have thought he had somehow traveled into a fantasy Cultivation World.
Before you continue