Dark clouds blocked more than eighty percent of the sunlight, making Old Yu Street, already on the shaded side, seem even darker.
Decay and desolation had always been the theme here, as though this were a wasteland abandoned by the entire city.
Yet at the entrance to a building complex that looked practically abandoned sat a figure anyone would inevitably look back at.
The woman's face had never held the slightest expression. Her restraint was as cold and mechanical as a machine's. Though it was a stifling winter day, she held a chilled drink filled with ice cubes.
The ice cubes rolled about in the lemonade. The faint light that had just fallen upon them was immediately obscured by the cool shade of Old Yu Street.
Even her stunningly beautiful face was always half in shadow and half in light, constantly changing.
In the past, such changes had seemed absent from her, though perhaps the seemingly abandoned Old Yu Street behind her—actually filled with resentful ghosts—had affected her greatly.
Mei Sheng sat in an old but clean Grand Tutor Chair, leaning back slightly against it in apparent comfort.
Yet the fingertips clutching the lemonade had turned faintly white, and beads of sweat could vaguely be seen at her temples. Her expressionless face revealed nothing of her thoughts, nor could one tell the source of her tension.
A light breeze swept past, blowing a droplet from the rim of the glass. It landed softly on the ground.
The Grand Tutor Chair suddenly let out a creak, and Mei Sheng's body jolted uncontrollably, as though something had fiercely shoved her.
She still did not open her eyes, merely resting there.
A moment later, she slowly opened them, tilted her head slightly, and gazed darkly at the narrow alley at Old Yu Street's