Goodnight, Miss Ya

He picked up the folding knife from the ground and flicked it open with a "snap."

The blade, covered in scratches under the moonlight, was yellowed with white, indicating this cheap folding knife had been sharpened often.

"A toy for adults, right?"

Bai Zhou blinked.

With a "thump," he knelt on the ground.

The skinny man wailed, begging for mercy:

"Elder Brother, just let me go like I'm a fart. I was just joking with Old Zhao!"

"Yeah, yeah!" The muscular man nodded vigorously, "We know we were wrong!"

—Walking too many night roads, you meet ghosts!

Where did this kid get a gun?!

Although the firearm looked strange and unfamiliar, seeing the kid's confident demeanor...

It didn't seem fake.

The skinny man, closest to him, even smelled the pungent scent of gunpowder.

—As if the gun had just been fired!

This wasn't a soft persimmon, but a scale weight holding a durian.

Not only did it prick the hand, it was hard and smelly!

Facing their pleas, Bai Zhou shook his head.

"I don't think you seem to know you were wrong..."

You're just scared.

However, fear only breeds flattery, not goodwill.

"Look at me."

The dark muzzle of the gun swayed gently in front of the skinny man, drawing his gaze involuntarily.

A very simple hypnotic technique.

Absolutely ineffective against Extraordinarys, and even not effective against normal people, But against someone like the skinny man, who was in a state of panic and mentally unstable, it was a sure-fire way to hypnotize him into doing anything.

...Gradually, the skinny man's eyes, following the swaying gun barrel, became vacant.

"What do you mean by 'last time'?"

"It was..."

Under the stunned eyes of the muscle man, who looked like he'd seen a ghost, The skinny man, dazed and hesitant, began to answer every question.

"Last time, a child..."

"Went to the Black Market... we made a huge profit."

"But we gambled it all away quickly, so..."

"...No one knows about this."

A huge profit.

This phrase was somewhat sensitive to Bai Zhou.

The smile on his face gradually faded.

As expected.

—The one who understands fear the most is often the most wicked.

"Ah... Wi, witchcraft!"

The skinny man suddenly snapped back to reality, falling to the ground and scrambling away to the side, his eyes filled with extreme terror.

In that moment, he had felt dazed, as if he had been cursed.

This incredible, unprecedented experience filled him with immense fear.

"You're a ghost!"

But Bai Zhou didn't answer the question.

"Once upon a time, a mermaid grew tired of life under the sea and wanted to see the legendary warm and beautiful land."

"With great hope, she paid a heavy price to come to land."

Bai Zhou suddenly remembered a story.

...However, the land was not what she had imagined.

She personally witnessed a fisherman feigning a fall into the water, only to snatch all the gold coins from his companion's pocket when the latter swam over to rescue him, and then falsely accuse the rescuer of pushing him in.

She also saw well-dressed, respectable merchants dumping barrels of pungent black oil into her ocean.

Thus, the disappointed mermaid, unable to return to the sea, became the Lady of the Lake on land.

"Guess what?"

...The Skinny Man and the Fat Man shook their heads in unison, not daring to speak.

"Congratulations, you guessed correctly."

Bai Zhou nodded approvingly.

"Whenever a woodcutter passed by, she would come out with two axes and ask them if they had lost a gold axe or a silver axe."

In the silent environment, Bai Zhou slowly put away his enchanted pistol, "The Arbiter-300."

This action made the Skinny Man's eyes light up with surprise, and it made the White Vest Muscle Man beside him stare at Bai Zhou's back view, itching to make a move.

Then, Bai Zhou took out a pitch-black short club from behind him.

The moonlight shone on the dark club.

Bai Zhou revealed a brilliant smile and unveiled the end of the story:

"And then, the Lady of the Lake would use those two axes..."

"...to chop all these greedy and hypocritical humans into mincemeat!"

The dark clouds gradually moved away.

The moonlight tonight was exceptionally bright.

"This Blue Star... or perhaps Tinghai, doesn't seem much better than I thought."

Stepping out of the bushes, Bai Zhou left with light steps, treading on the moonlight.

"That's not entirely true."

"...There are good people and bad people everywhere."

Ya walked quietly beside Bai Zhou, replying softly.

"Besides, this is the edge of the forgotten city, the very bottom of the bottom."

"When people have no way out, their bottom line becomes exceptionally low, or they might not have one at all."

"That's true..." Bai Zhou shook his head and patted the mud off his clothes.

Dealing with those two was easy, but cleaning up the aftermath and covering their tracks was troublesome.

Bai Zhou, always cautious, paid special attention to the follow-up work.

--But it was this incident, that made Bai Zhou fully realize how much he had changed overnight.

Two lives had ended by his hand, yet he didn't even have much of a psychological reaction.

Perhaps the matters involving Deputy Han and Section Chief Liu had touched him too deeply.

He still maintained reverence for life itself, but precisely because he revered life, he became exceptionally indifferent to those who casually took innocent lives.

He could no longer trust the execution efficiency of the so-called Federation authorities.

Moreover, there were always people in the world who believed that wicked people lived long lives.

This wouldn't do.

Therefore, Bai Zhou thought that since he had encountered them, it was a form of Heaven's Will.

If he had the ability but did nothing, standing by and watching them continue to do evil...

Then what was the difference between him and the accomplices of the perpetrators?

If Heaven doesn't punish them, he will.

Perhaps, this was also their "destiny."

Finally, Bai Zhou walked another street and found a better base in this undeveloped fringe area.

It was a five-story unfinished villa, with a river not far behind and a road a short walk ahead.

Wild grass and reeds grew wildly in between.

"This is it," Bai Zhou decided.

If he couldn't find a place to stay temporarily, the sun would be up soon...

He would be living in a big villa.

But now was not the time to rest.

Mustering his strength, Bai Zhou found more discarded industrial materials from the villa.

He made multiple tripwires using discarded electrical wires and broken glass, discreetly placing them in various corridors and stairwells.

Linked to these tripwires were rows of sharp, rusted rebar.

...Bai Zhou even found several dried-up dead mice.

These were good stuff.

Ground into powder, they could be used with small animal bone shards to create a guardian ritual.

--However, Bai Zhou's special training hadn't covered this advanced course yet, so Ya had to handle it.

The abandoned villa was slowly becoming "enriched."

It was dark everywhere, with no light, making all the arrangements exceptionally hidden.

Bai Zhou finally felt a sense of security.

--The rest can wait until tomorrow!

If any uninvited guests were to break into this "Bai Zhou Happy House," they would find too many surprises awaiting them.

He only hoped these uninvited guests were the Special Management Department's pursuers, not some foolish petty thieves...

"Drip..."

Bai Zhou climbed the stairs to the top-floor room and cleaned the place up.

--His escape had cured his germaphobia, but not completely.

Although half of the top-floor wall was gone, with wind blowing through both sides, it provided the best overlook view and the most moonlight.

"Finally, I can rest!"

Spreading his suit on the ground, Bai Zhou lay down directly.

"--There shouldn't be any special training tonight, right?"

"Mm." Ya nodded gently.

She said softly:

"You've already submitted your answer sheet for the graduation exam."

A black ribbon floated in mid-air, and she sat on it, her back to Bai Zhou, who was lying on the ground.

The night faded, and the moonlight slanted.

The morning light was faint.

A gentle breeze blew from the quiet Wind River, rustling through the wild grass and reeds, carrying a hint of damp, earthy fragrance.

It lifted Ya's clothes.

Then, the wind mixed in the scent of oranges and coffee.

"You've worked hard... You should sleep."

She faced the moonlight alone, her voice drifting.

"I'm here."

A good sleep would be enough.

After waking up, it would be a new mood, a new world.

Even if new troubles might swarm in tomorrow...

That would be a matter for tomorrow.

I've worked hard, today's me.

Please take care, tomorrow's me!

And so...

Bai Zhou hugged his arms, curled up in the corner of the broken wall on the rooftop, and slowly closed his heavy eyelids on the blanket made of his suit.

The anxiety of the past few days was released like a dam bursting.

He shivered inexplicably, and then fatigue washed over him like a tide.

The sky was about to brighten.

Bai Zhou fell asleep.

In a daze, it must have been a dream, it must have been an illusion, he seemed to vaguely see--

Miss Ya, her back to him, facing the moonlight alone, turned her head, her rainbow-colored eyes unusually soft...

She said:

"Goodnight, Bai Zhou."

It must be a dream.

...So, even sleeping in a dilapidated, drafty haunted house, tomorrow might still be worth looking forward to.

Because the concept of living is to keep running, it's okay to run until you're exhausted, as long as you're sure you have a reason to keep running.

Might as well look at the moon in the sky, look at the dawning sunlight on the horizon.

The wind, named freedom, brushed past his head.

Thus, in his "dream," Bai Zhou vaguely replied:

"Goodnight."

Goodnight, Miss Ya.

See you tomorrow.