His inner alarm bells blared. Chen Mochuan sprang to his feet and dashed out of the bun shop.
Looking up, he saw a short, skinny figure in the distance across the street. At some point, it had appeared there and was now stumbling as it ran toward the mouth of the gloomy alley.
"Damn it!" Chen Mochuan thought.
Though his brief chat with the female shopkeeper and trip inside had lasted only a moment, they had inevitably left a blind spot in his surveillance. He had failed to spot the child running from the far end of the street sooner.
But now was no time for regret. The child was already close to the alley, and Chen Mochuan had no time to think things through. He sank his Qi to his dantian and shouted, "Kid, stop! It's dangerous over there!"
Worried the child might not hear him from so far away, he even incorporated the still-unpracticed Tiger Roaring technique into his shout. It was nowhere near powerful enough to shake anyone's mind, but at least it made his voice carry farther.
The child jumped at the sudden roar and stopped, turning to look at him in confusion.
He shouted something, but he was still far away, and the child's voice was choked with tears. Chen Mochuan could only make out a few words: "Looking for... Daddy..."
The child paused only briefly. His determination to find his father overcame his fear of a stranger's warning, and he turned back toward the alley.
Could the person calling for help inside the alley be this child's father? The thought flashed through Chen Mochuan's mind.
At the same time, his body had already acted before his reason could catch up. He raced toward the boy, trying to stop him from entering the dangerous alley.