Visitors at Home

A strange, eerie silence suddenly descended upon the alleyway; the narrow, dim space felt like the gaping maw of a man-eating beast.

A-Yuan watched Shen Qing approach and was the first to snap out of his stupor, shouting in a frantic rage, "Damn it, you dare fight back? Get him! Just make sure he doesn't die!"

He refused to believe that no matter how good a fighter one man was, he could possibly take on their entire group.

Not to mention, they were all armed with steel pipes and telescopic batons; even if a brick wall stood before them, they could have hammered a hole right through it.

Then, A-Yuan witnessed what it meant to be "hung on the wall like a painting."

The alley was narrow, allowing only one or two people to charge at a time, yet the first two didn't even get close.

With a dull "thud," they were sent flying backward, slamming into the wall and going limp, sliding down like paintings that had lost their nails.

Shen Qing's movements weren't fast—one might even call them casual—yet somehow, no one could dodge him.

The men behind them froze, and before they could even react, they suffered the same fate, crashing into the walls.

One after another, the dull "thud-thud-thud" of bodies hitting the walls echoed through the alley.

The entire process took less than ten seconds. A-Yuan looked at his subordinates, all of whom were now sprawled on the ground, and his legs couldn't help but tremble.

"Y-you, don't come any closer!" His voice cracked, rising into a sharp, panicked pitch.

This guy was clearly too good at fighting, but so what if he was?

He reached into his jacket and pulled out a switchblade, flicking it open with a sharp click, though his hand shook so violently he nearly dropped it.

"Damn it, I'm not afraid of you!"

As if trying to bolster his own courage, A-Yuan let out a sudden roar, hurled the switchblade at Shen Qing, and turned to run.

He hadn't taken two steps when he heard the sound of metal clattering behind him.

Then, a flash of intense pain struck him, feeling as if he'd been rammed by a car. His vision went black, and he suddenly understood why his subordinates hadn't made a sound after going down.

"Bang!"

A-Yuan slammed heavily into the ground.

A few seconds later, Shen Qing sat on top of him and dialed Public Security Bureau officer Wang Yu. After briefly explaining the situation, his gaze drifted inadvertently to A-Yuan's right hand.

"A tattoo, too?"

On the web of his hand was a tattoo shaped like a Withered Leaf. It was very inconspicuous; if not for his sharp eyesight, it would have looked like nothing more than a smudge in the dim alley.

Shen Qing didn't dwell on it. Even if they were part of an organized crime ring, the Public Security Bureau would handle it.

He hung up the phone and began to ponder Chen Chen's reaction earlier; it was clear he had been covering something up.

So, did he guess something?

Shen Qing wasn't sure. There were no surveillance cameras near the Alumni Grove, so under normal circumstances, no one should have known he had fought a demon.

So it must have been from another angle...

Shen Qing suddenly looked up. He realized that Chen Chen might have recognized Xie Chong.

"Are you free in the next few days? Can I treat you to a meal?"

After a moment of thought, Shen Qing sent a text message to Chen Chen. He needed to know exactly how much the other man had figured out.

Meanwhile, on the edge of the old district near the commercial street.

Wang Yu, a Public Security Bureau officer in plainclothes, put away his phone and waved a hand at the young officer beside him, who was holding a walkie-talkie with a headache-stricken expression.

"Alright, no need to waste effort trying to find nearby surveillance footage."

"Huh?" the young officer asked, confused.

"That group of thieves has already been caught." Wang Yu spat on the ground. "A dog really can't change its habit of eating dung; they couldn't even stay out of trouble for a year."

In high-traffic areas like the commercial street, especially during holidays, they always had officers on patrol.

Even so, by the time they received a report, it was usually an hour or two later, and since these people were conscious of avoiding cameras, they were nearly impossible to catch.

The only way was to interrogate the old-timers with criminal records; after all, snakes have snake paths, and rats have rat holes.

But Wang Yu never imagined that these people would actively provoke the Special Department.

Thinking of this, he couldn't help but chuckle, shaking his head. "Let's go, time to pick them up."

The young officer followed behind, looking completely bewildered.

When they arrived at the dark alley, they saw seven or eight men lying like corpses, with several steel pipes and telescopic batons scattered nearby.

The young officer's mouth hung open, and it took him a long time to squeeze out a single sentence.

"Did a large-scale gang fight happen here?"

Wang Yu crouched down to observe the men, noting that each one had been knocked unconscious with a single strike, yet their injuries weren't severe.

"Just a one-sided crushing." He picked up a telescopic baton and gave it a shake. "Armed with weapons—that adds to the sentence."

Compared to the Living Corpse from last time, which had been difficult to comprehend, this scene gave him an even clearer understanding of the strength of that Special Department member.

To handle seven or eight people in such a narrow alley.

Normally, the elites in the military could achieve this, but holding weapons was a different story; if one were to accidentally get hit, the situation could flip in an instant.

Yet, the person before him didn't look the least bit disheveled.

"Captain Wang."

Wang Yu stood up as a figure emerged from the alley—it was Shen Qing.

Seeing that Shen Qing wasn't even panting and his clothes were spotless, looking nothing like someone who had just been in a fight, his eyes filled with even more surprise as he nodded and said:

"Many thanks. We were just looking for this group ourselves."

"It was just a matter of convenience. They were the ones who sought out my friend first."

Shen Qing shook his head.

"However, Captain Wang, I suspect this is a fairly large organization. I noticed they all have the same tattoo on the webbing between their thumbs."

Wang Yu's expression turned serious upon hearing this. A uniform tattoo?

He crouched back down to inspect the webbing of each person's hands, and sure enough, they all bore a Withered Leaf tattoo—something that hadn't been there before.

"Right, I understand. Thank you for the heads-up."

Wang Yu nodded and stood up to look at Shen Qing. "However, Comrade Shen Qing, we need to briefly ask about the process; it concerns the matter of a reward."

Shen Qing waved his hand, only to hear Wang Yu continue: "Several of them are repeat offenders. The reward money could be around ten thousand."

"Hm?"

Shen Qing paused in his tracks.

Since the injuries sustained by A-Yuan and his group weren't serious, and Shen Qing was a member of a special department, he was allowed to leave after a brief explanation of the events, with the reward promised to arrive within three working days.

He had been busy for two days, so Shen Qing decided to go back and get some rest; there was no rush to cultivate at this very moment.

Soon, he returned to the apartment complex where he rented a unit.

The hallway light was still flickering. Shen Qing stared at the broken lock on his door, stunned, unsure if it was just his imagination, but it felt like there were more scratches on it than before.

He pushed the door open, acting as if nothing had happened, and turned on the light. His gaze swept across the entire room, which appeared unchanged from when he had left.

However, there were a few tiny, easily overlooked white crumbs on the floor.

Shen Qing was very puzzled. He opened the refrigerator door, and sure enough, the few cold steamed buns inside were gone.

"Swish!"

The sound of a sharp object cutting through the air erupted from behind him. Shen Qing froze, his brows furrowing.

"You steal my things, and now you want to attack the homeowner?"

Was this a coincidence, or had the people behind Wu Yuan from earlier today tracked him down this quickly?

But why steal steamed buns?

"The food... I will pay you back."

Behind him was a crisp female voice, sounding very vigilant and tense. Footsteps followed—very light, and moving further and further away.

Trying to run?!