Zhang Tian stood frozen, staring blankly at the iron cuff around his wrist.
"Damn it! What the hell is going on?"
Just then, the man in the jacket stood up, pulled a small black booklet from his pocket, flipped it open, and shoved it in Zhang Tian's face.
"Don't resist! Sea City Destiny Bureau!"
As soon as he finished speaking, the man in the jacket twisted Zhang Tian's arm behind his back and slammed him against the wall.
All of Zhang Tian's defiance vanished in an instant. The moment he heard the words "Destiny Bureau," he abandoned any thought of resisting and obediently pressed himself against the wall.
It had all happened too fast.
Gu Yuan and Zhang Yining, crouching behind them, jolted awake, still unsure what was going on.
Then two figures suddenly darted out of the crowd.
"Stay still! Don't move!"
Two Destiny Bureau agents charged out of the shadows.
The agent on the left grabbed Gu Yuan by the shoulder with a grappling hold.
Gu Yuan and Zhang Yining didn't resist at all.
They clasped their hands over their heads with practiced ease.
The scam artists manning the nearby stalls, on the other hand, went into a frenzy.
They didn't even bother to pick up the counterfeit goods on their stalls. In an instant, they scattered in every direction without a moment's hesitation.
"Seal the exits! Don't let a single one get away!"
The man in the jacket barked.
A large group of uniformed law-enforcement officers immediately poured into the passage behind them, batons in hand, and rushed after the fleeing crowd.
In less than five minutes, all the vendors who had scattered in every direction had been brought back by the officers. Not one escaped. They were gathered in the middle of the passage.
"Officer! We've been framed! We're just selling a bit of scrap in the black market to feed our families. We haven't broken the law!"
A fat man lay on the ground, wailing at the top of his lungs.
"Exactly! Even the Destiny Bureau can't just arrest people without a reason! I'm selling legitimate ferocious-beast materials!"
A thin man beside him chimed in.
A chorus of protests broke out in the crowd. More than a dozen vendors shouted that they were innocent.
The man in the jacket turned around, pulled a baton from his belt, and slammed it against the iron pillar beside him.
The piercing clang drowned out all the commotion.
"Enough nonsense!"
The man in the jacket pointed his baton at the black-market vendors.
"We've been keeping an eye on you counterfeit-medicine and fake-equipment peddlers for almost a week!"
"You've got some nerve! The Destiny Bureau's been stretched thin lately, so you've been brazenly selling fake medicine here—and even dealing in contraband!"
The man in the jacket swept his gaze over the crowd.
"Today, every stall owner in this black market is coming back to the Destiny Bureau for questioning! Not one gets left behind!"
About three minutes later,
two law-enforcement officers led over two young men. Both looked sallow, and one was clutching his stomach, his legs trembling.
"Take a good look. Is the person who sold you your stuff among them?"
The man in the jacket pointed at the black-market vendors gathered together.
The young man clutching his stomach jerked his head up. After scanning the crowd, he excitedly pointed at a middle-aged man crouched in the corner and shouted,
"It's him! It's him! He's the one!"
The young man stamped his feet in agitation.
"I took his so-called 'internal Blood Qi Pill,' and I've had the runs all day! I was stuck on the toilet and nearly died of dehydration in there!"
"Damn it, I turned into a human sprinkler!"
The other young man standing beside him was even more worked up. He stepped forward and pointed at a fat man, cursing him out.
"And that fat bastard selling the crappy chest armor!"
"I'd barely left the city and reached the wilderness when an Iron-Armored Pig gave me a light nudge. My chest armor shattered into eight pieces, and I broke three ribs! If I hadn't run fast, I'd have been dead!"
The young man lunged forward. If the officers hadn't held him back by the arms, he would've rushed over and slapped the fat man.
After hearing the two victims' testimony, Zhang Tian, still pinned against the wall, began to protest.
"Big brother! Officer! You've got the wrong guy! I'm not with them! I just got here today!"
"We're law-abiding citizens! I'm a first-year student at Martial University! I'm selling defective pills made by a Martial University professor, genuine goods—not contraband!"
Gu Yuan lay on the ground, his mind racing.
This is the Destiny Bureau! My cousin Shen Tingxue is a team leader there. If they take me back as a suspect in selling contraband and I end up in her hands, I'll be lucky to get out in one piece.
"Officer, please hear me out! He dragged me along to make up the numbers! I don't know anything!"
"I don't even know what's in his bottles! I'm a law-abiding, studious high school senior who just happened to be passing by!"
Gu Yuan looked utterly sincere as he sold out his friend without a second thought.
Zhang Yining lay beside him, froze for half a second, then quickly nodded along.
"Right, right! Officer, we were just here to see what was going on. We don't even know him!"
With his face still pressed against the wall, Zhang Tian struggled to turn his head and stared at Gu Yuan and Zhang Yining in disbelief.
The man in the jacket sneered.
He let go of Zhang Tian, pulled out his phone, tapped the screen, and shoved it right under Zhang Tian's nose.
"See for yourself!"
"Your situation is a lot more serious than selling fake medicine!"
The phone displayed a clear, secretly taken photo.
In the picture, Zhang Tian was furtively pulling two white porcelain bottles from his shirt and setting them on the table.
Gu Yuan and Zhang Yining were leaning in from either side, craning their necks to stare at the bottles.
The photo had been taken from an extremely tricky angle, perfectly capturing the three of them gathered around the bottles.
"Someone has filed a report under their real name, accusing you of reselling high-risk contraband in the black market!"
The man in the jacket put his phone away and slapped Zhang Tian on the back of the head.
"With witnesses and evidence right here, what do you three have to say for yourselves?"
Zhang Tian stared at the photo, frozen stiff.
"Wait, Officer, why don't you just open the bottles and see what's insi—"
"Shut up! I've been trying to inspect them since earlier, but you kept getting in the way!"
The man in the jacket rudely cut Zhang Tian off and waved to his subordinates.
"Save it for the interrogation room at the Destiny Bureau! Take them all away!"
Gu Yuan's heart sank.
I'm screwed.
If I step through the Destiny Bureau's doors, my reputation is finished.
Just as the Destiny Bureau officers were about to take the black-market vendors back,
a young woman in a Destiny Bureau uniform strolled leisurely into the black market.
She carried a large bag of original-flavor potato chips and grabbed a handful with her right hand, stuffing them into her mouth.
The needle on the compass in her hand was spinning wildly.
The woman paid no attention to the vendors being arrested around her. As she chewed her chips, she stared down at the spinning compass and muttered something indistinctly.
Gu Yuan looked up, his gaze sweeping over the woman's face.
Gu Yuan's eyes suddenly lit up, as if he'd found a lifeline.
"Big Sister Miaomiao!"
Before you continue