The Young Shen He

Just as Xu Shi had said.

Shen He's life had not been going well lately.

Nearly two weeks had passed since Luo Zhikang went missing. Combined with the base's tightly shut doors and the bodyguards who had vanished with him, even an idiot could tell that something had happened to him.

Shen He could also guess that this was Serpent Coil's doing again.

Their relentless pressure was making it hard for him to breathe, but what he could not understand even more was why they were always able to pinpoint his weak spots so accurately.

Xia Wuyou was one thing—after all, she worked for Serpent Coil... But what happened afterward was simply baffling.

The raid on the District 13 factory had been a private deal between him and He Yuqiang. No third party should have known about it.

Not to mention that he had launched the operation the very next day after finalizing it, precisely to catch them off guard.

Yet Serpent Coil had still been prepared, reinforcing the place with a large number of guards and making them pay a terrible price.

What happened to Luo Zhikang was even more absurd. Old Mr. Luo had concealed his identity and lain low in some corner of District 12 for nearly ten years, never drawing anyone's attention.

That was enough to show just how well he had hidden himself... Even Shen He himself had been quite shocked when he learned that the old man was still alive.

Yet not long after Shen He handed Sea Crane over to him, Serpent Coil's people had appeared and abducted him.

All of this gave Shen He a feeling.

The person pulling the strings behind the scenes had every detail firmly under control and had arranged everything in advance based on that knowledge.

Everyone else was merely acting along the path he had planned.

That was what Shen He found hardest to understand—even Tianhe back then could not possibly have been this capable.

So what gave Xu Shi the right...?

From the bottom of his heart, Shen He did not believe that playboy possessed such ability, but the facts before him left him no choice but to accept it.

From the moment he began taking action against Serpent Coil, his once smooth-sailing life had taken a sharp turn for the worse.

He had spent immense manpower and resources, only to gain nothing in the end. The one operation that could be called a "success" had soon been snuffed out as well.

The string of failures had undoubtedly dealt him a massive blow. The foundation Spark had painstakingly built up had been worn down by more than half, while several of its most important talents were either dead or injured.

Not to mention that he had personally suffered the ruthless betrayal of someone he cherished.

Tch...

Just then, his wrist communicator rang.

"Boss, Boss! Lei Song is awake!"

!

This was probably the best news Shen He had heard in a long while. Without giving it much thought, he hurried over.

Lei Song, lying in the hospital bed, was still very weak. The extensive burns and his missing arm made him look somewhat horrifying.

"Boss..."

"It's good that you're awake. Good that you're awake."

Shen He let out a breath. "You're still very weak. Rest properly for now."

"...I was incompetent. I failed your expectations."

Lei Song was deeply moved by his words, but then he became agitated again. "It's all that bitch from the Inspection Bureau's fault! I... Sooner or later, I'll chop her into eight pieces!"

The grudge of a severed arm was truly irreconcilable.

"Mm-hm."

Shen He nodded along, though he knew this would not be easy to handle.

The media had been covering the matter nonstop these past few days, and Shen He had learned that the person who arrived at the scene had been Director Tang Shuang of the Inspection Bureau.

Dealing with her would probably be no easier than dealing with Serpent Coil.

At least for now, he did not have the strength or energy to do so.

And that was not what concerned him most.

"I saw in the news that there was another person at the scene. They were eventually listed as a wanted criminal along with you?"

He asked curiously, "That person wasn't one of ours... Did he save you?"

"Yes."

At the mention of his savior, Lei Song's attitude noticeably softened. "If he hadn't stepped in to save me, I probably wouldn't have made it back alive."

"But my eyes were injured at the time, so I couldn't see clearly. I only know that he..."

As Shen He listened to his fragmented account, his expression gradually became strange.

He had already been somewhat suspicious when he saw the wanted notice released by the Inspection Bureau.

Combined with what Lei Song had said, why did it feel like... this person was Xia Wuyou?

After her failure at Huajin Plain, Shen He had roughly learned about Xia Wuyou's ability—it was related to gravity, very similar to that Armored Man.

But hadn't she already chosen Xu Shi's side? Why would she save Lei Song at such a critical moment?

Such contradictory behavior truly puzzled Shen He. Could it be that she was merely pretending to cooperate with Xu Shi? That what happened before had also been something she had no choice but to do?

...Or was this Xu Shi's arrangement again, with some other scheme hidden behind it?

From the bottom of his heart, he wanted to believe the first possibility, but reason forced him to lean toward the second.

This psychological struggle was undoubtedly painful.

"Boss, speaking of which, what happened with the drones?"

Lei Song had no idea what he was thinking and instead asked about what concerned him. "That old Luo—ptui, ptui—did Old Mr. Luo crack them?"

"..."

Shen He was immediately at a loss for words.

Lei Song had only just awakened. Shen He truly could not bear to, nor did he have the nerve to, tell him that the matter Lei Song had nearly sacrificed his life for had already gone down the drain.

Even Luo Zhikang himself had...

But just as he was trying to find the words, someone else answered for him.

A bullet shattered the ward's window and flew straight between the two of them.

"What's going on?!"

Lei Song abruptly sat up. "Who's shooting?"

He had not expected anyone to be so bold as to cause trouble like this on Spark's turf.

But Shen He did not look surprised at all.

Because incidents like this had happened countless times recently.

Their repeated defeats and the collapse of their partnership with Shark Tooth had caused Spark's influence in Sin City to plummet. Its control over many strongholds was no longer what it once was.

This gave other gangs an opening, and they began steadily encroaching on Spark's territory.

At first, it had only been gangs of comparable size. Later, even scattered little organizations dared to step on them.

And those gangs all had one thing in common—they had all received, to varying degrees, equipment support from Shark Tooth.

It was obvious that He Yuqiang intended to wipe Spark out completely.

With such a siege and Spark's own severely weakened state, it had lost quite a few strongholds in less than two weeks, and its room to survive had been drastically compressed.

Even their current hideout had already been relocated several times.

The explosions that followed proved that this was yet another of the many attacks... Or was it not?!

Because through the window, Shen He saw a heavy armored vehicle slowly approaching in his direction.

This was Shark Tooth's flagship product, the Gray Bear!

And Shen He knew full well that Shark Tooth would never use a weapon of this caliber to support Sin City's gangs.

So it could only be...

"Shen! If I don't toss you into this armored vehicle and grind you into minced meat today, then my fucking surname isn't He!"

P.S.:

Gray Bear:

An all-terrain armored vehicle produced by Shark Tooth.

Built from high-toughness alloy and equipped with an energy shield, it was costly to manufacture but possessed extremely high physical defense.

By dismantling and replacing certain components, it could be modified into either a "mobile fortress" or a "command post."

It could also be used as a transport truck under normal circumstances.