Exchange

At the corner, Li Ran seemed to hear footsteps by the stairs and opened her eyes in a daze.

"Brother Wang Yiyang..." she called out groggily, her voice low and her face flushed a sickly, feverish red.

Wang Yiyang frowned and stepped forward.

"You've been out here all night?" he asked.

Li Ran forced a smile but didn't answer, seemingly unsure of what to say.

"Did you eat breakfast? Never mind." Wang Yiyang realized it was a pointless question. "Let's go. I'll treat you to breakfast downstairs, and then you need to head to school."

Li Ran steadied herself against the wall as she stood up, remaining silent for a moment before giving a soft reply.

"Mm... thank you, Brother Wang Yiyang."

"It's nothing. Don't worry, everything will be fine soon." Wang Yiyang didn't know how to comfort her, so he could only offer vague reassurances.

Li Ran seemed to have heard such platitudes many times before; she just smiled faintly, her expression unchanged.

They put away the blanket, and she obediently followed Wang Yiyang downstairs.

The two of them sat down at a noodle shop near the entrance of the residential complex.

The proprietress, a woman in her thirties wearing a large white apron, was busy wiping down tables.

Since the shop had just opened, Wang Yiyang and Li Ran were among her first customers.

"What can I get you?"

"Two bowls of beef noodle soup, one spicy and one mild." Wang Yiyang didn't ask Li Ran, ordering directly.

Li Ran didn't speak, keeping her head down. Once the noodles were served, she silently picked up her chopsticks and began to eat, one mouthful after another.

As she ate, tears dripped into her bowl.

Wang Yiyang didn't say anything more. He finished his own bowl quickly, then stood up to pay.

"Let's go, to school. You..." He suddenly noticed the dirty dance costume Li Ran was wearing.

If she went to school in that outfit, it would likely be very damaging for a girl.

After all, her originally white dance costume and white tights were already covered in gray and black smudges.

Wang Yiyang was momentarily stumped.

Li Ran seemed to have realized the problem as well, but she remained silent.

After they finished breakfast and left the shop, she suddenly spoke up.

"I'll go find a classmate and borrow a school uniform to change into. Thank you, Brother Wang Yiyang, please don't worry about it," she said softly.

"A close friend?" Wang Yiyang asked.

"Mm..." Li Ran nodded.

"Then... have you called her?"

"I contacted her earlier, and she agreed. Also, Brother Wang Yiyang, could you... could you lend me some... money..." Li Ran lowered her head again, her face turning bright red.

"Sure." Wang Yiyang pulled a hundred-yuan bill from his wallet and handed it to her.

Li Ran took it silently, bowed earnestly to Wang Yiyang, and then turned to dash into the stairwell, disappearing from sight in a few moments.

Wang Yiyang sighed and took out his phone to check the time. Eight-fifteen.

Today was the first day he had issued orders to mobilize the group's resources against Mantis.

The first operation had officially begun at seven this morning, with personnel gathering.

In Dada's confession, he had revealed three Mantis strongholds. The one Wang Yiyang was targeting today was the closest of them.

He had to investigate why Mantis had targeted the Yuekong Martial Arts Hall.

And why they had used such brutal, extermination-style tactics.

Of course, if he truly couldn't find any leads, he might return to the martial arts hall.

Rather than conducting various investigations in the shadows, it might be better to obtain evidence and confront Zhong Can directly, or simply ask his grandfather for the truth.

Angli Hotel in Yingxing City.

Two tall men with buzz cuts were standing idly in the alley outside the hotel, smoking and chatting in low voices.

The sun was approaching its zenith, and the temperature was slowly rising.

Despite this, both men were wearing thick, hooded sweatshirts, with the edges of black masks visible in their pockets.

"Is the target's location confirmed?" one of them asked in a low voice.

"It was confirmed a long time ago. That guy was seen earlier and hasn't left the hotel since. As long as we guard the entrance without being detected, there's no way he can escape," the other replied calmly.

"That's true."

As frontline operatives for the Mantis, even with less than three years of training, their combat prowess far exceeded that of the average person thanks to rigorous specialized drills and pharmacological enhancement.

Thump-thump-thump-thump...

Suddenly, a heavy, rhythmic sound approached rapidly from the distance.

"The construction noise in the city has been getting louder lately; I feel like I can't even sleep soundly anymore," one of them chuckled, taking a drag of his cigarette.

"Maybe the government started another urban renewal project. Those officials are all the same—tearing down perfectly good structures just to rebuild them, only to tear them down again," the other shook his head.

"Forget it, it's none of our business. Let's go, finish the job so we can get home."

One of them flicked his cigarette butt away, crushed it under his boot, and strode toward the alley exit.

The two had barely stepped out of the alley, their smiles still lingering, when they saw squads of heavily armed police—clad in black bulletproof gear, wielding riot shields, and carrying submachine guns—rushing toward the Angli Hotel, their heads adorned with infrared scanners.

Bang!

The main entrance was smashed open.

"Lockdown!"

"This is a riot control drill! This is a riot control drill! All unauthorized personnel, please evacuate the area immediately!"

"This is a riot control drill! This is a riot control drill! All unauthorized personnel, please evacuate the area immediately!"

High above, several armed helicopters swept the area with blinding searchlights, the stark white beams scanning across the hotel windows like lasers.

The thunderous roar of the rotors was exactly the "construction noise" the two had heard moments ago.

"..."

"..."

The cigarette butt still hanging from one man's mouth fell silently to the ground, yet he didn't even notice.

The two stared blankly at the scene unfolding before them.

At least a hundred armed riot police had completely surrounded the Angli Hotel. In the distance, police cars arrived one after another, from which squads of armed SWAT officers rapidly disembarked.

Further away, red dots flickered into existence, scanning across the hotel floors—the laser sights of snipers.

"There are two more people here!" a low shout came from behind them.

"We're law-abiding citizens!!" The two shuddered, immediately raising their hands high and shouting. They crouched to the ground, hands clasped behind their heads, not daring to move a muscle.

"If you're law-abiding, why are you so practiced at crouching??" The voice behind them carried a hint of strangeness.

"Take them away!"

The two were left completely dumbfounded.

Just as they were being handcuffed and led away, a massive armed helicopter approached the Angli Hotel, accompanied by the deafening roar of its rotors.

The cabin door slid open, revealing the face of Jian as he looked down at the hotel, which was being systematically occupied.

A moment later, he pulled out his walkie-talkie and flipped the switch.

"Boss, the primary stronghold has been successfully intercepted. With the military's support, we have it perfectly surrounded. Do you wish to see the live progress?"

"I only care about the results," Wang Yiyang's calm, icy voice came through the other end.

"Understood."

Closing the walkie-talkie, Jian waved his hand, and several ropes were quickly tossed from the helicopter behind him.

Soldiers in full tactical gear slid rapidly down the ropes, landing on the hotel roof.

As soon as one soldier touched down, he quickly set up a small, precision instrument he had been carrying on his back.

The device was pitch black, with four speaker-like rings mounted around it.

Following the soldier's operation, a hidden touchscreen unfolded from the top of the device, and a flurry of black-and-white data flashed across the screen.

Beep... beep... beep...

As the data scrolled, the base of the instrument began emitting rapid, imperceptible microwaves that permeated from the roof down dozens of meters into the ground.

As the waves spread, the screen shifted rapidly, displaying a dense cluster of red dots.

These were markers representing living people inside the building. Every red dot was a person.

Aside from this soldier, the rest of the team dispersed like ink dropped into clear water, rapidly infiltrating the hotel.

Some rappelled down the exterior walls, some descended the stairwells, and others even used cutters to slice through the floorboards to reach the levels below.

Click.

Jian took a firearm handed to him by a subordinate, disengaged the safety, and walked slowly toward the stairwell.

"Boss, I heard there are quite a few martial arts experts in here. Be careful," his deputy whispered a warning.

"Martial arts?" Jian fired a shot casually. Bang.

A figure rushing out of the stairwell to the front right exploded in a spray of blood and collapsed to the ground.

"I used to be one, too."

He carried his gun, said nothing more, and strode into the stairwell.

Gunshots, explosions, roars, and screams echoed incessantly throughout the hotel building.

Wang Yiyang watched the scene outside the cafe in silence: the flowing streets, the flowing crowds, the flowing traffic, and the flowing waves of noise.

In the coffee cup resting on the pristine white tablecloth before him, the Red Leaf Coffee, heavily diluted with milk, was being slowly stirred by a spoon, creating concentric ripples.

Once the mission objectives and the execution units were confirmed, he suddenly found himself with nothing to do.

If he were actually forced to command on-site, he wouldn't dare.

If a stray bullet were to fly his way, or if a stray enemy were to get close, he—being utterly powerless—would suffer a massive loss even from the slightest scratch.

He was a man who cherished his life dearly.

Why go to the front lines when he could command from the safety of the rear?

He wasn't one of those brain-dead villains from the movies who, just as their plans were nearing success, had to jump out to explain everything, savoring the shocked and stunned expressions of their opponents.

Only to be countered at the last second and die a miserable death.

The highest realm of planning was to ensure that when the enemy died, they still believed their nemesis was someone else entirely.

Or to make them believe that their misfortune was merely a stroke of bad luck.

Of course, he was still far from reaching that level, so the only thing Wang Yiyang could do was hide in the rear.

He picked up the coffee, took a small sip of the dark brown liquid, frowned, and set the cup back down before tearing open another packet of sugar and pouring it in.

This was already the third packet of sugar he had added.

For some reason, the sugar in this cafe seemed to lack sweetness; no matter how much he added, it never tasted quite sweet enough.