Night, Boiling!

During morning study the next day, the clear chirping of birds drifted faintly in through the window.

Gu Jianlin sat in his usual seat, silently eating a hamburger as he stared blankly at his phone.

All around him, pen tips scraped across exam papers.

Only Su Youzhu was an exception. The girl had already fallen asleep with her head on her desk.

Early that morning, Gu Jianlin had asked her for the so-called love letter and spent a long time studying the handwriting.

Most of the confession at the beginning was nonsense. Only the last few lines contained an obvious hint or warning.

"First, he's telling me that if he can pass Youzhu a love letter, he can kill her, too."

"Second, he's warning me not to tell anyone. He knows I've joined the Ether Association. If he senses danger, he'll go after Youzhu first as punishment for me."

"Third, the appointed time might just be a ruse. There's a good chance this guy will make his move on Youzhu beforehand."

He tapped a finger lightly on the desk. He couldn't waste any more time.

"I can't pin my hopes on the Ether Association or Lu Zicheng and the others, either. I don't know how they operate, and if word gets out and Joker senses danger, he'll flee at once. It's hard to say whether the Ether Association can even protect my family. After all, he has ways to stay hidden."

He analyzed the situation to himself. "What's more, there's Mom and Uncle Su."

When it came to his family, he wouldn't take even a one-in-a-million chance.

He had to use the safest method.

Joker had to die.

If he had any accomplices, they had to be eliminated, too.

Otherwise, Gu Jianlin's family would never know peace.

Old Gu had once told him that if he wanted to defeat a criminal, he couldn't follow the other person's logic.

He had to break out of that logic and win through an unexpected move.

At the moment, Joker held the initiative because no one could find him.

If his ability to stay hidden failed, that would be another story.

Lu Zicheng would make short work of him.

"If I can find Joker, he'll lose the initiative for good."

Gu Jianlin's finger paused against the desk. "The price is that I'll have to bear all the risks alone, because he survived the Blood Moon Massacre and came here for revenge."

"Joker's rank is higher than mine, but I have Dual-Core Drive and a gun. Most importantly, he has the ability to mutate. If it's anything like Li Changzhi, then he really is dangerous. But..."

Back in the Kirin Immortal Palace, Gu Jianlin had been in a state that was unmistakably that of an Ancient God.

He had also possessed immense strength, especially when it came to that strange syllable.

But after returning to the real world, he could no longer unleash that kind of destructive power.

The Black Kirin deep in his consciousness was asleep, too.

Unless it was stirred by mental distress or fed spiritual energy, it didn't move at all.

It might as well have been dead.

"How do I wake it up?"

After a moment's hesitation, Gu Jianlin picked up his phone and left the classroom.

Just then, Su Youzhu raised her head groggily and glanced at his retreating figure.

A park in a quiet corner of the campus lay beneath the sunlight.

Someone held a phone to his ear and smoked a cigarette, speaking with a grin. "Heh, just as we expected, the Ether Association has its eye on us. They've probably sent people from the Tribunal, too."

A hoarse voice came through the phone. "I'm amazed you can still laugh, Joker."

Joker stubbed out his cigarette and chuckled disdainfully. "Why so serious? The people from the Ether Association have no idea what we went through back then. And the Non-Existent Lock and Soul-Pacifying Bell I have are nothing compared to the perfect evolutionary chain."

The other person replied, "Without the Non-Existent Lock, the Tribunal would have killed you a long time ago. You'd better be careful. How could someone of your rank contain those two weapons without paying with your life?"

Mythic Armaments were worth far more than Alchemy Armaments.

But not everyone was qualified to wield them.

Anyone who tried to contain a Mythic Armament by force had to risk having their life and soul devoured.

"As long as we complete that esteemed person's mission, we'll get the full evolution and be reborn." Joker licked his lips.

A stern voice came through the phone.

"Joker, don't create unnecessary complications!"

The other person went on, "Even with your newfound ability to mutate, you can't take them on head-to-head."

Joker's mouth curled into a sinister smile. "With that esteemed person's Necro-Gu, what's there to fear?"

After a moment of silence, the other person said, "Do as you like. Have you found Gu Ci'an's son?"

"He's been in my sights this whole time."

Joker's voice was calm. "As long as his family is still in Feng City, he can't get away. He's in the open, I'm in the shadows. I'll always have the initiative. As for the Ether Association... heh."

He scoffed. "He's Gu Ci'an's son. How much could the Ether Association really trust him?"

With that, he hung up, cigarette between his lips, and disappeared into the shadows.

Joker had great confidence in himself.

He was the hunter.

His prey was nothing but a rookie who had just entered the supernatural world.

To him, the boy was an ant.

He could crush him whenever he pleased.

As for the Ether Association and the Tribunal, they were nothing but a bunch of fools.

They were no threat.

But as he passed the balcony of the girls' dormitory, he spotted a letter lying there.

"Your life is what you love?"

Joker fell into thought.

In the empty garden behind Fengcheng No. 2 High School, Gu Jianlin stood beside the grass, looking down at the bloodstains that had yet to be cleaned up. He said nothing.

The blood had dried, turning a deep, mottled dark red.

Animal fur was scattered on the ground.

A pet bowl sat by the flower bed, its food long gone bad and foul-smelling.

Suppressing his revulsion, Gu Jianlin carefully sniffed the scents.

He pieced them together with the animal carcass he had seen the night before, searching for clues step by step.

The overturned pet bowl, the scattered fur, the blood sprayed across the ground, the grass stained red, the footprints crushing it, the depressions in the soil, and the scribbled handwriting on the love letter—all the clues linked together, one by one.

That was enough.

Gu Jianlin closed his eyes and gradually built a profile of the killer in his mind.

His cruelty, his sickness, his madness.

It was chilling.

"Forty-six years old. A dark personality. Grew up in a foreign slum, perhaps witnessed a shooting and suffered domestic abuse. Likes torturing animals. Has been single for years. Received a higher education as an adult. Extremely unstable mental state."

Gu Jianlin paused. "And he has inhuman traits."

Good. It matched the information in the file.

So it really was you, Joker!

For an instant, he opened his eyes, and a strange image flashed before him.

Sharp, blade-like limbs, accompanied by a spray of blood, split open the belly of some animal.

A bloodied hand reached inside the animal and plucked out a still-beating heart.

Fragments of images flashed through his mind and vanished in an instant, like scenery whipping past the window when a car was speeding at full throttle.

Gu Jianlin turned and searched through the weeds. Only after a long time did he find a strand of spider silk.

It was so fine that anyone who didn't look carefully would surely miss it.

"This Joker is really cautious. He left almost no trace of himself. Good thing there's this strand of spider silk." Gu Jianlin took out a tissue, carefully picked it up, wrapped it, and slipped it into his pocket.

It was precious material for a curse.

The profile was more or less complete. All that remained was to compare it against people one by one.

This time, Gu Jianlin had to find someone capable of concealing his identity somewhere on the entire school campus. It was more work than ever before.

But it was a challenge for him, too.

That was fine. He could skip all his classes today and take his time searching.

He was a patient person.

Gu Jianlin put on his Bluetooth earbuds and started playing music on his phone, putting it on repeat.

As the classical melody flowed and twisted, a plaintive male voice rang out.

"An alley in 1983, a clear December night, chapter seven of the night..."

The campus lay beneath the dusk.

The classroom buildings, science buildings, office blocks, basketball courts, swimming pool, and restrooms.

In one classroom, the math teacher was already writing problems on the blackboard, while fifty students sat below, completely absorbed.

No one noticed the boy with earbuds hurrying past the door.

In the science building, the chemistry teacher shouted at the top of his lungs as clumsy students fumbled with their test tubes.

On the basketball court, the game was in full swing. The blue and red uniforms of the two school teams crisscrossed as sweat poured down their faces.

Their panting mixed with the thumping sound of the basketballs slamming against the court.

Only one person sat in the stands, watching them in silence, a lollipop between his lips.

At the school's swimming pool, girls in swimsuits splashed and played in the water, their well-developed figures stretching freely. Droplets danced across their snow-white skin as they swam beneath the surface, light as fish.

In the gym next door, a junior in white lace was practicing ballet, spinning effortlessly on one foot.

Her skirt opened and fell like a lily, a lovely sight.

The boy wearing earbuds watched them in silence, then headed straight for the restroom.

The guys in the men's room saw a figure flash past the door and thought they'd seen a ghost.

A pretty teacher had just come out of the women's restroom when she nearly collided with a boy wearing earbuds. She cried out in surprise.

A dozing kitten by the path rubbed affectionately against his ankle.

Across the vast campus, Gu Jianlin hurried past everyone like a wandering ghost.

He kept profiling them in his mind, recording the results as he went.

It was as if there were a palace of memory inside his brain, filled with books. Every book contained a profile of a different person, recording who they truly were.

Before becoming an Ascender, he might not have been able to do something so astonishing.

But ever since he awakened, his profiling ability seemed to have grown stronger, too.

Perhaps... it was the evolution of life.

Over the course of nearly an entire day, he even found the Ether Association's plants at the school.

By then, the sun was sinking in the west.

The music in his earbuds began another cycle after playing an unknown number of times.

Gu Jianlin adjusted his earbuds and walked silently toward the cafeteria, his right hand on the gun at his waist.

He moved through the darkness, his footsteps growing faster and faster.

As if he were following a certain rhythm.

"We can forget, forgive."

"But we must know the truth."

"The iron window that was moved."

"At last, the final piece of the puzzle falls into place."

Bang.

The cafeteria doors were shoved open, and a cool breeze rushed inside, stirring up dust across the floor.

The sunlight vanished, and darkness swept over everything. Someone was already preparing to serve food on the first floor, while the second and third floors lay dim and dark. The stairwell elevator wasn't running, and nothing could be seen.

Someone entered the third floor with an arm around a girl. They looked like a couple in love and disappeared around the corridor's corner.

Gu Jianlin stood in the darkness, watching his back.

The melody in his earbuds reached its climax.

"I hear the footsteps I expected, the soft leather heels."

"He pushes open the door; the evening breeze stirs the kerosene lamp."

"The typewriter stops at the killer's name. I turn..."

"The night sky above Westminster begins to boil."

In Gu Jianlin's vision, the person's silhouette gradually twisted, as if it had become a magician wearing a clown mask.

Gu Jianlin had finally found the person he'd been looking for.

He had spent the whole day observing countless faces across the school, and in the end, he had identified the figure he'd just seen.

He had looked at this person three times, confirming beyond a doubt that it was him.

The cafeteria was dimly lit. Students carrying the dinners they had bought brushed past him as he walked in like a ghost.

The dim glow of dusk illuminated his back, light and shadow meeting at the edges.

He stepped into the darkness as if entering another world. The clamor of the mortal realm receded at speed, and mystery and strangeness surged toward him.

Clear footsteps suddenly rang out from the stairwell. A girl with pale azure short hair came up the stairs, wearing her school jacket loosely over her shoulders. Her figure was petite and graceful, her back slender and willowy.

Gu Jianlin was startled. He hadn't expected her to be here at this hour!

No, it wasn't that she just happened to be here.

It was that Joker was lurking nearby.

Su Youzhu had only come to the cafeteria to buy some tremella porridge. She hadn't had much of an appetite today, but none of the third-floor food stalls were open yet, so she decided to go upstairs and sit by herself for a while. She was used to keeping to herself, anyway.

For a homebody, as long as her phone had battery, it was the same as roaming the whole world.

Just then, she suddenly heard strange sounds coming from the corridor ahead, along with some odd cries.

It sounded like rustling clothes, and lips and teeth kissing, sucking.

A woman's low moans followed, as if she were in pain.

Her pretty face flushed. She was about to turn and leave, thinking that someone was getting hot and heavy in the cafeteria corridor. How shameless.

Suddenly, someone came up behind her, wrapped an arm around her waist, and pulled her tightly into his embrace.

Su Youzhu was about to scream when a hand covered her lips.

"Shh."

Gu Jianlin held her slender waist and led her step by step behind the corner. His eyes remained fixed on the darkness in the corridor ahead as he whispered in her ear, "Don't make a sound. It's dangerous here."

Thump, thump.

It was the sound of a heartbeat.

Su Youzhu's heart raced with fright, but when she heard the familiar voice beside her, she opened her clear, bright eyes wide. She turned and saw the boy's stern profile, and didn't struggle.

She didn't know what was happening. She watched him silently, seemingly stunned.

In the few months they'd spent as siblings, this was the closest they'd ever been.

Gu Jianlin's hand pressed firmly over her mouth. It didn't smell of sweat; instead, there was a faint fragrance of hand soap. Her breath had dampened his palm, and he'd probably gotten some of her lipstick on it by now.

As for the so-called danger, she had no idea what it was.

Her heart was simply racing on instinct.

"Listen to me. When I let go, run out immediately. Don't look back. Head toward the most crowded place you can find. There are people at the school who can protect you. Understand? It's dangerous here. There's a murderer."

Gu Jianlin lowered his voice. "Do as I say."

His voice was so steady it seemed almost magical.

Su Youzhu had some idea what his father did for a living. As a profiler, he'd solved plenty of major cases, so it was only natural that his enemies might come after him. The thought made her nervous, and she raised her phone to show him.

Gu Jianlin moved in front of her, shielding her. "There's no time."

They'd only lived together for four months, but she'd never once rejected him.

Instead, she'd kindly looked after him and tried to help him fit into the family.

He couldn't let anything happen to her.

Otherwise, Mom would be heartbroken.

For an instant, a gaunt shadow appeared in the corridor.

Gu Jianlin saw it and sensed that someone was standing at the far end of the hallway.

He took a deep breath and mouthed, "Do as I say, then call the police and come back for me."

At that moment, Gu Jianlin finally understood how his father had felt during the car accident.

This was what it felt like to want to protect someone.

"Go!"

He suddenly shouted and shoved the girl out of his arms.

Su Youzhu stumbled backward from the force of his push. Her pale azure hair fell into disarray, and her eyes were filled with tension and worry. Then, without hesitation, she rushed down the stairs and fled outside.

Good. She was calm. Absolutely perfect!

With a bang, a cloud of smoke exploded, and a shadow appeared out of nowhere behind the boy.

Gu Jianlin grabbed a chair, spun around, and swung it behind him!