At five-thirty in the morning, the base's wake-up call had yet to sound. Lin Xiao opened his eyes to a room shrouded in darkness. He looked toward the folding cot in the corner—Nightingale was curled up there, the blanket pulled to her chin, her breathing even. Su Ying sat in a chair with her eyes closed, but Lin Xiao knew she was awake. He rose quietly and walked to the door, placing his hand on the handle. The metal was cold. He needed to get breakfast for all three of them from the mess hall without drawing suspicion. But just as he was about to turn the handle, footsteps sounded in the corridor—not the heavy boots of a patrol, but lighter, quicker steps approaching this room. They stopped outside the door. Then came a knock. Not a coded signal, but a regular knock with an official air to it: knock, knock, knock.
Lin Xiao's hand froze on the handle.
Su Ying opened her eyes. Her body did not move, but her right hand had already slid toward her waist—where a dagger was hidden. Nightingale's breathing rhythm changed. She was awake, but she made no sound.
Knock, knock, knock.
The knocking came again, heavier than before.
Lin Xiao took a deep breath, turned the handle, and opened the door.
Wolf stood outside.
He wore the base's gray training uniform, his hair still wet as though he had just washed his face. His eyes were bloodshot, but bright. Seeing Lin Xiao, he lowered his voice. "Captain, something's happened."
Lin Xiao stepped aside to let him in, then closed the door.
Tension filled the room. Nightingale sat up from the folding cot, the blanket slipping to her waist and revealing the ill-fitting base training uniform Su Ying had found for her the night before. Her eyes remained fixed on Wolf, while her fingers curled faintly beneath the blanket.
"What is it?" Lin Xiao asked.
Wolf glanced at Nightingale, then at Lin Xiao, seeming unsure whether he should speak in front of this stranger. Lin Xiao nodded, signaling for him to continue.
"That anomalous data packet," Wolf said. "I traced it further."
He took a folded piece of paper from his pocket and opened it. It contained hand-drawn waveform charts and densely packed pencil notes. Lin Xiao accepted it and examined it by the faint light filtering in through the window. The handwriting was messy, but it was obvious Wolf had been up all night.
"The signal's final jump coordinates," Wolf said, pointing to a spot on the paper. "Last night, I used one of the base's backup servers to trace it in reverse. Multiple layers of encryption interfered, but I still caught several key nodes. The final traceable node was in Manhattan, New York. The exact coordinates... are here."
He tapped a number with the pencil tip: 40.7128° N, 74.0060° N.
Lin Xiao stared at the string of numbers.
New York.
Several names flashed through his mind at once: Nick Fury, director of S.H.I.E.L.D., who should currently be sitting in some office at the Triskelion, studying global threat assessment reports. Tony Stark, Iron Man, tinkering with his new armor in a lab atop Stark Tower. And Captain America—though he was still frozen beneath the Arctic ice, S.H.I.E.L.D. had already discovered his location and was planning a recovery operation.
But the encryption style of a "private or special project"...
Lin Xiao remembered what Nightingale had said the night before. That sort of encryption protocol was not standard S.H.I.E.L.D. equipment, but something privately commissioned by certain high-ranking figures or special project teams. That meant the party intercepting his anonymous report might not be S.H.I.E.L.D. itself, but someone within the organization—or a small group.
"What about the encryption characteristics?" Lin Xiao asked.
"Just like Nightingale said," Wolf replied. "A nonstandard protocol, multilayer nesting, and a self-destruct mechanism. When I tried to crack the third layer, I triggered an alarm and cut the connection immediately." He paused. "Protection at this level isn't something ordinary intelligence personnel can access."
Lin Xiao folded the paper and slipped it into his pocket.
The New York coordinates were like a stone dropped into the lake of his heart, sending ripples spreading outward. His little move—that anonymous report—had actually caught the attention of some powerful figure. It was both a risk and an opportunity. The risk was that his identity might already have been exposed, or at least marked as "suspicious." The opportunity was that if he could identify the other party and their intentions, perhaps he could establish some kind of... connection.
But there were more urgent matters to deal with.
Lin Xiao looked at Nightingale.
"You said both sides are hunting you," he said. "Because you stole sensitive data. What exactly was it?"
Nightingale stood from the folding cot. Her movements were a little stiff, perhaps because her wounds still hurt. She went to the table and pulled a black USB drive from the inner pocket of her battered jacket. It was tiny, no bigger than a thumbnail, with no markings on its surface.
"This," she said, "contains things I stole from S.H.I.E.L.D.'s peripheral servers. Part of it is records of communications concerning internal factional conflict within S.H.I.E.L.D.—the disputes between Director Fury and the World Security Council, Deputy Director Pierce's expansion of power, and the struggle for resources between departments. The other part... is an early version of Hydra's infiltration list."
The room fell silent for several seconds.
Su Ying's breathing became quiet. Wolf's eyes widened.
"Hydra's infiltration list?" Lin Xiao repeated calmly.
"Yes," Nightingale said. "It isn't the complete list, only data from the early investigation stage. Someone inside S.H.I.E.L.D.—I'm not sure who—was secretly investigating abnormal personnel movements and resource deployments within the organization. They made a preliminary list of suspects, around thirty-seven people distributed across various departments. The list was encrypted and stored on a Level Three access server. It took me two months to break into it."
She placed the USB drive on the table.
The metal drive gleamed coldly in the dim light.
"This is my 'pledge of loyalty,'" Nightingale said. "But it isn't everything."
She walked to the window, lifted one corner of the blinds, and looked outside. Dawn was beginning to seep over the horizon, painting the sky in intertwined shades of deep blue and orange-red. The base's outline appeared and vanished in the morning mist like a sleeping beast.
"While I was on the run," Nightingale said with her back to them, "I intercepted an internal Hydra transmission. It used their own encrypted channel, but I had the tools to crack it."
She turned around and pulled an old phone from another pocket of her jacket. Its screen was shattered, but it still worked. She pressed several buttons, brought up an audio file, and hit play.
A man's voice emerged from the phone's speaker. It had been encrypted and sounded electronically synthesized, but the coldness and authority in its tone could not be concealed:
"...The recent string of setbacks has seriously affected the organization's efficiency. The Conservative Faction under Fletcher is obstructing necessary steps in our evolution. Experimental progress has fallen behind, resource allocation is unreasonable, and internal discipline has grown lax. This situation must be corrected."
Another voice spoke, also altered, but younger. "What do you mean?"
"Purge."
The first voice spoke.
The word echoed through the room, carrying a chilling weight.
"Operation codename: 'Purge,'" the voice continued. "Objective: eliminate all destabilizing factors within the organization. This includes, but is not limited to, Conservative Faction members who openly oppose the advancement of experiments, neutral personnel with suspicious contact with outside forces, and all new recruits who demonstrate disloyalty or incompetence. The operation will begin soon. The exact date is pending. Heads of each sector will receive the purge list."
The audio ended there.
Nightingale turned off the phone, and silence descended on the room again.
Lin Xiao felt his heartbeat accelerate. He looked toward Su Ying. Her expression was ice-cold, her eyes sharp as blades. Wolf's breathing had grown heavy, and his fingers unconsciously clenched.
"When was this transmission intercepted?" Lin Xiao asked.
"Three days ago," Nightingale said. "The day after I escaped S.H.I.E.L.D.'s pursuit. The source couldn't be pinpointed precisely, but signal strength analysis showed that the sender was near this base—within a fifty-kilometer radius."
She went to the table and picked up the USB drive.
"I stored the encrypted summary of the transmission in here too," she said. "Along with several key conclusions from my analysis. First, the purge wasn't a sudden decision. The Radical Faction's upper ranks have been planning it for a long time. Second, its targets are clearly aimed at Fletcher's faction—those old-school Hydra members at this base who oppose human experimentation and extreme methods. Third..."
She paused and looked at Lin Xiao.
"The purge list will likely include every new recruit deemed 'suspicious' or 'disobedient.'"
Lin Xiao understood what she meant.
What was the position of his squad—the Third Action Squad—within the base? A group of newcomers with unclear backgrounds whose behavior was completely unlike that of traditional Hydra soldiers. Su Ying, a former S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who had suddenly appeared at the base and been taken in by Lin Xiao. And now Nightingale, a hacker hunted by both sides.
In the eyes of the Radical Faction's upper ranks, all of them were "destabilizing factors."
All targets to be "purged."
"When will they act?" Su Ying asked coldly.
"I'm not sure," Nightingale said. "But the transmission mentioned 'soon.' Based on Hydra's operating patterns, 'soon' usually means within seven to ten days. And..." She looked out the window. "You can probably feel the atmosphere in the base too."
Lin Xiao certainly could.
Over the past few days, patrol frequency around the base had increased. Some regulations that had once been loosely enforced were suddenly being strictly carried out. Several mid-level officers from the Conservative Faction had been reassigned for vague reasons. Soldiers in the mess hall spoke in hushed voices, their eyes filled with wariness.
Individually, those details might have meant nothing. But taken together, they were signs of a coming storm.
"We need more information," Lin Xiao said. "The specific contents of the purge list, the exact time of the operation, and who will carry it out."
"I can try," Nightingale said. "But I need equipment. I lost my laptop while I was running. Right now, all I have is this phone and that USB drive. And..." She glanced at Wolf. "The base network is physically isolated. External signals can't penetrate it easily."
Wolf immediately said, "I have a way. The communications center has a backup server. It doesn't have high-level access, but it can connect to the internal network. I can take you there, but we'll need to avoid surveillance."
Lin Xiao considered it for several seconds.
The risk was enormous. If Nightingale's identity was exposed, not only would she die, the entire squad would be implicated. But if they did nothing and waited for the purge to begin, they might not even get a chance to resist.
"Su Ying," he said, "make preparations. We need a safehouse outside the base, but not too far away. If things get out of control, we need a way out."
Su Ying nodded. "There's an abandoned radar station three kilometers east of the base. It was built during the Soviet Union era, and it has two underground shelter levels. I scouted it yesterday. The structure is mostly intact, and it has a backup power connection."
"Good," Lin Xiao said. "This afternoon, you and Wolf will set it up. Bring necessary supplies and equipment."
He looked at Nightingale.
"You stay in this room today. Don't go out. Wolf will bring you a backup computer and the tools you need. First, try to crack the full contents of that transmission. At the same time, monitor the base's internal network traffic and look for abnormal data transfers—especially anything related to Operation Purge."
Nightingale nodded. "Understood."
Lin Xiao walked to the table and picked up the USB drive. Its metal casing was cold, but it felt heavy in his hand. The information stored inside might determine whether they lived or died.
He handed the drive to Wolf.
"Make a backup," he said. "Keep it physically isolated. Don't connect it to any network."
Wolf accepted the drive and carefully placed it in an inside pocket.
The morning light grew brighter, filtering through the gaps in the blinds and casting narrow streaks across the floor. They slowly shifted with time, like a silent countdown.
Lin Xiao walked to the window and looked out over the base.
The perimeter walls, watchtowers, training grounds, warehouses, laboratories... On the surface, this massive facility was a Hydra outpost. In reality, it was a battlefield for a struggle over power. The Conservative Faction and Radical Faction, the old guard and the new guard, loyalists and opportunists... countless forces intertwined and collided here.
And he and his squad stood at the center of that battlefield.
"Captain," Wolf suddenly said, "those New York coordinates... are we still going to investigate them?"
Lin Xiao was silent for a moment.
The ripples in New York were still spreading, but the shadow before him had already fallen. The threat of an internal purge was imminent, and he had to deal with the crisis in front of him first.
"Put it aside for now," he said. "We deal with what's in front of us first."
He turned and looked at the three people in the room.
Su Ying stood by the door, her body taut like a blade ready to leave its sheath. Wolf gripped the USB drive in his pocket, his eyes resolute. Nightingale sat beside the folding cot, lightly tapping her knee with her fingers—a habitual gesture of a hacker deep in thought.
These three people were now his core team.
And the people he most needed to protect.
"During the day," Lin Xiao said, "everything proceeds as usual. I'll attend the morning tactical briefing. Su Ying will go to the training grounds. Wolf will report for duty at the communications center. Nightingale stays here. At eight tonight, we meet here and share whatever information we find."
He paused.
"Remember, trust no one. Every person in this base could be an operative assigned to carry out the purge—or a target on the list."
All three nodded at once.
Outside, the wake-up call sounded.
The low, lingering bugle call pierced the morning mist and echoed over the base. It was the signal to assemble, the announcement of a new day. But to Lin Xiao, it sounded more like a warning—time was running out.
He opened the door and walked out.
Footsteps already echoed through the corridor. Soldiers emerged from their rooms and headed toward the mess hall. The air was filled with the scent of breakfast—oatmeal porridge, dark bread, and the bitter smell of low-quality coffee.
Lin Xiao blended into the crowd and headed toward the briefing room.
His face was expressionless, but his mind raced.
The New York coordinates, private projects within S.H.I.E.L.D., Hydra's purge operation... these clues formed a net that was slowly tightening. Before it closed completely, he had to find a way through.
The briefing room was already full. Fletcher sat at the head of the long table, his face grim. Several Radical Faction officers sat on the other side, whispering among themselves. Lin Xiao found a seat in the corner, opened his notebook, and pretended to take notes.
Fletcher began speaking about raising the base's security level and adjusting recent training plans. But his eyes occasionally swept over those present, as if evaluating something.
Lin Xiao kept his head lowered and watched from the corner of his eye.
He noticed that several mid-level Conservative Faction officers had not been informed of the meeting. Meanwhile, there were clearly more people seated on the Radical Faction side than usual.
It was a signal.
The purge operation might already have begun.
After the meeting, Lin Xiao did not leave immediately. He waited until the crowd had dispersed before slowly standing and walking toward the exit. At the door, he ran into a Radical Faction second lieutenant—a young man named Klaus, who usually carried himself with arrogance.
Klaus gave Lin Xiao a look, the corner of his mouth curling into a faint, ambiguous smile.
"Captain Lin," he said, "your squad has been quite active lately."
Lin Xiao stopped. "Routine training, that's all."
"Is that so?" Klaus stepped closer and lowered his voice. "I heard you took in a woman of unknown origin. And you've been spending quite a bit of time with a technical soldier."
Lin Xiao's heartbeat remained steady, and his expression did not change.
"Base regulations allow squad captains to recruit suitable personnel," he said. "As for the technical soldier, that's normal work-related cooperation."
Klaus stared at him for several seconds, then smiled.
"I hope so," he said. "After all, these are unusual times. The higher-ups place great importance on... discipline."
He patted Lin Xiao on the shoulder, neither lightly nor heavily, then turned and left.
Lin Xiao remained where he was, watching Klaus's back disappear around the corridor corner.
That pat on the shoulder had not felt like a friendly gesture. It felt more like a... mark.
As if he were saying: I've noticed you.
Lin Xiao took a deep breath and headed toward the squad office.
The corridor lights were dim, the bulbs humming with electrical current. Paint peeled from the walls, exposing dark red brick beneath. The air smelled musty, mixed with the sharp stench of disinfectant.
He pushed open the office door.
Nightingale was still sitting beside the folding cot. An old laptop sat before her—the backup device Wolf had left behind. The screen's glow illuminated her face, making her expression appear focused and calm.
"How is it?" Lin Xiao asked.
Nightingale looked up.
"I cracked the full contents of the transmission," she said. "The purge list... is longer than we thought."
She turned the laptop screen toward Lin Xiao.
A list of more than fifty names filled the screen. Beside each name were their department, position, and "reason for purge." Lin Xiao scanned it quickly and saw several familiar names—all mid-level officers from the Conservative Faction.
Then, near the end of the list, he saw his own name.
Lin Xiao, captain of the Third Action Squad. Reason for purge: abnormal behavioral patterns, suspicious contact with external forces, possible double agent.
Su Ying's name was below it.
Su Ying, member of the Third Action Squad. Reason for purge: former S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, loyalty questionable, possible undercover operative.
And... Nightingale.
Codename "Nightingale." Reason for purge: hacker, stole organizational secrets, wanted by both S.H.I.E.L.D. and Hydra, high-risk factor.
Lin Xiao stared at the screen, feeling a chill crawl up his spine.
At the bottom of the list was a line of small print:
"Execution window: within 72 hours. Executing unit: Special Elimination Squad. Order source: directly authorized by upper command."
Seventy-two hours.
Three days.
The storm was truly coming.
Before you continue