Club

The desolate street was empty. The moon hung high overhead, its watery light spilling onto the road alongside the soft glow of the streetlights, illuminating the back of the man ahead. Aloof and proud, he seemed like a mysterious night-blooming flower, appearing only this once.

Wei Yunmo followed behind, watching silently. His steps grew lighter, and he could barely contain the joy in his heart.

"Having that much fun?" 39's voice was cold.

Wei Yunmo apologized with practiced ease, looking thoroughly aggrieved. "I'm sorry. I know I was wrong. I shouldn't have stayed out so late. I got carried away. This was my first time meeting people my own age. Before this, I could only stay in the Laboratory. They wouldn't let me out."

Why did that make him sound like the unreasonable one?

Xie De raised an eyebrow, thinking speechlessly, Fine, let him think I'm the bad guy. The villain is a bomb that could go off at any moment. There's no way I'm letting him stay in an ordinary person's home, anyway.

"There won't be a next time."

"Okay."

Wei Yunmo answered obediently.

Xie De thought for a moment. "You have to be back before six in the evening."

"Okay."

That agreement had come far too quickly. It felt as though the villain was plotting something. Xie De glanced back at him suspiciously, but Wei Yunmo was so small right now that he looked especially innocent and pitiful.

Perhaps he was overthinking it.

Xie De kept walking. He had already exhausted himself today. 455 had arranged an entire day of firearms and footwork training for him, with every bullet carefully accounted for. He was worn out. The sooner he got home, the sooner he could sleep.

Wei Yunmo trotted happily behind him, a small smile appearing on his face.

The night breeze blew gently. For a moment, Wei Yunmo felt like an ordinary child. He didn't have to worry about the Laboratory hunting him down or capturing him. All he needed to do was follow the figure ahead, and he could find safety and warmth.

But that same breeze also dispersed some of the gunpowder smell clinging to the man ahead. Wei Yunmo came back to his senses, his smile fading slightly, as though he had been knocked right back to where he started.

He knew perfectly well that the man ahead was neither his guardian nor an ordinary person.

If this man learned what he was thinking, he would surely laugh at him.

His Excellency 39 seemed never to yearn for warmth, and he could never belong to an ordinary life. He was one of the powerful figures Wei Yunmo knew of in the hidden world, with danger forever coiled around him. A mysterious eagle would not linger for a mediocre lamb unless that lamb had some use.

He understood that he was merely one of 39's jobs and would be sent away sooner or later.

To think he had actually been moved tonight by Mr. 39's meticulous attitude toward his work. What a laughable feeling.

They returned home.

The villain trudged listlessly back to his room, drooping like a cabbage wilted by frost.

He seemed like a completely different person from the one Xie De had just picked up.

And the turning point had been when he laid down a few rules for the villain.

Xie De found it amusing. He really was just a little brat. All he had done was set a curfew and forbid him from staying overnight with a friend. Apparently, such a tiny matter was earth-shattering to a child.

Xie De couldn't be bothered with him. He lowered his head and petted the little house centipede that had come to greet him as though it were a puppy, then fed it some newly bought cicada pupae.

The little house centipede had never gotten along particularly well with the villain. Even after all this time, Xie De had never seen it voluntarily show him any friendliness.

Well, of course, it was also possible that the villain simply couldn't bring himself to regard the little house centipede as a pet.

Xie De, on the other hand, thought the little house centipede was ugly in an endearing sort of way.

After feeding it, Xie De washed up, then stretched out comfortably on his bed and reached for the phone by his pillow.

"455, I asked you to find a way to send the villain away. Have you thought about where to send him?"

455 emerged from the Player Forum and immediately replied, "I know a place that specializes in taking in creatures like villains."

"Where?"

"The Incomplete Instance, also known as the Instance Reserve. It's an auxiliary space attached to the instance main system, and it's huge. There are all sorts of NPCs in there who haven't made their debut yet. It's an enormous place. If we send the villain there, the instance main system can take care of him. He won't have to worry about food or drink, and there's even work."

"...Are you serious?" The more Xie De listened, the more astonished he became. "Are you already that close to the instance main system?"

"Heh heh. I told you not to underestimate me!" 455's laugh sounded rather sleazy. "I earned this through hard work. Keep it low-key, low-key."

"What did you do?"

"I sent it two hundred million messages in one day."

"Holy shit. Impressive. How is that any different from forcing your love on someone?" Xie De shot upright as though rising from his deathbed and even gave it a thumbs-up. "I seriously doubt how reliable this is. If the benefits are that good, why don't you get me in?"

455 answered honestly, "It doesn't want someone as old as you."

"Fuck."

"I'm kidding. The instance main system wants special people like villains, as well as people who died horribly. You don't fit either category."

455 added reassuringly, "Being a player is much better than being an NPC. Players are customers, while NPCs are workers. The instance main system said it has always treated players like God."

Xie De said, "...So that's why it's always working so hard to send players to heaven?"

While Xie De was considering where to send the villain, far away in another country, an extravagantly ostentatious building stood in the pleasant Mediterranean climate.

In front of an enormous floor-to-ceiling window.

The man seated at the head was young, dressed in a suit, and exceptionally handsome, with a pair of deep blue eyes. He belonged to an old aristocratic family from Country I, though one could also call him a capitalist. He provided most of the Laboratory's funding.

"Has the test subject Wei Yunmo still not been found?"

A group of people stood in the spacious hall. Their leader stepped forward and bowed.

"We're terribly sorry. His trail disappeared in northern Huaxia. We have almost no leads and no idea where to look."

"Northern Huaxia?" Jefferson Morkney lowered his head and considered this for a while. When he looked up again, his expression was somewhat grave. "What do you think happened?"

The people opposite him looked much graver than he did, and anger crept into the speaker's voice. "We believe the Club may have taken him. Its people even killed two of our agents."

Morkney's brows drew tightly together, and he murmured, "God..."

The Club they were discussing was a mysterious private organization affiliated with neither the Laboratory nor the authorities. It proclaimed that it would not allow mysterious powers to be exploited by vile capitalists, and that people with such powers should also enjoy basic human rights rather than being controlled.

It frequently opposed both the Laboratory and the authorities.

Wei Yunmo had very likely been taken away by the Club!

What an utterly detestable organization.