The interview

"Ah! Aaaah..." Pang Jun screamed from his chair, twisting his obese body frantically for seven or eight seconds before he gradually calmed down.

"I... I'm not dead?" Panting, Pang Jun looked down. The bullet had struck his right arm. Strangely, the wound wasn't bleeding; it had left only a small, pitch-black hole.

Then Pang Jun's right arm began to "melt" again, followed by "fermentation." Finally, with a bubbling gurgle, it turned into an enormous tumor-like mass of flesh and spat out the bullet with a wet squelch.

A few seconds later, his arm slowly returned to normal.

The other three watched the whole thing.

Officer Huang put away his gun. "Pang Jun, that arm of yours is definitely a Beast. As far as I know, there's no ability in the Talent Sequence that causes this kind of strange bodily mutation." He rubbed his temple with his thumb and frowned. "But you yourself are still human for now."

"For now?" Pang Jun sounded discouraged.

Officer Huang sighed and turned to Gaoyang. "What do you think?"

"Yang! Yang, save me..." Pang Jun was on the verge of tears. "I know you won't give up on me. You even saved Kai, didn't you? How could you bear to kill me?"

"We won't kill him yet," Gaoyang said.

"Why not?" Wang Zikai looked a little disappointed. "Keeping this guy around is pointless. Just kill him."

"How am I pointless?" Pang Jun cried. "I'm way more useful than you! You... you..." In the end, he couldn't bring himself to say "Lost One."

Gaoyang looked at Pang Jun. "His arm probably mutated because that white cat bit him. If the mutation eventually spreads through his whole body, we can kill him then. But if it stays confined to his arm, Pang Jun is more valuable alive."

"Yes, exactly!" Pang Jun's will to survive surged. "I can heal! I'm the team's only healer! I'm valuable!"

Officer Huang considered it briefly. "All right. Keep him tied up, and we'll observe him for a few days."

Then Officer Huang turned to Wang Zikai. "I'll entrust this glorious and arduous mission to you. Give him plenty of food and water. Don't let him starve."

"No problem." Wang Zikai patted his chest and grinned wickedly. "I'll take good care of him!"

The three left the underground garage and returned to the living room.

Before they knew it, it was five in the morning, and dawn was approaching. The floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked a bustling riverside scene. The three sat on beanbag chairs, drinking beer and watching the morning light slowly tint the shimmering river from grayish blue to pale pink.

After some discussion, Officer Huang reached a conclusion. "I've never seen anything like Pang Jun's condition before. But he probably isn't a Beast. At least, not yet."

"Was that white cat that bit him a Beast?" Gaoyang pondered. "I thought Beasts only disguised themselves as humans. Can they take animal forms too? And can bites from certain Beasts infect people, like zombies?"

"I don't know." Officer Huang shook his head. "My contact in the organization once told me that there are far more than just the two major categories of Infatuation Beasts and Wrath Beasts in this world... What we know is only the tip of the iceberg."

At that, Officer Huang glanced sideways at Wang Zikai.

Wang Zikai had been far too excited all night, and he had even partially transformed into a Beast during the fight earlier. Exhausted now, he had curled up on the couch and fallen asleep, complete with snores.

"This friend of yours... might be a new type of Infatuation Beast too."

Gaoyang nodded.

He had noticed it as well. Wang Zikai was very different from Old Man Liu.

Old Man Liu automatically ignored and filtered out any verbal information related to "Beasts." How he would react to visual information about Beasts, or even firsthand experiences, remained unclear. But Officer Huang suspected that such things would most likely provoke a "Lost One," causing him to go berserk and transform into a Beast.

Wang Zikai, however, didn't filter out anything, whether it was verbal information, visual information, or firsthand experiences involving Beasts. Nor did he go berserk. Instead, he simply remembered, understood, and rationalized it all. In short, he never considered himself a Beast and firmly believed he was human. Could all of this... really be because he wasn't very smart?

"I don't know if I'm imagining it," Officer Huang said with a self-deprecating smile. "Ever since I met you, I've felt like this world has been getting more and more dangerous. Some delicate balance is being disrupted, and certain things seem to be spiraling out of control. I've been Awakened for years, and this is the first time I've ever felt this way."

"..." For a moment, Gaoyang didn't know what to say.

"When you add them all up, I've met quite a few Awakened." Officer Huang took out his cigarette pack. "Some were strong, some were weak. Some were reckless, some were cautious. Some were insane, some were cold-blooded..."

Officer Huang narrowed his eyes. "But most of them died, for one reason or another."

Gaoyang said nothing, quietly waiting for him to continue.

"You're different." Officer Huang glanced sideways at Gaoyang. "There's something very special about you, kid."

"Really?"

"Yes. I think you're bound to live a long time."

"Really?" Now that was something Gaoyang liked hearing. To be honest, he was pretty afraid of dying. Once he died, everything would be gone. As long as he was alive, there was always hope.

"So... I think I'm in danger." Officer Huang lowered his voice.

"Why?"

"I loved reading comics when I was a kid. The people who live a long time are usually the protagonists. But the people around the protagonist usually have very short lives..."

Gaoyang felt sheepish. That makes so much sense I can't even argue. I really am different from everyone else. For starters, I transmigrated into this world, and I even got a miraculous system when I awakened. Shameless as it sounds, calling this 'plot armor' wouldn't be an exaggeration. But maybe it's just survivorship bias. There could be countless transmigrators. Maybe I'm neither the first nor the last...

Gaoyang's mind wandered a little.

Officer Huang stood up. "I've decided. From now on, I'll keep as far away from you as possible."

"Huh?" Gaoyang was shocked. "Officer Huang, don't abandon me!"

"I wouldn't go that far." Officer Huang took a drag on his cigarette and gave an inscrutable smile. "What I mean is, we need to join an organization as soon as possible. That way, you'll have more companions around you. Statistically speaking, the risk of me getting killed off will be spread more evenly."

Gaoyang was speechless. Man, I think you're the transmigrator here!

Officer Huang took out a notepad and pen and quickly wrote down a time and address. "Come with Qingling at midnight tonight. I'll take you both to an interview."

"All right!" Gaoyang took the note.

Gaoyang took a short nap at Wang Zikai's house, then went to school.

Wang Zikai stayed behind to watch Pang Jun and continue his training. He believed his sudden "power-up" the previous night was the result of his training, and he was now brimming with motivation. It looked like using that excuse to fool him into behaving for another few days wouldn't be a problem.

After morning self-study, Gaoyang asked Qingling to meet him on the rooftop and briefly explained what had happened the night before. Naturally, he downplayed Wang Zikai's power-up as much as he could.

Qingling offered no opinion.

Later that morning, Gaoyang went to Wan Sisi, the English class representative, for help with a few English questions. Flattered by the attention, she happily explained the answers. Once she finished, Wan Sisi took the opportunity to invite Gaoyang to lunch with her and some other classmates.

Gaoyang gladly accepted and spent a "rather pleasant" lunch with his classmates. They all believed his previous withdrawal had been due to overwhelming grief over Li Weiwei's death.

Nothing happened that afternoon.

Nothing happened during evening self-study.

After evening self-study ended, Gaoyang met Qingling in an alley near the school, their usual meeting spot by now. As soon as he saw her, he started taking off his clothes.

"No need," Qingling said.

"We're not disguising ourselves today?" Gaoyang was a little surprised.

"No." Qingling glanced at the note. "The address is 121 Huang Song Street, Feiyang District. It's too far away, and we have to cross a bridge. We can't walk there."

"Then what do we do?"

Qingling thought for a moment. "We'll take the last subway train with a perfectly legitimate excuse."

"Okay."

They walked out of the alley. Qingling wrapped both hands around Gaoyang's arm and leaned her head against his shoulder, looking sweet and dependent. "We'll pretend to be students dating before we're supposed to. That makes our behavior more plausible."

"Sure." Gaoyang had no objections. How could he put it? With Beasts all around him, having a beautiful, incredibly powerful bodyguard cling to his arm gave him a solid sense of security.

They took the subway and emerged half an hour later in Feiyang District, Hexi. Then they walked through the night for nearly another twenty minutes. Along the way, Qingling bought some malatang on a street lined with late-night food stalls-she really loved malatang!

The area around Huang Song Street was an old neighborhood awaiting demolition. Both sides of the street were lined with squat, two- or three-story concrete buildings. The outdated shops had closed early, the neglected road was riddled with potholes, and few of the streetlights still worked. Presumably, the security cameras were all "broken" too.

They followed the street numbers and soon found number 121.

It was an unassuming little storefront with a rusty rolling shutter lowered halfway. An old-fashioned blue curtain hung inside. Behind it, fluorescent lights flickered amid the sounds of fighting and explosions, and they could vaguely make out a few old arcade machines.

"I didn't think arcades like this still existed." Gaoyang had loved places like this as a kid. For half a yuan, he could hang around for most of the day. Of course, he had been hopeless at the games himself. Mostly, he stood behind the older boys and watched them clear a game on a single coin. Thinking back, weren't they basically the earliest gaming streamers?

"Come on. Let's go in." Qingling put on a face mask.

"Wait," Gaoyang called out.

"What?"

"Give me the length of one song first."