"You... you're going to Li Family Village?"
Lin Wanyi's voice trembled slightly. She hurried over to Su Mingfeng and looked at the drowsy Nuannuan in his arms, her heart aching beyond measure.
"If you have to go, then go. Why do you have to take Nuannuan? She's only just come back, and she hasn't fully recovered yet. It's so cold outside..."
"Mom, she has to come." Su Mingfeng cut his mother off, his tone brooking no argument. "She's the only witness. Only she can pinpoint that place."
More importantly, he wanted Nuannuan to see with her own eyes how the people who had bullied her were punished.
He wanted to erase the deepest shadow in the child's heart in the most direct way possible.
"But..." Lin Wanyi was still worried.
"Grandma," Nuannuan poked her little head out of Su Mingfeng's arms and reached out to touch Lin Wanyi's face. "I'm not afraid of the cold. I want to go help Mommy fight the bad guys."
Her voice was soft and sweet, but her gaze was exceptionally firm.
Those words left all Lin Wanyi's worry and reluctance lodged in her throat. She thought of her equally strong daughter, Su Mingyue, and nodded, her eyes reddening.
"All right, go. Grandma supports you."
She turned and hurried upstairs. A few minutes later, she came down carrying a thick military overcoat with a fox-fur collar. It was a war trophy Su Zhenbang had captured while fighting in the Northeast years ago and had been sitting at the bottom of a trunk ever since.
"Put this on and wrap my darling granddaughter up tight. Don't let even a breath of wind get through."
Lin Wanyi personally draped the oversized military coat over Nuannuan's tiny body, wrapping her from head to toe like a round little ball, leaving only her dark, grape-like eyes exposed.
Su Zhenbang had remained silent all this time. He sat on the sofa, rubbing the five-pointed star medal in his hand, his face as dark as the sky before a storm. Only when Su Mingfeng was about to leave with Nuannuan in his arms did he speak, his voice hoarse and commanding.
"Mingfeng, remember this."
"The Su family doesn't look for trouble, but we never fear it."
"Since you're going, don't spare anyone's dignity. Even if you tear a hole in the sky above us, I'll damn well patch it up for you!"
"Yes, sir!" Su Mingfeng straightened his back and gave a regulation military salute.
Outside the Su family's small building, the night was black as ink.
In the bitter wind, several army-green jeeps and two large Jiefang trucks had already assembled without a sound. All their headlights were off, and only the cold steel outlines of their bodies gleamed in the moonlight.
The soldiers of the guard company stood silently beside the vehicles in two ranks, fully armed, their weapons loaded. There was not a sound or a single unnecessary movement, only an air of deadly menace spreading through the air.
Seeing Su Mingfeng emerge carrying the child, guard company commander Zhang Li immediately stepped forward and reported in a low voice, "Sir, the entire guard company is present and ready to depart at any time!"
Su Mingfeng nodded, opened the rear door of the first jeep, and carefully placed Nuannuan inside.
Su Mingzhe followed close behind and got in as well.
Just as the door was about to close, a huge white shadow flashed past like a phantom.
"Awooo-"
A low roar.
The snow leopard, Big Kitty, sprang out of the darkness, his lithe body landing on all fours without making a sound.
He merely glanced at Nuannuan inside the jeep with his golden, slit-pupiled eyes, then leaped effortlessly into its spacious back seat.
He curled up his enormous body close against Nuannuan, resting his massive head on her lap as a contented purr rumbled in his throat.
The entire sequence flowed seamlessly, so fast that the soldiers around them gasped.
This was no wild beast. This was practically a well-trained special forces soldier!
Nuannuan was not afraid at all. She stretched out her little hand, thoroughly bundled in the military coat's sleeve, and gave the snow leopard's large, furry head a practiced-looking pat.
"Big Kitty, be good."
"No making noise. Be quiet."
An astonishing scene unfolded.
Upon hearing the girl's command, the fierce beast, powerful enough to tear any grown man to pieces, immediately stopped purring and obediently closed his eyes, as though he really had become a harmless big cat.
Outside the jeep, Zhang Li and the soldiers of the guard company watched, dumbfounded.
They had only heard that their commander had brought back a valiant snow leopard and even given him an official place in the ranks. Only upon seeing him for themselves today did they realize how intimidating this "king of the snowy mountains" was, and how docile he was before his little mistress.
That extreme contrast inspired awe.
Su Mingfeng closed the door and got into the front passenger seat.
"Move out."
He gave the brief command over the radio.
There were no honking horns, no clamor.
More than a dozen military vehicles formed a long steel dragon, slipping silently into the capital's night and speeding toward Li Family Village.
It was quiet inside the jeep.
Leaning against the snow leopard's warm fur, Nuannuan soon fell asleep.
Su Mingzhe watched the streets racing backward outside the window, adjusted his glasses, and said to Su Mingfeng, "Brother, have you considered that if the person Liu Guifang killed really was a mail carrier, then what she intercepted wasn't just a child support payment?"
Su Mingfeng shifted his gaze from Nuannuan's sleeping little face in the rearview mirror, his eyes icy.
"Our sister's letters."
"Exactly." Su Mingzhe's tone was grave. "Five years ago was the most critical period for Project 713. Could Mingyue... have mentioned something in her letters that she shouldn't have?"
That question instantly brought the air inside the jeep to freezing point.
If Liu Guifang's murder for money had merely been a coincidence.
Then behind that coincidence, could there have been a connection to the true cause of their sister Su Mingyue's and their brother-in-law's deaths?
Su Mingfeng did not answer.
He merely clenched his fists, every knuckle turning white from the force.
The convoy picked up speed, piercing the darkness like a sword drawn from its sheath, aimed straight at that sinful village.
Whatever the truth was, tonight he would pry an opening out of Liu Guifang's mouth.
An opening through which all the evil could be glimpsed.
The wheels rolled on, grinding over the cold asphalt and stirring up a whistling wind.
On the horizon, dark clouds obscured a waning moon, heralding an approaching storm.