Chameleon

Time sometimes passed quickly, and sometimes slowly.

Like now.

The elevator took only about seven seconds to descend from the first floor to the second basement level, but to Su Bai, those seven short seconds felt like an eternity.

How were the three of them supposed to deal with an attack by a dozen or even dozens of fully armed security guards?

Within those seven seconds, countless thoughts raced through Su Bai's mind.

He considered many approaches, but with his limited knowledge, the best he could come up with was to raise his hands and surrender.

A gentleman did not stand beneath a crumbling wall. It was wisdom passed down by the ancestors.

Su Bai could hardly call himself a gentleman, but he knew better than to put himself in danger without absolute necessity.

Yet today, for some inexplicable reason, he had accompanied two violent brutes who knew only how to charge in headfirst into danger.

Stranger still, he felt no fear at all. Instead, he was so excited that his whole body trembled.

Ding!

With a crisp chime, the elevator doors slowly opened.

The scene before him unfolded inch by inch, like the opening of a grand film.

Almost the instant the doors opened, Su Bai calmly and decisively pulled the trigger. The Reaper Desert Eagle's dark-purple muzzle spat a tongue of crimson flame, lighting up the dim corridor.

Bang!

At the end of the corridor, a flower of blood bloomed from the shoulder of a man holding an AK rifle. The immense force sent his 1.89-meter frame flying straight into a pillar at the casino entrance.

Bang!

Bang!

Bang!

In the space of a single second, Su Bai held his breath and fired again and again. Deafening gunshots echoed through the narrow corridor, and after a succession of crimson flashes, the magazine was empty.

Su Bai had no time to see what he had hit or worry about his aching arm. He abruptly twisted sideways into the elevator's blind spot and grabbed the grenade he had prepared, but before he could pull the pin, he saw a silver-white bullet rushing straight toward the center of his forehead, trailing a current of air.

Behind it came more silver-white bullets.

The bullets howled through the air, their sharp slipstreams so dense they nearly formed a spiderweb.

At that moment, time seemed to stand still.

Su Bai's gaze passed through the web, and he clearly saw more than a dozen men firing AK rifles wildly.

Strangely, the eyes of these men, who should have been furious and crazed, were filled with an indescribable fear.

It was the kind of fear that made the soul itself tremble.

In that split second-

An intensely brilliant white light suddenly burst forth inside the cramped elevator.

Like a tide descending from the sky, the white light completely engulfed the web of bullets. Soft pops rang out one after another as every bullet hurtling toward them was stopped outside the membrane of light and instantly bounced away like pebbles striking cotton.

Pfft.

Pfft.

Bursts of bloody flame bloomed in the entrance corridor, at the casino doors, and across the bodies of the dozen-plus security guards firing their AKs wildly, easily snuffing out their fragile lives.

The smell of blood filled the air in an instant.

They might never have imagined that they would die from bullets they had fired themselves.

After a brief silence, the white light gradually faded. A pair of wings even more dazzling than the light slowly spread, revealing Su Bai sheltered within their feathers.

Divine Oracle Sequence 76: Angel Wings.

Not everyone with wings was an angel. They could be a birdman... or Qingxue.

Chu Ning glanced at Su Bai and said coolly, "Your courage is commendable. Your marksmanship is terrible."

Su Bai took a deep breath and slowly exhaled. He released the grenade's pull ring and gently shook out his sore, swollen shoulder. Once he had composed himself, he turned and looked Qingxue carefully over from head to toe, then said with feeling:

"If you weren't made up to look like a bearded middle-aged man right now, I might have fallen in love with you."

Qingxue looked immensely pleased and waved her little fist.

Have you ever seen an angel walking among humans?

I have.

What a fireworks display.

Inside the surveillance room, not a sound could be heard.

Several staff members looked at one another, their hearts in turmoil.

The events of the past ten minutes had completely shattered the fixed understanding they had built over decades.

A girl in a baseball cap, her face obscured, had beaten up five burly men with a sword.

A male pervert dressed in women's clothes had easily breached the tight security system, then emptied a magazine and pulled out a grenade the instant the elevator doors opened.

A little girl dressed as a bearded middle-aged man had actually killed more than a dozen fully armed security guards while they sprayed her with AK fire. Most absurd of all, she had even grown a pair of wings?

Sister Hong stared at the surveillance feed and gave orders in a cold voice:

"I just received word from the boss. The criminal police are surrounding Heavenly River International.

"Xiao Wang, contact security and have them send everyone downstairs immediately. Tell them they can use any means necessary, but they absolutely cannot let the police set foot inside Heavenly River International. We can't withstand an investigation.

"Xiao Li, activate the alarm system and arrange for the casino's guests and staff to leave by the backup elevator.

"The rest of you, remove the surveillance hard drives immediately. Whether you smash them with hammers or chop them with knives, they must all be destroyed within ten minutes. Then forget this ever happened.

"As for those three lunatics... leave them alone."

Sister Hong gave the surveillance feed one last look, then pushed open the door and left the room.

Outside the surveillance room, a man was crouched in a corner.

He wore a black jacket and a baseball cap pulled so low that only half of his pale face was visible.

He said to Sister Hong as she emerged, "We're in big trouble."

Sister Hong's face darkened. "That girl dressed as a man has Angel Wings as her Oracle, ranked 76th in the sequence. I've never heard of anyone like her in the underworld. Her bloodline level is at least seventh tier. She really is big trouble."

"No, I'm not talking about that little girl. I mean the youngster who broke through our elevator's security system. I just looked up his information on the dark web. His name is Su Bai. A few days ago, he was still a student."

"Su Bai? I played dice with him all afternoon. I'm certain he's just an ordinary person. How is he big trouble?"

The man in the jacket slowly shook his head. "Last night, our company's internal system was breached, and a great deal of important information was stolen. It included not only the security system and personnel deployment lists, but also the financial records of our Bloodline Mark transactions with major multinational corporations."

Sister Hong's expression changed drastically. "That happened last night. Why are you only telling me today? If that information falls into the Grave Keepers' hands, the company will be finished!"

The man in the jacket fell silent for a moment, then said:

"Partly because our financial transactions were concealed very well. Even if someone checked the books for irregularities, it would take a great deal of time. The other reason was that the boss suspected an insider was behind the breach... and now there's evidence that Su Bai was the one who broke into our company's system last night, so naturally you're no longer a suspect."

Sister Hong frowned. "I've been in the guild for seven years and worked for the company for four, and you actually suspected me?"

The man in the jacket chuckled softly. "If you want to hold a city, first you have to make sure your own people won't open the gates. Only then do you reinforce the defenses. I don't need to tell you that a thousand-mile dike can be destroyed by an anthill.

"I understand why you're unhappy, but now isn't the time to vent. They're after you, and you're no match for them, so leave first. I'll deal with them. Those are the boss's wishes too."

At the mention of the boss, Sister Hong could hardly disregard the order. She turned toward the hidden door, but before leaving, she made a point of saying:

"A student managed to get involved with Transcendents in just a few days and even set his sights on Heavenly River International. I think there are only two possibilities.

"One is that he works for a guild. The other is that he joined the Grave Keepers.

"I think the former is more likely. After all, the Grave Keepers' rules forbid them from recruiting ordinary people without an Oracle, while guilds will often take someone in because of a special talent... The company recently restarted its trade and cut into the interests of many guilds. Perhaps that angered them.

"Based on my analysis, they chose to force their way in and even use an Oracle to intimidate us, probably to draw the Grave Keepers' attention."

The man in the jacket nodded. "That's close to what I think."

He rose and turned toward the casino. In the shadows, his tall figure gradually grew slender and delicate, and the clothes on his body kept changing along with it.

A few seconds later.

He had taken on the appearance of a beautiful blonde woman.

The windbreaker he wore had also become a bright red qipao printed with violets.

He had become Sister Hong, an enchanting, graceful woman who walked with a sway in crystal high heels.

Divine Oracle Sequence 91 (Chameleon): The user can obtain the unique attribute "Replication" for x (unknown) amount of time. For x (unknown) amount of time, the user can replicate the genetic sequence of any living being they have come into close contact with, becoming that being at the genetic level. Note: I am not your twin. I am you.