Fishing

Luo Ruzhuo did not leave immediately after getting the aircraft.

She spent a few days familiarizing herself with its control panel. During those days, she went to the purification room as usual and spent her full working hours with Captain Xianzhu. She browsed her optical computer, had cookies for afternoon tea, and played patty-cake with the dragon.

Without entering his Mental Domain, the extent to which she could purify him through Guide Element exchange alone was limited.

But when Luo Ruzhuo went to ask Lin Sheng for time off, the delight on his face exceeded her expectations.

"The captain's distortion value has dropped a whole one percent!" Lin Sheng looked at Luo Ruzhuo as if she were a miracle and readily agreed to her request for time off. "You want to look around the Central District-do you need someone to accompany you?"

Of course not. Luo Ruzhuo promptly rejected Lin Sheng's offer of protection.

If someone followed her, how was she supposed to go fishing?

The next morning, Luo Ruzhuo changed into casual clothes and boarded a civilian starship bound for the Central District via Planet b-475.

The Central District consisted of more than one planet. It was somewhat like the districts and counties of a major city in her previous life, divided into four stars and three belts: Morning Star, Central Left Star, Central Right Star, and United Star. Everything within the Small Asteroid Belt, Rock Belt, and Gas Planet Belt also belonged to the Central District.

But the most prosperous and bustling of them all was Morning Star. As the political and economic center, it was packed with skyscrapers and crisscrossed by aerial transit tracks. Throw a stone at random, and it would hit a young master or young lady from a family famous on the Star Network, or an Alliance government official.

Luo Ruzhuo had previously been held in a detention center here.

Returning to the old place, she did not feel the slightest discomfort.

Over the course of the morning, she visited two shopping malls, lingered for quite a while in front of various display windows, bought a few local snacks, and sat for a while on a bench in a public rest area.

After tearing open the snack packages, Luo Ruzhuo did not eat a single bite. She spread her mental power over a fifty-meter radius, capturing every glance directed at her like a patient spider hunter spinning a web.

She had spent the whole morning looking around without noticing anything unusual.

Luo Ruzhuo could not help feeling a little disappointed... Was her fishing technique really that poor?

Or had the original owner truly been a lone wolf who had cut off all her social ties for the sake of revenge?

She was just preparing to reel in her net and head back when, as she entered an alley leading to the spaceport, a hand suddenly reached out of the darkness and gripped her wrist.

The hand was not particularly strong, but its angle was tricky, catching her wrist at the weakest point of the joint. Out of an instinct acquired after the apocalypse, Luo Ruzhuo wanted to twist it back.

Then her mental power detected the other person, and she heard a woman's voice kept very low.

"Why are you coming to the Central District now?"

Luo Ruzhuo paused and made out the other person's appearance by the faint light at the mouth of the alley.

She was a young woman, no more than twenty or so, with short dark brown hair. She wore a loose gray coat with the collar turned up high, concealing most of her face and leaving only a pair of eyes filled with confusion and concern visible.

"The boss has been looking for you." The young woman released her wrist, stepped farther into the alley, and glanced back at her, signaling her to follow. "Come with me."

At last, she had caught a fish.

Several possibilities flashed through Luo Ruzhuo's mind.

The young woman before her did indeed know the original owner, and more than that. Judging by her tone, the two of them seemed to have some sort of organizational connection.

"Boss" sounded like a title for the leader of some social organization.

The young woman's gaze did not seem hostile. Luo Ruzhuo's thoughts passed in an instant, and she stepped forward to follow closely behind.

She followed the young woman through three alleys, along an underground passage, and through the side door of an old building. Inside was an abandoned warehouse, its shelves piled with dusty boxes of parts. The air smelled of dust and rust.

A secret passage was hidden behind a wall at the back of the warehouse. At the end was a small secret room.

The room was simply furnished with a table and a few chairs, and many posters were pasted on the walls. The light was dim, but Luo Ruzhuo glanced over them and saw reports about Ankang Pharmaceuticals, as well as scandals involving the Feier Family and the Federation royal family.

There were not many people in the room: a middle-aged man sitting behind the table, a young man leaning against a corner and fiddling with his optical computer, and another person standing in a corner far from her, where it was almost completely dark and she could not make out the person's face.

The young woman who had led her there pulled down her collar, revealing her entire face, and nodded to the man behind the table. "I brought her."

The middle-aged man raised his head and looked Luo Ruzhuo up and down, then smiled.

His face looked honest and plain, with features that would have been lost in a crowd. Only when he smiled did a small scar above the corner of his eye move with his muscles, giving him an inexplicably fierce air.

"Phoenix, you're here."

The original owner's codename was Phoenix? Luo Ruzhuo committed the name to memory without showing anything on her face and merely nodded.

"We know the situation." The middle-aged man did not ask why she had not contacted the organization, seemingly taking her silence as some kind of unspoken understanding.

"We know. You survived this mission entirely by luck. You've had your revenge, and you've paid a high enough price. If you want to leave the organization, we have no complaints-"

The middle-aged man gave a bitter laugh. "It's just... we spent several years together, day and night, after all, and the organization is in a very difficult position right now. Ankang Pharmaceuticals has been secretly trying to track down the informants we planted there."

"And now you've awakened as a guide. At least while you're serving in the Black Tower, they won't dare make any rash moves against you for the time being."

"Ruzhuo, will you help us again?"

He had used the original owner's name instead of her codename.

How should I answer?

Luo Ruzhuo's mind raced as she analyzed the information around her. A faint sweat broke out on her forehead.

She knew nothing about the original owner's past in this organization, nor did she know what the original owner's personality had been like...

But she could not go wrong by following the other person's lead.

When she raised her head again, Luo Ruzhuo pretended to be utterly disheartened, with a hint of bewilderment on her face.

"To be honest, I never thought I'd make it out alive either." The young woman tugged at the corner of her mouth. "What else can I do to help... Die one more time?"

Her voice was quiet, but anyone could hear the emotion in it.

Without the fire of hatred, it seemed Phoenix could no longer rise from the ashes.

The young woman who had led her there pressed her lips together, and the middle-aged man was momentarily at a loss for words. The atmosphere fell silent.

Yuan Xiao could not help tugging at Luo Yongtao's sleeve. "Forget it, Uncle Luo," she whispered. "Let Xiao Zhuo live a quiet, ordinary life... She's suffered enough in the first half of her life."

As Luo Ruzhuo's close friend, Yuan Xiao had witnessed her living under someone else's roof since childhood. Later, for the sake of revenge, she had all but abandoned everything she had and devoted herself wholeheartedly to her hatred of Phil Rice. She had long since prepared herself to die.

Who would have thought that, by a strange twist of fate, Luo Ruzhuo would awaken as a guide before she was sentenced?

Yuan Xiao was naturally happy for her, but at the same time, she felt somewhat sad.

Their organization was an alliance made up entirely of Ankang Pharmaceuticals' victims. They were trapped in hatred, yet it was also hatred that kept them going. Without hatred to sustain them, even living seemed like an arduous task-Yuan Xiao had never once thought about what her own life would be like after she succeeded in getting revenge.

Luo Ruzhuo now... was probably in the same state of mind.

At that thought, her gaze gradually grew resolute. "Uncle Luo, let her live the life she wants."

"People shouldn't spend their whole lives living in hatred."

"But..." Luo Yongtao sighed deeply, unsure what to say.

Just as he found himself torn, the young woman in front of him suddenly spoke. "I can help the organization with one last thing."

Luo Ruzhuo had finally managed to catch some fish. How could she possibly let them get away?

"But I have a condition this time," she said. "I need to know the location of one of the Feier Family's collections and the details about it."