Chapter 7 – The bullet would eventually pass through his skull

It really only took Su Fengzhou three hours to rush back to Chen Mountain Cave.

The headlights swept past, revealing a figure standing in the night wind.

Rong Yun wasn’t sure how long she had been waiting, but as soon as she saw Su Fengzhou step out of the car, she rushed over to him. While guiding him inside, she quickly explained the situation, “We’ve rounded up all the mutated ones that were killed. The Research Department wanted to take them away, but we held them off for now. The Defense Force is incredibly shameless. We made a significant effort to assist them, and now that there’s an escape, they’re suggesting it’s not their responsibility if issues arise outside the cave? It made Shen Wenyan so mad that he started throwing punches.”

She glanced at Su Fengzhou’s expression. “If we get reported afterward, we’ll take full respons—”

She hadn’t even finished the word ‘responsibility’ before Su Fengzhou cut her off sharply, “Did we win?”

Rong Yun choked for a moment. “…We won.”

Su Fengzhou nodded. “Then it’s fine.”

Rong Yun said that the 39th squad of the Defense Force, which was stationed at Chen Mountain, had been temporarily forced to submit. At that moment, they were taking orders from the Seventh Squad and assisting with the review of surveillance footage from the nearby roads.

The tense and uneasy atmosphere between the two sides hadn’t relaxed at all.

As Su Fengzhou opened the door and stepped inside, he felt all the eyes in the room turn toward him.

A smirk of disdain curled at the corner of his lips. Ignoring the stares, he walked directly to the captain of the 39th squad, Wang Kan, and gave him a pat on the shoulder. If one didn’t know the two were rivals, one might think it was a friendly conversation just by the tone. “Old Wang, a tough day, is it? Since I wasn’t present, I relied on you to monitor these little brats. So, what’s the update? Have you been able to gather any information from the surveillance footage yet?”

One of those ‘little brats,’ Shen Wenyan, let out a low, mocking snort.

Wang Kan’s lips twitched hard.

But Su Fengzhou had just walked in, damp with night dew, and he gave off a cold aura. Even the way he casually kneaded Wang Kan’s shoulder held an unmistakable threat in every motion.

No matter how friendly the gesture looked, he was clearly a devil in disguise.

That was enough to make Wang Kan swallow the curse that was already on the tip of his tongue. “Captain Su, you’re being too polite. We’re all comrades here, so it’s only right to help each other. Everyone’s still looking into it. Why don’t you take a seat for now? We’ll let you know as soon as something comes up. Ning City isn’t too far away, but it’s not exactly close either. If you keep running around at night and get sick, the guys from the Seventh Squad will turn our entire Defense Force upside down.”

“You can’t say it that way,” Su Fengzhou replied lightly. “With my physique, even if Captain Wang drops dead a few times, I’ll still be bouncing around full of energy.”

Wang Kan: “……”

He had a strong urge to curse aloud, but he couldn’t decide if it was worth it.

In the end, Su Fengzhou did pick a spot and sat down.

Otherwise, with the Defense Force all sitting neatly and leaving him standing around like a guard in the back, they really didn’t deserve that.

Shen Wenyan leaned in, sounding upset. “Boss, why did you take this errand to Ning City yourself? You’re doing well; why would you volunteer for all that legwork? Look at what happened—we almost got bullied!”

Su Fengzhou wasn’t buying it one bit. He shot him a mocking look. “Bullied? If anyone’s getting bullied, it definitely wouldn’t be you guys.”

As soon as he entered, he scanned the room. Shen Wenyan had a scrape on his lip, but the Defense Force guys looked really wrecked.

Just like Rong Yun had said earlier, it was obvious their group would gain the upper hand.

Rong Yun handed Su Fengzhou a glass of water.

Unlike Shen Wenyan, she wasn’t impulsive; her focus was clear and direct. “Has the Research Department given the results? What was the final comparison?”

Su Fengzhou replied, “95.6% similarity.”

“That high?!”

The other members of the Seventh Squad, who had gathered around, looked at each other in shock.

The sample they had sent for comparison this time was collected in the cave a few days earlier. At that time, no one truly understood why Su Fengzhou suddenly took on work from the Research Department, nor did they grasp what he meant by the ‘familiar feeling’ he sensed from the alien.

After taking down all those aliens—hundreds, maybe even thousands—it was really difficult to spot any similarities or differences among such ugly creatures based on human perception.

So, it was hard not to think that Su Fengzhou’s sudden hunch felt a bit far-fetched.

However, the current results clearly proved that their captain was correct.

Shen Wenyan struggled to process it. “What does that mean? The things we ran into yesterday are really connected to the one from Qiufeng Community?”

Rong Yun thought out loud, “According to earlier research, alien bodies produced through ‘reproduction’ can have a maximum of about 75% genetic similarity. To achieve over 90%, it would need to come from ‘self-division’ of a mother body.”

Shen Wenyan looked even more confused.

Rong Yun explained patiently, “No matter how it occurs, reproduced offspring always show clear individual differences. But that group we encountered all had almost identical appearances, and like the one from Qiufeng Community, they were all A-rank alien forms with similar strength.”

“So what you’re saying is that there’s clearly no ‘reproductive’ relationship between them, which means…” Shen Wenyan began to understand and swallowed hard. “No way. Those things were already a huge pain—and now you’re telling me there’s an even higher-level mother body above them?”

Everyone around them fell silent.

Confronted with this silent agreement, Shen Wenyan couldn’t hold back any longer and yelled out, “What the hell! That size was just a subform? How huge would the monster that created them have to be? If that thing breaks out, we’d need military vehicles here to stop it! There’s no way a handful of us could handle it!”

Xiao Liu quietly reminded him, “Just so you know, our regular human-grade firearms can’t deal lethal damage to those things.”

Shen Wenyan: “…….”

“Whether we can stop it or not, we’ll find out when the time comes.” Su Fengzhou instinctively reached into his pocket but then remembered he had already finished the mint cigarettes back at the Research Department. He frowned slightly. “What’s more important now is that we need to track down the ‘escaped’ infected person as soon as possible.”

With danger ahead and behind, everyone’s brows furrowed tightly into knots.

At that moment, the Defense Force, pushed into work mode, finally made a breakthrough. “We found something!”

The first footage of the infected person showed up at 9:30 p.m., near the highway entrance, not far from the cave.

It was dark at the time, and full mutation hadn’t happened yet, so the passing vehicles hardly noticed. But because the figure was still wearing the Defense Force’s protective equipment, anyone who recognized them would see it immediately.

As the captain of the 39th squad, Wang Kan’s expression had turned extremely grim.

He hadn’t wanted to dig too deep earlier, afraid that higher-ups would pin the whole responsibility on the Defense Force. If the infected Defense Force member had been discovered a bit later, with more time between infection and mutation, there might still have been a chance to argue for leniency.

However, now that this footage had appeared, it was clear that dodging responsibility was no longer an option.

As one of the Defense Force squads responsible for managing the Chen Mountain Cave lookout post, the 39th Squad on duty today was undeniably implicated.

Starting with the first piece of footage, they followed the trail. Before long, the team discovered additional evidence in the surveillance videos from other intersections.

Wang Kan was the first to lose his composure. He took out his phone and called someone right away. “Hey, Xiao Sun, I’ll send you the exact timestamps in a minute. Get in touch with someone from the Communications Department and have them handle the surveillance footage quickly before the Traffic Bureau finds out. Make sure everything gets cleaned up. Don’t let these videos leak, got it?”

His voice echoed throughout the room, while the others slowly fell into silence.

Everyone’s faces darkened as more and more segments of surveillance footage emerged.

Amid the dead silence, someone muttered uncertainly under their breath, “If this route keeps going… the next stop is…”

“Ning City.” Su Fengzhou’s expression grew serious. He had driven over that overpass back and forth earlier that night, and the landmarks were still clear in his mind. He let out a vague snort. “If you all had been even a little more efficient, I wouldn’t have needed to make the return trip.”

Wang Kan had just finished his call when he heard that, and he froze for a moment.

Then he quickly shook off his thoughts, swearing as he grabbed his phone again and called the mayor of Ning City directly.

Maybe the infected one was originally from Ning City, and that last shred of human rationality had pulled it back. Alternatively, it could have been an entirely different situation. But either way, no one had expected it to head straight for the city center.

This was now a top-level crisis—alarms were triggered.

The situation escalated in an instant.

At this point, Su Fengzhou hadn’t slept for thirty-two hours straight, and the corners of his eyes were clearly bloodshot and red from being dry.

Without even warming the seat he had just taken, he stood up again. With a sweeping gesture toward the Seventh Squad, he issued a strong command, “Everyone, assemble—we’re heading to Ning City!”

……..

“I told you, stop making me soup.” After three full days of drinking chicken soup, Ying Xize finally voiced his displeasure.

He stood by the window, watching the oddly frequent police cars passing through Ning City lately, his brows tightly furrowed.

He was talking to Xiang Jiayan. “Assistant Xiang, if you thoroughly enjoy making soup, I can request a reassignment for you so you can work with someone who appreciates it.”

“You haven’t been in great shape recently—you need some nutrition.” Xiang Jiayan paused and then added, “This was an assignment from the director.”

“The director only told you to follow me, not to act like my nanny. In fact, you’re not even officially my assistant.” Ying Xize was clearly fed up with the soup by now—his gaze was colder than ever. “There’s no need to pretend to be so dutiful. You and I both know that one day, you’ll be pointing that thing at your waist right at me.”

Xiang Jiayan instinctively reached for his waist. The cold sensation of the gun grip beneath his fingers spread instantly through his body.

Just like Ying Xize had said, the bullet would eventually pass through his skull.

The look in his eyes, behind the golden-rimmed glasses, shifted slightly as if he were in a daze. However, Xiang Jiayan’s tone remained firm. “It’s already made. Just drink this one, at least.”

Sometimes, Ying Xize truly couldn’t understand the strange principles this so-called assistant insisted on following.

As he was getting ready to say something else, a sharp siren suddenly broke the silence.

He looked out the window and saw large crowds of people rushing from the nearby business district, pushing against each other. Many kept turning to glance back as they escaped.

With the Guide’s enhanced vision, he was able to see a range of expressions on their faces—discontent, curiosity, and nervousness.

Ying Xize turned to Xiang Jiayan with a questioning look.

The latter quickly looked up the news and found the important information. “It’s the Delong Business District. The police abruptly closed off the nearby roads and are evacuating civilians. They officially say it’s because of a sighting of a wanted criminal, but… look at this.”

Ying Xize took the phone from him and focused on the video playing on the screen.

Among the crowds behind the reporters, he could clearly spot the Investigation Department personnel in their protective suits, busy at work.

His lashes lowered slightly. “Now the scene is a real mess.”

Xiang Jiayan said, “If it’s another alien escape this time, the Defense Force at the Chen Mountain Cave lookout post will probably need to be replaced.”

Ying Xize didn’t comment.

He was about to return the phone when something caught his eye. His gaze locked in place, and his pupils suddenly became wide.

A chilling feeling rushed through his body, draining the last bit of color from his already pale skin.

Xiang Jiayan had been watching Ying Xize the entire time. Noticing that something was clearly off, he quickly stepped forward. “What’s wrong? Is it another reaction?”

Ying Xize raised his hand slightly in a casual gesture to keep him from getting any closer. His eyes stayed glued to the phone screen, dazed and unmoving.

He replayed the freshly uploaded video report over and over. Unconsciously, a cold smile crept into the corner of his mouth.

Ying Xize seldom revealed his feelings. Yet at this moment, pieces of memory surfaced from the depths of his mind—scene after scene, pulling him into a freezing abyss.

A distant voice whispered softly past his ear, like a nightmare that played endlessly in his mind. “You really think you can escape…? Just wait. One day, I’ll make my own rules—and trap you in them forever.”

It wasn’t until he started to feel suffocated that Ying Xize realized he had actually forgotten to breathe.

He took a few deep breaths before becoming aware again. Without glancing at Xiang Jiayan, he grabbed a jacket from the rack and walked out the door.

Footsteps quickly approached him, and he heard Xiang Jiayan’s questioning voice. “Where are you going?”

Ying Xize heard himself answer, “Delong Business District.”