The tall man didn’t give him much time.
Hai Ning could already hear strange noises from outside.
He looked at the iron chain as thick as a finger, then at the cement pillar that would take an adult to wrap their arms around, raising his hand to press at the joint of his shoulder, quickly confirming the connection point.
…
The tall man, who had just stuffed a high-concentration lip snuff into his mouth, was startled into a coughing fit by the sudden clanging sound of the axe hitting the ground.
After barely catching his breath, rubbing his sore throat, he peered inside and called out, “…Qi-ge?”
The tall man knew that Qi-ge hated being disturbed when working.
But it was too eerily quiet inside.
Just as he was about to step in, the dull thud of an axe sinking into flesh rang out unexpectedly.
Qi-ge made his move?
The tall man felt reassured and brought the lip snuff back to his mouth.
But as he was about to step forward, he heard faint breathing from the extreme silence.
—That was not Qi-ge!!
A chill swept over his scalp.
Sensing something wrong, the tall man quickly strode forward and yanked aside the fishy-smelling plastic curtain—
A white, icy blade that had been lying in wait from the side slashed upward, fiercely slicing across his abdomen.
The last thing the tall man saw was a severed arm, abandoned on the ground along with a sturdy cylindrical lock.
Everything that followed, he no longer needed to know.
In the overwhelming dizziness and pain, Hai Ning, driven by fury and adrenaline, lunged for the tall man’s waist pouch.
There, imprinted with an upside-down blood-red “A” symbol, next to a red cross, was a simple medical supply kit.
Hai Ning had had his eye on it for a while.
…
Hai Ning pulled out three or four syringes, scattering them haphazardly on the ground. Forcing himself not to pass out, he grabbed the one labeled “Hemostasis” and directly jabbed it into the side of his wound, where blood was gushing like a spring.
Having taken care of his bedridden mother for years, he knew some basic first aid.
This was a quick-acting hemostatic agent meant for adult mercenaries.
Within 15 seconds, the bleeding from his wound visibly slowed down.
He pulled out the gelatin hemostatic spray, his fingers trembling, and sprayed three or four times on the severed limb he had caused himself.
A transparent film quickly formed at the wound.
Hai Ning continued kneeling on the ground, mechanically injecting himself.
It was as if he was burning his life force, constantly injecting false vitality into his weakened body, which had lost so much blood.
Under the stimulation of a mixture of stimulants and artificial adrenaline, Hai Ning staggered to his feet.
His remaining three limbs were filled with strength.
With a wildly beating heart, seemingly about to explode at any moment, Hai Ning stood up and took a small key from Tall Guy’s waist, unlocking his own mouth gag.
Because his hands were covered in blood, they slipped a bit. Hai Ning tried several times before successfully freeing himself.
The empty gag fell to the ground, echoing with a hollow metallic sound.
He breathed lowly, focusing entirely on recovering his strength.
Under the influence of the drugs, Hai Ning’s hearing became unusually sharp.
A few minutes later, he heard light footsteps from outside, along with the faint sound of rough fabric brushing against the ground.
The swollen-eyed man was dragging a corpse of a vagrant teenager, walking lightly, feeling fortunate that he hadn’t gone far when he found a child near the garbage bins about the same height as Ning Zhuo.
He happily whistled.
Between breaths, the fresh smell of blood faintly hit his nose.
The swollen-eyed man froze for a moment, looking down at the child he had been dragging along like a broken sack.
The child’s face was covered in blood, and his eyes were still open, the whites showing an eerie blue.
The swollen-eyed man shrugged indifferently and stepped through the door of the abandoned factory.
The heavy scent of blood hit him so hard that he tripped.
…It was a genuine fall.
The swollen-eyed man fell face-first onto the fishy, foul ground.
And in the next second, he couldn’t stop himself from rolling and wailing in pain.
His left leg, below the knee, had been cleanly cut off by an axe!
Hai Ning stood up from the shadows by the door.
Because he had lost an arm, he unconsciously leaned to the left as he walked.
He unsteadily made his way over to the swollen-eyed man, tilting his head, his single hand holding the axe trembling slightly.
The swollen-eyed man, paralyzed by fear and pain, was limp as mud, unable to form a word, only making meaningless “ee ee” sounds of pain.
Hai Ning stared at the man with swollen, frightened eyes and, as if speaking in a dream, echoed his earlier words back to him: “Hey, give us a smile.”
Without waiting for any response, Hai Ning swung the axe down.
After finishing everything here, Hai Ning dragged what was probably the fuel originally meant to burn him and his father’s bodies, pulled the four corpses together, and set them on fire.
For that already dead vagrant child, there was no more respectful way to handle the situation.
The most the police would do later would be to haul the bodies away and incinerate them.
If there really was an afterlife, Hai Ning hoped that when the child returned full of hatred as a vengeful ghost, he would stay close to his enemies.
As the flames slowly devoured half of the factory, Hai Ning sat by the tall grass outside, quietly waiting for his father to arrive.
The drugs made Hai Ning’s wound tingle with a numb itch, but at least it wasn’t painful.
He seriously thought about whether his father would be scared by his appearance when he arrived.
But there were no other clothes to change into now.
He focused intently on this, so much so that he zoned out.
Five minutes later, he saw a rundown car kicking up clouds of dust as it came towards him.
He felt a little happy, supporting his body to stand up, but worried that if he walked into the light, he would scare his father at first glance. So, he tried to avoid the firelight, stepping into the shadows as he walked.
When the car came to a stop, and the rolling dust settled, Hai Ning found he couldn’t take another step.
He recognized this car.
A stranger jumped out of the driver’s seat.
The man took a couple of steps and then cursed loudly, full of energy: “Damn, too quick, huh?! I haven’t even brought the guy yet.”
Hai Ning froze in place.
The cold shadow engulfed his heart and mind.
He had been wrong.
He knew there were five people in the car.
One commander, three mercenaries…
…and a driver.
He had actually overlooked the driver, who might also have been a mercenary.
His father didn’t have to be taken all the way to the destination before being killed.
For a small, easily panicked man, a mediocre policeman who always came last in combat assessments, professional killers could deal with him in the time it took for a traffic light to change.
…
The driver, thinking his companions hadn’t gone far, walked toward the side of the fire scene: “Brother Qi?! Ronnie! Where are you? Where is everyone?”
As his figure was swallowed by the shadows at the other end of the factory, Hai Ning rushed toward the car.
He prayed that what was about to happen wouldn’t happen.
And then, he saw his father.
He was lying in the passenger seat, quiet as if asleep.
His throat had been precisely slit, and he was soaked in blood, the car seat beneath him completely saturated.
To make it look like he had been killed by bandits, his face had been hacked seven or eight times, leaving it in pieces.
“Dad.”
Hai Ning stood on tiptoe, leaning against the window, softly calling, as if afraid of disturbing the man’s good dream: “…Dad.”
None of this should have happened.
If it weren’t for his offhand remark, reminding his father of something strange about “Dionysus World,” the youth who had robbed “Dionysus World” would have been ruled an accidental death.
Then, right now, they would probably have finished dinner by now.
His mother, in poor health, would have gone to bed early.
And he would be carrying his crying younger brother up to the rooftop, walking through the neon lights, softly singing a lullaby, waiting for his father, who was working the night shift, to come home.
Hai Ning mechanically thought about all of this while calmly hiding under the car.
He was clutching a particle-cutting dagger that he had confiscated from Puffy Eyes, allowing the raging anger and hatred to torment his mind and body.
But he did not move.
Even he was surprised that he could hide so calmly like this.
A pair of feet approached from a distance.
The driver clearly hadn’t found the whereabouts of his companions.
So, he temporarily gave up the search, opened the passenger side door, and tried to drag Dad out to throw him into the blazing fire.
Sneak attacks are not hard when you’re used to them.
The particle-cutting dagger pierced through the top of the driver’s foot as if cutting through warm cheese. While he was immobilized, Hai Ning, holding a severed fuel line, sprayed gasoline all over the driver’s face and body.
When the driver’s face showed shock and horror, Hai Ning threw out a delicate silver lighter.
He had taken it from the tall smoker when he escaped.
As the flames roared up, lighting up half the sky, Hai Ning was inappropriately reminded of a poem from his textbooks:
“The east wind scatters a thousand trees of blossoms at night… A night of fish and dragon dances.”
Hai Ning watched the burning man running in agony for a while without expression, then got into the truck’s driver seat, intending to drive the truck back.
However, to start the vehicle, it required a second facial recognition scan.
Hai Ning leaned on the steering wheel and observed for a moment, confirming with frustration that the man burning on the ground no longer had anything resembling a “face.”
He buried his face in his left palm, which reeked of gasoline and blood, and laughed quietly.
What now?
How would he get home?
How would he explain to Mom when he got home?
As Hai Ning’s brain, severely overloaded, struggled with these thoughts, the radio channel crackled.
Charlemagne’s voice came through.
“Hey, you there?”
Hai Ning stared blankly at the radio for a moment, lowered his voice, and tried his best to imitate an adult tone: “Mm.”
It was unnecessary.
Because of dehydration and blood loss, his voice was terrifyingly hoarse.
And Charlemagne, clearly panicking over something, had no time to notice anything unusual on this end.
—Hai Ning, as bait, was supposed to be the easiest to die in this kidnapping case.
Other than his parents, no one thought he should live.
Charlemagne, agitated, said, “There’s a bit of a problem here. In a while, bring one of them back, anyone, and clean this up.”
“The sickly woman in this family isn’t easy to deal with; she noticed something was wrong.”
“Who the hell knows why… Either you were too professional, or she saw that spider tattoo on your ankle—I’ve told you before to cover it up! ‘White Shield’ doesn’t allow tattoos, remember? If it weren’t for the fact that I can’t use my own people for this, why would I have asked you to impersonate a ‘White Shield’ officer…”
Charlemagne gulped, his voice trembling with anxiety: “She didn’t ask anything, didn’t say anything, just directly tried to kill me. Damn it, damn it! Crazy woman!”
“I pushed her. Now she’s passed out.”
Hai Ning’s fingers trembled slightly as he listened, and the only hand he had left reached for the communicator, as if trying to grasp something.
When there was only breathing and no response from this end, Charlemagne’s voice grew louder: “Get it straight, this mess was caused by you. If you don’t clean it up properly, are you going to leave this disaster to me?”
Hai Ning opened his mouth.
He knew begging wouldn’t work, but he still wanted to beg—please, don’t hurt my mom, don’t hurt my brother.
But Charlemagne, whose cover was blown, didn’t even give Hai Ning the chance to beg.
“Fine, great, I know there’s extra payment for this. I don’t need you anymore. Scram.” His tone was indifferent. “Follow your rules and never contact me again.”
The communicator disconnected.
___
Author’s Note:
[Silver Hammer Daily]
Headline Special Report:
Good News! The entire murderous drug trafficking gang “ANY” has been wiped out!
Recently, to maintain Silver Hammer’s public safety and return peace to the city’s residents, “White Shield” launched a sweeping operation. Charlemagne, the newly appointed Deputy Chief of “White Shield” headquarters, took the lead in this operation, killing multiple criminals and receiving the second-class silver medal!
Note: The symbol of the “ANY” group is the mathematical symbol ∀, so they are often called the “Anti-A.”
:((( this backstory man… I’m so sorry Hai Ning…