After Tan Shiming submitted the report up the chain, approval came back quickly — a decision was made to launch a reconnaissance and strike operation against the drug manufacturing facility in Kuangshan West Quarter.

The operation would be jointly commanded by the Municipal Public Security Bureau and the Major Crimes Unit, with the Deputy Director of the Provincial Department’s Anti-Narcotics Bureau serving as overall commander.

Time moved to two-thirty in the afternoon. The reconnaissance team deployed first, driving out to Kuangshan West Quarter and returning to the same warehouse where Jiang Cheng had been rescued.

That day, he had been blindfolded and taken away from this very spot. Deprived of his sight, Jiang Cheng had drawn on every other sense to memorize the journey — cataloguing everything along the route to piece together the path.

Now he was back.

In the off-road vehicle, Jiang Cheng sat wearing sunglasses, the high bridge of his nose and the firm set of his lips visible beneath them.

Zhou Jin pulled open the car door and leapt in, geared up and ready. She was wearing a black jacket on top, fitted trousers, a belt cinching in her slender waist.

Her hair had grown out considerably and she’d tied it back, leaving her neck pale and slender where it showed. The shorter strands at her forehead refused to be tamed, falling loose in scattered wisps like wild grass.

Jiang Cheng’s gaze settled and deepened as he studied her profile.

Zhou Jin finished checking her gear, turned her head toward Jiang Cheng, and walked straight into his line of sight. “What is it?”

Her eyes held a light, easy smile — bright and quick.

Jiang Cheng said, with a tone that was far from serious, “How is it that you seem to have gotten prettier?”

They were about to head out on an operation, and he was already acting out of sorts. Zhou Jin shot him a look. “Can you not be serious for one moment?”

“Alright.” He gave a light laugh. “Seriously then — very pretty.”

“…” Zhou Jin lowered her head to escape his burning gaze. “Thank you.”

She redirected the moment at the right time, pulling the atmosphere back to where it should be. Jiang Cheng’s interest dimmed slightly; his sunglasses did a good job of concealing the brief flicker of loneliness that passed through his eyes.

Zhou Jin gestured toward the front of the vehicle.

The officer in the driver’s seat glanced back at Jiang Cheng in the rearview mirror. Seeing no further requests, he picked up the car radio and said, “All ready.”

Jiang Cheng exhaled a long breath and reset his focus.

He closed his eyes and said to the driver, “Go straight ahead first. Keep the speed at forty.”

His fingers tapped lightly against his knee — once per second. He needed to count time with his full concentration, so Zhou Jin made sure to breathe as quietly and evenly as possible.

Because the exact speed of the vehicle couldn’t be confirmed, he couldn’t make entirely precise judgments — only provide a general outline of the route.

The command center had already built a partial electronic model based on the topographic map of the entire Kuangshan area, ready to provide technical support and analysis as needed to supplement his memory.

The weather that day was poor. A dense layer of grey cloud hung overhead. The Kuangshan mountain range folded upon itself in ridge after ridge, wisps of light mist curling around the mountainsides.

The off-road vehicle climbed onto the winding mountain road. On one side, sheer rock faces rose steeply; on the other, the road dropped away into cliffs thick with dense forest.

Traffic infrastructure in the Kuangshan area was underdeveloped. Even this so-called mountain road wasn’t laid with asphalt — it was a concrete track built years ago. Some sections had deteriorated badly from neglect, and with the recent cold and wet rainfall, the surface had turned muddy and rutted. The ride was rough and jolting.

At a certain point along the way, when Jiang Cheng could no longer make a reliable identification, he had the vehicle stop.

He thought carefully for a moment, then said, “During the stretch just before we reached the facility, I heard the sound of running water. There should be a river somewhere nearby.”

That day, old Scorpion hadn’t shown him very much.

One building was used to process and cook down the raw materials; another was used for refining the product into white blocks. The former required no specialized skill, while the latter had been staffed with a dedicated team of technicians.

Behind the facility there was an area for piling up waste and residue.

Off to one side stood a separate building used as a rest area, stacked inside with large quantities of timber.

Jiang Cheng said, “It’s a disused factory — three buildings. It was probably a timber trading operation, or maybe a furniture factory, back in the day…”

At the command center, Bai Yang worked from the information Jiang Cheng had provided, analyzing the direction of the river channels to determine where a factory might plausibly be situated up ahead.

In less than ten minutes, he locked onto a location and turned to report to Tan Shiming: “Following the road in the direction Jiang Cheng indicated, there’s a place called Cliff Head Village up ahead — small population, around a hundred or so people. The villagers used to run a timber factory together, up in the hills, but it shut down and closed more than ten years ago. That might well be the spot he’s describing.”

Tan Shiming said, “Look into it.”

With a target established, the reconnaissance team mobilized again.

Jiang Cheng warned, “Watch out for their sentries.”

Half an hour later, the reconnaissance team confirmed the exact location of the facility. Wary of tipping them off, they had sent only a small advance team to get close and assess the situation.

The remaining personnel drove their vehicles into a dense stretch of woodland to wait.

Since Zhou Jin and Jiang Cheng couldn’t directly take part in the strike operation, they naturally stayed back with the reconnaissance team, resting there and awaiting further instructions.

In the off-road vehicle, Jiang Cheng’s gaze drifted to Zhou Jin. She still had her handcuffs and sidearm on her — just no place to use them.

Zhou Jin’s composure was complete throughout. Being ordered to stay on standby at the rear, she showed not the slightest trace of frustration. She was steady and resilient — the kind of person who gave the impression she simply wouldn’t cry.

Watching Zhou Jin now, Jiang Cheng thought back to the past.

In the days after Zhou Chuan died, their once bright and warm home had sunk into a deep, lightless pit.

The plants on the balcony — the ones they’d tended so carefully for years — gradually withered and died. He watched Zhou Jin, who had always been like a sunflower, wither in the same way, and there was nothing he could do.

She curled up on the sofa and cried without stopping, day and night. Jiang Cheng would dissolve sleeping pills into water and coax her to drink it by telling her about the latest developments in the investigation — only then could she sleep peacefully.

Sometimes, seeing her sit there looking hollow and lifeless, hugging her knees and just saying plaintively that she wanted Zhou Chuan back, Jiang Cheng couldn’t hold himself together.

He shouted at her in a low, raw voice: “Zhou Chuan is dead. Dead means never coming back. What good does crying do?”

Zhou Jin stared at him blankly for a moment. Her dry, cracked lips moved but formed no response. Then she quickly covered her eyes and broke into the most wretched, agonized sobbing.

Seeing her like that, something tore through Jiang Cheng like a blade. Overcome with regret and self-loathing, he raised his hand and slapped himself hard across the face.

“I’m sorry…” he said, and pulled Zhou Jin’s trembling shoulders into his arms, his eyes red as he pressed frantic, clumsy kisses to her forehead, her hair. “I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.”

Gradually, coming home became something difficult for him to face.

He was afraid to confront the Zhou Jin who had fallen apart — and even more afraid that he would be powerless to do anything about it.

The Zhou Jin of now had changed greatly. She no longer left people at a loss for what to do. When she faced problems, she didn’t cry, and she no longer had any impulse to throw herself into his arms.

Jiang Cheng smiled to himself, silently. He couldn’t quite say whether that was a good thing or a bad thing.

Zhou Jin sat in silence the entire time. So did Jiang Cheng.

Before long, the reconnaissance team relayed some findings back. Based on what had been established so far, there was only one road in and out of the facility, with a guarded checkpoint; four people were on watch duty, and the possibility that they were armed could not be ruled out.

However, the team couldn’t advance far enough to gather intelligence on the interior of the facility.

After receiving this report, the command center deliberated and developed a plan for a surprise raid, along with a subsequent containment strategy, aiming to ensure that every person inside the facility would be taken in the net.

The command center went over many times with Jiang Cheng everything he had observed that day, and he answered each question in turn.

The operation was fully primed and ready. By now the sky was nearing dusk, and the mist among the mountain forests had grown much heavier.

Jiang Cheng pushed open the off-road vehicle’s door. His right leg — long and solid — stretched out and rested casually on the running board.

He pressed a hand to the back of his neck and rolled his shoulders, working the tension out of his tight muscles.

Not far away, members of the reconnaissance team were gathered around their various electronic devices, fully focused on responding to the operation as it unfolded.

Jiang Cheng lit a cigarette. His gaze swept across the forest, and landed on the nearest police vehicle — keys still hanging inside.

After a moment’s silence, Jiang Cheng spoke suddenly. “Xiao Wu,” he said to Zhou Jin, “do you trust me?”

Zhou Jin startled. “What?”

Jiang Cheng sounded as though he were bringing up something entirely inconsequential. “I’m a good person.”

He turned his head to look at Zhou Jin. His eyes curved in a smile — a smile that carried a trace of his old reckless ease, yet with a depth behind it still as a bottomless lake, his gaze fixed on her without moving.

Zhou Jin broke into a bright smile. “I trust you.”

Jiang Cheng knew what Zhou Jin looked like when her eyes turned genuinely sincere. It was exactly this.

She had beautiful eyes. When she looked at someone, they always filled with admiration and warmth. Every time Jiang Cheng felt like he had nothing and was worth nothing, Zhou Jin would look at him just like this — following after him without conditions or reservations, full of devotion and adoration…

For as long as he could remember, Zhou Jin’s affection had made him feel like he was someone worth cherishing.

But that was then. Now her eyes followed another man, and he had no right to receive that gaze any longer.

Jiang Cheng tilted his head back against the seat, smiled at himself with a trace of self-mockery, and said, “Seems like Jiang Hansheng never told you about the hearing.”

Zhou Jin: “What?”

Jiang Cheng saw from her expression that she genuinely had no idea, and let out a short, derisive sound. “He’s still the same, isn’t he. Obviously crazy about you, treats me like a thorn in his eye — and still puts on that virtuous act.”

Zhou Jin wasn’t sure why he was saying this, but hearing him speak badly of Jiang Hansheng made her slightly uncomfortable. She gave him a look. “Stop picking on him. What about the hearing?”

Zhou Jin assumed it was just idle talk, her attention fixed on what was unfolding at the front lines — she didn’t notice the somewhat darkened look in Jiang Cheng’s eyes.

He said coolly, “At the hearing, Jiang Hansheng could see I was lying.”

Zhou Jin sensed something wrong immediately. Her gaze snapped back to Jiang Cheng. “What did you say?”

“I said I lied. Yao Weihai wasn’t killed by old Scorpion — he was killed by me.” Jiang Cheng smiled in a way that didn’t reach his eyes. “No choice. If they knew I was the one who pulled the trigger, they’d never give me the kind of freedom I have now.”

Zhou Jin froze.

Jiang Cheng’s voice dropped lower, and lower still. “I’m still going to end up back in that wretched interrogation room — some faceless thing pressing down on my head, questioned like a dog.”

His voice was quiet and subdued, yet he bit into that last line with a ferocity that was almost vicious.

Zhou Jin lost the ability to speak entirely. Her eyes trembled faintly, and she felt a chill, sharp as needles, crawling up along her spine.

“And why should they get to do that? While they sat in their offices sipping tea, we were out there risking our lives. You barely make it back alive, and these people get to sit in judgment over you…” The whites of Jiang Cheng’s eyes were slowly threading through with red. “Xiao Wu, do you know — Meng Junfeng was barely twenty years old. A student pulled out of the police academy before he even graduated, put to work as an undercover. He died right in front of me. Do you want to know what he said at the end…”

“…”

“He said: ‘Uncle Yao, I haven’t lived enough yet. I don’t want to die’…”

At the time, they were at the edge of life and death. Qi Yan had adopted a policy of killing rather than risking letting anyone go — out of five people, either the sole target Cangfeng would die, or they all would.

Three people were killed after resisting. That left only Jiang Cheng and Meng Junfeng.

Jiang Cheng thought he had truly reached the end of the road this time. What he hadn’t expected was that, at that critical moment, it was Meng Junfeng who knelt down first and admitted he was an undercover.

Meng Junfeng shuffled forward on his knees to Uncle Seven, pressing his forehead to the ground and begging for his life.

From where he was being restrained on the floor, Yao Weihai shouted at him: “Cangfeng!”

Meng Junfeng’s entire body jolted.

Meng Junfeng knew perfectly well — he was not Cangfeng. Jiang Cheng was. And he was Cangfeng’s “sheath” — his task was to protect Cangfeng’s safety when it mattered most.

When Yao Weihai addressed him as “Cangfeng,” he was issuing a command.

Even if that command was this cruel.

Yao Weihai looked at him, his expression full of anguish. “Remember your mission. Remember what you believe in… Don’t be afraid…”

All the strength left Meng Junfeng’s body at once. He collapsed to the ground.

Uncle Seven looked at A’Feng — the boy he had always treated like his own son — and realized he was a police undercover. Rage erupted through him instantly.

He had Meng Junfeng dragged over beside Yao Weihai and made to kneel alongside him.

The fury of betrayal ignited and blazed through the group. They fell on Meng Junfeng and Yao Weihai with fists and boots, screaming abuse without stopping — then tore the police badge from Yao Weihai’s uniform and forced both men to swallow it, humiliating them to the utmost degree.

Meng Junfeng’s mouth was filled with blood, half of it drenching his front. His entire body had been beaten to the point of numbness, his consciousness on the verge of disintegrating — and still he was hauled up and forced back onto his knees.

Uncle Seven pulled on his gloves, took a gun from one of his men, and leveled the muzzle at Meng Junfeng’s back.

Meng Junfeng’s instincts still functioned. The moment he heard the slide rack, the hairs on his back stood on end — every pore on his body flung wide open, screaming with an endless, bottomless terror.

He had once been so brave, so fearless. But in this final moment, as death became undeniably real before him, he was afraid.

Meng Junfeng began to cry — the way a young boy cries. He said, “Uncle Yao, I’m scared…”

Jiang Cheng was standing right beside Qi Yan, watching all of it.

His palms were soaked with cold sweat. A searing, tearing pain ripped at his heart.

The irreversible scene unfolding before him was like a train hurtling forward at full speed — even if he threw himself in front of it, he would only be crushed to nothing. It would change nothing.

He couldn’t stop it.

The pain was unbearable.

It was as though a thick, insoluble darkness closed over him, suffocation closing around his throat.

Jiang Cheng felt the cold spread through his entire body. It was as though he had lost all sensation — his soul drifting up to hover somewhere overhead, looking down at everything happening below.

He saw that his own expression had not changed in the slightest.

Facing the terrified Meng Junfeng, Yao Weihai tried to offer comfort: “I’m here with you.”

But those words, up against the crushing weight of death, were so light — so utterly without power.

Meng Junfeng was still crying. “Uncle Yao, I haven’t lived enough yet. I don’t want to die…”

Yao Weihai finally shed tears. “Don’t be afraid,” he said. “Don’t be afraid.”

Uncle Seven watched him shaking uncontrollably and, perversely, was in no hurry to fire.

When Meng Junfeng was nearly driven to madness by the terror of death, thrashing and screaming: “I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die!”

Uncle Seven pulled the trigger without hesitation. With a single thunderous crack, the bullet tore through Meng Junfeng’s body from behind.

Perhaps it was an illusion — Jiang Cheng thought he could smell the sharp, acrid stench of gunpowder mixed with blood, thick enough to turn his stomach.

After being hit, Meng Junfeng fell forward without a sound. His body convulsed involuntarily for a long while, suffering through agonizing spasms, before death finally came completely.

Uncle Seven watched until Meng Junfeng went still, then let out a cold, quiet laugh. He stripped off his gloves, wiped his hands carefully with a handkerchief, and passed the gun to Qi Yan.

Uncle Seven said quietly, “Yao Weihai is yours.”

Qi Yan was wearing a pair of black gloves as well. He took the gun and turned it over in his fingers for a moment before finally leveling it at Yao Weihai.

Just as he was about to fire, something seemed to strike him as unsatisfying.

Too easy. That kind of ease wasn’t enough for him.

Qi Yan looked around, and his gaze settled on Jiang Cheng. The gun spun in his fingers — he shifted his grip to the barrel and extended the handle toward Jiang Cheng.

He smiled — something mischievous in it, like a director who had finally found exactly the right actor for the most important scene.

Qi Yan said, “Team Leader Jiang. You do it.”

The way he addressed Jiang Cheng was more mockery than anything else.

Even Jiang Cheng himself didn’t know how he managed it — his expression didn’t waver in the slightest. He gave a nod and took the gun from Qi Yan’s hand.

Yao Weihai was kneeling with his back toward him. Jiang Cheng raised the gun and pressed it to his back — an execution in everything but name.

An execution carried out by his own hand.

He paused. Then Jiang Cheng looked up at Qi Yan and asked, “Can I say a few words to him?”

Qi Yan raised an eyebrow, spreading his hands wide. “As you like.”

Jiang Cheng knelt on one knee, pressed the muzzle against the back of Yao Weihai’s skull, and said to him, “I genuinely don’t understand what keeps you going like this.”

He wanted to hear Yao Weihai’s answer.

An answer that could sustain him — help him keep living and keep moving forward.

Jiang Cheng’s expression was ice-cold, yet his eyes were edged with red. “Deputy Director Yao, do you have family? Do you have friends? What is it you believe in so strongly that you have to hound people like us without ever letting go?”

He gave a sharp warning: “Don’t give me any nonsense about glory and justice!”

Yao Weihai smiled, pale and faint, and murmured, “Li Jingbo…”

“What?”

“My belief… is Li Jingbo…”

“…”

Jiang Cheng stilled for a moment. He thought of something similar he had once said to Yao Weihai himself — that he, too, held a belief. He had said that his belief was Zhou Jin.

No matter what it took, he wanted to survive and return as a police officer — to see her one more time.

Yao Weihai spoke haltingly, his voice thin and fading: “Li Jingbo’s father… was my comrade in arms. When we were fighting on the border, he gave his life to save mine. I promised him I would take care of Jingbo… I failed him… Let him die in the August 17th incident…”

He slowly raised his head, fixing his eyes on Qi Yan in the distance. “Him — it was him who killed Jingbo.”

At the mention of Li Jingbo’s name, Qi Yan made a show of thinking hard for a long moment, as though sorting through the countless souls who had died at his hands to locate this particular one.

“Oh, that kid…” Qi Yan made a show of sudden recollection. “He was an observer, if I remember right. I’d just shot the sniper in the leg — it gave away my position — and he was the first one to find me. I remember he was quite capable. He even managed to scratch my face. I got angry, so I stabbed him about ten times or so.”

At those words, Yao Weihai was immediately taken back to the moment he had stood in the autopsy room and looked at Li Jingbo’s body. The immensity of that grief ignited instantly into a rage like wildfire.

His eyes burst with threads of red. He surged forward toward Qi Yan — and was slammed back down by Jiang Cheng behind him, held with iron force.

Qi Yan was very pleased with his reaction, and pushed further still, grinding deeper into Yao Weihai’s nerves. “His blood got all over me. It took such a long, long time to wipe it all off…”

Pinned and unable to move, Yao Weihai could do nothing but bellow at Qi Yan in anguish.

Qi Yan reveled in the exposure of the selfish ugliness hidden beneath the coat of righteousness — it made him intensely, brilliantly alive.

He stripped the pretense away without mercy. “So that boy was the son of an old friend of Deputy Director Yao’s. No wonder… no wonder you came after me like a rabid dog back then. I’d thought you were some great and noble figure willing to sacrifice everything to bring me in.”

Yao Weihai roared, “Qi Yan, you won’t have much longer to run free! Not much longer!”

Qi Yan’s expression was entirely unbothered. “In any case, so many officers have gone down to keep me company along the way. I’m not too troubled by it. Oh, and speaking of which — there’s one other person. That Professor Jiang. Does he know what kind of person you really are?”

At the mention of Jiang Hansheng, Yao Weihai’s ragged breathing hitched. Slowly, his head dropped. The expression on his face reached a level of pain that had no further to go.

“You really should have heard how he screamed while he was in my hands during those days.” Qi Yan sighed with something resembling genuine regret. “And those undercovors you sent in…” He gestured toward the fallen Meng Junfeng. “—which of them ended up well? They were all destroyed because of you. Deputy Director Yao, if I were you, I’d have taken my own life long ago in penance.”

Yao Weihai closed his eyes. Scalding tears of remorse spilled down his face. From Jiang Cheng’s angle, his shoulders were shaking violently.

Yao Weihai’s mind began to come apart. To people who weren’t there before him, he kept repeating over and over: “I’m sorry… I’m sorry…”

Qi Yan said cheerfully, “It’s a good thing when a person can repent.”

Jiang Cheng tightened his grip on the gun again and said quietly, “Yao Weihai. You’ve reached the end of your road.”

The muzzle pressed once more against the back of his skull. The cold touch of it jolted Yao Weihai back into clarity.

Jiang Cheng asked him, “Do you know who is about to pull the trigger?”

Yao Weihai pressed his bloodied lips together and answered in his heart: yes.

Jiang Cheng was not one of his subordinates, nor a pawn he had deployed to infiltrate the enemy. Jiang Cheng was his hope.

Over the course of five years, every time Yao Weihai came close to losing heart entirely, the intelligence that “Cangfeng” delivered would ignite the fire in him all over again.

Carrying the weight of his duty as a police officer, carrying his guilt over Li Jingbo, pulled along by Jiang Cheng step by step, he had walked all the way to this moment.

If at the very last, the hand that fired the shot was Jiang Cheng’s — there was not too much left in his heart to regret. Because Yao Weihai knew: Jiang Cheng would step from his shoulders and continue chasing the light that lay ahead.

That was his sacred mission. And that was the worth of his death.

Jiang Cheng said, “I was once a police officer too — full of ambition and resolve. But the police force had no use for me, and I was forced down this road. Sometimes I think about what could have been, but when I look at how you ended up — what do I have to regret—”

Yao Weihai let out a low, quiet sound — something between a laugh and a murmur. Tears ran down his face in full.

He understood the meaning beneath those words. Jiang Cheng was saying: he had no regrets about accepting this undercover assignment.

Jiang Cheng racked the slide. Nobody noticed the faint trembling in his hand. Only Jiang Cheng himself knew.

“—Because your road ends here. Mine still has a long way to go.” Jiang Cheng said these words and rose sharply to his feet, his gaze hard and cutting, the muzzle trained on Yao Weihai. “If you want someone to blame, blame yourself — for insisting on standing against us.”

Yao Weihai said quietly, “…Fire.”

Jiang Cheng closed his hand around the cold body of the gun — like taking hold of a black venomous snake, its hard, slick scales dragging softly across his palm. A chill ran through him; every pore on his body pricked with a sharp, needle-like pain.

Yao Weihai waited, and waited, and Jiang Cheng didn’t fire. Afraid that any more hesitation would give something away, his eyes blazing red, Yao Weihai threw his voice at Jiang Cheng in a great roar: “Jiang Cheng, I’ll remember you! Even as a ghost, I won’t let you go! I want to see just how far your road goes! Fire! If you have any spine at all, fire!”

“Bang—!”

In an instant, blood sprayed outward. A few flecks of hot blood spattered across Jiang Cheng’s face, and the heat of it sent a shudder through his entire body.

The deafening gunshot echoed and reverberated through the warehouse for a long time. Beneath the smoke curling from the muzzle, Yao Weihai fell at the sound.

The exhaustion accumulated over years and years fell away from him in this moment. Except for a touch of regret, there was nothing left to regret — and without regret, one could die in peace.

He saw Meng Junfeng lying on the ground. He saw Jiang Cheng’s boots pass by the two of them and walk forward, out ahead.

Yao Weihai finally breathed out his last breath and slowly closed his eyes.

Jiang Cheng understood the meaning of Yao Weihai’s last words before he died. He was saying —

I will watch over you from above.

I will watch — until the moment you break through to the very end.

He holstered the gun on the thigh strap and walked to stand in front of Qi Yan. “Satisfied now?” he asked.

Qi Yan raised an eyebrow slightly, said nothing for a moment, then only replied, “Deal with the bodies. Then come find me.”

As Jiang Cheng recounted all of this, his eyes went red at the rims — but not a single tear fell.

He said, “Xiao Wu, to tell the truth, I should have died there with them.”

Zhou Jin felt a bolt of shock, and a nameless dread seized her heart.

She saw that the bright, easy confidence that had always defined Jiang Cheng’s expression had given way to a darkness that couldn’t be dissolved. He said, “Because the ones who survive — it seems like everything they do is wrong.”

“Wanting honor and an identity back — that’s wrong. Wanting my woman to come back to me — that’s wrong…”

“Knowing that A’Feng died in my place — even drawing an extra breath feels wrong.”

“No! That’s not true!”

Every alarm in Zhou Jin was going off at once. Something like a premonition seized her, and she reached out and grabbed hold of Jiang Cheng hard.

Jiang Cheng’s hand moved instantly — he caught her wrist with a grip that was quick and cold and without mercy.

Back at the police academy, he had been one of Zhou Jin’s instructors. Half of her close-quarters combat skills had come from him.

He subdued her with effortless ease, his hand reaching for the handcuffs at her waist.

Zhou Jin’s hands and feet were pinned. The pain in her wrist brought cold sweat to her skin, and before she’d even registered what was happening, she heard a click — cold, hard metal snapped around her wrist, and with a sharp jerk, she was cuffed to the inner door handle.

Zhou Jin’s face drained of color. “Jiang Cheng!”

Seeing her this worked up — the way she used to be, tears and fire both at once — something heavy in Jiang Cheng’s chest unexpectedly lightened.

Jiang Cheng laughed — a smile that was all bravado and satisfaction, deliberately baiting her. “Look at you, all fierce again. Are you like this with Jiang Hansheng too?”

Zhou Jin said furiously, “Jiang Cheng, let me go! If you dare go off and do something on your own again, I’ll—”

Jiang Cheng quickly covered her mouth. Zhou Jin couldn’t make a sound. The eyes above his hand burned with both urgency and anguish.

He let his expression grow slightly serious and spoke to Zhou Jin with sincerity. “Jiang Hansheng is certainly no match for me in many ways, but he’s someone you can trust your whole life to. I know he’s been fond of you since he was young, and now you feel the same about him — that’s good. That’s very good—”

His smile was a little forced.

“Xiao Wu, knowing that… I can go do what I need to do with a clear conscience.”

Zhou Jin was frantic, tears streaming without stop. She had sensed what Jiang Cheng was about to do. She sobbed against his hand: “No! Jiang Cheng, don’t you dare! Don’t you dare!”

She wrenched against the cuff. The hard iron cut red marks into her wrist.

“Just listen to me…” Jiang Cheng pressed down on her arm, stopping her from struggling, and said in a low voice, “If I don’t settle this with my own hands — don’t atone for what I’ve done — I can’t die in peace!”

In that instant, a fine glimmer of tears surfaced in Jiang Cheng’s eyes. They were facing each other directly. Zhou Jin could see straight into the pain and wreckage he had buried for so long, and she stilled.

Jiang Cheng let his hand fall. Her tongue seemed to lock in place — she couldn’t say a word.

Jiang Cheng very much wanted to kiss Zhou Jin, but in the end he couldn’t bring himself to. Instead, he reached out and pulled her into his arms — with a force so strong it was as though he wanted to press her into his very soul and bone.

He said, “Xiao Wu, I’m sorry. Sorry to you, sorry to Mom and Dad…”

Zhou Jin’s one free hand seized his jacket — clenched it with everything she had. Her voice trembled. “If you do anything foolish, I will never forgive you for the rest of my life.”

Jiang Cheng heard this, and let out a soft, bitter laugh.

“…That’s alright too.”

A whole lifetime of Zhou Jin’s — what a gift that would be.

The hand gripping his jacket was pried open finger by finger. The weight against Zhou Jin lifted all at once — she saw Jiang Cheng take her sidearm, spring out of the off-road vehicle with sharp agility, and bolt toward the nearest police car as though he had wings.

He leapt through the window, turned the key, and the engine roared to life.

Everyone around turned to look, momentarily confused about what was happening.

Jiang Cheng’s face was cold and resolute. He tugged at his jacket collar, turned his head, and looked across the distance at Zhou Jin one last time.

“Jiang Cheng!” Zhou Jin was beside herself. She screamed at her colleagues in the reconnaissance team: “Stop him!”