Rong Qian had thought it would take two days to get a result, but unexpectedly, this gang of fugitives saved her the trouble and came looking for her first.

Rong Qian stayed calm. The first thing she did was drive away from the city center, determined not to let innocent civilians get hurt because of her.

Xie Dong stayed on the line with her the whole time.

They didn’t have time to make a careful plan and could only react as things came. The police had already deployed a special task force, which was tracking them all the way.

And Rong Qian’s job was simply to stall for time!

But the other side had clearly guessed her intentions too, and kept accelerating the whole way. Rong Qian floored the gas pedal as well, with several cars relentlessly chasing her from behind.

Soon, Rong Qian discovered the gas was running low. Her speed gradually slowed, and the cars behind quickly caught up, repeatedly ramming into her car to force her to stop.

Rong Qian ignored it all, gripping the steering wheel tightly with both hands, determined to grit her teeth and fight it out to the end.

Until, passing by a construction site, near an abandoned unfinished building, these people opened fire on her.

A bullet came in through the car window—with a “crack,” the window glass shattered, and the bullet passed right in front of her eyes, piercing through the window on the other side.

The next shot, the muzzle was about to aim at her head.

Rong Qian finally stopped the car.

Rong Qian was taken up into that abandoned building. To strip her of any ability to resist, these people beat her like a punching bag, with fists and kicks, as if venting their fury.

Being beaten like this by a group was a first for Rong Qian.

But these people also knew they couldn’t waste time, so they had no intention of beating her to death outright. They only stopped once she could no longer stand up.

Rong Qian collapsed onto the ground. She tried to struggle and get up, but there wasn’t a shred of strength left in her body.

Throughout the beating, she had been doing her best to protect her vital areas, so most of the damage was external. As for internal injuries, she guessed at least one rib was broken, and her internal organs felt as if they had been shaken out of place, the pain leaving her unable to catch her breath.

She had already coughed up blood, yet this bunch of inhuman beasts still showed no intention of stopping—utterly deranged.

Seeing that she could still move, a man dressed entirely in black, his face covered by a skull mask, walked up to her, then stomped his foot on her hand, grinding down hard several times, as if trying to crush her fingers!

Rong Qian trembled all over from the pain, but she bit through her own lips and refused to make a sound.

The man crouched down, took out a photo, and compared it to her face, saying, “The woman in this photo is you, isn’t it?”

Rong Qian struggled to lift her head. She couldn’t see very clearly, but she could vaguely make out the woman’s outline—the person in the photo was indeed her.

But she had no memory of ever having such a photo taken.

“Someone hired us to kill the woman in this photo, and time is short—you have to die tonight.” As the man spoke, he aimed the muzzle at her forehead.

But Rong Qian smiled. “No. You don’t actually want to kill me yet.”

“Want to find out?” The man’s index finger was already on the trigger.

Rong Qian stared straight into his eyes and said with certainty, “You still have something you want to ask me. Otherwise, you wouldn’t bother wasting time.”

The man fell silent. And in that moment of his hesitation, the police arrived!

The well-trained special police swiftly surrounded the scene and immediately shot down the armed men, but the man in the skull mask reacted quickly too, instantly taking Rong Qian hostage.

“Nobody come any closer, or I’ll take her down with me!” The man held Rong Qian by the neck, the gun aimed at her head, continuously backing away.

But there was no wall behind him at all—this was the fourth floor, and falling from here was no joke.

No one dared make any rash moves.

“Just who… are you?”

Rong Qian wanted to see the man’s face clearly, but the mask was fitted too tightly—she simply couldn’t make it out.

“Even at the brink of death, you still want to know who I am?” There was a trace of mockery in the man’s voice.

Rong Qian remained calm. “You’re wrong. The only one at the brink of death… is you.”

“What?”

In Rong Qian’s hand was a photo—one she had picked up off the ground amid the chaos earlier. Looking at the image of herself in the photo, Rong Qian’s lips curved up into a smile as she said, “Thank you for bringing this photo before me.”

Then, under everyone’s stunned gazes, Rong Qian shoved the man away, threw herself backward, and leapt off the fourth floor!

There was no fear on Rong Qian’s face, no panic—only a calm she had never felt before.

This was the first time she’d ever jumped off a building. It was different from what she’d imagined—she didn’t even have time to think about anything. In the face of gravity, she hit the ground in mere seconds.

But she did experience the weightlessness of falling—it was quite terrifying. If possible, Rong Qian never wanted to jump again.

Still, before she fell, Rong Qian saw several special police officers subdue the man—truly worthy of being called Chinese special police, their reaction speed was impressive. Her jump hadn’t been in vain.

But there was one fleeting instant—she didn’t know if her eyes had deceived her—she thought she saw Shen Yi?

But before she had time to look closely, she hit the ground. Rong Qian came to understand the pain Yan Qingyao must have felt.

So this is how much it hurts to jump off a building…

Lying in a pool of blood, Rong Qian struggled to turn her head, looking at the photo clutched tightly in her hand. As her life ebbed away, her strength gradually faded too. A gust of wind blew by and carried the photo from her hand away.

Then, midair, it turned to ashes.

Rong Qian let out a breath of relief. Thankfully, her gamble had paid off…

————

Rong Qian felt as if she had passed out—and yet, perhaps not. Her consciousness was hazy. When she opened her eyes, she found everything around her pitch black.

Rong Qian felt around and discovered she was sitting on the floor with her back against a wall. Enduring the discomfort, she held her waist with one hand, braced the other against the wall, and struggled to stand up.

Thinking it over carefully, this was the first time she had traveled through with injuries on her body.

It seemed that each time she traveled, only her fatal injury could be offset.

The room was very dark—the windows were probably covered tightly by curtains, not letting in a sliver of light.

Rong Qian could only feel along the wall, trying to find a light switch. She didn’t find one, but instead her hand landed on a bed.

Reaching further onto the bed, she discovered there was someone there—she had touched the other person’s hair!

And the very moment she touched them, that person woke up!

Before Rong Qian could react, the person seized her with a grappling hold—one hand clamping her wrist, the other gripping her throat—and slammed her hard against the wall!

If it had been the usually lively and energetic Rong Qian, she would have already been fighting back against this “stranger”!

But having just been beaten like a punching bag, she was already running on fumes, without even a shred of strength left to struggle. Especially the moment her back hit the wall, aggravating her other injuries—Rong Qian let out a muffled groan, unable to hold on any longer, and passed out.

That single muffled sound was all it took—the other person recognized her voice.

The man’s clear, deep voice carried a note of astonishment. “A’Qian?”