Jiang Cheng’s head tilted slightly to one side, his pupils contracting.

He felt that every knife wound and beating he had endured couldn’t compare to this single slap from Zhou Jin.

He slowly turned his head back and looked at her carefully.

She lowered her hand and clenched it into a fist. Her stinging palm trembled faintly. Her chest heaved violently — yet her expression remained blank, her parted lips the only sign of the ragged breaths she was drawing. Her body was rigid.

Jiang Cheng was covered in wounds, barely recognizable as a person. Tears surged up in Zhou Jin’s eyes all at once, yet her expression stayed cold. She stood stiff and motionless, her lips trembling slightly with the force of her fury as she demanded of him, “Who gave you permission to do this? Jiang Cheng — who told you to do this!”

Jiang Cheng smiled. “I knew you’d be angry at me. I was wrong… Xiao Wu, I was wrong…”

He murmured low, coaxing her, and reached out to press her into his arms.

It hurt — it truly hurt. Zhou Jin was pressed against him, her body touching those wounds, and the pain nearly made Jiang Cheng retch — yet he couldn’t bring himself to let go. The person he was holding was Zhou Jin.

His Xiao Wu.

His fingers, bruised and bloodied, threaded through Zhou Jin’s soft hair. His vision was beginning to blur and dissolve. He could only gather just enough strength to breathe out in a whisper: “Forgive me — will you?”

Zhou Jin choked back her sobs. The hand clutching Jiang Cheng’s clothing gradually tightened. She closed her eyes and wept against him just like that, tears falling freely. “I hate you so much — do you know that? I’ve hated you every single day. Every single day, Jiang Cheng.”

Jiang Cheng smiled. “I know.”

Before long, a voice came through the earpiece — it was Tan Shiming: “Bring him back.”

Zhou Jin heard it too. Reluctantly, she released her hold. Jiang Cheng seemed confused, reaching out to grasp at her — but a special operations officer stepped forward and seized his wrist, snapping a handcuff onto it in one swift motion.

“Jiang Cheng, we are placing you under arrest on suspicion of the murders of ‘8·17’ task force leader Yao Weihai and officer Meng Junfeng.”

Jiang Cheng’s eyes went bloodshot at once. “What are you doing?”

The officer stood between him and Zhou Jin, blocking his line of sight. His emotions erupted in an instant. He struggled and fought back. “Let Zhou Jin talk to me!”

Seeing that he was about to lash out, the officer immediately restrained him from behind. Jiang Cheng felt a sharp pain in the back of his knee and dropped to one knee, his vision spinning, light and shadow swirling around him.

He watched Zhou Jin’s silhouette and face grow dark, impossible to make out anymore. He was just about to call out Xiao Wu when, with a heavy thud, he collapsed unconscious to the ground.

The officers rushed to check on him. His breathing was still present — he had only lost consciousness. They immediately called for an ambulance to stand by.

The final report came through: “Four criminals neutralized at the scene. Jiang Cheng is not in critical condition. No casualties on our side. Mission complete.”

Command center.

Tan Shiming gave the final order: “Good. Stand down.”

Jiang Hansheng raised his hand and removed his Bluetooth earpiece. He stood perfectly still, staring at the large screen that had already gone dark.

Bai Yang got to his feet and walked over to Jiang Hansheng, unable to hide his excitement. “Professor Jiang, you were incredible! If it weren’t for you, we couldn’t have pinpointed their location so quickly.”

The walkie-talkie had lost its positioning signal, leaving the police unable to determine Jiang Cheng’s exact whereabouts.

From the recording, they had only been able to confirm that the location was somewhere in Xili, Kuangshan. But that area presented two problems — the range was vast, and the terrain was complex, with mountain zones and villages scattered throughout, making a systematic search extremely difficult.

Fortunately, Jiang Cheng had provided precise timing and weather conditions in the recording. Since he’d been able to watch a boxing match, he must have been somewhere with accessible network signal. Combining all of this information, the police quickly narrowed the search down to four possible locations.

Time waited for no one.

If they searched each site one by one, it would take too long — and the longer it dragged on, the greater the chance the mission would fail.

It was then that Jiang Hansheng suggested they begin from the location that was the most sparsely populated, the most concealed, but simultaneously the most difficult to retreat from.

Tan Shiming asked, “How confident are you?”

Jiang Hansheng said, “Fifty percent.”

Tan Shiming drew a measured breath and decided to trust him. “Things are already the way they are. Let’s gamble on it.”

As it turned out, they had gambled correctly.

After the mission was complete, Bai Yang couldn’t help but ask in admiration, “Professor Jiang, how did you determine it?”

Jiang Hansheng said, “I guessed. Just very good luck.”

If he were Qi Yan, he would only allow two kinds of people to exist under him — those still alive because they had value, and those who had lost that value and were dead.

His own luck had never been particularly good. The person with good luck was Jiang Cheng.

Tan Shiming noticed Bai Yang was still chattering away, and his eyelid twitched. He directed him, “Xiao Yang, go get Professor Jiang a glass of water.”

Jiang Hansheng declined. “That’s not necessary. I’d like to rest for a moment.”

He turned and walked out of the command center alone, coming to a stop in a corridor where no one else was present.

His back against the wall, he was only wearing a shirt. The chill from the wall seeped through the fabric — an unusual cold.

Because his own body was burning hot.

Jiang Hansheng’s cheeks were flushed a vivid red from fever, making the skin elsewhere appear strikingly, almost troublingly pale.

His throat ached, and his head throbbed mercilessly.

Jiang Hansheng furrowed his brow slightly, raised his hand to press over his sweat-soaked forehead, and coughed several times in quick succession.

— If Jiang Cheng had died, perhaps…

In the command center, there had been one moment when this thought surfaced in Jiang Hansheng’s mind. The instant he caught himself, large beads of sweat had streamed down from his temple.

He told himself it was the fever making him delirious — that was why such a thought had come to him. But he couldn’t deceive himself. Jealousy was warping his character, filling him with those unimaginable, contemptible, filthy thoughts…

His hand had begun to tremble again. Jiang Hansheng clenched his jaw and grabbed hold of that wrist with his other hand, his breath coming through his nose in quick, scorching bursts.

“Professor Jiang?”

Bai Yang walked over. He’d been staring at screens for too long and his eyes were aching, so he’d slipped out to smoke a cigarette to clear his head.

Seeing Jiang Hansheng leaning here, apparently resting, he went over to say hello, then out of habit held out a cigarette toward him and asked, “What are you doing out here?”

The words had barely left his mouth when Bai Yang remembered that Zhou Jin had mentioned Jiang Hansheng didn’t smoke or drink — and that she had given both up entirely for his sake. He hastily moved to take it back.

“Thank you.”

Jiang Hansheng suddenly held out his open palm toward him.

Bai Yang froze, glanced at the cigarette between his fingers, and felt it would be awkward to pull it back now. He handed it over and asked, “Are you alright? You look a bit off.”

He helpfully flicked his lighter and lit it for Jiang Hansheng.

Jiang Hansheng said nothing. He took the cigarette between his lips and inhaled — something sharp and pungent rolled through his mouth.

The ember glowed red between his fingers, flickering in and out. A thin pale haze of smoke curled around him.

He tilted his head back and exhaled slowly, his features obscured in shadow, his expression impossible to read.

Unwilling.

The thing he had held carefully in his hands was slipping away, little by little, through the gaps between his fingers.

No matter what — he was simply unwilling to let it go.