Han Guan had taken the submachine gun, leaving Chen Fu with only a handgun. He loaded a round, feeling somewhat relieved: fortunately, Han Guan’s magazines were empty—if the submachine gun fell into the enemy’s hands and was turned against him, he’d be in trouble.
Near the doorway, Chen Fu called out again: “Han Guan?”
Still no response.
Chen Fu steeled himself, charging in with his gun raised, ready to fire at any moment.
What he saw inside made his scalp tingle, both shocking and eerily disturbing.
The room was messy, with the standard fixtures of an abandoned pump house: rotted water pump, dust-covered pipes, and brick debris scattered on the floor from bullet-pierced walls.
A pool of blood spread across the open floor.
In the corner was a well. Usually, abandoned pump houses either had their doors locked or wells filled in to prevent children from falling in or livestock wandering in—wooden planks were scattered by the well, clearly having covered the opening moments ago.
But now, the boards had been moved aside, and Han Guan’s body was mostly submerged in the well, only his shoulders and above visible, head hanging down, arms spread out like Sadako crawling out in the classic horror film “Ring.”
He saw no one else.
Chen Fu cursed internally. The pump house had nowhere to hide; there was a small ventilation window up high, but no one had come out—undoubtedly, the woman was down in the well.
He approached cautiously, step by step, concerned for Han Guan: “Brother? Brother! Make a sound.”
As a Dixiao, he was confident: no matter how severe the injury, death wasn’t possible—a grunt should still be manageable.
Sure enough, Han Guan’s body seemed to twitch, his throat making a muffled, strange gurgle.
This was getting serious. Chen Fu stepped closer while keeping his body leaned back, eyes squinting down the well: he couldn’t see anything. Pump well openings were usually small, and with this lighting, especially indoors, it was impossible to see clearly.
He wanted to fire down there but feared hitting Han Guan.
Chen Fu mentally counted “1, 2, 3,” then with a roar, grabbed Han Guan by the scruff of his neck and collar, yanking him up while pointing his gun into the well, firing twice rapidly.
Dixiao was naturally strong, and Chen Fu was particularly robust—lifting over a hundred pounds wasn’t an issue, but even so, the weight in his hands felt strange…
Too late—the moment he lifted Han Guan, a figure flipped out from beneath him. He didn’t even see their face clearly before a cold flash of steel swung toward his throat.
Chen Fu knew he was in trouble. He let go of Han Guan while swinging his gun around, but before he could pull the trigger, he felt a cold wind across his palm—the next instant, half his hand, the gun, and several fingers holding it went flying, hitting the well’s edge with a clang before falling in.
Nie Jiuluo crashed heavily to the ground, extremely frustrated: she had been using Han Guan’s body for leverage, and when Chen Fu let go, she fell too, inevitably losing her blade’s precision—a perfect chance to finish Chen Fu in seconds, lost.
She knew from experience: that once an ambush failed to strike true, the ensuing confrontation would be incredibly difficult. Chen Fu was already a fierce dog, and now he would become a rabid one.
Chen Fu’s eyelid twitched as he stared at the well in disbelief: the gun and half his palm were down there, with two fingers left on the edge.
His… hand was gone?
The pain came with a delay. Chen Fu clutched his half-right hand with his left, his face grotesquely twisted as he let out an agonized howl, banging his head against the wall with loud thuds, then frantically rubbing and grinding. When he raised his head again, his forehead was a bloody mess, with several trails of blood flowing down, dividing his face into particularly fierce and hideous sections.
This must be stimulating triggering his feral nature.
Nie Jiuluo gritted her teeth as she stood, tightening her coat’s belt. Usually, she wore the coat open for style, but now she needed it tight, as a makeshift bandage.
Don’t look—as long as she didn’t see it, she could pretend she wasn’t injured.
Her legs were trembling slightly, the pain becoming increasingly vague, but she could hear blood dripping from her feet. She did not doubt that if she released this breath she was holding, she would collapse immediately—so she couldn’t let go. With a formidable enemy before her, letting go meant death.
She couldn’t die. The happy life she had begged from Jiang Baichuan at age eight, built with such difficulty, was finally taking shape, possibly reaching its peak. Old Cai had said she might have a chance at a touring exhibition. She couldn’t let this end here—whoever tried to bury her, she would bury them instead. Today, either she would walk out, or they would both die here, but he definitely wouldn’t leave alive.
Chen Fu’s eyes bulged as he shouted: “Brother?”
He saw the bloody hole in Han Guan’s throat but wasn’t too worried: it was a serious injury, sure, but would heal in a month or two.
He looked up at Nie Jiuluo: “Who are you?”
Nie Jiuluo didn’t respond—every bit of energy was precious now; she had none to waste on words.
Chen Fu suddenly realized: “You’re… from the Bandaged Army?”
There was no Bandaged Army anymore—that was ancient history. Nie Jiuluo pressed her palm against the knife handle, her mind buzzing, probably from blood loss, her vision intermittently going dark: she would have to fight head-on. Chen Fu was taller; she’d have a hard time reaching his skull, so she’d need to focus on severing his spine and get behind him…
Seeing Nie Jiuluo’s continued silence, Chen Fu lost patience. With a roar, he reached for a crowbar leaning against the wall, forgetting his right hand was useless. He grabbed at empty air, and Nie Jiuluo seized this opportunity, lunging straight at Chen Fu’s waist, one arm wrapping around him for support while the other violently brought out the dagger.
Chen Fu wasn’t helpless—knowing he was in danger, he reached down with both hands, forcefully grabbed Nie Jiuluo by the waist, lifted her entire body, and slammed her against the opposite wall.
Nie Jiuluo’s vision went dark as she felt herself suddenly airborne, then hit the wall before crashing to the ground. The pain made her gasp, stars and blood mixing in her vision, her previously secured hair coming loose.
Through the haze, she saw Chen Fu grab a pump pipe with his left hand, swinging it down at her head.
Water pump components were mostly made of alloy steel—anyone could imagine how heavy they were. Nie Jiuluo’s body reacted instinctively, her head jerking aside as the pipe grazed her ear and struck the ground, creating a bowl-sized crater in the cement floor and making her eardrums buzz.
Missing once, Chen Fu had gone berserk, raising the pipe for another strike.
Dying from a pump blow would be too undignified. Nie Jiuluo used all her strength to roll away, but the effort was massive, causing her abdomen to churn as if several organs had shifted—but she couldn’t complete the roll. The pipe came down, trapping a large section of her hair in the crater, pulling her scalp and preventing her from rolling fully.
If she couldn’t roll away, she’d roll back. Nie Jiuluo reversed direction sharply, driving her knife down, the blade entering through the top of Chen Fu’s right shoe until it hit the bottom.
Chen Fu felt the stabbing pain in his foot and staggered backward. Normally, a knife in the foot was like being nailed down—you couldn’t move. But what made this different was how incredibly sharp Nie Jiuluo’s dagger was. As he stumbled back, he watched the dagger slice straight out through his shoe tip. It took a moment to register what had happened before he fell on his backside, clutching his foot and screaming in agony.
Fresh blood gushed from the split in his shoe sole, spattering the ground.
Nie Jiuluo lay face-up, laughing loudly, but her laughter cut off almost immediately: her breath was gone, along with her strength.
The pump house had no ceiling, just exposed beams—ugly and rough. In her idle moments, Nie Jiuluo had imagined her death: usually living past a hundred, passing peacefully in her sleep without illness or pain, lying in a luxury villa by the sea or the mountains, with bright sunshine, blue skies, and blooming flowers all around.
She never imagined it would be here.
She closed her eyes, a faint tear track at the corner slowly diluting the blood on her face.
A shadow moved—Chen Fu dragging his injured foot over. He walked slowly, one leg trailing, leaving bloody footprints with each step, but that didn’t stop him from finally reaching her side and stepping on one of her arms.
Nie Jiuluo looked up, though she could barely see anymore, only aware of a huge, nauseating figure swaying in her blood-tinted vision.
Chen Fu bent down, breathing heavily, grabbed her arm with his left hand, and cursed: “You filthy woman.”
Then he violently wrenched.
A crack rang out.
Nie Jiuluo’s body arched—that crack seemed to wrench half her soul out through her crown, the sudden agony instantly reactivating all her previously shut-down nerves. She let out a piercing scream, her knee driving hard into Chen Fu’s groin.
His family jewels would probably be ruined, or at least damaged—though… Dixiao’s recovery ability was too strong, it would only keep him injured for two or three months.
Nie Jiuluo collapsed back to the ground, unable to even breathe properly now, only able to gasp with her mouth half-open. Chen Fu seemed to be rolling around in pain nearby, or perhaps crashing about in a frenzy, but she no longer cared.
She was too tired.
Nie Jiuluo slowly closed her eyes.
However, she couldn’t rest for long before being disturbed by movement and pain in her scalp. Nie Jiuluo opened her eyes to a slit, seeing the ceiling beams swaying left and right as if in an earthquake.
Not an earthquake—Chen Fu was dragging her by the hair. Hundreds of thousands of hair strands deeply rooted in her scalp somehow managed to move her heavy body.
Chen Fu dragged her to the well, giggling as he stuffed her body and the attached broken arm into the well, speaking incoherently: “You can just… slowly down there… drown… dissolve… rot in there… stink in there…”
The well was deep—pump wells were typically no shallower than forty meters—and with its narrow opening, it seemed even more confined and bottomless. When she had looked down earlier after moving the boards, she had seen black, shiny water far below, emanating an aged, stale smell.
Nie Jiuluo was being stuffed in almost folded in half, fortunate only that her head was facing up. There was slight friction between her body and the well wall, preventing her from sliding down immediately, but it wouldn’t hold.
Her body was sliding inch by inch into the darkness, like a blood-soaked, dirty rag destined to be buried with this putrid well.
Her fingers weakly scraped at the well wall but couldn’t hold on, watching Chen Fu’s ugly face grow more distant.
Chen Fu, impatient with her slow descent, wheezed as he reached for the pump body components by the well. The pump body was much heavier than the pipe. In his severely injured state, he couldn’t lift it with one hand, so he used his stub hand to help slowly raise it…
Nie Jiuluo felt she should close her eyes, but she didn’t. She kept them open, watching.
Until her skull was crushed and her breathing stopped, she wouldn’t give up.
Then, as if watching a movie, Chen Fu and the pump body were suddenly thrown aside, leaving her with an unobstructed view of the light through the well opening.
She heard the heavy pump body hit the ground, heard fighting, heard heavy impact sounds.
Finally, everything went quiet.
Then suddenly, another figure appeared at the well opening. She saw Yan Tuo lean down, reaching for her, calling out: “Miss Nie.”
He couldn’t reach her.
And as her strength gave out, she slid further down.
Nie Jiuluo’s eyes closed again, her eyelids like butterfly wings being pounded by heavy rain, no longer able to open.
She thought hazily: he came so quickly.
He must not have turned back only after receiving the “reed marsh” message—he had already turned around before that.
***
Nie Jiuluo wanted to let out her final breath, feeling the suffering was over and she could finally rest.
But she still couldn’t. Her entire being felt enclosed in a black cocoon, everything swaying, her body moving up and down, pain scattered throughout, now here, now there throbbing.
Suddenly she heard Yan Tuo calling: “Miss Nie, Miss Nie?”
Nie Jiuluo responded unconsciously: “Ah?”
Her voice was very weak, barely more than a moan.
She felt herself lying in Yan Tuo’s arms, very warm. Under his coat, he wore only a thin shirt, and her face rested against it. The shirt was new, or freshly starched, with a pleasant fabric smell. Through this layer, she could feel his body heat and heartbeat.
Both the warmth and the heartbeat radiated vigorous life force, so vigorous it made her a bit envious.
Yan Tuo lowered his head and said softly: “Miss Nie, your life is in your own hands. I can’t help you now; no one can help you. You need to hold on for another half hour. After half an hour it will be better, understand? Half an hour.”
Half an hour?
What was half an hour?
Nie Jiuluo’s consciousness scattered into countless pieces again, each growing wings and fluttering away, and amid this chaotic flight, Yan Tuo’s words echoed like enchanted sounds.
Half an hour.
Hold on for another half hour.
***
Lu Xian usually didn’t hang out much with A Peng’s group, but probably because he had saved Tian Xiang the night before, earning merit, A Peng came by in the afternoon to ask if he wanted to join them for an essential oil massage, specifically emphasizing it wasn’t anything sexual—just legitimate massage.
As a medical student, Lu Xian well understood the benefits of massage and manipulation, and couldn’t help being tempted. After briefly settling Tian Xiang, he happily went out with the group to wait for the elevator.
The elevator stopped at the third floor with a ding, its doors slowly sliding open.
The elevator wasn’t empty—someone was standing inside. Yan Tuo.
He was dragging a suitcase.