The car had been stopped in the wilderness for some time now.

Rain drummed steadily against the roof—tap, tap, tap—and it reminded Cen Jin of the watch she had worn at the reserve. The second hand had moved just like this, as though it would never stop.

A pair of headlights appeared in the distance, drawing closer. Cen Jin found them blinding and raised her hand to shield her eyes.

After a moment, the car door was pulled open from outside.

Cen Jin looked up. It was En Nu, umbrella raised, standing in the knee-high wild grass. Rain streamed off the rim of the umbrella in all directions, and in the darkness and the glare of the headlights it shimmered a strange, translucent white.

En Nu seemed to have aged somewhat. The passionate indignation he had worn on that television screen three years ago had given way to a composed, measured steadiness.

Cen Jin waited for him to speak first.

He studied her for a long while before he began.

“Miss Cen?”

“Three years ago, I was not yet particularly prominent in Ka Long’s political world. I was dissatisfied with the government’s handling of the war criminal issue, so I organized supporters and held protest marches and demonstrations frequently. I remember that for the third anniversary of the April Calamity, I planned a demonstration on a larger scale than usual—but it still came to nothing. Once, in the middle of a speech, the police deployed tear gas, and everyone scattered in disarray.”

Cen Jin listened without interruption.

“That evening, I watched the news coverage on television and was deeply disheartened. In the middle of the night, a phone call came out of nowhere. The caller had apparently used a voice changer—impossible to tell if they were male or female. Do you know what they said to me?”

Cen Jin smiled. “I imagine they asked whether you knew about the Jewish avengers.”

The muscles in En Nu’s face gave the faintest twitch. Then he nodded.

“I answered that I had looked into some accounts. If the government continued to do nothing, I also wanted to establish such an organization in Ka Long. As long as one’s conscience was clear, that was enough. But I was just an impoverished social activist—I had no idea where to even begin. She answered: that’s all right.”

“About a month later, she contacted me again. Through an untraceable account, she transferred a sum of money—the start-up capital for the Hand of God. Do you know how much it was?”

Cen Jin said: “It wasn’t only the money, was it. Along with the five hundred thousand US dollars in seed money, she must also have laid out a number of conditions—for instance, to remain as ‘fair, just, not driven by rage, not reckless, not to kill the wrong person, not to let the guilty escape.’ And also: please do not investigate her identity; simply maintain the cooperation.”

En Nu was silent for a long time. In the distance, the long slender blades of grass bent under the weight of raindrops, then sprang back.

At last he spoke. “Miss Cen, you are the founder of the Hand of God.”

Cen Jin laughed softly. “That’s overstating it. Whatever scale you’ve achieved today, I’ve had little to do with it. That five hundred thousand dollars probably isn’t even enough to keep the sanatorium running now.”

“At the start of this month, after a gap of three years, Miss Cen made another transfer.”

Cen Jin nodded. “I heard your focus was shifting. A small token. Besides… I have no use for the money anymore.”

As she said this, she lifted her gaze slightly. “But how did you… find out?”

En Nu said: “It wasn’t us. It was Mr. Wei.”

Working from Cen Jin’s signature, Wei Lai had pieced together the entire sequence of events. He had no time to deal with Ke Ke Shu’s vows to pull those three bodyguards apart limb by limb. Using that riddled, bullet-pocked desk, he found paper and pen, and laid out the full chain of reasoning for En Nu, point by point.

——”Here: third anniversary of the April Calamity. Re Lei Mi returned to Ka Long as an investor and government guest. At the same time, Cen Jin, consumed by guilt and burdened by her circumstances, also returned. She met with Re Lei Mi. Old wounds were reopened.”

——”Shortly afterward, Re Lei Mi was found dead in his home in France. His safe was wide open. Cen Jin was a suspect—she had been present that evening—but was later cleared due to insufficient evidence. Now we know: she admitted to it. Which means she did in fact kill Re Lei Mi and took the five hundred thousand dollars.”

——”What followed: the Hand of God was established. Mr. En Nu—I’ve been told the Hand of God started out very small, and the initial seed money would not have needed to be large. You are the founder; you know best what was first received. Was the original figure five hundred thousand?”

——”Then, closely following that: the sudden shift in Cen Jin’s writing style. Your people said she ‘sensed danger closing in and started pulling on cover after cover.’ That’s not right. Under normal circumstances, from the time of your founding to when your reputation had spread far enough to reach her—that should have taken considerable time. But in fact it was as though you founded on one day and she changed her style the next. Because it was all arranged by her. She knew what her outcome would be. Once she had done what needed to be done, she stopped holding back.”

——”On the informant’s letter, she wrote out the names of those who should be held responsible for the reserve in sequence. She placed herself last. She was waiting for the others to be dealt with first, and then she would bring the whole matter to a close.”

——”There is one more thing: Cen Jin was the sole person who handled the registration of refugees at the reserve. If it is said that the original name list is held in the National Archives, and yet there exists a second person in this world who can reproduce all 292 names—that person can only be her…”

Cen Jin listened in silence until it was over. Then she asked En Nu: “Do you have a cigarette?”

En Nu didn’t smoke. He gestured to an aide, who brought one over. Cen Jin turned it between her fingers, held it up to the car light, and saw the label—Gold Leaf, a premium blend from Zimbabwe.

She lit it. A faint, sweet, scorched fragrance drifted into the air.

She drew a breath, then exhaled. The smoke blurred the air before her, blurring into the past.

She said: “I am, by nature, rather cowardly. I was intimidated by Re Lei Mi and didn’t dare speak for three years. What finally made up my mind—what drove me to the decision—was the meeting with Re Lei Mi three years ago in Ka Long.”

That visit had, of course, brought more threats. Re Lei Mi had leaned close to her ear and, in fact, let slip a secret.

He said: “Do you remember that colleague of yours who went out to find help? He was the one who told us the location of the reserve. He said that apart from himself, there was only one more person left—a young woman, inexperienced, just starting out. Right then we thought: if it’s only this young woman, this will be easy to handle.”

As he finished, he burst into laughter. That laughter still echoed in her ears.

……

Cen Jin looked at En Nu. “It’s raining heavily—won’t you come up and sit inside?”

En Nu shook his head and went on standing there.

“On the way back, everything suddenly fell into place for me.”

“This was not my life alone to lose. This was not my matter alone. Re Lei Mi had made his arrangements airtight. If I didn’t come forward, the truth would never be known—so what would those lives amount to? And my colleague—what would his life amount to? His bones are mixed in with two hundred thousand others from Ka Long, impossible to pick out. And the man who put him there has been hailed as a hero by the Ka Long people.”

En Nu was silent. The rain seeped into his shoes and socks, and his feet were ice-cold.

Cen Jin watched the unbroken lines of rain hanging from the rim of the umbrella.

She had always dreamed there would be a great hero, clad in armor, who would come to rescue her in her darkest moment.

But then—on that journey back—she suddenly understood.

There was no such person. But the armor had always been there, prepared for her. She would have to put it on herself.

All she had to give up was one life, and a life that had already become unbearable to live.

“Once I made peace with it, nothing else seemed to matter. What needed doing was to fight it out with Re Lei Mi and the rest of them. But I didn’t want him to die quietly and be mourned as a hero—I wanted everything brought into the open, I wanted Ka Long to be part of it, I wanted black to be called black and white to be called white!”

“That night, the Ka Long channels cycled through the same few programs. I watched your face. I listened to your speech. I watched you being driven away in disarray by the police. And it suddenly occurred to me—perhaps we could carry out a collaboration without ever meeting face to face.”

She called Re Lei Mi. He asked: “How much do you want?”

She answered: “Five hundred thousand.”

Re Lei Mi agreed—but with conditions attached. A man like him would never let money drain freely from his fingers.

“Cen, have you ever considered that we might join forces? You’ve received a medal, and so have I. If we were together, we’d be a very good advertisement—enough to make money in Ka Long for another ten years.”

Cen Jin said into the phone: “That sounds lovely.”

As she said it, she was turning a page on an introduction to tetrodotoxin, TTX.

She liked this poison.

——Those who were poisoned, though unable to speak or move, remained fully conscious throughout the entire process of dying—aware of everything happening to them.

Things unfolded exactly as she had intended: she stood over Re Lei Mi, paralyzed yet fully aware, and from her vantage above him, read out his crimes one by one, informing him that there was no antidote for this poison, that he should experience the process of dying—very few people ever got such an opportunity.

Then she put on music and gently turned the dial of the safe.

The second was Sai De. He had hidden himself well, and she couldn’t find him—but she knew he would come for her, and she knew how she would reason with him.

Sure enough, half a year later, Sai De cornered her in a dark alley and nearly choked the life out of her. But she kept smiling through it, saying between gasps: it wasn’t me, I know who it was, neither of us can escape. If you kill me, you’ll have no one to pin it on.

Sai De loosened his grip, half-convinced.

Cen Jin clutched her throat, coughing, and said: look into it—there’s a revenge organization in Ka Long. The night I went to see Re Lei Mi, that was what the meeting was about. I didn’t expect they had already moved. Look into it, and you’ll see I’m not lying…

Sai De fled, desperate to bury himself as deep as he could—but someone would find him. She didn’t have that capability herself. Someone else would.

She waited patiently for the Hand of God to take shape, then sent the informant’s letter. The entire thing was typed—only when it came to the names did she feel that, as with all important correspondence, the most critical parts warranted being written by hand.

Pursuing war criminals was not a tale from legend; the time it would require would always exceed what anyone imagined. When Sai De’s hand appeared before her in He’er Xinji, the city was still locked in the bitter wind and snow of a winter that refused to end.

The cleaning woman screamed and rushed to the phone to call the police. But Cen Jin felt the corners of her lips curve upward. She looked at the blurred reflection of herself in the window glass, and a smile crossed her face.

En Nu said quietly: “Miss Cen, when you wrote the informant’s letter, you could have left your own name out.”

Cen Jin smiled. “It wouldn’t have helped. Even if I had left it out, Sai De would certainly have implicated me trying to save himself. And as for what role I truly played in the reserve—I have no intention of hiding it. Even after six years, I can’t tell you clearly what kind of person I am.”

She had wanted a trial. She had wanted many eyes on her. The result mattered less than that. She had wanted to lay the past open—for people to look, to reproach, to accuse, to let it stop needing to be hidden. Some secrets, kept inside the body, grow into bones that have no right to be there, piercing through your own liver and gut.

“But the thought of dying—I was still, at the last moment, unwilling. So I sent Re Lei Mi off myself as a way of making up my own mind: even if the end meant paying with my life, I couldn’t say I was truly innocent. You might not know this—even though there wasn’t enough evidence, the French police never fully cleared me of suspicion. If you hadn’t gotten to me first, they would have eventually.”

En Nu gave a rueful smile. “I truly couldn’t have imagined… Miss Cen, is there anything you miscalculated?”

The smile faded from Cen Jin’s face.

She said softly: “Yes.”

She hadn’t accounted for the final stretch. The final surprise.

Wei Lai would be… very disappointed in her, she supposed.

Back at the sanatorium, Wei Lai was nowhere to be found. Only Ke Ke Shu was in the room, sitting on the bed, his expression dark, the shark’s jawbone beside him—all those sharp teeth, one set facing one direction and the other facing the other, as if both were waiting to stir up waves in a storm.

The first thing he said when he saw her was: “Wei’s gone. He told me to tell you—he’s done with you. Breakup. It’s over. Understand?”

Cen Jin said: “Oh.”

She sat down on Wei Lai’s bed.

He must have gotten up in a great hurry. The blanket was tossed haphazardly aside, the pillow bore a faint hollow where his head had been. He was gone, but a familiar warmth lingered behind. If Ke Ke Shu weren’t here, she’d want to lie down and pull the blanket over her head and sleep through to morning, never mind the mess around her.

Ke Ke Shu was very dissatisfied with her reaction. “I’m telling you the truth. You can’t react like this.”

Cen Jin asked: “Then how do you want me to react?”

Ke Ke Shu found himself at a loss. He paused, then asked: “Is your matter settled?”

Cen Jin shook her head. “I’ll go back to Ka Long’s capital with En Nu. There are some finer points he still needs to confirm, and the final outcome will require input from higher-level authorities.”

Ke Ke Shu said: “Anyway, you’re not going to die.”

Cen Jin answered the question she had really been asking. “Is he very angry?”

Ke Ke Shu hesitated, not sure how to put it.

To say Wei Lai was angry—he had traced through all the timelines, confirmed with En Nu that Cen Jin’s life was not in danger, and his expression had then been unmistakably one of relief.

“He nearly lost his life. He was in despair for days, desperately trying to find a way. And now he suddenly learns the truth—that everything he fought so hard to save was something you had already arranged to throw away. If that were you, what would you be feeling?”

Cen Jin said nothing.

“Miss Cen, did you truly never consider staying alive—living together with Wei?”

Cen Jin smiled. “Of course I did.”

“If there had been evidence, who wouldn’t want that? But in those early days, I genuinely tried every avenue I could think of. I felt there was truly no other way out, and it was only then that I decided to take the gamble.”

Founding the Hand of God, writing the informant’s letter—in her mind, these had always been background, preparatory steps. They had never been the point. She hadn’t anticipated that, after the situation had seemingly become locked in tragedy, these actions of hers would transform into new evidence to be considered.

En Nu also marveled at it. “It came so close. That informant’s letter—because you wrote it—I never made it public. I only took it out at night to compare against other evidence. If not for that accident…”

If not for the accident. If the documents hadn’t been scattered by the gunfire. If Wei Lai hadn’t happened to see one of them. If he hadn’t noticed the particular way the character “Jin” was written…

En Nu’s words: “At the very least, once the jury is informed of this backstory, the landscape will shift considerably. What adds particular weight is that it wasn’t you who came forward—it was discovered by someone else.”

“Before, perhaps only Wei Lai believed you. Now there will be many more. And as the person responsible for the Hand of God, I hope to do what I can for you—because everything I am today, and everything the Hand of God has become, all of it traces back three years to that phone call of yours.”

Cen Jin looked at Ke Ke Shu. “I know you’re probably angry that I didn’t tell him the truth. But if you were in my position—six years of enduring, three years of planning, everything proceeding according to plan—and then at the very end, suddenly the plan is thrown off because you lose control of yourself and fall in love with someone—how do you explain it? How do you even begin to wrap it up?”

“Wei Lai always calls me a young girl. I’m not a young girl. It isn’t as simple as: hand me a good man and everything is resolved.”

“Before Wei Lai, I had a fiancé named Jiang Min. After I sent Re Lei Mi off, I ended things with Jiang Min—because I knew my path was set, and I didn’t want to drag anyone else into it.”

“I was ready to give up my life. Ready to give up my fiancé. I thought when a person had stripped themselves down that far, nothing could throw them off anymore. When I first met Wei Lai, he was the bodyguard hired for me by the Saudi, and he wasn’t particularly fond of me. It was only going to be a matter of days—negotiating for a boat. I never expected to fall in love with him…”

By now, counting the days, she and Wei Lai had known each other for not even a full month.

A knock at the door.

Both of them looked up. It was Dao Ba, one side of his face swollen to a significant size, his dark glasses barely staying on. He said: “Miss Cen, the car is ready. Mr. En Nu is waiting.”

Cen Jin rose. Before leaving, she said to Ke Ke Shu: “You’ve never particularly liked me, and Wei Lai is gone—you staying here must be at his instruction.”

“Then please pass along my words: I respect every decision he makes. I have no regrets about what I planned. No matter whether he loves me or not, no matter who he loves in the future—I still love him. My love may not be the kind you approve of—perfect and uncomplicated—but…”

She smiled and said softly: “Never mind.”

She turned sideways and slipped out the door.

Dao Ba looked at Ke Ke Shu.

Ke Ke Shu suddenly burst out: “Is that woman even human? Every time I’m about to break up with my wife, she cries and shouts and clings to my leg to stop me…”

He finally gave chase. “Hey! Hey! Miss Cen!”

Cen Jin stopped and turned around.

The rain was still coming down heavily. Ke Ke Shu kept wiping the water streaming down his forehead.

He said: “You know where Wei went back to. Once your matter is settled, go find him and win him back.”

Cen Jin said: “Aren’t we already broken up?”

Ke Ke Shu looked deflated—and was unwilling to admit that he had made the whole thing up. “Then you still have to go after him.”

“I know Wei. He did so much for you—he put his life on the line. He really likes you. When he found out the truth, the first thing he did was ask En Nu whether your life was in danger. Do you understand? He did all of this, and if you don’t go after him, don’t try to get him back—how hurt will he be?”

Cen Jin smiled. The rain struck her face, ice cold. Yet her eyes burned.

“I’m not saying this for your sake—I still don’t like you. I’m saying it for Wei. You know he was brought to Europe by his father as a child, smuggled across borders, and then sold. He’s never been passionate about anything, never wanted to settle down. Always says he’s a broken-down boat, drifting until he washes up on some shore. For him to care this much about you—even I’m surprised. You may not be ideal, but finding someone else who matters to him like this—who knows how many years that would take. So this will have to do.”

Cen Jin laughed until her voice caught.

“You feel guilty toward him, feel like you owe him—that’s good. Guilt means you’ll give back to him tenfold. So go after him. No matter how much he pushes you away, drives you off, yells at you—don’t you leave. He won’t hold it against you. Wei is a good person. As long as you’re honest from here on out and don’t go founding any more organizations…”

He suddenly became alert. “Wait—you only founded the Hand of God, right? You haven’t founded anything else?”

Cen Jin turned and got in the car.

The door shut. Ke Ke Shu panicked and circled the car. “You haven’t answered me! Are you going to go after him or not? And how many organizations have you actually founded…”

The car started. Ke Ke Shu had to step back. As it passed him, the window suddenly rolled down. From inside, a paper airplane came flying out.

It drifted through the air for a stretch, and then the wings were dampened by the rain. It sank slowly to the ground.

Ke Ke Shu stared at the airplane.

What a child. Grown woman, still playing with paper airplanes. Who knows how she’d ever take care of Wei.

Besides, it didn’t fly half as far as the ones he could fold.