Volume 2, Chapter 37 – Encounter

With a loud “bang,” the car door shut, and Yin Hua could feel the heavy atmosphere brewing inside the cab.

“Mr. Cerredo,” Li Rongwen said cautiously, “since people under Fang Xianzhang have stepped in, I think we should hold off on containment for now.”

“Fang Xianzhang?” The white man beside him spoke with a strange accent. “Do you mean Fang Xiaochun, the State Governor of Qizhou?”

Li Rongwen hurriedly nodded. “Yes, that’s him.”

“I don’t understand.” The white man frowned. “When I came, what I was told was that you’d already made up your minds to change the status quo—to break those outdated rules and embrace a more open civilization and science and technology.”

After a pause, he added, “But what you’re giving me now is the feeling that you still fear authority, still fear those old ideas and that power.”

“That’s bad,” he stressed. “It doesn’t fit free will at all.”

“Mr. Cerredo,” Li Rongwen finally frowned as well. “Please believe this isn’t fear. We’re willing to face any hardship in the world for our ideals, but that takes time—until the overall situation is settled, certain things are not suitable to do.”

“I believe ‘the other side’ thinks the same.” The white man still wasn’t appreciative, raising a hand to straighten his collar.

“My impression is that you’re always thinking on ‘their’ behalf. That’s what I dislike most about you, Li. I don’t think it should be us accommodating them—it should be them accommodating us.”

“If they really cared about the overall situation, they wouldn’t do anything just because they lost those two.”

“So what you mean is…”

“Skip their commission task and complete containment of the ‘Shadow’ directly.” The white man nodded.

“The ‘Shadow’ is an extremely important experimental subject, an indispensable piece of the company’s plan. Since I brought it out, I have to take it back. Otherwise I can’t explain myself to the company.”

Li Rongwen still wanted to say more, but Cerredo simply opened the door on his side and crossed the road alone.

“People from the Sami Union…” Only then did driver Yin Hua dare speak. “Isn’t he a bit too…”

“Arrogant.” Li Rongwen nodded. “They’re very arrogant.”

“But they have the right to be.” Li Rongwen looked up through the tinted window at the sky, his gaze gradually firming.

This country was already beyond saving.

History would prove it: he hadn’t chosen wrong.

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On the other side, Bai Xiang and Yu He had already arrived at the site where Zhao Shuyuan had died.

It wasn’t the one on Nanping Road—the one beside the dojo—but one in the northern outskirts of the Circuit City.

On the way over, Bai Xiang hadn’t seen many people in the northern suburbs. The layout of the buildings was loose and scattered, with no high-rises in sight, and between the buildings was a vast stretch of bare yellow earth.

Jinshui Construction’s site sat on a street corner, covering an area close to that of a large mall. They planned to put up two office buildings over ten stories tall on this plot. The basic framework was already done; once the scaffolding was removed and the outer shell laid, the rest would just be interior finishing.

“We’re here.”

The employee at the wheel pulled up at the site entrance and called to Bai Xiang.

He knew how popular this girl had been lately. Under other circumstances, he wouldn’t have minded taking a few more looks at her, properly appreciating that charming face people said was no worse than a movie star’s.

But right now he had no such mood. All he wanted was to drop them off and get away as quickly as possible.

Bai Xiang saw his fear. She said nothing, just took up her longsword and stepped out of the car.

The engine noise faded into the distance. Standing on a patch of rutted, uneven yellow ground, she tilted her head up to scan the surroundings, taking in the environment first.

The road was wide, the area remote.

Directly across the four-way intersection was a stretch of lush green woods, and beyond the trees a row of six-story gray buildings—likely a factory dormitory out here in the outskirts.

She’d noticed it on the way in: there wasn’t a single shop for kilometers around.

It was the northern suburbs, after all—still waiting to be developed.

After looking around, Bai Xiang turned her gaze back to the construction site.

The site gate was a sheet of metal. She walked over, grabbed it, and tested it, finding that with a little careful work at the crack she could pop the lock.

Gates like this were mostly for show anyway. Normally, as long as the site was active, someone would be on watch. Even if thieves came, they wouldn’t be dumb enough to use the main gate.

After opening it and stepping inside, she walked past piles of bricks and cement bags, then by an excavator parked off to the side, and quickly zeroed in on one bare concrete building, narrowing her eyes at its second doorway.

She took out Zhao Shuyuan’s photo from her chest and compared the two.

No mistake.

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He’d taken the picture right here.

“There should still be a while until nightfall, right?”

Yu He pulled out his phone to check the time. It was only four in the afternoon.

“We shouldn’t have come this early. We should’ve waited until after dinner!”

Bai Xiang looked back at him. “You don’t have your own work to do?”

Yu He raised his brows. “Little Taozi… and me as well—we think keeping you safe is what matters most.”

Bai Xiang gave a small nod and didn’t say anything else. Under Yu He’s gaze, she headed straight into the stairwell.

“Eh?”

Yu He’s voice jumped an octave. She really wasn’t afraid of death. He hurried after her.

Inside the stairwell, Bai Xiang first pressed the switch on the wall.

No lights came on.

“That’s a bit of a pain,” Yu He’s voice drifted over. “Either there’s no power, or there is and the generator’s off.”

“Disgusting… You think there’s still ‘unclean stuff’ left inside?”

He was an old hand. He knew that in unfinished buildings like this, until the fine finishing was done, piles of piss and shit were common.

Some naive homeowners always overestimated the professionalism of construction crews, thinking that when workers suddenly had to go while working on a high floor, they’d come down first to take care of it, then huff and puff back up to continue.

Bullshit.

If you don’t have the toilet installed beforehand, just guess where they’ll take care of it.

Bai Xiang was no stranger to that reality either. But she did a quick calculation: given the present cold weather and how long Jinshui Construction had been shut down, even if there were things like that around, they probably “wouldn’t pose any threat” at this point.

She just had to be careful not to go stomping around in corners.

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As usual, she didn’t choose the elevator and started climbing.

The stairwell was narrow.

As she climbed, she was measuring various distances with her eyes.

Such cramped quarters weren’t favorable terrain for a weapon like a longsword. For a traditional swordsman, many techniques would be hard to use here.

But Bai Xiang wasn’t much constrained by that.

Her Qi came from within herself. Even without a sword in hand, she wouldn’t be helpless.

It made no difference to her.

“Ugh… my old waist…”

Yu He hated stairs and trudged after her, grumbling all the way.

“You really have guts!” he said to Bai Xiang.

“I’ve lived this long, and this is the first time I’ve seen a rookie rushing to catch a demon!”

There was no demon-hunting record in Bai Xiang’s file—if you had to count, cracking ‘Shenli’ at No. 1 High School made her a rising star, and only when she broke ‘Bronze Cicada’ later did her talent in this area truly show.

Those were indeed impressive achievements. But the Demon Pools under heaven were innumerable. Did she really think she could rely on talent alone to solve all of them?

If only it were that easy.

He was just waiting to see her make a fool of herself.

“Since it’s called the Demon-Suppressing Bureau, you should be very familiar with this kind of work,” Bai Xiang turned her head slightly.

“There are so many Demon Pool legends in the Circuit City—how come you don’t see them being cleared out?”

“You mean idiotic Demon Pools like ‘Back Alley’? That’s the Inspectorate’s job!” Yu He snapped. “Any Demon Pool whose pattern you can see at a glance doesn’t need us. We only handle the most dangerous ones… the ones that can spread widely!”

“For example,” Bai Xiang paused, “Jingmao Tower?”

Yu He fell silent. His eyes grew distant without him realizing it.

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“Jingmao Tower is one of the few cases we didn’t resolve perfectly,” he said quietly.

That was one of the blood debts owed by Demon-Immortal Dao as well.

To get back at the State Governor of Qizhou at the time, Wang Shou, those demonfolk had taken his daughter, wife, and mother hostage and gutted them alive in front of him, devouring their flesh and blood. The carnage had even shocked Yujing, which was why Fang Xiaochun had later been sent down.

“At the time, Lord Wang had just arrived and wasn’t familiar with the local Demon-Suppressing Bureau,” Yu He sighed. “That was the one chance we had. We didn’t expect… And no, I’m not trying to shift blame.”

A State Governor was the reason a Demon-Suppressing Bureau in a region continued to exist. After the handover, Wang Shou had taken command of the Qizhou Bureau. He could essentially be called Yu He’s master.

When a case involving his master’s family reached such a scale, and the Demon-Suppressing Bureau still failed to hunt down and kill every culprit, it was a deep shame.

Bai Xiang bringing it up really left him with no face.

Fortunately, the girl didn’t press.

Yu He followed her up to the fourth floor. They stepped out of the stairwell into a bare concrete corridor.

Even though it was sunny outside, the corridor inside was pitch-black.

The outer scaffolding and green mesh cloth were still in place, so even by the windows only a faint gray daylight could filter in, making the atmosphere inside feel rather eerie.

Bai Xiang stopped asking questions and Yu He stopped talking.

Both of them raised their guard to the utmost, constantly watching their own shadows.

“Bzz—”

Suddenly, Bai Xiang’s comm unit vibrated.

She glanced at the screen.

【Break-the-Heavens One Sword】

“Whose call is that?” Yu He’s voice came from behind her.

Bai Xiang tilted her head and saw that his hands were empty.