Skinwalker Belle – Chapter 116 – The Silly Sweet Vice Captain

Lin Fan stood before the porthole, her rainbow-colored eyes reflecting the menacing purple Rift in the distance.

The room was quiet.

Her mind, however, was racing, reorganizing, piecing together, and analyzing the information revealed by Chu Chen and Sun Jing.

There were too many loopholes.

So many that it was like a deliberately woven net, full of holes.

The first loophole: rescue.

Chu Chen had said that the one hundred and three Rifts around the globe had tied up all of the Federation’s elite forces, leaving them no time to attend to other cities.

The explanation sounded reasonable, but it didn’t hold up to scrutiny.

The Tidal wave of beasts happened once a month.

In the one-month interval when the Rifts were closed, why didn’t they send people to other cities?

Even dispatching a small team of level-three Evolved beings would have been enough to establish a stable survivor base in any city during the initial outbreak of the apocalypse, sheltering tens of thousands of lives.

But they hadn’t sent a single one.

They had allowed Hang City, Jiang City, and countless similar cities to become living hells in the jaws of zombies.

It was illogical.

The second loophole: timing.

It had been almost a year since the apocalypse began.

Why was it that right after the first major team led by Lu Yuan entered the Rift, their fate unknown, that the entire world ushered in the apocalypse’s second evolution?

That Purplish-red radiation shockwave, which covered the entire globe, caused all zombies, animals, and plants to undergo a Secondary mutation. The harshness of the survival environment abruptly escalated by several levels.

Was all of this really just a coincidence?

Lin Fan didn’t believe it.

These clues and doubts intertwined, like a fog too thick to disperse, concealing an even more astonishing truth behind it.

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And Chu Chen, that impossibly young commander-in-chief, he definitely knew something.

He had seen through her God-level charm, accurately judged her strength, and even guessed that she had integrated Hang City and Jiang City.

Yet, when such a meticulous person spoke with her, he avoided these obvious loopholes.

He was hiding something.

Or rather, the entire upper echelon of Magic City Base was collectively maintaining a colossal lie.

Trying to pry open this lie by directly questioning an old fox like Chu Chen was clearly impossible.

In that case… the breakthrough point could only be that simple, enthusiastic, and even somewhat dorky vice-captain.

Sun Jing.

A meaningful arc formed on Lin Fan’s lips.

…

“Knock, knock, knock.”

A knock sounded at the door.

“Come in,” Lin Fan’s voice returned to its usual coldness.

The metal door slid open, and Sun Jing walked in carrying a metal tray. On the tray were several dishes that looked rather exquisite for dinner.

“Miss Lei Li, I’ve brought you dinner.” Sun Jing’s face wore an enthusiastic smile, her high black ponytail swinging back and forth, full of youthful energy.

“It smells delicious,” Lin Fan said faintly.

“Of course! This is a special meal from our base, made with beef specially raised by the logistics department. Ordinary soldiers don’t get to eat this,” Sun Jing introduced with a hint of pride.

She placed the tray on the room’s desk and prepared to turn and leave.

“Wait a moment,” Lin Fan called out to her.

“Huh? Miss Lei Li, do you have any other instructions?” Sun Jing turned around, puzzled.

“You haven’t eaten yet, have you?” Lin Fan’s gaze fell upon her.

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“I… I’ll just go to the main cafeteria later,” Sun Jing said, scratching her head in embarrassment.

“Don’t go to all that trouble.” Lin Fan pulled out the other chair beside the desk, a gentle smile in her rainbow-colored eyes. “Sit down and eat with me. I can’t finish this much by myself anyway.”

Sun Jing froze.

She looked at the silver-haired woman before her, who was so beautiful she didn’t seem real. Her eyes were clear and sincere, and her innate sacred aura made it impossible for Sun Jing to even think of refusing.

She couldn’t help but want to get closer to her.

“Is… is this okay?” Sun Jing was a little overwhelmed by the favor, her cheeks flushing slightly.

“What’s not okay about it?” Lin Fan chuckled lightly. “I’m new here and don’t know anyone. I was just hoping to find someone to chat with.”

“Hurry and sit down, or the food will get cold.”

“Oh… okay! Alright!”

Like an obedient schoolgirl, Sun Jing quickly pulled out the chair and sat down, looking a bit reserved.

Lin Fan pushed a plate in front of her.

“Eat.”

“Thank you, Miss Lei Li!” Sun Jing picked up her fork but seemed hesitant to start.

“By the way, I don’t know how old you are yet,” Lin Fan asked, feigning casualness as she cut the steak on her plate.

“I… I’m twenty-three this year,” Sun Jing answered in a small voice.

“Twenty-three…” Lin Fan’s movements paused. She looked up, a perfectly timed touch of sentiment in her rainbow eyes. “So young. Just like a little sister.”

“I’m already twenty-nine, a whole six years older than you.”

She deliberately stated the real age of her “Lei Li” identity.

This single sentence instantly closed the distance between them.

Sun Jing’s original restraint and awe quietly melted away amidst the “big sister” and “little sister” dynamic.

“Lei… Jie, you don’t look twenty-nine at all. You look like you’re in your early twenties,” Sun Jing praised sincerely.

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“You’re just a sweet-talker,” Lin Fan smiled, forked a piece of cut steak, and put it in her mouth, chewing elegantly.

Her every movement was as perfect as a painting.

“In this apocalypse, there aren’t many young people like you who can maintain such vitality,” Lin Fan put down her knife and fork, took a sip of water, her tone carrying the world-weariness of someone with more experience.

“You must have worked very hard to become the vice-captain of the second major team at such a young age, right?”

“Were you an outstanding soldier in the army before?”

Lin Fan’s questions were like a gentle trap.

As expected, upon hearing the question, a look of awkwardness and embarrassment appeared on Sun Jing’s face.

“Actually… actually, no…” She lowered her head in embarrassment, her voice growing softer.

“I… I wasn’t a proper soldier at all.”

“Before the apocalypse, I was just a trainee nurse at the military district’s general hospital. I had only been enlisted for less than half a year…”

“Ah?” Lin Fan’s eyes widened in feigned surprise.

“Then how did you…”

“It’s because of my ability,” Sun Jing said in a low voice, as if afraid of being overheard. “I awakened a Healing ability, and… and it was level three from the very beginning.”

“Later, after the first major team lost contact and our original vice-captain was sacrificed, the team urgently needed a powerful healer to hold the line, so… so Commander Chu Chen promoted me to vice-captain as an exception.”

“Actually, I don’t know anything… fighting, commanding… I’m clueless about all of it. All I can do every day is heal everyone’s wounds from the back.”

As she finished, her tone was filled with disappointment and self-loathing.

So that was it.

Lin Fan understood.

A sweet, naive girl, fresh out of society with no cunning, who had risen through the ranks purely based on her ability.

Chu Chen had likely placed her in the vice-captain position not just for her ability, but also because she was easy to control.

“There’s nothing to feel bad about,” Lin Fan’s voice became gentle, filled with a power that soothed the heart.

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“Your ability is more important than any weapon.”

“Every person you save is the best proof of your value.”

She reached out and gently patted the back of Sun Jing’s hand.

“In this world, being able to save people is the greatest skill of all.”

The warm touch and encouraging words made Sun Jing’s eyes instantly turn red.

She had been well-protected her whole life. After the apocalypse, although her status had risen, the immense pressure, responsibility, and the subtle doubts from those around her had been suffocating her.

No one had ever affirmed her value like Lei Jie before her.

“Thank you… Lei Jie…” Sun Jing sniffled, her voice choked with emotion.

“Silly girl, what are you crying for?” Lin Fan pulled out a tissue and handed it to her. “Hurry up and eat.”

The atmosphere at that moment became incredibly harmonious.

Sun Jing completely let down her guard, treating Lin Fan as a confidante she could pour her heart out to, chattering away about all sorts of interesting stories and troubles at the base.

Lin Fan listened patiently, responding from time to time and guiding the conversation.

When the topic shifted to the world outside the base, Lin Fan finally threw out the question she had long prepared.

“Speaking of which, there’s something I still don’t quite understand.” She furrowed her lovely brows, her face showing pure curiosity and confusion.

“Our Magic City Base is so powerful, with so many amazing Evolved beings.”

“Why didn’t we… send rescue teams to other cities when the apocalypse first started?”

“Like Hang City. If one or two Chosen Ones like you had gone over in the early days, you definitely could have saved more people. It wouldn’t have ended up like this… almost a dead city.”

Her tone was innocent, like an ordinary person unfamiliar with military strategy raising a reasonable question.

The question made the smile on Sun Jing’s face freeze.

Her hand, holding her knife and fork, also stopped in mid-air.