Morning sunlight spilled over the villas in the compound.

After getting up, Bolong did a few sets of stretches to loosen up his muscles.

Bolong stood bare-chested, his powerful upper body exposed. A fierce blue dragon tattoo stretched from his shoulder to the cleft between his buttocks. As his muscles flexed and relaxed, the tattoo rippled, looking all the more menacing.

Afterward, he ate the breakfast the maid had prepared while savoring memories of last night's young woman. She'd been quite good, and had more than satisfied his sadistic urges. It was just a little disappointing that she'd suddenly died from him being too rough.

There was a knock at the door.

“Who is it?”

“It's me, Linu'an.”

“What is it?”

“Brother Long, someone from the Ranch is here. They say they've brought us some special goods.”

The Ranch was a criminal syndicate with a complete, well-oiled operation. Unlike the Compound, their main business wasn't fraud—it was “people.” They supplied clients with a taste for the bizarre with slaves, organs, human-made products, grotesque videos, and animal-fighting entertainment, among other things. Their methods were extraordinarily cruel.

For the Compound, once a dead person had been stripped of their heart, liver, lungs, kidneys, and corneas, there wasn't much value left in the body. Burying the remains in a mass grave wasted manpower, so they were better off selling them to the Ranch. As long as a corpse hadn't rotted, the Ranch would usually take it. Sometimes, they even bought surplus organs and disposed of employees whose identities were sensitive, making them an important business partner for the Compound. Besides the Ranch, the Compound also did business with plenty of other criminal organizations, such as Sacred Island and the Cartel. Not one of those groups was an easy mark.

Bolong lit a cigar out of habit, opened the door to let his trusted subordinate in, and asked casually, “What is it? Aren't they here to buy goods?”

“They are, but they said they've got something special they'd like to sell us while they're at it.”

Bolong's curiosity was piqued. After getting dressed, he followed his trusted subordinate downstairs to the reception hall.

A middle-aged man with chestnut hair had already been waiting for a while. When he saw Bolong come downstairs, he stood up and spread his arms, beaming. “Oh, my friend! It's been so long. I've been looking forward to doing business with you.”

“Olipeng, I've been looking forward to seeing you too,” Bolong replied in halting English. “So? What have you brought me?”

“Before that, I want to confirm: forty males and twenty-five females, right?”

“Of course. Apart from one missing kidney, the rest of them are intact.”

All these men and women were addicts. Their bodies were in bad shape, they couldn't work properly, their organs wouldn't fetch much, and their families had little left to squeeze out of them. Selling them off to the Ranch in one batch was more profitable.

“Besides that, I've got some other choice goods—a few fresh bodies, dead for less than twelve hours. We've only removed the internal organs and corneas. You can have the rest at a low price.”

“Did you leave the skin on?” Olipeng's eyes lit up.

“Of course. The faces are intact, too.”

“That's excellent news. I'll take them all.”

“Would you like to check the quantity?”

“Thanks. I'll have my deputy do it. Please send someone to meet him.” Olipeng texted his deputy, while Bolong gestured for his trusted subordinate to show them the way.

“Now, let's go see that ‘special item,’” Bolong said.

“Sure. Follow me.”

With their respective bodyguards, the two men headed to the storeroom. Olipeng beckoned to one of his guards. The man understood, walked over to a four-wheeled cart, and used his gun barrel to lift the burlap covering off the cage.

The “goods” inside the cage were revealed to Bolong and the others.

…Gussy lay motionless, eyes closed, pretending to be dead.

“What is this?” Bolong raised an eyebrow, took the cigar from his mouth, and blew out a ring of smoke.

“To be honest, we don't know what it is, or where it came from.”

Bolong stepped closer for a better look. Gussy's body was fully exposed to view.

A little girl, 1.4 meters tall, with skin smooth as jade and a slender figure. At first glance, she seemed human, but on closer inspection, something was off. She was so cute and beautiful that she seemed detached from reality. Humans simply couldn't look like that.

“Like a doll. Not bad as a… display piece. Anything else special about it?” At first, he'd thought it was a realistic doll, but after looking it over, he'd concluded it had no practical use.

A note of suspicion crept into Bolong's mind. Could there be explosives inside this thing? Olipeng wouldn't pull a stunt like that, but it never hurt to be cautious.

“It's alive.”

“Oh… What?”

“It's alive,” Olipeng repeated. “It's a creature with a human appearance.”

“Are you sure?”

“I didn't believe it the first time either.” Seeing Bolong's expression, Olipeng knew he'd grown suspicious, so he told the deputy beside him to open the cage.

“Mr. Bolong, please put on these sunglasses. Looking directly into its eyes might trigger a strong uncanny-valley effect.” Olipeng put on a pair of brown-tinted glasses and handed Bolong another pair.

“No need. I don't like wearing glasses.”

The deputy lifted Gussy out by the back of the neck.

Gussy sighed inwardly. What was wrong with these people? Why were they so determined to look into its eyes? What was so interesting about them?

The deputy was about to pry Gussy's eyelids open, but Gussy decided to open its eyes on its own.

Everyone jumped, especially Bolong, who'd been caught completely off guard. After staring into Gussy's eyes for a few seconds, he felt as if his soul had been sucked right out of him.

“Fuck, what the hell is that thing?!” Bolong shuddered inwardly and instinctively pulled out his gun.

“Don't be afraid. As long as you don't look it in the eyes, this doll is harmless.”

Bolong wiped the cold sweat from his forehead. “What exactly is it?”

Olipeng shook his head and answered honestly. “I told you from the start that we don't know what it is, or even whether it's human.”

Gussy scoffed inwardly. Hmph. Who are you calling not human? You're the one who's not human!

“Why are its eyes…”

“This is beyond what I can understand. We need to leave it to the right people if we want the right answers… There are so many mysterious things in this world. What's one more?”

Bolong was puzzled. He couldn't figure out where Gussy had come from, but that didn't stop him from thinking about how to turn it into money.

He had connections everywhere. Someone might be willing to pay a fortune for something with such mysterious qualities.

“How much?”

“My partner suggested five million dollars, but we've been doing business together for years, so I've decided to give it to you for free, my friend.”

When Bolong heard the five-million-dollar figure, he'd been a little reluctant.

On the black market, the blood, corneas, kidneys, heart, liver, and bone marrow of a healthy person could fetch him $200,000. That wasn't even counting the value they could generate while still alive. For five million dollars, he could buy several hundred people from a broker. Spending that much on something with no known origins felt like a bad deal.

But when Olipeng said it was free, Bolong grew wary instead.

There was no such thing as a free lunch.

“Olipeng, I appreciate the gesture. What do you want from me?”

Olipeng laughed. “I can't hide anything from you. Our clients have been asking for a lot of children lately, but the authorities are cracking down harder and harder on missing kids. I know you do business with other organizations too, but I still wanted to ask—could you sell to us first?”

Bolong watched Olipeng for a while but couldn't spot any trick. “How many do you want? What kind?”

“Under twelve, either sex. They have to be intact. The more, the better.”

“Get in touch with me next month. I might have fifty available, but it'll cost you fifty percent more.”

“Ha-ha! I like doing business with a seller who gets straight to the point. Here's to a happy partnership!”

“Here's to a happy partnership.”

The two devils smiled as they struck a deal that pleased them both.

Once the deal was done, Olipeng immediately led his convoy away.

“Boss, you're really giving that thing away?” his deputy asked Olipeng.

“What's the secret to making money?” Olipeng suddenly asked.

“All the profitable businesses are listed in the Criminal Code… But what does that have to do with my question?”

“Then what's the secret to a long life?”

“…” His deputy seemed to understand.

“Are we going straight back, boss?”

“I spent a lot of money on this shipment. First, I need to earn back my investment.” Olipeng toyed with the human-bone pendant in his hand. “We can break even by selling their ‘emotions.’”

…

Gussy felt white cloth being wrapped around its eyes. Maybe those people couldn't bear to look it in the eyes either. They wouldn't want someone to get a heart attack from fright.

It didn't matter that its vision was blocked. Gussy could still see the flow of energy through the cloth.

Two thugs hauled Gussy out of the cage and swept it up and down with a scanner. Once they were sure everything was fine, they put it in a plastic bag and carried it out of the storeroom.

“What the hell did Boss Long buy?”

“No idea. A lifelike doll? It's pretty light.”

“I figured it didn't have anything down there.”

“It's definitely custom-made for some rich kid with a special fetish. You wouldn't get it.”

“It's too small. I'm into big butts. Listen, last time…”

The two men naturally moved on to evaluating performance.

After listening to twenty minutes of filthy talk, Gussy was brought to an open area.

Twelve long, slender candles were arranged around Gussy. A disheveled man circled it, singing and dancing, laughing and crying.

He didn't stop until the candles went out, sending up wisps of white smoke.

“Wizard, what did you see?” Boss Long's muscular body appeared in the doorway.

“Boss, this is an evil entity known as the White Taisui. It's of extreme yin and cold, untouched by the mortal world, and impossible to fathom. At best, it'll take all your wealth. At worst, it'll bring you endless misfortune!” The wizard spoke with theatrical emphasis.

Bolong flew into a rage and slapped the wizard across the face. “Where'd this fraud come from, pretending to be a mystic? You moron.”

The wizard spun around three times, fell to the ground, then scrambled away in terror.

Tsk, tsk. What a charlatan. Your Highness is a once-in-a-thousand-years auspicious sign. Calling me an evil entity is downright rude, Gussy thought.

Bolong was a materialist. He knew how many terrible things he'd done. If ghosts and gods really existed in this world, wouldn't he have been punished by now? And yet he was still alive and well.

This “White Taisui” had to be some kind of high-tech creation or an alien life-form!

“When have I ever been afraid of superstitious nonsense? Bring it over and cut off a piece so we can see what it's made of!”

One of the thugs came over with a kitchen knife.

Gussy had a bad feeling about this.

“Four fingers?” The thug pulled out Gussy's little hand and frowned. Then he raised the knife.

“Thunk!”

The knife came down, and a pale finger was severed.

Aah! Damn it!!

Gussy wailed inwardly. The physical pain was faint, but losing its memories felt awful—it had forgotten what the wizard had just said.

Bolong kicked the severed finger over to one of the captive addicts.

“Eat it, and I'll let you leave.”

The long-suffering addict picked up the finger from the ground and stuffed it into his mouth without hesitation.

He'd had enough of being tortured. If it meant getting out of there, he'd try human flesh—even poison.

“How does it taste?” Linu'an asked curiously.

“It doesn't taste like much… Ugh!” The addict suddenly let out a cry of pain.

“What's wrong?”

“My stomach's burning! Aaaagh!!”

The man writhed in agony, desperately clawing at his throat until he spat out a mouthful of blood mixed with steam, then passed out.

Linu'an dipped a finger into the blood. It was as hot as boiling water. “Its body tissue gives off heat. The man's esophagus has been burned through!”

“Good, good! Now that's interesting!” Bolong was delighted instead of shocked. The more bizarre this thing was, the more it was worth.

After dealing in human trafficking for so long, Bolong had seen all kinds of goods. Some mysterious organizations were obsessed with strange humans and were often willing to pay enormous sums for them. It was questionable how much this thing was really “human,” but that might actually make it even more marketable.

“Brother Long, it's grown back!” The thug with the knife pointed at Gussy's finger, stunned.

It had returned to normal in the blink of an eye?

“Keep going. I want to see how many times it can grow back.”

Gussy couldn't sit still anymore. At this rate, it really might die. Even if it didn't, it would keep losing its memories until it became an empty shell.

What should it do? Try talking to them? If it showed them that it could think like an intelligent being, what would they do?

Just then, Bolong's WeChat call rang.

“Boss, we closed the deal with that rich kid! His family is willing to pay five million to get him back!” A man's excited voice came through the phone.

“Two pieces of good news in one day, Fengzi. Nice work. I’ll give you a cut afterward.” Bolong grinned greedily. “Linuan, come with me and bring the person out.”

“And… haul those pigs out of the water dungeon and lock them up with the evil thing. Feed it live people.”

...

After the henchman threw the people down, he pulled the white cloth off Gussy’s eyes.

With a bang, Gussy was locked in a small, sealed room with several people who were drenched from head to toe.

Concrete walls. Iron-barred windows. A toilet in the corner, and several dog bowls on the floor, filled with half-eaten leftovers.

These people looked as if they’d just been hauled out of the water. They were all listless and haggard, filthy, and reeking—Gussy couldn’t smell them; it was just imagining the stench.

Gussy narrowed its eyes and studied them. Through its energy vision, it could see that several of them were extremely weak. The cold and their festering wounds were eating away at their lives.

It thought about how to escape.

Actually, it could still move even while paralyzed. Back then, its original self had crawled to an electrical outlet at a speed of 0.012 kilometers per hour.

That speed was nowhere near enough to escape. There was no electricity here, not even any fuel. The difficulty had gone up by more than a level.

Gussy’s head felt a little fuzzy. It was so desperately low on energy that even thinking was becoming difficult.

Gussy kept observing its surroundings. Through the walls, it sensed dense energy signatures in the distance. Closer by were a cafeteria, cars, and a power room. Farther away were offices and a chimney giving off warmth. But reaching any of them was impossible. Someone was on guard at the entrance, and several armed mercenaries stood in the watchtower outside.

Despite how dismal the situation was, Gussy felt nothing. This body couldn’t produce negative emotions.

Thanks to that, Gussy was still optimistic.

Gussy silently tried another approach, attempting to push past its limits.

Back then, Gust had used some incredible method while possessing this body and nearly broken free of Horror Novel Web’s control. Maybe it was possible to undo the 3% paralysis, too.